Switched: A Soldiers Tale

“Yes it does. Shall we?”

"Onwards!" They began a march to find some pie, and finally marched into the castle due to strange business hours.

Drake pouted and wiped some wasted bakery-employee-blood off his hands, muttering, “Honestly, why is it so difficult to get pie in this goddamn city?” He inspected his clothes, idly picking at the numerous bloodstains and gore-clumps adorning both him and his clothing.

"Attacks. And we look strange to them. Lets have the castle chef whip up some shall we?" She asked, lounging in a chair.

“Sounds good to me.” Drake flagged down a rather startled servant, asking her to get the both of them some pie. “Hey, Abigail, what kinda pie you want?”

"Cherry. With a bit of cider or alcohol," she answered, monotonously.

“Huh, interesting choice. I’ll take apple. Also, get me some alcohol. I feel like right now’s as good a time as any to see if I can get drunk or not.” Drake ordered, sending off the poor mare with nary a second glance.

"So. Feel free to look through that Tome while we wait," she said, dismissively.

Drake flipped through the Tome, idly scanning through the pages. “Ben, eh, he’s an asshole. I know that much. Sorta okay-ish, but waaaaaay prone to overreacting. Kat was kinda a bitch… didn’t know she was named Allison, though. Team Rocket? Meh. Boring. Geo the Charizard? Meh, I could take him. Majin Buu? Now there’s a rival worth getting behind! Jason was sorta a prick, but he had a good reason, in hindsight. Crow Murder… teleporter… maybe I’ll ask for a blood sample. Aaron Heibai…. whoo… chills up my spine. Definitely don’t wanna piss this guy off if just reading his name does that…”

"Essence oughta be next. I haven't dug through the book much," Abigail commented.

“Essence…. more chills… Jesus, if they send chills up the spine of someone who’s basically indestructible…” Drake shuddered, only then noticing the mare bearing plates full of pie and alcohol. “Oh sweet! Pie’s here! Thanks.” He took the plates and set them before him and Abigail, already uncorking the bottle of mysterious alcohol. “This smells like… vodka? Huh. Cool. Never had much of that stuff on Earth, preferred the lighter beers myself.” Drake shrugged and took a swig, waiting for the effects to hit him.

"Ah. They brought Celestia's stock. Brilliant!" Abigail downed a decent sized drink.

Drake pouted, “I can’t feel a damn thing. Maybe if I tried….” And with a single, swift movement, he emptied out the entire bottle into his gullet.

"Is that a challenge?" Abigail grinned.

Drake shrugged and popped open another bottle, “Not really, but you’re more than welcome to drink obscene amounts of alcohol.” Another bottle emptied, still no reaction. “Seriously? Nothing? Tch. Times like these when I wish I didn’t regenerate and adapt so quickly.”

Abigail leaned towards Drake, "Wanna mess with Celestia?"

“Sure, how so?” Drake replied, still downing entire bottles of hard liquor without a sweat.

"We drink every drop of alcohol in Canterlot," she said, a twinkle in her eyes.

Drake’s eyes literally shone with internal flame, “If you think we can, let’s.” He proceeded to down the last bottle of vodka at the table. “Uh, we’re gonna need to get more alcohol first,” he muttered, standing up and leaving behind a massive gore stain upon the upholstery of the chair.

"Onward my fine fellow," she grinned evilly.

Ice Cold’s Bar and Grill, 4 pm. Bars destroyed: 0

Drake smashed through the doors of the bar, grabbing random ponies’ drinks and downing them in single swigs, ignoring their cries of protest. Anypony that got too uppity received a slap upside the head with the flat side of his tail blades.

Abigail dove in the back and started guzzling the drinks behind the bar. The bartender that tried to stop her recieved a very loud, and strangely, fiery burp. Drake continued his slaughter of random ponies’ alcohol, kicking them aside gently while downing glass after glass of various alcohols. A fiery stream of liquid burst from his mouth as he burped, spraying the bar with the smell of napalm. The liquid remained alight, causing the bar itself to slowly catch fire.

“Uh, hey Abigail?” Drake spoke using a quickly generated mouth on his hand, still chugging down a glass of unidentifiable ale.

"Yeah?" She asked between bottles.

“We should probably pack up. I accidentally burped out a stream of napalm and the bar is now on fire.” Drake was now beside Abigail, chugging down bottles at an entirely absurd rate. He even had bottles emptying into mouths that had no right to be there, bottles sticking out of strange orifices in his upper body.

"Alright," she finished three bottles and made for door, grabbing the few ponies left, taking them with her.

Drake sniffed and his flesh unfolded like unto a massive flower, strange and horrifying growths and tendrils spreading out to consume all the alcohol left in the bar. Once the bottles were finished and the entire stock had been drained, Drake refolded back into himself and strode out of the now blazing inferno, terrifying the crowd of onlookers and firefighters outside with his strange appearance and currently on fire status.

Abigail gestured at Drake, "You got a little something...everywhere."

“Hmm?” Drake glanced down at his flaming body, completely unconcerned that his flesh was charring and melting right off of him. As his left eyeball burst into a spray of boiling fluid and gore, he looked up, half his entire face missing, the other half staring forward in a completely deadpan expression. “So I do. Could I get some water here?” he asked, motioning at the completely terrified firefighters.

Abigail frowned' "Gentlemen, help my friend."

The chief shook his head, "Yes General." They moved a cloud and the unicorns directed the water. Drake stood under the shower, flames slowly dying out as his flesh repaired and un-charred, still taking sips from one last vodka bottle that he’d manage to procure from inside his flaming chest cavity. As the last of the flames died out and his body finally finished healing, he strode up to Abigail and saluted the firefighters. “Hey thanks guys. So, Abigail, wanna keep going?”

"How many bars left you think?"

“I dunno. As many as we can before we get arrested for destroying them all?” Drake counted on his fingers, then his toes, then his tail spines, then started counting out little flesh tendrils. “... I’m thinkin’ maybe…. forty? At least forty. Yeah.”

"We can make those in around an hour."

Drake shrugged, “I figure we got at least six hours. So… two hundred and forty. Then we can raid private stashes, yeah?”

"Yup," Abigail pulled a bottle from who knows where.

“The hell did you get that from?” Drake stared at the bottle, slightly perplexed. Then he shrugged and grabbed the nearest pony by the scruff of their neck, “Yo, where’s the nearest bar?”

The shivering pony shakily pointed off to the east, “F-four -blocks do-own…. Lucky Horseshoe’s… c-can’t miss it…” Drake dropped the pony and loped off, patiently waiting for Abigail to catch up.

She came skipping towards him and sipping the bottle. "Let's go."

Black Ale’s Pub, 8 PM. Bars destroyed: 173.5

“So and then I was like, ‘Rip and Tear! RIP AND TEAR!’ and then everyone pissed themselves!” Drake cackled as he patted out another smoking spot on his jumpsuit, wings extended and twisted into a makeshift basket containing hundreds of empty bottles and cans. Drake’s explanation had been something along the lines of, “Littering in someone else’s world is pretty shitty”.

"I love scaring ponies. Humans just jump, ponies? Best reactions around," Abigail snickered, holding multiple bottles.

Drake downed another bottle and tossed it into his skin-basket, still snickering. By now he had begun to feel a slight tingle, not enough to be called drunk, but still enough to be called slightly buzzed. “Ah man, but back on my world, it’s full a’ humans with the same reactions as ponies! Bunch a’ softies! I fucking blast a hole through five reinforced walls and they all piss themselves and run like a bunch of bitches!”

Abigail laughed, being so drunk she was sober. "That's priceless!"

“I know, right!?” Drake shrieked out his laughter, scaring the dickens out of every pony around. Up ahead, Black Ale’s pub stood, the patrons inside being the kind you’d find in any stereotypical biker bar.

Welcome to the lower class slums of Canterlot. Remember to wipe the blood off when returning to high society.

"Ok, this is the last one," Abigail grinned.

Drake shrugged, and skipped up to the door, shooting a teasing wink at Abigail. “What, you done already? C’mon, Abby! Y’can’t be drunk yet~! The night is still hella young!”

"Bar wise, of course," she answered.

“Wait, is this the last bar in the city!?” Drake stared at the door as the patrons inside finally took notice of the two outside.

"Yup! I had the guards round up the private stashes in the castle," she smirked.

“... Was that what you did while I set bar 45 on fire?” Drake mused, pushing the door open and immediately snatching away a random biker-pony’s drink amid heavy protest.

"It was when you flooded number 89," she laughed, grabbing a tankard.

“I had no idea that my laser eyes would hit that water main! …. Or the sewage main….” Drake shuddered, punched out an angry pony’s lights and stole his beer, downing it in a single gulp. “Anyway, I guess we can head out after this one. Still kinda sucks that I can’t get drunk, though. Honestly, a whole hundred and seventy bars completely emptied, and I’m still barely buzzed!”

"You might get lucky, if not, a void person might help," Abigail said.

“Yeah, fat chance of that happening.” Drake muttered, continuing to punch out the now mobbing patrons. Once again, various tendrils of flesh and bone jutted out of his body, emptying bottles, cans, and glasses into oddly placed orifices.

"Ask the Tome, it knows a shit ton," she guzzled down a barrel.

Drake consulted the massive book as his tail sliced a barrel’s top off, sliding inside and absorbing the liquor inside at a frightening rate.

“Hmm…. Maybe… Y’think Sanguine would help? He is the Daedric Prince of Debauchery.” At this point, every single other patron had been knocked out and tossed into a pile outside the door, each one bearing either a black eye or a busted jaw.

"No clue who that is," Abigail shrugged, grabbing another barrel.

“Eh, guess not, then.” Drake shrugged and attacked the back room, unfolding and rippling into tendrils of biomass and impaling hundreds of containers at once, a deluge of alcohol flooding his system as he reveled in the feeling of thousands of kilo-liters of alcohol racing through his system.

"Ask it for the Services section," Abigail said through a mouth full of liquor.

“Eh, nah. I’m good.” Drake retracted back into his normal form, licking a droplet of wine from his finger. “Hey, Abby, I just thought of something really weird.”

"What's that?"

“I’m a shapeshifter, yeah? So… Y’think I can turn into a girl…?” Drake mused, flesh already rippling and bubbling as he pulled another bottle from a shelf, not even bothering to check the label as he downed it.

"Probably," Abigail said, "If you want."

“I think I’m gonna try it!” Drake roared as his flesh bubbled and changed, smoothing out and losing its pasty color, changing into such a pale shade that it nearly seemed white. His tail lengthened as he shrunk in height, curves filling out and hair lengthening, turning from black with green stripes to a solid ebony, with two streaks of bright green framing his (her?) face. Eyelashes lengthened and facial structure smoothed out, lips plumping and body slimming.

When the transformation finished, Drake stood in all hi-her glory, a fairly tall woman with a swishing, bladed tail and pointed ears, with claws on her hands and feet and fangs in her shark-like grin. “Ohhhh yeah~” She murmured, running her eyes and hands over her body. “I make this look good.”

Abigail clapped, "Nice." She guzzled a barrel of wine. "All I change is my physical abilities." A second later a ding sounded. Abigail looked up to find a video message.

"Heyo! Its me! So Abigail," the woman said, "Hello Drake as well. Anyway, I put a few more battle suits in your inventory. I just kinda found them so you can test them. Adieu!" The message cut off.

Drake sashayed up to Abigail, leaning over her shoulder, “So… who was that?”

"Essence. She can pop in at really random times," Abigail said, grabbing a new barrel. At this point the entire bar was on its last two barrels. Drake shrugged, scratched at her left breast idly, and impaled her fist through the wood of the last barrel, flesh once more unfolding and absorbing all the liquid inside.

“So… now what?” Drake asked, withdrawing her fist and shaking out the splinters.

"To the castle," Abigail grinned.

Drake grinned back and spat out a glob of burning saliva. “Let’s go then!”

Canterlot Castle, 8:30 PM. Bars destroyed: 174.5

Drake strode into the castle, hips swaying and tail swishing, already licking her lips in anticipation of the alcohol inside.

"Voila, I had them put it in the throne room," Abigail smirked.

“Oh Celly must be so confused right now~” Drake smirked and rushed away, racing towards the throne room.

"She and the others went to the Crystal Empire," Abigail said, "and left me in charge."

“....” A devious smirk spread Drake’s lips, the lizardgirl racing off even faster now.

Outskirts of Canterlot, 12 AM. Bars destroyed: 174.5. Castles defaced: 1. Mansions defaced: 54. Ponies knocked out: 1203. Guards knocked out: 44. Debauchery score: 11/10

Drake raced around, over, under, and through a massive crowd of enraged ponies, slapping aside their pathetic attempts to hurt him with nary a backwards glance. She giggled and slapped her ass at the gathered crowd, taking to the air at mach 2.

Abigail was lounging in a chair nearby. Drake circled through the air, chased by pegasi at every turn and picking up speed as she went. Finally, with an earth shattering kaboom, the air tore itself asunder in a massive ripple of blood red light, Drake descending at mach ten, trailing a trail of deep red. Every pegasi in the air dropped out of the sky from the force of the shockwave, and when Drake slammed back into the earth, she knocked out every other pony from that impact.

“Well, that was fun,” she mused, striding up to Abigail and stopping with a cocky pose, hand on her hip. “Well, what did you think of the Sonic Bloodboom (Title Pending)?”

"Pretty cool," Abigail nodded. Drake frowned and leaned over Abigail.

“Oh come on, ‘pretty cool’? That’s it?” She pouted adorably, poking Abigail on the nose. “I think going at mach ten and actually creating a shockwave powerful enough to be blood red deserves more than a ‘pretty cool’.”

"Ok, it was awesome," Abigail smiled.

“Much better.” Drake grinned and sat on the arm of the chair. “Say, what was your life like before you got Displaced?”

"Fairly similar, just male and more tech," Abigail frowned.

Drake blinked and put a hand to her cheek, “Male? The hell happened to you to give you… well…” She motioned at Abigail’s body, “... y’know…”

"Essence, my Displacer, I almost died and she had to give me a new body," Abigail said.

“Ouch. I feel lucky to have just had my mind shoved into a male body…” Drake muttered, shifting back to his male form once more. “Seriously, even if it weren’t male, at least I’m a shapeshifter.”

"Yeah," Abigail frowned, "It was definitely weird."

“Well, at least you got a bunch of nifty stuff out of it.” Drake shrugged. “I mean, I guess it’s not as cool as being nigh-unkillable, but still.”

“True, true,” Abigail nodded. Catching a glimpse of flash of light outside the castle, “Crap. You should probably go, they’re back.”

“.... Who, the Princesses?” Drake asked, idly scratching his cheek.

“Yeah,” Abigail said, squinting out the window, “It looks like the noble’s have distracted them for now.”

Drake shrugged, “Eh, I mean, is them being here a problem for either of us? Well, other than having drank literally every last drop of alcohol in the entire damn city, of course.”

“Not for me, the princess may think you’re a minion of Chrysalis or something, they’re ridiculously paranoid lately,” Abigail said.

Drake snorted, “Well, I kinda fucked up most of bug bitch’s army right there, so I highly doubt she’ll think that once I explain how I murdered most of them.”

“True enough,” Abigail said, “However…” Abigail pointed towards the door as the sounds of hoofsteps echoed, “She’ll be pissed about the alcohol, and, I’m not sure about your Celestia but this one is the ‘shoot-first, ask questions later’ type.”

“Can she annihilate matter instantly?” Drake asked, still rather unconcerned.

“I think it depends on how pissed she is,” Abigail said.

“.....” Drake blinked, “..... I left a lot of spare biomass all over the city. I’ll be fine…. probably.”

“Fair enough, but I’d still like to send you home to be safe. Any idea how I do that?”

Drake shrugged, “Deus ex Machina?”

“Um, one sec…” Abigail pulled out her Book of Displaced and scanned through it before tapping a page, “Here it is. Drake, our contract is fulfilled.”

Drake promptly vanished in a puff of weirdness, leaving no trace of him behind save for the faint scent of blood.

“And, three...two...one,” Abigail finished counting and Celestia, literally on fire, blasted through the door.

“YOU LITTLE!” The raging fireball princess screamed.

“Here we go again,” Abigail rolled her eyes.