Conduit

by Darkscout99

Rating: teen
Tags: Changelings, Original Character, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Zecora, Alternate Universe, Human, Main 6
Length: 19692

A human appears in equestria, only to find that he can absorb magic and use it because he has none of his own.

DJ appears in Equestria five years before the events of season one start. On the day of nightmare moon's return, he travels into Ponyville for the some potion ingredients Zecora needed at the time. When Twilight meets him she decides to study him, and misses the raising of the sun ceremony in the process. When DJ accompanies the girls through the Everfree to gather the elements of harmony, the whole universe is set on a different, yet similar path.

NOTE: This story is set in an alternate universe, so I will do my best to make sure all characters will be introduced. I'm going to be writing almost a new story line because of this, but I will make sure to include all of the major villains and unique experiences the best i can.

Published 2016-03-30 20:50:02 UTC
Last updated 2016-10-25 00:37:44 UTC

Nightmare moon.

Well this was great. it was 11 A.M., but the moon was still out. either Celestia was sick, or someone had stopped her from raising the moon. a certain someone if the now in complete panic mode purple unicorn was right.

"I can't believe I forgot! How could I forget something as important as Nightmare Moon returning to Equestria!" She screamed while pacing quickly in a circle around the table in the middle of the room.

"C'mon Twilight, calm down. It's not like you were supposed to stop her." I said trying to stop her from making the trench in the floor from getting any deeper. "I mean, how could you know?" Bad thing to say. She launched into a huge lecture about how she was reading a book she saw a prophesy about how Nightmare Moon would return on the longest day of the thousandth year. I kinda blanked out as she rambled on. I walked over and picked her up and moved her so she was at face level. “Twilight. Stop. there’s no way you could have known for sure. even if you did, didn’t celestia tell you everything is ok?”

Suddenly the door to the library was thrown open and 5 other ponies walked into the room. As they were talking, I heard each one of them call each other by name.

“C'mon Pinkie, we gotta find more ‘bout this mare in the moon business.” Rainbow dash said. Twilight teleported out of my hands and appeared in front of them. They all jumped at the action but recovered quickly.

“Are you looking for information about Nightmare Moon?” She asked.

They all nodded before the Applejack replied. “Yep, and why are you interested in what we’re doing?”

“Because im looking for information on the same thing.” She said. Before she turned around, I asked her a question myself.

“Hey Twilight, would you mind teaching me that spell later?” She nodded and everyone else in the room turned to look at me in shock. They had all seen me before, but never without my traveling cloak.

Pinkie pie bounced past me and said. “Silly human, you can’t use magic. Only unicorns can control magic!”

“That’s not actually true, since my body is completely devoid of its own magic, being from another non-magical world, Twilight has concluded that my body absorbs magic. Of course, since i’ve been around Twilight all night and she has horrid magic leaking problems, and a huge magic reserve, I should be able to cast that spell. I need to learn it first though.”

Everyone stared at me. The first pony to speak up was Rainbow dash, and all she said was two words. “Prove it.” I sighed and moved my hands in a circular motion, joining them together at the middle. I then pushed my right hand outwards and used a levitation spell on some of the books in the room, pulling them into the air and spinning them around. They all looked at me in awe. I finished by putting the books back where they belonged in a quick fashion. Turning to them, I asked, “Is that a good enough example?”

Twilight looked at me proudly. “Nice work Dj, still a little wobbly though but at least you can control multiple objects at once. She then turned back to the other ponies in the room. “So with that out of the way, we need to look for books about the elements of harmony.

“What did ah do?” The orange pony asked.

“I was talking to the human applejack, i said DJ not AJ.” She responded.

“Anyway,” I started, “ also since my body isn’t meant for channeling magic I have to do extra movements, as a way to better channel it. If I don’t, i’ll have the skill of a filly with almost no sleep for a few days.” I explained. Reaching backwards, I pulled out glass bottle of water out of my pouch. Uncorking it, I quickly downed it and put it back into my pouch.

“That’s so cool! Where did you get a bag of holding?!” Twilight asked excitedly. She almost ran behind me and started inspecting it.

“Last year as a birthday gift. Focus Twilight, what do we need to stop Nightmare Moon.” She immediately pulled her hoof out of my pouch and addressed the other girls there.

“OK girls, I need to find a book on the elements of harmony, they reformed Nightmare Moon once, and they can do it again.” They all nodded and got to work. Soon after, Pinkie pie found the book, bouncing around and saying it was under “E”. I face palmed, the prior librarian obviously didn’t know about the Dewey decimal system, or this world’s equivalent to it. After reading the book and arguing some, the group of six ponies and a human set out for the Everfree.

“This place is simply dreadful, why would the elements of harmony be here?” Rarity asks.

“It makes sense, if you were to hide powerful magic artifacts wouldn’t you hide them someplace dangerous?” Twilight responded. The cliff suddenly gave out under their hooves, and they all started to fall. I saw applejack holding onto Twilight and slid down next to them. Twilight suddenly let go and then applejack was stuck with nowhere to go. Grabbing her, I fell off the cliff and fell. “Man I hope this works.” I muttered under my breath, before putting all of the earth pony magic I had into my fist and punching the cliff face. My hand started to slow us down, and I felt a spear of pain go through it. We slowed down until we were a few feet off the ground, then I jumped the rest of the way. Everypony stared at me in shock.

“How did you do that sugarcube?” Applejack asked in amazement.

I sat down, grabbed the stuff I needed, and started bandaging my hand. I first smeared a salve on my hand, then put a bandage around it. Standing up I answered her question. “I channeled all the earth pony magic I got from you and Pinkie into my fist and arm, before striking the rock cliff. If I would’ve tried doing that without your magic, then I would have destroyed my hand. I used the techniques that Twilight taught me for learning a new magic.”

Twilight beamed before she said, “Comon girls, we still have to find the elements of harmony. We started walking again, and Rainbow started boasting about saving everypony. She would have continued with her bragging, had a manticore not jumped out in front of us. While we were debating on what to do, the manticore jumped forwards in anger. Surprisingly it was rarity who turned around and bucked it.

She screamed “Take that you ruffian!” The manticore roared in her face as a response. When she realised her hair was messed up, she ran away. Applejack took up the slack, jumping on it’s back. The creature struggled and managed to buck her off. While she was flying through the air, she turned to Rainbow dash and said, “Your turn.” Rainbow nodded and shot forwards and started to fly around the manticore. At the speed she was going, there was a Rainbow trail following behind her. Being smarter than most think they are, the manticore stick its scorpion-like tail out behind it and stopped her in her tracks. I looked at Twilight and nodded. Everypony started to charge at the manticore, before fluttershy of all ponies screamed for us to stop. She walked over to it, then nuzzled its paw. After debating with itself for all of two seconds, the creature held out its paw, showing a massive purple thorn in it.

“Oh, my.” Fluttershy whispered. “Now this may hurt for just a second.” She reached her head forwards and grabbed the thorn in her mouth, then yanked it out with a single quick tug. The manticore roared in pain and we all called out fluttershy’s name before starting forwards again, but were astonished when it started licking her in joy.

“Aw, you’re just a little ol’ baby kitty, aren’t you? Yes you are, yes you are.” Fluttershy said. The manticore licked her mane, and she giggled in response. We all walked past the creature.

When fluttershy managed to get detached from the manticore, Twilight asked her a question. “How did you know about the thorn?”

“I didn’t. Sometimes we all just need to be shown a bit of kindness.” Fluttershy replied. Twilight smiled and we continued on our way. Eventually rarity started complaining.

“My eyes need a break from all this icky muck.” When it turned almost pitch black she continued, “Well, I didn’t mean that literally.”

The next comment came from Twilight. “That ancient castle could be right in front of our faces and we wouldn’t even know it.”

I chirped in next, “Thank you queen obvious for pointing that out.” The other ponies gave a small giggle at my remark, other than Twilight. It was good I had decided to speak at that time, because the next thing we saw was horrifying. The very trees around us had demonic faces, with snarling maws and razor sharp teeth. I froze in horror and all the other ponies around me started screaming at the top of their lungs. All except one. The pink menace herself was staring at one of the possessed trees and laughing while making funny faces.

“Pinkie, what are you doing?! Run!” Twilight screamed. Pinkie responded by starting to sing. After the world was done being a musical, something I had only seen once before, our whole party fell over laughing. A few minutes later, we got up and started back our our way in high spirits. Our next challenge that we had to face was a raging river.

“How are we gonna cross this?” Pinkie asked.

“Pinkie, Dash can and I can carry you guys. Maybe Fluttershy too if she’s willing.” I said. I started to walk into the river, the strong current not bothering me too much. As I waded in deeper, making sure it was safe, I suddenly dropped into the deepest part of the river. Surfacing and sputtering, I coughed out water and tried to get my breath. I felt a hoof grab my hand and I let it steer me where it wanted to go. After what felt like an eternity, I crawled onto the shore and wiped my eyes out. After seeing it was Rainbow who led me to safety, I thanked her and passed out.

When I woke up, I had no idea where I was. “Hello?” I managed to sputter out. Sitting up, five pastel colored ponies ran over to me and started all talking at once. “Woah girls, one at a time.”

Pinkie started talking first, fastest and loudest. “Well, after you walked into the river, dashie saw you fall into it and bolted out to get you. Of course you were too heavy for her to pick up, so she led you to the riverbank where you passed out! Then we heard crying and it turns out that a purple water serpent was causing the river to go all wonky because a cloud of purple smoke came by and WOOSH! Took half of his moustache off! So rarity cut her tail off to use as a replacement and he calmed down. Then he helped us carry you across the river to the other side. Finally after Twilight, AJ, and RD helped carry you to this bridge, and RD went to the other side to tie the rope so we can get across it! Now im telling you how you walked into the river-”

“Ok Pinkie that’s enough. I just barely caught that the first time and if I hear it again then my head’s gonna blow up.” I stood up and Rainbow flew back across the canyon and said something about never leaving her friends hangin, I guess that had something to do with before I woke up.

“Ok girls, let’s go get the elements.” Said twilight. Everyone nodded and we followed her. When we got to the castle, it was surprising to see that the first room contained the elements.

“Well that was easy.” I muttered. Twilight had a different reaction though.

“We’ve found them!” Rainbow and Fluttershy started getting the elements. “Careful girls, we don’t want to break them.”

“Hey Twi, there’s only five. Shouldn’t there be six?” I asked.

“The book that that when the five are present, a spark will cause the sixth to appear.”

“OK then Twilight, we’ll leave you alone to concentrate.” Everyone except for twilight left the room. Just as I had left, I heard twilight scream and bolted back into the room with everyone following me. The burst of adrenaline I had gotten allowed me to reach the purple tornado with the elements inside of it. I jumped forwards, hoping to knock twilight out of it and save her, but ended up getting teleported to who knows where. The first thing I did when I arrived at my new destination was throw up blood. The raw magical energy in the air here was overwhelming. I heard the words, “you’re kidding” before a pop and then twilight saying something. I managed to get up at this time, and took deep breaths to steady myself. The rest of the girls ran into the room, and twilight started shouting something about how the elements worked. I finally recovered when twilight was just finishing her speech.

“...The element of magic!” Twilight was lifted into the air with the last word, her eyes glowing in a white light. A rainbow formed and started to move towards Nightmare moon, but she wasn’t about to stand there and just take the hit. Her mane moved forwards and wrapped around each of the girls’ throats. The magic rainbow dissipated just before it hit her.

“Did you really think it would be that easy? Did you think I would just stand there and watch all of my hard work go down the drain? I HAVE PLANNED FOR 1,000 YEARS MORTAL, THAT IS NOT SOMETHING THAT YOU JUST GIVE UP ON A WHIM!” She screamed the last bit, then took a second to regain herself. “Forgive me my little ponies, that was out of character. I was right though, I have been waiting for over 1,000 years, and I have almost reached my goal, do you think I would just give up and-” I cut her off, finally regaining my composure.

“Blab blab blab. Are you just gonna monologue or are you going to do something about the six little ponies wielding the only thing you can be defeated by?” I asked in a sarcastic voice.

“I will warn you though, if you think of laying a hand on any one of my friends, you will be sorry.”

She laughed before figuring out a reply to my threat. “And what are you going to do to me, a goddess mind you, hug me to death?” She laughed again.

“Funny right? No, let me tell you something. You may have been training or plotting over the past thousand years, but there’s one thing that you overlooked. You leak magic faster than a overfilled bucket in a monsoon. And in this world, i’m a giant magic sponge. I can also learn the pony who leaked it’s special talent based on the amount of time I spend near them and the amount of magic they leak. In other words just by spending a few minutes in a room with you,” black flames flared up on my right arm, my eyes went green, and my voice dropped a few octaves, at the same time becoming rougher. “I’ve mastered your control over magic, and have just as much reserves as you do, maybe even more. Do you still think i’m a joke?” I finished. Nightmare moon looked at me in shock before going offensive. She sent a bolt of black magic at my chest. I grabbed it and redirected it back towards her. She rolled to dodge and bolted forwards. With my right hand I caught her off guard as she finished standing up with a solid right hook enhanced with magic, sending her flying back a little bit. She started to throw a maelstrom of black blades at me. I dodged most of them, but one caught me in the chest. I slowed down a bit and used the magic I had acquired to temporarily heal myself. Nightmare moon used this and an opportunity to throw a huge ball of black magic at me. I barely managed to dodge it and throw back a beam of magic at her. She caught it head on with her own beam, slowly pushing me backwards. I pushed back as hard as I could but she was simply stronger than me. Her beam finally got to my hand, cutting my own beam off and sending my flying headfirst into a wall. Nightmare moon went into her gas form and reappeared right in front of me.

“Was it worth it creature, to destroy your own life in a hopeless attempt to save others?”

I weakly smiled at her and groaned out “Monologuing.” Before spitting some of the blood in my mouth into her eyes. She dropped me and a flash of white light engulfed us, draining me and Nightmare Moon of almost all of our magic.

I woke up in a pure white room, with the only color being me, and my black magic counterpart.

“Got hit by the elements didn’t i?” I asked the black creature across from me.

“Yep. this room is what happens while the elements do their work. If you choose to let yourself be cleansed of the evil in your heart… screw it, i’m skipping the dialogue. You gotta choose whether you want to continue using black magic and be banished for a thousand years, or if you want to give it up and be “cleansed”. I’m neutral, since you absorbed me from Nightmare Moon.” My counterpart replied.

“Seriously, you’re not gonna try to trick me? Seems like something black magic would do.”

“Nah, you’re human remember. Humans can’t be just put into good, bad, or neutral. Besides, you probably couldn’t survive for a thousand years, plus i’m sure you would choose to be cleansed no matter what I said.”

“So how does it work. Do all I say is I wanna be cleansed?” To answer my question, the wall directly to the right of me started to crack, and shattered. Sitting behind it was a smaller, more blue-ish Nightmare Moon. She was crying as she looked up at the full Nightmare Moon, without any armor.

“You have made this choice 1,000 years earlier luna, do you not believe it to be the best choice now? Are you really going to be beaten by some strange monkey without hair?” Nightmare moon lectured.

“I take offence to that Nightmare moon, how would you like it if I called you an overgrown housecat?” I called out to Nightmare Moon as I walked over. “Hi there, luna was it?”

Luna looked up at me, still sobbing and holding her head with her hooves. “Y-Yes? What would someone so nice want to do with a monster like me?!” She sobbed out.

I put my hand in her mane and started to stroke it. It had proven effective to calm down others when they were upset, and I hoped it could do the same for her. “Luna, you’re not a monster-”

“Yes I am!” She screeched in my face. “You didn’t see what I did the first time! You didn’t see me kill anypony, burn down innocent ponies homes! You never heard what I told my guard to do! I ALMOST KILLED MY SISTER! I am a monster, treat me like one.” The last line was said in a dejected tone.

I spun her around and got on one knee, then looked her directly in the eyes.“Luna, you are NOT a monster. It was all the magic’s fault. You did nothing you were willing to do. Even now, 1,000 years later, and being controlled like a puppet for all of that time, you feel remorse for Nightmare Moon’s actions. And notice how I said Nightmare Moon, not you luna.”

“How did you get rid of it so easily, I get the magic had very little time to attach to you but still… that power is alluring.”

Nightmare moon cut in and started laughing. “It’s true, the power black magic gives you is incredible, why not embrace it again luna? Like I was saying before this ape cut in, you make this choice before, why not make it again?”

I jumped in before she could say anything else. “Luna, humans, that’s what I am by the way, can’t be put into categories of good and bad. Some people see something as good, while others see it as bad.” Luna gave me a questioning look so I continued. “How will I put this so you understand. Let’s say that a unicorn was having a bad couple of years. So he decides to blame earth ponies. After joining up with some other unicorns, he gains more and more power, eventually starting to kill the earth ponies, as a cleansing of equestria from the terror they bring. Pegasi eventually join the unicorns and help exterminate or deport the earth ponies. Eventually he reaches into ally nations to ‘cleanse’ them too. Then he goes too far and decides to ‘help out’ nations not allied to equestria and they get mad. The nations eventually manage to bring him down, but not without significant loss of pony life.”

Luna looked at me in horror. “Why would you tell me that?! That’s disgusting that they would do that, slaughter other ponies just because of their race?”

“The reason I told you is that in the beginning, that unicorn was considered good to his people, helping the economy and getting rid of a common enemy of the ponies at the time, but near the end he was considered bad by almost everyone, including his own nation. The same person over a span of time was both a great hero and a psychopathic murderer. That happened in my world, humans are grey, never black or white in our moral alignment.”

Luna looked at me in horror. “So a human killed immense amounts of other humans just based on their race?”

“Religion, but yes. Anyway luna, people, and I assume ponies, can change. You don’t have to be nightmare moon to have ponies know your name. Just be luna.”

“But why should I go back? It’s not like anypony cares about my night. The only ones who can really work at that time are unicorns, and they a really prissy and other negative features.”

“That’s what this was all about?” I chuckled. “Luna, other types of ponies can work at night now, in fact, many do! I do some of my best work by moonlight personally, it’s hard to brew a potion that bursts into flames if it touches sunlight in a wooden cottage during the day.”

“Really?!” Luna looked amazed. “If that’s the case, then,” she turned around and faced nightmare moon. “I reject you nightmare moon, I wish to be cleansed!” She turned back to look at me as the room started to grow cracks all along it. “You better not be lying…”

“DJ.” when I finished my name, the room shattered and we were released from the element’s grasp.

Author's Note

Figured I would start the story out at the beginning, and only vary the story slightly. Trust me though, as this goes on further, the story's gonna get way off track from the show. As always, tell me about any grammar/spelling mistakes you see please!

Hospital trip

The first thing I remembered when waking up was that I had talked with Luna when the elements hit us. I remembered nothing else. The next thing I remembered was that I had taken a huge slash of black magic to the chest. The elements had removed the black magic from my chest, preventing it from doing any more damage, but there was still a large amount that was already done. I saw light enter the room and looked at it. Princess Celestia was standing there, and instead of bowing like the others I coughed up some blood and tried to hold out a thumbs up, before struggling to stand up and starting to walk back to Ponyville. I still couldn’t hear from the elements hitting me, but AJ suddenly appeared under my hand. Using her as a support, I continued to walk towards Ponyville. I knew there was a hospital there, but I didn’t know where. Making it to the entrance to the castle, my vision started to get darker. I sat down and hoped that I could get up in a minute, but applejack ran off, and my vision went completely black as I faded into unconsciousness.

I woke up and screamed in agony, my chest felt like someone had stabbed it over and over with a yellow hot blade. Twilight jerked her head back in surprise, and good thing too. Unicorn horns were surprisingly sharp, and I would have impaled myself if she hadn’t pulled away. I threw my hands over my chest, only to have applejack and pinkie pull them back and hold them down. Twilight stood on my legs and went back to work. Something happened and the pain was less,i found out later that Celestia had cast a pain spell on me. A few minutes later, my chest was no longer bleeding, my insides were back in the right place, and I was awake. I tried speaking again to find that I could actually hear stuff now.

“T-Thanks for that everypony. I think you saved my life.” I managed to pant out.

Twilight sat down before speaking. “Now we’re equal right?” Twilight then slapped me with her hoof and started shouting at me. “Why would you do something like that!? There is no way you thought you could take on nightmare moon and win without getting seriously hurt! You could have just ran away, we would have been fine! The elements would have cleansed her before she could hurt us. Even without them 6 on 1-” I cut her off there.

“Twilight, she would have killed you if you had tried to fight her. She almost killed me and I was using the same magic she was, and with almost the same level of skill she had, and she would have killed me had you six not deus ex machina-ed her. I was just stalling for you girls to recover.” I cut her off mid sentence.

“We could have taken her! We had the elements, all we needed was a clear shot!” Twilight screeched in reply.

“You had a clear shot Twilight, and I do have to thank the human for his actions. If he had not stepped in and fought to help you, then you all would have been killed. I do have to disagree on his choice to fight nightmare moon though.” Celestia interrupted, preventing us from spending all night going back and forth, “Now, we really should get Mr. DJ to the hospital rather quickly. you did well Twilight, but you are no doctor. He needs real medical attention.”

Twilight nodded and I stood back up. I managed to walk on my own this time and we made it to the hospital in a few minutes. When we got there, I blacked out again from the exhaustion of walking a mile or two after being hit by black magic, the elements, and a painful healing spell.

I woke up some time later and looked around. The first thing I noticed was the iv drip needle in my arm. I freaked out, screamed, and ripped it out of my arm, then fell out of the bed and crawled into a corner and curled up into a ball. Six ponies, two princesses, and a doctor ran into the room, trying to figure out what was wrong. After a few minutes of calming me down, I finally got back into the bed, and they took the iv drip away. Rainbow was the first to speak up.

“What the hay dude, you can fight a corrupted, immortal, Alicorn goddess, but you’re scared of a little needle?!”

“Hey don’t blame me, I have a phobia of them!” I shot back.

Rainbow started to argue “DJ, whatever a phobia is doesn't mean you should be scared of needles and not corrupt godesses."

I started speaking but Twilight cut in, “Rainbow, a phobia is an immense fear. If you are scared of falling off a cliff, that’s normal. A phobia would be like a Pegasus not flying because they are scared of heights. I know you’re thinking of Fluttershy, but she’s just scared of everything, that’s pantophobia.”

“Can we please get off of my irrational fears?” I asked. Rainbow was about to start teasing me about it again when Zecora burst into the room.

“I enter this room to see, two princesses staring back at me. I have heard my student is now a hero, is is this a lie and he just a zero.” She said quickly.

“I do not know about being a hero, but Zecora, I am not a zero.” I responded.

Twilight looked confused before asking, “Why are you two speaking in rhymes?”

I was the one who answered her question. “We have to, it’s part of Zebrica’s potion brewer’s rules.”

“So why weren’t you speaking that way earlier?”

“DJ did not speak that way to thee, because it did not need to be. A teacher must rhyme at all times, but the student only needs to speak with the teacher to be fine.” Zecora explained.

All of the mane 6 except for Twilight looked confused, so I explained. “Basically, I have to talk to Zecora in rhymes, but I can talk to others normally. Zecora has to speak to everyone in rhymes, but when I pass my final test we may speak to each other normally. It has something to do with the spirits and imbuing potions better. I just don’t question it.”

One of the doctors came into the room at this point. “OK DJ, it looks like you should be fine to leave tomorrow, just stay away from fighting any corrupted Alicorns for awhile please?” Pinkie broke down at his joke and everyone in the room started to giggle, except for princess Luna. She walked out of the room, and Celestia followed her. When Twilight noticed that Celestia was missing, she went to find her. The rest of the mane 6 left shortly after that leaving me alone. I started to practice the light spell I had gotten from twilight but soon found my reserves exhausted, and decided to just fall asleep, which I did promptly.

Author's Note

So this chapter was short, but I kinda lost what else to add at the end. don't worry, more deity fighting coming soon! As always, tell me if you see any typos.

The Tickets

I woke up the next day, and true to their word, the doctors let me out of the hospital. I got out and stretched my back, wincing at the pain in my chest. I had gotten a nice scar from the magical attack, even with the doctor’s and Twilight’s help. I turned the corner and got a face full of confetti. When I could see and breath again, there was a lightly giggling pinkie sitting in front of me.

“I guess I should aim higher next time?” I nodded and pinkie put her party cannon to wherever in the aether it was before.

“So, anything going on today?” I asked pinkie.

“Not really, my next party is in a few days and nothing else is happening in about the same amount of time either. So what are you gonna do today, i’m busy planning that party, it’s gonna be the best one ever! Well until my next party, that one’s gonna be the best, or the one after that…” I let her ramble on and she started to bounce away from me. Seeing twilight sitting in a restaurant, I walked over to her.

“Hey Twilight, what’re you doing?”

“I’m trying to get some food, i’m starving!”

“What did ya order?”

“Dandelion sandwich.” I stuck my tongue out and she looked at me with a face saying why.

“I can’t eat plants really. I can eat some plants, like corn or brussel sprouts, but I prefer meat. Part of the reason I live in the everfree. Did you know manticores here taste like cows on my home planet?”

“Fascinating, I really need to study your eating patterns they-” she cut herself off there. “No! Go away! Stop trying to bribe me with science! Why does everyone want the gala tickets! URG!”

I took a step backwards in surprise at her outburst. “Gala tickets, what gala?”

Twilight glared at me, “don’t play dumb mister, I know you want one of the tickets I got for the gala!”

“Twilight, what is the gala?”

“Wait, you don’t know?”

“I’ve been in the everfree forest for the past five years, only coming out for potion ingredients we couldn’t get there or getting/delivering potion requests. I’ve never even heard of a gala.” During this time, clouds had gathered above our heads, and twilight’s food arrived.

“The grand galloping gala is considered the highest event that one can possibly attend. Princess Celestia sent me two tickets to it, and now everypony is trying to get one of the tickets from me to attend. Applejack and Rainbow wanted to get one, why do they even wanna go?!”

I would have started talking again, if it hadn’t started raining. I quickly pulled out my cloak, and started home after saying goodbye to twilight. When I got home I greeted zecora. And started to work on one of the few potions that could only be brewed during a heavy rainstorm, I had a client that had been waiting for a few weeks to get the potion, and it would save for a few more. I had just finished brewing a batch and eating my manticore steak when in a green flash a letter appeared.

It read: “Dear princess celestia, I am sending this letter to DJ, but if you get it, please send it back to me as soon as possible.

Dear DJ, if you have gotten this letter, then I know how that I can send letters to everyone. Also, please come and see me as fast as possible, preferably tonight.

Sincerely,
Twilight sparkle.”

I was confused, but I pulled on my cloak and told zecora I was going out. When I got to twilight’s treehouse library, I found out that all of her friends were gathered there.

“So what’s important enough that I had to come to your house in the middle of the night?” I asked.

“Oh it’s just that we all got tickets to the grand galloping gala!” Twilight replied. Almost everypony in the room started to squee and prance on their toes. I just looked at them in shock.

“I thought you only had two tickets?”

“I did, but instead of deciding who to give the extra ticket too, I just sent them back to celestia. She then sent me 7 tickets back!”

“So?”

“We all get to go!”

“Good for you then.”

She looked at me questioningly. “What do you mean good for us, you’re coming.”

I stared back at her “I don’t have a choice do i?” All of the girls there shook their heads. “Fine, but i’m gonna be grumpy the whole time.” Twilight kept my tickets so I couldn’t ‘lose’ it or sell it off, and I left grumbling. They assured me I would have a great time, but I wasn’t so sure. I left the library and started walking home. About halfway there, I felt a burst of strange magic behind me, and turned around to see what it was. I got two surprises, one was a pinkie pie flying at my face with outstretched forelegs. The second was when she pulled her right one back and rammed it into my face, knocking me out cold.

Author's Note

So this chapter was short too, sorry. I'm going to make the next one longer, so please bear with me. Make sure to point out any typos that you see please!

negotiations

I woke up to a throbbing headache. My vision was blurred but after a short bit I recovered and could see my surroundings. Before I could figure out where I was, three pony-like bug creatures walked into the room.

“I told you guys he shouldn’t be tied up, just set on the bed! Ugh, and now he’s awake.” By its voice it was a she, but I couldn’t be too sure. The two changelings on the other side of her walked behind me and untied me, then bolted back to the other side of the room and hid behind the first creature.

“I’m sorry about that. I told them not to tie you up like a prisoner, we just wanted to talk and we knew once you saw what we were, you would run away as fast as you could. I want to let you know why you’re here. Our species is called changelings, and we feed off of emotions.” I started to speak but she cut me off. “No, we don’t want to eat yours. We also are freeminds, we don’t have a ruler. Changelings need to have a sort of mon or diarchy, we can’t survive without one for too long, and we can’t gather into too big of groups. Also, you need a large amount of changeling magic to be a ruler. We have come to ask you, because if you don’t we will all die out in a few weeks, maximum.” She looked at me, begging me to accept.

“So what does it mean to be king?” I asked.

“You will be linked into the hive mind, as the highest power. You will be able to talk to any changeling under your command at any point, and significantly influence us. You won’t be able to command drones like puppets, we do have a semblance of a mind, especially since we were freeminds for a long time. You will also be able to appoint higher ranks, like generals or overseers from drones, this does take a good amount of magic though. Your responsibilities will be keeping us fed, and keeping us secret.”

“Why do I have to keep you secret? If you feed off of emotions, why not just go around to others and feed off of their emotions?”

“Are you not intimidated by this at least a little? Also, changeling drone lifespans are short, about 20 years before we die off. A higher rank can survive for longer than that, generals and overseers at about 100, and purebred kings/queens can live for thousands. Back to what I was saying though, love is the best thing to feed on, although others will do in a pinch. We’ve been disguising ourselves for awhile now, so we’ve gotten relationships set up.”

“How can you disguise yourselves so well, you have holes in your legs and kinda look like alicorns.” Her response was to engulf herself in green flames, and turn into pinkie pie. “Oh.”
“You should be able to do this if you become king. Please, we’re begging you. We need a king to survive, we can reproduce on our own until someling makes a royal, it can happen. At that point, you would need to train the king or queen as an heir, but that’s it. Please.”

“Two more questions, how do you gather emotions?”

“Either feeding pods, or directly feeding.”

“And how many of you are there? How many minds would be linked to me?”

She hesitated for a moment. “This may seem like a lot, but it’s really not.”

“How many?”

“231.”

I stared at her in shock. “You want me to put 231 other brains in my head.”

“Well, more like 231 mouths next to your ears.”

“That’s still a ton!”

She sighed. “So I guess you’re not going to help us?”

I looked at her for a few second before speaking. “Is there any way I could try it with a small number?”

“Well, you could link with us.”

“How do I do that?” as a response, all three of the changelings walked around me, and stopped to form a triangle. They put their heads down and activated their horns.

“This is how.” she said. Magic flew through the air towards me, striking me in the chest. This happen two more times. Another burst of magic went from their hooves, connecting to the next and forming a circle around me. A sound like a bee buzzing started, and got louder with each passing second. When the noise got to be defining, I was blinded by a flash of white light. A few seconds later, I realised that I was kneeling on the floor with my hands in between my legs. I tried to stand up, and did successfully, but needed to use the wall for support.

I heard the voices then, three female voices in my head. “Hello?” I thought.

“It worked!” I recognised it as the changeling who had been talking to me earlier.

“Can you hear us.”

“Well of course he can!”

“It doesn’t matter what you think, I wanna hear it from him!”

“Im so happy to be part of a hive mind again, even if it is a small one.”

Three other voices were flying around in my head. “Woah, i’m new to this, can I block it out or channel it if I need to?” I asked mentally.

The three changelings turned to me and answered in sync. “Yeah, if you imagine what job, or just try to block everything out, you should be able to channel who can talk to you.”

I focused on the changeling who was speaking to me originally, three voices speaking in sync was just plain creepy to me. I didn’t get it on the first few tries, I managed to get the other changelings out of my head temporarily. It would take a few more hours before I could change easily, and way more time before I could channel 200 voices easily.

I started asking them questions, like what jobs are there. The information I got was that changelings were divided into a few groups. There were the soldiers, who guarded the hive. They made up about 25% of the changeling’s total numbers, so they had about 50 of them. Farmers made up about 25%, but here they were more like 35% because they couldn’t farm ponies. 100 of the changelings here were farmers, and they somehow supported the whole hive. The final 25% were scholars, the ones who helped plan out attacks, devise new strategies for defense, new adaptations for magic, and other things like that. The final amount was the miscellaneous; architects, smiths, and other changelings that didn’t fall into other categories. Turns out they had a tailor for the infiltrators. Who knew changelings were into fashion.

“So can I have some time to think about this, I really need to get back to zecora so she doesn’t freak out and start a search party. It wouldn’t go well if it looked like you kidnapped a unique species and forced it to be your king.” I said.

“Not really… the problem is to get you out, you would need to be awake, and see where we are positioned, or you would probably be found knocked out somewhere and they would question you about why you were sleeping on a hill.”

“I guess that’s right… still stinks I can’t go home though. What if I were to just fight my way out?”

“We would fight to our last breath, and so would every other changeling here.” she said in a flat voice, telling me she wasn’t trying to be intimidating, she was just telling me the truth.

“So I can’t fight my way out, not realistically. I’m in a room with no windows, so no escaping, and you won’t let me leave until I tell you whether I will be your king or not.”

“Yep.”

“One more question, would I have to live here?”

“No, but if you need a place to stay, then a room would be prepared in a few minutes for your use.”

I sighed and took a deep breath. “Give me five minutes please. I need to think, alone.”

They nodded and left the room. I played with the idea, if I took control, I would be saving lives, but at the risk of trouble down the road. For all I knew, they wanted me to be ‘king’ just so they would have an easier time capturing me and turning me into food. On the other hand, they were a huge source of magic which I could master, and they could help me get stuff like potion ingredients easier. When the changelings walked back in, I had an answer.

“Please tell us your answer, if you don’t within a few minutes, we can’t get you out of here without somepony seeing us.”

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath before saying, “i’ll do it. Under one condition though.”

They immediately had a reaction, their wings started flapping at a bazillion miles an hour and flew up into my face. They all mentally screamed “what is it?!” at me in excitement.

“You have to help me in return, I want to learn all of the magic you can use.”

They started laughing, “we were going to do that anyway, it’s hard to have a leader who can’t shapeshift. We’ll do the binding ritual tomorrow, it takes a good amount of time that we don’t have tonight. We’ll lead you out, conscious this time.” I nodded and stood up. They left the room and went into a strange hallway, made of black stone and a strange glowing green goo. I followed them up a steep slope to a hole in a mountain, and waved goodbye to them before heading back to the everfree to go home.

Author's Note

here's the next chapter, it's longer. I think. sorry, my capitalization is probably pretty bad, and make sure to point out any spelling errors you see. thanks!

The new king cometh

I managed to get to zecora’s home before daybreak, and I slept through most of the day. I woke up when I heard the three voices of changelings in my head.

“C'mon you’re gonna be late!”

“You can’t be late. if you are, expect a riot.”

“I’m coming, i’m coming.” I mentally shouted, so I could be heard over the other voices in my head. I told zecora I was going out for awhile, I left and arrived at the hive entrance half an hour later.

What I was not expecting was walking in, and having my three changeling friends corral me into a room and start playing dress up with me.

In an attempt to derail them, I asked them a question. “So I just realised, what are your guys’s names?”

The changeling who was talking to me yesterday started. “Mine’s lisa. i’m the current leader of the warriors, but you can change that once you become king.” a flash of disappointment ran across her face for a second, but she gather herself almost instantly.

“I’m james, i’m the current head of the farmers and the others not in the main categories.”

The third changeling joined in, “i’m Emily, I welcome you into our hive.” she bowed and then everyone in the room started laughing. “I’m sorry I couldn’t help myself. I’m the head of scholars around here.

A fourth voice cut in. it was hardened, and deep, almost bellowing unlike the others. “Are we giving out names now? I’m Aaron, master smith. I brung ya a present future king.” I turned around quickly to find another changeling. Green patches covered his forelegs. It wasn’t any of the goop I had seen before, so I wondered what is was. When he realised where I was looking he let out a bellowing laugh then answered the question I hadn’t asked. “I’m assuming you don’t know what’s wrong with my forelegs do ya boy? Changeling blood is green, and for some reason, so are scars. No, it’s not changeling blood on the walls. So do you want your present?”

In nodded and he walked over. “We can’t have a changeling king looking like that, no offense.”

“None taken.”

“Here, take this.” two other changelings walked into the room. The first was carrying a set of armor, and the second contained two small daggers in sheaths.

“How did you forge all this in one day? And is that even the right size?”

“Changelings have a sense of where others are even if not in a hive mind, and we took your measurements when you were knocked out. Also helps that we had lisa morph into your form.”

I shuddered at the thought of someone else looking like me. “Am I a real king, or does someone else hold the power and i’m just an anchor for the hive mind?”

“You hold all the power, why would you think you were a figurehead?”

“I have no idea how changelings work. Anyway, if I say that I don’t want anyone to morph into me then nobody will right?”

“Yep.”

“That gonna be the first thing I say then.” they nodded and I finally got my armor on. As promised, it fit like a glove. I then took the dual daggers and wrapped them around my waist, then Aaron started explaining the magic that was in my gear.

“So your armor has three abilities. The first is that it’s enforced with the will of all changelings to protect our king. That means that the better you treat us, the stronger it will be. Second is that it reflects the wellbeing of the changelings. The worse we get, the more our bodies rot and become black. When we start getting better, the armor will turn white and holes will close up, same as us changelings. Finally, it should melt into your normal clothes, so you can wear it at all times.

“Now onto the knives. They are also enchanted with the strength of our hive’s will. They should never become dull nor break if you keep us in good spirits. Also, they can morph into other types of bladed weapons if need be. All you need to do is channel some magic into them and focus on the weapon you want it to be.

“That should be everything, now I suggest that you get out there and start the ritual, the rest of the hive is waiting.” I thanked him and let my armor stay like it was, in what I called base form. When I walked out into the auditorium, a roar of changelings went up. They all cheered and I raised one hand and waved. They were everywhere, in seats, on the ceiling, and as close to me on the floor they could comfortably get. I then went and stood in the middle of the room, with lisa, james, and emily to either side of me. Emily, in front, started to speak.

“Brothers and sisters, we gather here today to welcome the new king into the hive!” a third roaring cheer went up. “He shall serve as the pillar to our hive mind, keep us together, and help us in any way possible! We know he doesn’t have a proper form yet, but let us commence the ceremony and be done with our torture!” she finished. Instead of cheering again, the hive fell silent. I thought they were all disapproving of this, but when I looked closer, they all had looks of concentration across their faces. A green glow started to appear from every corner and coat the room. It slowly got brighter and brighter, then beams started to shoot out of the wall.

The first one hit me and I could feel another mind inside my own. A second beam hit me and another mind joined the other four already there. They they started to pick up the pace. Another quickly joined, then a 7th, 8th, 9th, faster and faster they came. I lost count after the 100th mind was connected to mine. I stopped focusing on everything at that point. Good thing too. Turns out they forgot to tell me that a second magic would be working at the same time. A very painful magic.

My body started changing, from the feet up. My skin first started to go black, and I don’t mean african american black, I mean jet black. Then my feet started contracting, and hardening. My legs then started to round out, and get bigger. I fell over, and the magic started at my torso. It then moved onto my arms, or now, forelegs. They hardened to and turned into hooves. My head then started to get more equine, and I started to grow. Then the changelings finished connecting their minds to mine. My painkiller was cut off, and I felt the two most painful parts of this process and their full glory. A long horn sudden shot out of my head, with some green changeling blood dripping off of it. Then two sets of insect wings made themselves known. I somehow bit my tongue at the pain. Then emily started to speak again.

“We can now truly call ourselves a hive now, for we have our king! LONG LIVE KING DJ!” she shouted and raised a hoof in the air.

“LONG LIVE KING DJ!” the changelings shouted back. I don’t know why, maybe it was the fact I had just been injected with hundreds of changelings worth of magic and their instinct was calling for me, or the pain had finally caught up with me, but I roared. A deep guttural roar. One so loud it shook the hive, and that some of the changelings standing on the ceiling fell off and had to catch themselves with their wings. The changelings were silent for a second, but then broke out in the loudest cheer that I had ever heard. Some of the changelings were stomping their hooves, some were jumping up and down, some were flying around the hive like a swarm of mosquitos. Between the noise they made, and the roar I had let out, if the royal guard or at least some pony didn’t come to check it out in the next hour it would be a miracle. I then collapsed and emily, james and lisa carried me back into the prep room.

I looked over myself. At least my armor had changed to fit my new form. “So, why am I now a changeling?” I asked.

Emily stepped up to the plate, “We don’t actually know, but I would venture a guess that since you absorbed the magic of over 200 changelings, you took the form of one to help you better channel it.”

“Ok, they why do I look so different from most changelings? The ones i’ve seen have been at max like 4ft at their heads and i’m like 6ft at the shoulder now.”

“Well, you’re technically a king now. That’s why you look so different. The form you possess is of a king.”

“Is that why I can see things I couldn’t see earlier?”

“Like what?”

“Green lines running down lisa’s hind legs.”

Emily looked happy. “I was wondering if you could do that. Changelings are assigned jobs at birth. A king or even a general/overseer can see the vis lines that show what job you have.”

“Can I have a list of what they are? That way I can help everyone do their jobs right?”

“Yeah, I was gonna give you one. Let me rattle it off from memory. The easiest to identify will be a king/queen, their vis lines are blue instead of green, and they run to the successors mouth. Next easiest will be a royal guard, the vis lines run from their hindlegs to their forelegs. Scholars grow normal manes. These are the only changelings that grow normal manes without being upgraded in rank. Next is warriors, like lisa, they have vis lines running down their hind legs. Farmers have them running down their forelegs. Some changelings don’t have fangs, some do. Drones have nothing special about them.”

“Thats a lot of information to take in at once.”

“Yeah, but we need to work on your shape shifting. It would NOT be a good idea to go home and look like a changeling king, would it?”

“You’re right, that would not be a good idea.”

The next few hours were spent teaching me to change my form. I messed up a few times, mainly with becoming a bipedal changeling with hands. I kept pushing though, and eventually managed to push back into my human form. When I finally managed to hold that form for half an hour they said I could go. I finally got home and some liquid fell on my head. I groaned before trying to wipe it off and smearing it over my mouth. Thinking it was water, I accidentally got some in my mouth and fell over unconscious.

Author's Note

i have no idea what to put here. guess you got some of my changeling headcannon throw into the story. extra points if you guess what the title is a reference is to! as always, tell me about grammar mistakes and spelling and all that please, thanks!

The hive

Author's Note

So I figured that I would put the note at the top at this time. This is mainly because I want to let you guys know that words encased in <> are over the hive mind, while words in "" are said out loud. Sorry this took so long, between problems with school, my parents, and my computer's hard drive calling it quits, it's been pretty hard to work. Also, I now understand why people don't write too many things with Zecora. Now back to your not regularly scheduled update.

The hive

Being tied up after getting knocked out was not fun. What else isn’t fun? Losing your disguise and being an 8ft changeling king where a 6ft human was already cramped for space. It was kinda funny seeing zecora staring up at me in the face while i was lying down, but the pain i felt from ropes being inside the holes in my legs was immense.

“Ow ow ow ow ow pain pain pain.” i started muttering under my breath. Zecora glared at me.

“Where is DJ?” it took me a second to realise she wasn’t rhyming. I then took another second to realise that she considered this an emergency, giving both of us the ability to speak freely.

“It’s me, i know i look different but uh, i’m kinda a changeling king now.”

She hit me across the, muzzle i guess, with her hoof. It hurt a surprising amount taking both my chitin and armor into account but it got the point across.

“You may be a king, but you are not DJ. If you are, tell me about the time you accidentally drank pure poison joke cure.”

I gave her a strange look. “Zecora, i never did that. You know it’s deadly to drink pure poison joke cure. If i did, i wouldn’t be here. Now the time i got poison joke on me wasn’t fun.”

She narrowed her eyes at me. “And what happened then?”

I grimaced. I should have expected this was coming. “It turned me into a filly. And you wouldn’t let me use the cure for a week because i would have drowned before the cure worked and you refused to hold me. At least it helped me learn how to stand on four legs.”

She stared at me for a second before walking over with a knife. I was scared for half a second before she cut one of the ropes and started pulling on it. I grit my teeth in pain as the rope pulled through the holes in my legs but said nothing. When she was done i transformed back into a human and stood up.

“Sorry for the scare zecora, we-” she hit me across the back of the head, not hard enough to do damage, but enough to hurt.

“If you ever scare me like that, you won’t have a home, nat.” i nodded my head before she sat down and filled up two cups for us. “Now please sit, explain how you became a changeling, in plain.” the next two hours were spent telling her about how i was abducted, talked into it, earned a new home, and changelings in general. Zecora had given me permission to talk normally for ease of understanding. “.. and then i came home, got sloshed with the knock out potion, and woke up all tied up without my disguise.”

I had just finished explaining to zecora when a ping came over the hive mind from an unknown source.

i asked back.

I glanced at zecora. She would be suspicious if i left so early after finding out i had transformed into a changeling. I sent another question to erica.

The reply came a minute later. i turned to zecora.

“Zecora i have a question, would you like to give my hive an inspection?” she stared at me with narrowed eyes.

“If it is not a trick, then may we please make it quick.”

I nodded and we set out. I led her out and towards the hive. As we walked i sent a ping out to the higher ups in my hive.

i got a mental nod as we arrived at the entrance. I let out a pulse of magic and the wall of the cave fell away, leading us into the hive. Zecora walked in and i made the wall again before letting my disguise fall away. A few changelings walked up and started to say something. Zecora turned to me.

“DJ something’s off. I can understand them no more than a cough.” ii frowned and then realised the changelings were buzzing. I face hoofed and sent out a question to the hive. A second later i cast a spell that allowed zecora to understand them. She blinked and almost said something before a changeling cut her off.

“Zecora come this way, we have a few thing you might find hard to get around ponyville. Changelings aren’t very good at brewing…” they started to walk away as zecora inspected the walls and overall just looked impressed with the hive. I turned to the four changelings that were still there: Emily, Lisa, James and Erica.

Erica motioned and i followed her to where the hatchlings were. When we got there i was startled to see that they were walking around. some of them were actually having full conversations, if with simpler words.

“Jeez, how fast do changelings age?” i asked.

“Well as you can see, hatchlings mentally age fast because of the hive mind, but they age physically like normal foals. Their vis lines should have come in by now.” she handed me a sheet and pointed towards a room. “I figured you may need this, it’s a list of the markings to the best of my ability. Now into the room, we need to screen them individually.”

I groaned before walking into the room and sitting down. The first nymph walked in. i saw no vis lines, but they had a regular mane growing in. I told them scholar and sent them out. The next one walked in. This process repeated about 15 times before a slightly taller changeling walked in. My eyes grew wide as i saw not only vis lines running down the forelegs and the hindlegs, but fangs and a normal mane. My first thought was a royal, but that was immediately removed when i saw her vis lines were green. I glanced back over the the sheet and saw one that matched her description. I double checked before pinging Erica.

she replied.

my mind reeled and the door flung open. Erica flew into the room and stared at the changeling. She had a strange pair of glasses with runes around the lenses on her face. When she concluded to herself i was right she started muttering under her breath. I only caught a few words but some of them were: “stores… shortage… rations… love… trouble…magic...” i decided to get her mind off of the problem.

“Her, what are those goggles?” i asked.

“Oh, their experimental prototypes that allow changelings to see vis lines.”

“Shouldn’t that be really hard?”

“Not really, for a normal pony maybe. Changelings are naturally inclined to enchant items, it’s a lot harder to pick up a changeling that items rather than our magic.” she then left the room with the hatchling and shoved another into it. “Back to work, you can learn more later.”

As I continued to identify the hatchlings i made a plan in my head. With a few questions and requests into the hive mind, i finished up both actions rather quickly. When i left the room, luckily with no more unexpected high ranking hive members. I looked around and saw the two small glass balls with metal caps lying on a table. I grinned and got to work.

A few hours later, i wiped the sweat off of my brow as i finished putting the last enchantments on the two small orbs now covered in runes. Inside was royal salve, a special substance that came from royal changelings like the name implies. Normal salve was mainly used in battles to cover wounds as it hardened quickly, and if needed, it could be used as a food source to prevent starving for a short amount of time. Royal salve on the other hand takes much, much longer to produce, and has almost godly healing powers. If you have a giant gash in your side, royal salve heal it. accidentally cut your leg off, royal salve can fix it. As long as you have the two parts to put back together, you can fix it. Royal salve could also probably survive a uranium round at point blank range, only to dissolve at a touch from me. Also while normal salve is green, mine was blue.

I put the first one around my neck and it flashed blue with the salve. It linked to the changeling language and i grinned before taking it off. I then put the other one, less ornate, and walked out. A few questions and i got to zecora rather quickly. I walked up to her and looked down.

“So zecora do you like what you see, or is it not up to your degree.”

“It’s fine with me, though i may need to re-see.”

“I’m happy you now know, just keep it secret, no?”

She nodded and i held out the first amulet, “Take this it should allow you to hear, what the changelings speak clear.”

She took at an placed it around her neck. I was about to become human again when Erica ran up to me. “Is it possible that we could talk for a little while? It’s about jessica, the royal guard you identified earlier.” i glanced over at zecora.

“Can you make it home by yourself? I know you don’t know the path too well.”

She gave a nod and the changeling by the door dropped it to let her out. When she left Erica turned back to me. “Let’s go somewhere else, the main entrance isn’t the best place to talk.” she turned around and led me to what i assumed was my room. The biggest key to this assumption was the fact that there was a giant bed in the middle of it. I knew most changelings slept in some sort of cocoon thing, so it was a huge indicator.

“So what did you want to talk about? Is there something wrong with him?” i asked.

“Well, it’s not really wrong… but he’s a royal guard.”

I raised an eyebrow. “And that means…?”

“He’s going to consume much more love than a normal changeling. About twice as much.”

I stared at her for a second before groaning. “Let me guess, we don’t have the ability to feed this many changelings do we.”

“Not really… we’ve been living on half rations for awhile now, and with effectively 31 more changelings we’re going to have to cut that down even more.”

“Ok, how do we get love now?”

She perked up a bit. “We have collectors, they store extra love in essence gems that get transported back to the hive where the energy can be sent out to other changelings.”

I nodded. “How much love is lost between transfers?”

“Not that much, but the biggest problem is getting them back to the hive.”
“Really? I wonder…” trailing off i took a step away. “Give me a week, i’ll have an answer to this problem, ok?”

She nodded and i smiled back. Walking to the entrance, the guards gave a nod and dropped the door. I quickly left and went back to zecora’s cottage.

The Great and Powerful...

I was in the middle of working on a way to get love back to the hive without having to drag crystals there constantly when Twilight burst into zecora’s hut.

“Hey DJ, I need your help!”

Stashing the crystal I was working with into my pocket, I turned to her. “What’s wrong?”

“There’s a unicorn in town, she’s claiming that she’s the best at magic.”

“That’s ridiculous. You’re the best at magic, you literally embody it.”

“I know, and I want to take her down a notch, but everyone hated the way she was bragging. If I go there and show her up, won’t everyone hate me?”

I laughed. “How about this, i’ll go take her down a notch. If she takes me down, you have full permission to take her down. Is that good?”

She bit the bottom of her lip. “I guess… but if she beats you it will only make it worse if I beat her.”

“That’s the point, she won’t beat me.” Twilight thought about it for a moment before accepting.

“Ok, if she beats you i’ll go up there. If she doesn’t, then I don’t have to risk anything.”

“Exactly, no where is she?”

“Main square. i’ ll take you there.” she left the hut and led the way. When we got to the square, the pony was there performing rather mediocre magic tricks that any human magician could do, all while flaunting about being the best.

“The Great and Powerful Trixie will beat any and all challengers!” she shouted

“Care to put that to the test?” I asked while climbing onto the stage.

Without turning around, she shot back. “Ha! Do your best. There is no possible way you could beat The Great and Powerful Trixie!” I grinned and clapped my hands while crouching down. When I put my hand on the ground my eyes flashed green as I felt a wave of flames flash over me.

“Done.” I said calmly. Trixie turned around and her smile dropped instantly.

“What the?! How?! Wha-” she took a moment to regain her composure. “Is that all you can do? Imitate one greater than you?! Try this!” she threw a beam at me that I easily absorbed, only causing a small beurn mark on my fur.

“Is that all you can do?” I asked dropping her form. She stared in shock. “Wh-What are you?”

“A creature that absorbs magic. A creature that can take on the forms of others. A creature called a human.” her eyes shrank.

“You don’t exist! Humans are creatures of legend! You’re not real!”

I poked her on her forehead. “Do I feel fake?”

She turned her head to Twilight. “You brought this creature here!” she fired a bolt at Twilight who managed to block it at the last second. “Defeat the caster, destroy the summon!” she cried before sending another bolt at Twilight. The townsponies ran away in terror, and I dashed towards Trixie. She somehow teleported away. I then ran over to Twilight.

“You ok?”

“You mean other than the crazed unicorn trying to kill me? Yeah, I can hold my own.”

“I hope so.” a much stronger magical bolt hit me in the head. I was sent flying from the hit even though I absorbed most of it. Twilight rushed over.

“You ok?”

“Deja vu, but yeah.” I saw Trixie standing on top of town hall. “There!” Twilight popped out of existence, and reappeared on top of the roof. Trixie then jumped off. I panicked and started casting my transformation spell while running towards her.

“Nonononononono NO!” I planted my hands on the ground and before I was even fully transformed I was a rainbow colored bolt flying towards Trixie. Right before she hit the ground, I caught her. After I grabbed her I dropped my rainbow dash form and put her down.

“Why did you save me?”

“Nobody deserves to get hurt, even if they tried to hurt me. Just for good measure though.” I placed my finger on her horn and started to drain her magic. I got about halfway before I couldn’t hold any more.

She smirked at me. “Trixie has the biggest magic reserves that anypony has ever seen. Not even you can hold it all!” she was a little woozy from losing so much magic at one time.

“Got me there. Now, please go with the kind guard ponies over there.” her mouth dropped as she saw the royal soldiers behind her. They quickly grabbed her and placed an inhibitor on her and took her to the jail. Twilight teleported over to me with a flash.

“That was… interesting to say the least.” I said.

“Yeah… about that, how did you change into Trixie and rd?”

I blinked before realising this must not be normal for ponies to do. I mentally facepalmed for not researching shapeshifting spells before showing off.

“There’s some creatures in the everfree that can shapeshift. They’re really deep in, so we only occasionally see them. I used up most of the magic I had stored from them with that little show there. It’s starting to get dark though, I should go home.” I lied. She nodded her head.

“Interesting. I’ll do some research into these cre-” a loud roar cut her off. “What was that?!”

We ran in the direction of it and found a large shimmering bear. Actually, large would be an understatement. This thing was huge! The houses to it’s side were dwarfed in comparison. It roared again towards tome of the townsponies. I clapped my hands and started to channel a basic beam to distract it but cried out in agony when the magic hit my hand. The spell fizzled out instantly and I looked down. A large gash was in my hand. I cursed before addressing Twilight.

“This is what I get for casting and running. I can’t do anything to stop this, my hand’s cut too badly. It wont let me channel. You’re gonna have to do this Twilight.” she grimaced.

“But, this is the same thing as showing off! I can't do that after Trixie just got put in jail!”

I glared at her. “Twilight, you need to do this. If you’re concerned about them thinking that you’re bragging, ignore them. If you don’t, a lot of ponies could get hurt. NOW GO!” with that I shoved her forwards.

She took a deep breath before she started casting her spells. The first one started wind blowing over a nearby pond. I was about to tell Twilight to actually try when I noticed that the creature was starting to bob back and forth. Twilight then ripped the water tower from its… tower, and sent it through a barn. When it emerged, it was full of milk and she levitated it over to the creature. It started to drink the milk and it’s eyes half closed. Twilight wrapped it in her magic. When she tried to lift if, she faltered and lost the spell playing music. I placed my good hand on her back and pumped some of Trixie’s magic into her. Her spells picked back up immediately. Somehow, she managed to levitate the star bear thing back to wherever it came from. She dropped her spells and I stopped putting more magic into her. She dropped to the ground in exhaustion.

“C'mon, let’s get you to bed.” I picked her up and put her over my shoulder. She groaned and I walked her back to her treehouse. Handing her off to spike, I managed to get back to zecora’s house before passing out.

Author's Note

Remember how I said I was having trouble finding time to write? Well my school had school-wide testing today. This gave me over two hours that I could use to write. And I'm having this a few more times this and next week. Expect more chapters soon.

Dragons

“Aaand, done!” I grinned. “Now I just need to test it. Should probably go into the forest. Last time I tried one of these out, it blew up.” I mumbled to myself. grabbing the crystals, a full love crystal, and an empty one, I set out into the forest. After reaching a respectable distance from the house, I put one of the crystals on the ground with the full love crystal on top of it, and walked a little while away. When I got where I wanted to go, I held the transfer crystal to the empty love crystal. A few seconds passed as nothing happened. Then the love from the first crystal flew into the second, filling it instantly. The flow then suddenly snapped off. A few seconds later and it didn’t explode.

“I guess that counts as a success.” Walking back to the first transfer crystal, I noticed that it had a tiny crack in it. Looking back at the second crystal, i noticed it had a crack in it too. “Huh. that’s not good.” I had just gotten back to the house when RD smacked into the wall beside me.

“How do you manage to be both the best flyer and the best crasher in Equestria?” I asked as she peeled herself off the wall.

“Skill. Also, we need your help with a dragon.”

“A dragon. The fire breathing type?” she nodded her head. “Of course. I’m starting to get the feeling being friends with you six will be a lot of trouble. Fun trouble, but trouble.” she stood up.

“Well I have to go prep for our trip. Twilight sent me here to get you since, as you admitted, I’m the best flyer in Equestria. See ya!” she took of in a rainbow blur. I looked at the crystals in my hand and sighed.

“One day I’m going to finish you, but it does not seem that today is the day.” walking into zecora’s hut, I put the crystals into their hiding spot before telling zecora what I was doing and grabbing some extra supplies. Slipping them into my pack, I also grabbed the knives Aaron gave to me. I always wore the armor, but the knives were a little harder to conceal and ponyville didn’t like me carrying around knives. The final thing I grabbed was my travel cloak.

When I reached the square, Twilight had just finished setting everything up. “Alright girls, move out!” They suddenly burst out into a stampede, carrying a reluctant fluttershy with them, and leaving me behind. I spun my feet around before clapping my hands together and channeling earth magic into my feet. I then bolted after them. Somehow, just as they made it to the mountain, i caught up.

“So just because I’m a guy I get left behind?” twilight turned and looked at me, before putting her hoof to her head.

“I’m so sorry DJ, I don’t know why but for some reason I forgot to wait for you. Guess it was lucky that you managed to catch up to us.”

“Yeah, so all I know is that there is a dragon, and I’m assuming it is the cause for the smoke. We here to get rid of it?”

“Sorta, we don’t want to harm it, but we do want to encourage it to sleep somewhere else. The smoke it’s putting out would cover equestria for 100 years!”

My eyes opened wide in alarm. “Saying that’s bad is like saying nightmare moon was a little irritated. We need to stop it immediately. Up the mountain?” She nodded and walked over to the side of the cliff. The other girls followed her as she put her hoof on the rock face. She then lifted a second, third, fourth hoof onto the wallish surface. The only one who stayed behind other than me was fluttershy.

“How do they do that?” I asked.

“Do what?” fluttershy asked back. I looked at her. She was hiding inside a bush, but her head was peeking out enough that I could see her.

“Walk up nearly vertical surfaces.”

“Ok, everypony can do that. It’s the magic in our hooves, it allows us to grab things. We can also use it to walk up close to wall like surfaces. If it’s completely upright though we can’t do it.”

“Cool. I wonder…” I clapped my hands together and started searching through my stored magics. Changeling, unicorn, pegasus, earth pony, Zecora’s, a bit of dragon magic from spike, but nothing special. Grabbing the largest mana pool I had, changeling magic, I placed my hand to the wall and mentally gripped. When i tried to move it away, it slid right off. I put my hand back and grabbed as hard as I could. When my hand couldn’t move any further, I tried to move it away. This time it stuck like glue. I smiled and placed my second hand on. When I got to my feet it was a little bit harder, but i managed to do it.

We got halfway up the cliff before looking down. “C’mon fluttershy, we need you!” twilight shouted.

“But, it’s so steep.” she replied.

“Fluttershy, you just taught me how to do, what’s in my world, the impossible. Just fly up.”

“O-ok. I’ll try.” she pulled her wings from her side and started to flap them slowly. As she rose, it was evident she was no RD, but she could fly. When she had about matched where the ponies above me were, a loud snore shook the earth. Fluttershy’s wings stuck to the side of her body before she plummeted to the ground. Not being able to do anything, I had to watch as she luckily fell into a bush. When she emerged, i could see her struggling to start flying again, but she literally couldn’t pull her wings off the side of her body.

“Deus ex machina’s aren’t always good.” I mumbled to myself before shouting up to the other ponies. “I’ll get her up there somehow.” I started to climb back down the mountain before jumping off the last bit.

After doing a quick roll for a landing, I brushed myself off and went to fluttershy. I heard a thwack on the ground beside me. When i picked it up the and unrolled it, i found a map of the mountain. Sadly, the shortest way around the mountain would take multiple hours, compared to the first way that would have taken a few minutes. When i had gotten around the first bend, I turned to fluttershy.

“I’m going to try something, please don’t be afraid. I’m going to turn into the manticore. That way I can carry you easier and faster. I’ll still keep my mind, so you really don’t have to be afraid.”

With that, i clapped my hands together and crouched down before plating them on the ground. I tried to copy all of a manticore’s features. With a flash of green light I managed to attain the manticore form. Sadly this lasted all of two seconds as the disguise backfired and sent my flying backwards. I smacked into the rock face behind me hard. I heard a gasp and saw fluttershy staring at me.

“I-I’m ok.” i said as i got to my hooves. Hooves? I looked down at my hands and realised that when i lost my manticore form it had also dropped my human form, so I was standing in front of fluttershy with a form that could match celestia’s height. Combine that with the black chitin and holes to make one terrified fluttershy.

Without thinking i blurted out “Don’t scream!” before looking at her for a second longer, “You’re too terrified to scream aren’t you?” she nodded her head. I got down and put my legs under myself, strangely comfortable in pony-ish forms. Even while doing this, i was looking her in the face. Still better than looking down at her from twice her height.

“It’s still me fluttershy. I haven’t changed. Well, my body has. And i’m not the leader of a hive mind. Other than that though, i haven’t changed.”

“We-were you always a-a, whatever you are?” she asked.

“Changeling. And no, i wasn’t always one. In fact, the change was rather recent. Just a few weeks ago actually. Remember when twilight got the gala tickets? That night i learned about changelings.”

She seemed to be becoming more comfortable around me. Still on guard, but not scared to the point of shaking. “So what are they like? Changelings?”

“Mine are friendly, but secretive. The magic that allows me to shapeshift? That’s theirs.”

“That’s how you beat trixie?”

“Yep. used a magic she couldn’t use. At least, not without extensive training. Do you have any other questions?”

“Why do you have holes all over your body?”

That caused me to pause for a moment. “I have no idea, all I know is that touching the inside of one hurts. Now, I think we need to get going, if we take too long the others will get worried and come looking. Hop on my back.”

“A-Are you sure, I wouldn’t want to be a burden.”

I rolled my eyes. “Fluttershy, i’m almost three times as big as you, it won’t bother me.” she whimpered and started to slowly move backwards. With a sigh i grabbed her in my magic and put her onto my back. She gave a squeak as she landed but put up no fight. Standing up i started to trot at a good pace. When i felt confident about being able to go at a good pace without tiring out too quickly, i ran as fast as i could. When i felt fluttershy start to slide backwards, i used my magic to create thin lines that held her in place without wasting too much mana. A little while later, and after using up almost all of my earth pony and changeling magic, i finally reached the top. After getting fluttershy off, i changed back into a human and used up the last of my magic reserves. I was now left with unicorn magic and a rather decent supply of pegasi magic. We walked the rest of the way on foot.

Rounding the corner, i yelled out to twilight. “Hey! We’re here!”

She turned around. “Hey Aaron, how did you get up here so fast? It should have taken you twice as long to get up here as you did.”

I pointed downwards. “Longer legs.” she looked unconvinced but dropped it.

“Ok ponies and human, we need to get moving.” we started towards the next area that we needed to traverse. There was one problem, a small crack in the ground had split open at some point, meaning a small gap needed to be jumped over. The only danger it posed was to a foal, but fluttershy didn’t seem to think so. Pinkie grinned. “It’s not very far, just move your little rump, you can make it with a hop skip and jump!”

Twilight started to get irritated. “C’mon we don’t have all day!”

“A hop skip and jump, a hop skip and jump…” she bounced back and forth while repeating these lines. Not wanting to camp out on top of a mountain, i stepped back over the crack and bend down over fluttershy.

“You can do this, want me to go with you?” she nodded her head and i picked her up. She whimpered at being so high off the ground, but with a single step she was put down again. We then started walking across the mountain pass. When we were halfway through, pinkie started to bounce instead of walk.

“Stop that pinkie, the map said this is an avalanche zone!” with that fluttershy decided to make the loudest noise she had made yet.

“Ava- ava-” she was cut off with a resounding SHH sound from everyone present. That didn’t stop her though. “AVALANCHE?!” she screamed. We all froze as her yell bounced around the cliff. When after a few seconds nothing happened, we all let out a sigh of relief. Then the universe decided to intervene as we heard the rumbling start. The ponies looked at each other and bolted. Without earth pony magic I was much slower than any of them, so I quickly fell behind. With the rocks crashing down around me i did the only thing i could do. Spinning around, i channel magic into my hands and forced the rock closest to me away. I quickly turned back and threw a second rock away. Time blurred as i kept myself alive, a third rock, a fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, i lost count soon after. My arms and hands burned at being forced to channel so much mana, something they weren’t designed to do. I quickly burned through all the unicorn magic i had, and resorted to using the scrap of alicorn magic from when i was in the castle. Instead of using it to move rocks away, it pulsed out and incinerated all of the rocks around me. Not expecting such a powerful surge of magic, it knocked me out cold.

I woke up an unknown amount of time later. Hearing the crackling of a fire, i opened my eyes and turned towards the sound. Six ponies could be seen sitting around it. I struggled to get up, and realised that my legs were refusing to obey me. When they heard the sound of me trying to get up, their heads shot in my direction and they scrambled to get over to me.

“Are you ok DJ? We saw you throwing rocks around and then WOOSH! All the rocks just disappeared! Rainbow flew back to get you like ZOOM! And…” Pinkie started crying, “you weren’t moving and we couldn’t get over to you. We were so scared!” i grabbed her into a hug that the others soon joined.

“Don’t worry pinkie, i’m fine. Well, my legs don’t want to seem to work, but other than that i’m good.”

“That’s to be expected when calling upon powerful magic DJ, parts of the body stop working for awhile. You should be fine by tomorrow. Let’s get some rest before we have to set out in the morning.” Twilight told me. With that they dragged me over to a tent and put me in a sleeping bag. I didn’t manage to sleep all night.

When the ponies got me a few hours later i had managed to get on my feet, but at this point i had managed burn almost all my mana. I had only pegasus magic left now, with only a slight scrap of earth and unicorn magic left. We started out again and somehow made it to the cave.

“Cold up here isn’t it?” i asked.

“Yeah.” said pinkie.

“Not really.” said rainbow.

“Absolutely.” said rarity.

“N-no.” said fluttershy.

A “Yep.” came from applejack.

“Yes.” twilight replied.

I stared at the the two pegasi. While everyone else was shaking and i was holding onto my arms trying to warm them up, they looked like it might as well be the middle of summer to them. I tried to channel pegasus magic through my body like earth magic, and i succeeded in making myself warmer. Dropping my arms i could feel the relief that the warmth brought. The non pegasus ponies looked at me jealously.

With using the magic though came another effect. My bones hollowed out and became much lighter. I didn’t realise this until i tried to walk though. Not knowing about this i took a step forward and rammed my knee into my jaw throwing me back. In a world where a limb weighed as much as a filly, my muscles weren’t accustomed to moving something as light enough that with some wings i could probably fly. It was even more painful as i tried to get up with my limbs flailing everywhere. Eventually i got it through my head that if i wanted to move i would have to exert barely any force.

I managed to get up with only minor cuts and bruises, save the one on my chin. Rainbow was laughing the whole time, but everyone else looked concerned. I waved a hand at them.

“Just a little unexpected side effect of the magic. On a side note, did you know that pegasus ponies are much lighter than other types?”

Twilight was the one who responded. “Yeah but we didn’t know it was because of their magic. I’m going to have to run some tests on you when we get back, and see how much their mass drops compared to if they weren’t pegasus ponies.” i groaned but agreed. She then ran over who was doing what.

“So fluttershy and i will attempt to talk to the dragon, RD will clear the smoke, pinkie and rarity will make a distraction if need be, finally, Aaron and Aj will provide backup if necessary. Let’s go fluttershy. Fluttershy?”

“I-i can’t go in.”

“Fluttershy, you’re the best with animals here, you can do this.” i said trying to comfort her. It failed.

“But it’s a dragon!”

“And so is spike, but you have no problem with him.” twilight cut in.

“Yes, but he couldn’t eat me in one gulp!”

“He’s still strong enough to bite limbs off if he wanted too.” twilight replied. all that did was make fluttershy terrified of spike. “Look, i’ll go in with you if you want me to fluttershy. I’ll protect you two.” with a final gulp, fluttershy agreed to enter the cave. The whole time we moved she was cowering behind my legs. When we finally reached the dragon, she somehow hid behind me even further.

“Hello there mister dragon, we were wondering if you could uh, find somewhere else to sleep?” the dragon responded by turning over and letting out another belch of smoke in our faces. We all stumbled out of the cave coughing.

“I’m going to take that as a no.” i said. Rarity came up.

“Well, let us try something with a little bit more charm.” rarity said slyly. She walked into the cave. After another belch of smoke, the burst out of the cave coughing too. Then pinkie tried, and after walking in with what i thought was the most ridiculous outfit, she walked out with a broken form of it. Rainbow had enough at this point.

“THAT’S IT, I’M GOIN IN THERE!” she screamed as bolted towards the cave. A few shouts later, she came rushing out of the cave in a panic. The dragon soon appeared behind her. not being confident enough to challenge the dragon, all of us backed us into corner. then it roared at us. for some reason unknown to me, this set fluttershy off.

“HEY!” she roared back at the dragon. Never before had i seen her this angry. scratch that, this couldn’t even be considered angry. i couldn’t decide on furious, enraged, or murderous though. she flew up to the dragon and started ranting at it.

“you big menie pants, you can’t just go around harassing ponies!” the dragon was visibly cowering at this point.

“but, the blue one hit me.” he tried to throw the blame off of himself. it failed.

“I know, and she’s very sorry, but that doesn’t give you the right to go around harassing our friends. say you’re sorry, then go find another cave to sleep in that won’t cover equestria in smoke!” with the last line she shoved her face into the dragons and stared him down. He quickly apologised and flew off. We stared at fluttershy in shock. “What?”

“How- wha- huh?” all i could do was make sounds. Luckily twilight took over for me.

“Fluttershy, what did you just do?”

With that comment directed at her, she went back to her normal shy state. “I-i’m sorry, did i do something wrong? I-i’m so sorry i didn’t mean to.”

I laughed. Not the most considerate thing to do, and it caused fluttershy to hide even further behind her mane, but i laughed. “Fluttershy that was awesome! How many other ponies, no, any being in existence, can say that they yelled an adult dragon into submission while being a fraction of it’s size! Seriously, that was amazing!” with that we set back off for home. Not needing to be back immediately, we took the longer route avoiding the avalanche zones and sheer cliff faces we needed to climb down. When we finally got back a few days later, everyone was in high spirits, and split ways to get some much needed rest.

Author's Note

So the next super long chapter is out. I'm really random with these lengths aren't I? As always please tell me about any spelling or grammar mistakes you see. Thanks!

Finally, I can't decide whether to do a cannon remake or an original chapter next. Some help please?

let's have a party

“Attempt number 157, go!” i flicked my goggles over my face and pressed the crystals together. The love flowed from one to the other in a steady stream, and snapped off the second the crystal was finished draining. After walking over to the other crystal, inspected both. Neither seemed to have any cracks in them. I smiled, now all i needed was to figure out how to make the ingredients cheaper. I suddenly heard a shout.

“Aaron get over here, am i clear?” i quickly jogged over to her. When i got over she looked at me. “How are your crystals, is something amiss still?”

I shook my head. “Other than ingredient and mana cost these things are great, is there something you need done by a date?” i know my rhymes weren’t the best, but i had never had any time to practice before i was thrown into it, and i thought i was doing rather well.

She shook her head. “Well in that case… here.” she held out a purple crystal. i was shocked that she wasn’t rhyming, so i just stared at her.” “you passed your final test.” she elaborated.

“O-oh, is that so.” i then shook my head, i didn’t need to rhyme anymore. “Really? But i didn’t even do anything for it.”

“Explain how you made the crystals, in simple terms.”

“Well, first i carved the initial runes, and then i soaked it in a brew of… oh.” the realization that i had used a brew of many different ingredients, and not all potions needed to be drunk to be used. “So that counts?”

“You made a completely potion that you can replicate countless times, so yes. Also, i’ve been looking for a way to kick you out of my house. This hut was meant for one zebra, you count at least at two, three in changeling form.” she laughed and i knew she was joking about the second part. I then took the crystal and looked it over.

“What’s this?”

She laughed again. “That’s for you to decide. Wear it proudly.” she then turned around and motioned me in. while my bag was huge, it’s not like it could carry all of my stuff. Well, it could, but it wouldn’t be a good idea. I gathered all of my stuff, plus a few other things from zecora. That was when she handed me a sheet of paper and told me to go there. I quickly made my way to the address on the paper.

The strange thing about the house, was that it was in the middle of the way to the mountain, and the everfree. If it had been for sale, since zecora had just kicked me out, i would have chosen to live here. When i walked in the door two loud thumps went off in my ears. Confetti rained down and suddenly everyone in ponyville was jumping out and congratulating me. The loudest of them all, was of course, pinkie.

“SURPRISE!” she was almost as loud as her party cannons combined.

I almost asked for what, but quickly put two and two together. “How did you get this set up so quickly?” what i failed to think of was that zecora might have told her earlier.

“I found out from zecora earlier today! I was so happy that i immediately bolted off and started setting this up! Do you like your present?” i blinked as i tried to take in what she said.

“Yeah, the party’s great.”

“No, not the party, that's not your present!”

I looked around. Not seeing presents, i took a moment to think about what else it could be. “No, you didn’t…”

She smiled and started bouncing. “Yep! When we found out zecora was forcing you out, we all chipped in to get you this house!”

I just stared at the rest of the mane 6. “I get a stipend from both the princess and ponyville.” twilight told me.

“The farm’s doing rather well.” came aj.

“I-it surprises me how much ponies pay to help their pets.” fluttershy whispered.

“Weather manager.” rainbow told me.

“Only gems of the highest quality make it into my dresses darling. the rest i sell off or give to spike.”

“And i plan parties for all of ponyville!” pinkie finished while jumping in front of everyone else at the party. Tears started to well up in the corners of my eyes. I crouched down and open my arms. The six ponies got the idea and ran over for a group hug.

“You girls are the best friends a human could have.” i said. Eventually we split apart and the party truly started. All i could truly remember was hours and hours of loud music, way too many sugary snacks, and at some point late into the night i think someone spiked the punch. Or replaced it with some alcohol. When all was said and done, it was one of the biggest parties pinkie had thrown.

I woke up on the floor, slumped down near a wall. I couldn’t remember why though. Groaning as i somehow managed to stand up, i then took a survey of the room around me. There were remnants of the party strewn about. Streamers laid on the floor, balloons floated around pointlessly, and somehow a cloud had managed to make itself into the house. I did a double take at that. Rainbow must have wanted to mess with me, forgetting that i could channel the magic needed to get rid of it. I put the magic needed into my hand and punched the cloud, hoping that was all that it needed to break.

I was right about a sudden blow breaking the cloud. What i was not aware of though was that it wasn’t rainbow that wanted to mess with me. No, all pegasus liked to sleep on clouds. That meant even if they were indoors. Said clod did have a pegasus sleeping on it, and when her cloud disappeared, she dropped to the ground with a thump. She immediately sprang back up in a battle stance.

“Sorry, i didn’t know you were sleeping on that cloud.” i rubbed the back of my head sheepishly.

She relaxed when she realised there was no prominent danger. “It’s ok.” she then looked around. “I guess we should get this place cleaned up right?” i nodded my head not fully realising what she said. When we were halfway through i finally realised what she had said.

“Hey, why are you helping me clean up? Not that i’m against it, but still.” i asked.

“I’m your roommate, so this is my house too.”

“Roommate? But i never asked for a roommate.”

She handed me a slip of paper. After reading it, i felt a sudden sense of dread. “Orders from the princess to watch over me? Why are these coming now of all times? I’ve been here for years, and the princess has known about me for at least two months at this point.”

She stared me down. “You used alicorn magic. And didn’t die. That was impossible unless you were an alicorn yourself until the past few days. I’ve been ordered to watch over you, and to protect you, unless you present yourself as a danger. Then i’ve been ordered to subdue you, with any means necessary.” she then returned to her happy attitude. i looked at her nervously.

“Don’t worry, i won’t cause any trouble.” i then thought about the hive.

i heard a mental grunt of pain from her.

i shouted over the hive mind.

with a mental nod i turned my attention back to the mare.

“By the way, i never got your name?” i asked her.

“Shatterfall.” i nodded and tried to scratched her behind the ear. The second that my hand touched her, her wing jutted out in the pegasus version of a fist and rammed me in the gut. I fell over grabbing my stomach. “No touching.” she said before walking off. “Now get up, we have work to do.”

Author's Note

So I managed to cobble this chapter together over the past two months, sorry for the long wait. That should make this (at least in my head) short chapter all the better right? Right?

Contact

The hive mind had been silent for the past few hours. Every time I tried to reach out to lisa I got nothing, and it was starting to worry me. Luckily, Shatter had decided to go to the spa today. She claimed that she hadn’t had a day to herself in weeks, so I shoved her out the door with a bag of bits and told her to relax. She had objected at first but I locked the doors and refused to let her in. after waiting for about an hour, I assumed that she would have actually left. Grabbing the transfer crystals I had slowly been making in my basement, I slipped out into the streets and made my way to the mountain. The whole way there I felt like I was being watched. I knew I wasn’t, as I had been feeling that way for years whenever I was alone, but it felt particularly strong this time.

I finally made my way into the cave where the hive was before burning away the mirage wall and stepping into my secondary home. The wall reformed itself as I dropped my human form and walked deeper into the cavernous hallways. I couldn’t find anyone so I decided to send out a mental ping over the hive mind.

Following the instructions it only took me a few minutes to get to the library. When I got there though, I noticed something big. All of the changelings I knew were there, and they looked different. The first thing is that they were taller. While most changelings were about four feet, they seemed somewhere around 4 and a half to five feet. They also seemed to be slightly lighter colored, as well as all of their holes seemingly slightly smaller.

Lisa spoke up first. “Hello there DJ,” the anger in her voice was evident. “Notice something different?”

I took a second to compose myself before answering. “Y-yeah. You’re all, taller?”

“Yes. do you wanna know why?”

“I have a feeling this is not good news for me.”

“You’re right. We only did the second most important thing behind crowning a new king-slash-queen.”

My eyes grew wide in shock. “Your joking right.” she shook her head. “I’m so sorry.” I got down on my knees and lowered my head. “Please forgive me. I didn’t know there was such a thing. Next time something like this happens please tell me.”

“Jeez, you didn’t have to start groveling. You are a baby afterall.”

I stood up. “Hey! In my world i’m a full grown adult!”

“And how old are you?”

“21.” she paused for a moment before replying.

“Assuming you only have half the lifespan since you weren’t born a king, you wouldn’t even be a baby. You’d have just hatched if you were lucky. If you changed your age to be equal to the age you should be, you would be a little over four thousand. And that’s at the low end of the scale. A king can live for hundreds of thousands of years if he’s careful. The oldest king is around four hundred thousand years.”

My jaw dropped. “You’re kidding me this time right. Please?”

“Yes I was.”

“Oh thank goodn-”

“The current king is five hundred thousand, and the oldest queen is seven hundred thousand years.”

“That- how- wha-”

That was when emily stepped in,“You broke him lisa.”

“I might have. Anyways, what brings you here sir?”

I snapped out of my daze when lisa spoke to me. “I wanted to bring you the transfer crystals. I finished them up recently but there was some… complications in getting here though.”

Emily was the one who spoke up. “Really? So how do they work?” I proceeded to spend the next hour explaining how to use the crystals. While in truth it should have only taken a few minutes, emily wanted to figure out how to everything worked, how it was made, and all of these other things that made the process twenty times longer.

“... and when the love is passed through the crystal it can be absorbed by any changeling close enough to absorb it.”

“This is amazing! I can’t imagine what we will be able to do with this. We need to mass produce these-” Emily was cut off when a gigantic explosion rocked through the hive.

“What was that!” I yelled. This wasn’t good. An explosion of that strength could only mean-

“We’re under attack! The drones at the front entrance have passed out and are floating in the hive mind. They saw a flash of yellow magic and then were knocked out!”

“I’m moving to the entrance, lisa get me all the warriors and tell them to meet me there.”

“The only thing that could have destroyed-”

“I don’t care! I’m going to go stop them. That entrance is a choke point. If I die or get hurt, then leave me and go find a spot to build a new hive!” with that I ran off ignoring lisa’s sputters of discouragement. Racing to the entrance I could hear a female shouting orders. I could also hear pained groans from some changelings that had been around the entrance. Rounding the corner I saw my worst fear.

Celestia. Standing next to Shatterfall. Along with a whole platoon of royal guards at the entrance. All in what I could only describe as full war armor. The first moment we made eye contact. The second moment a group of changeling guards rounded the corner. The third moment Celestia and I tensed up. I was the first to speak.

“Hello Celestia .”

Her eyes widened in surprise. “That voice, is that you DJ?”

I dissolved my disguise as I nodded. “Yes. Celestia , why have you come into my home like this? You shattered my door and knocked out two of my subjects at the same time. Now, I don’t care about the door too much, that could be replaced before you leave, but you harmed what are effectively my children. How would you feel if I walked into your throne room and knocked out those guards? Now let me ask you, how would you feel if you could feel everything they can?” I lowered my eyes and glared at her. “What would you do Celestia ?”

She seemed surprised by how angry I was. From what she had seen, I only got like this when there was a serious threat to somebody near to me. And seeing as she was the only pony that I could reasonably direct my anger at currently she knew it was directed at her. “DJ i’m sorry I didn-”

“Sorry? Celestia , do you have any idea how strong that blast was? If it was strong enough to destroy that door that blast could have incinerated a dragon! If that door had been any weaker then my subjects would have most likely died! It’s not like changelings are beasts that aren’t truly alive. Celestia , the only differences between ponies and us is how we look, and what basic skills we are given at birth. And that we absorb love, but that’s only a small thing.”

“A small thing?” Celestia shouted. “You’re saying that it’s only a small thing that you steal something that my ponies make within themselves-”

“Celestia love is generated passively by ponies. The only time it’s actively taken is only if a pony gives it willingly, and the worse we’ve seen when a pony gave too much of it was a migraine for a day and a slightly grumpy attitude. Do you have any idea how much love you’re radiating right now? Here’s a hint, just in the small time we’ve been talking you’ve given enough love to my hive that if we didn’t have our stores we could survive on it for the rest of the month, without collecting any more. Now, do you feel any worse for wear?”

Celestia stuttered before responding. “N-No, but that doesn’t excuse the fact that you’re taking something from my ponies without their permission.”

“I’m assuming that the second you heard about this hive you started forming an attack plan. I haven’t even been here half an hour, heck, I left my house just over an hour ago, and you’ve already got a whole battalion of soldiers mobilized, no doubt with re-enforcements on the way. Now what do you think you could have gotten if you had heard that there was a strange monster that was attacking a village. You would have come down on them full force, with a whole army and the elements of harmony.” I paused and waited for her response. When none came, I continued speaking,

“As long as it protects your precious little ponies you would commit genocide, wouldn’t you, Celestia ?”

Author's Note

Well that took forever. Between the start of school and breaking my hand I just couldn't seem to get any work done. Plus the fact I didn't like the way that the initial draft was going. Sorry about any characters that might feel like they aren't the same, i have been cobbling this together for the past forever and yeah. so as always, tell me what grammar and stuff I've failed.

in my headcannon alicorns and changeling kings/queens are not truly immortal, just really really REALLY long lived.