Dawn in Little Hoofington.

A gray dawn, pale, like the mythical tall stallions of the apocalypse. It presided over the skeletal town below with hooves outstretched in the form of thick, masking clouds. They ruled the area of their own accord, for the local branch of the Pegasus weather service had long departed. Hardly a ‘town’ at all, the place was a gathering of less than twenty residents, who huddled under rickety shacks wondering if their stubborn desire to stick to their homes had been a mistake.

Soon, there would be one less.

Captain Silvermane’s heart was fluttering with pity, guilt, and regret, but he would not show it. Anger lived there as well – a fire that evaporated the heavy white all around him, borne of betrayal and terror. Homes had been broken, lives ended, and all for wont of love put to bad use.

Silvermane’s hate burned hot. Without his wife or his closest friends to confide in, only his martial discipline kept it from boiling over.

Upon the gallows platform stood Constable Dusky Rose, her military-striped cutie mark resplendent against the olive drab of her coat. She was wearing a black leg band, and her demenor was noticably subdued from the usual piss and vinegar Silvermane had come to expect. The loss of her deputy had harmed the constable more deeply than she wanted to let on, but she kept a steady marching cadence on the single snare drum levitated before her. Captain Silvermane had insisted the execution be carried out with military precision - as much to send a message as for respect of tradition.

Nearly the entire town, or what was left of it, had turned out for the show. They were milling about in the street before the gallows and the mining pit beyond, looking pensive yet wary. Missing only were the enigmatic Lora Lore, the escaped convict Stringbean, and the drunkard Beanie, who seemed to understand little apart from his own posting. This reduced the pool of spectators who were not present either as law enforcement officials, prisoners, or the condemned to a mere three ponies.

Against Silvermane’s better judgement, the Waffle children were also present. They were under the watchful eye of the scraggly sage green unicorn known as Whatzit, who had lapsed into a stern melancholy in the face of the proceedings. Silvermane wanted to order them away, but their mother, who stood beside them, demanded her entire family be present. Who was he to refuse? If anything, it might put their minds at ease – a dead changeling always reverts to its original form, and they would see their ‘father’ for what he really was soon enough.

Silvermane sneered at the prisoner whom he led on the green mile. The creature was back in the guise of Maple Waffle; not once had it allowed the Waffle family to see it in its true form. Surely the creature knew it was about to die – what was it expecting? That the Waffle family would leap in at the last moment to save it? Or was it just that vindictive of a beast, determined to torture those whom it had already robbed from until the last?

Silvermane could hear sounds behind him; Whatzit’s shushed attempts to give comfort to the family in the knowledge that their father’s killer was about to be brought to justice. But truth is often hard to divorce from perception, and the soft wails of the widow Waffle, coupled with those of her daughter, were plain to hear. Chocolate Waffle’s voice was not in the chorus, but Silvermane could feel the colt’s eyes on his back, lancing him like the lump of icy coal the boy resembled.

Silvermane glanced at the spectators. Caveat looked stoic and pensive, as if she had turned out in her battered armor plates for a routine cadet review. Cadabra Smile had an uncharacteristically shaken look, her head tilted to dip the brim of her brow over one eye. Kitty Contessa was the furthest away, and seemed oddly thoughtful. None of them bore reactions Silvermane came to expect from a spectacle as gruesome as a public execution, be they reactions of revulsion or perverse interest.

Silvermane floated the condemned to the scaffold. Maple Waffle’s grin was infuriating, but it lived behind a transparent purple bubble of magic that not only kept the fiend at bay, but suppressed his ability to take any form other than those that were easiest – those of other ponies. It was a complex spell, and one that neither Constable Rose nor Captain Silvermane could maintain for long. Placing a convict changeling in a cell with normal bars was inviting escape, so the princesses of sun and moon had thought to send along with their investigator a number of pre-prepared talismens that could reproduce the spell at will. It could be maintained for approximately eight hours, but after that not only would the spell fail, but the trinket it was attached to would crumble to dust.

There were only three such talismens remaining.

“You think you’re ridding the world of me,” the creature hissed under its breath. “You don’t understand anything. Everything I do is for the good of the hive. I’ve been prepared to die from the day I was hatched, and I’d do it in a minute if it meant that we get any closer to draining the sweet love out of another one of you prismatic bags of bones.”

Silvermane’s analytical mind was on the scene before him. Three ponies not present. Were they changelings, who had chosen to forsake their companion in order to maintain the act? Ten ponies who were present. Did any of them plan to effect a daring rescue of their ‘comerade’ at any moment?

Silvermane glanced at Cadabra, who had been incarcerated for a whole night in the jailhouse. Several of the townsponies seemed convinced that the arrogant Night cultist was the changeling queen herself, but if that were the case, could she not have altered her form to escape the prison at any moment? Had Beat Trotter’s watchful eye made that impossible, or had she merely chosen not to escape on purpose, to take suspicion off herself?

The drum beat ceased. Silvermane floated the magical sphere over to Rose, who began to fit the captured changeling within with a hood and noose. The spell only prevented the captured changeling from leaving, and thus she could still reach in. Rose had also thought todesign her knots tighten if the creature’s neck suddenly shrunk in size.

Silvermane felt compelled to address the crowd.

“…citizens of Little Hoofington,” he offered by way of stalling until he could think of something to say. “We have confirmed the identity of this creature, and in accordance with the power vested in me by the Princess of the Sun and the Princess of the Moon, I have ordered it to hang by the neck until dead.”

Buttermilk Waffle stifled a cry. She was blubbering into a hankerchief, and Whatzit was making a vain attempt to console her.

“He wants to kill me!” the hooded and noosed Maple shouted with a grin. “What do you all think of that?”

“Quiet you!” Rose snarled, her horn alight. “Y’damn monster, playin’ with their sympathies up till the very moment ya stretch!” She thrust her hoof at the Waffle family. “Y’killed their daddy, y’killed a good deputy, and y’prolly killed dozens more! Yer lucky this might go quick!”

Silvermane held up a hoof, demanding silence. He turned back to the crowd. “You have my solemn word as an officer of the royal court in the execution of my duty that this being is, in fact, a changeling. Several witnesses can corroborate this.” His voice remained even, his convictions firm. “I intend to carry out my duty, but if anypony wishes to speak, now is the time.”

Cadabra looked to Caveat, who puffed up next to her employer. Neither spoke, but the latter gave off a threatening air. Kitty Contessa turned away, a look of sudden disgust on her face. Silvermane couldn’t be certain if any of the spectators believed him. Perhaps they were simply eager for any result that promised to rid them of a foe they were otherwise powerless against.

“DADDY!!”

Strawberry Waffle was in hysterics, and Silvermane instantly regretted buckling under her mother’s insistence that they all be present. The filly was struggling against the combined grip of her mother and Whatzit, battling to get to the image of her father with all her juvenile might. Tears were streaming down her face, their flow matched only by those of her mother, who had her eyes shut tightly and was focusing only upon the firmness of her grip.

“Daddy, no! You can’t hurt my daddy!”

Silvermane could barely lay eyes on the spectacle. “This…this isn’t your father…” he muttered, his voice not carrying over the din. He cursed, stamping the scaffold with a hoof, and glared at the condemned, who stood tall despite the hood and noose it could not transform sufficiently to shrug off.

“You damn…thing!” he barked. “Spare her this! For the love of Celestia, die with some shread of decency! Die as the creature you really are!”

“Kill me,” Maple Waffle sneered. “Do it, Captain. Hang me, right in front of that family. Show the whole town that you mean business.”

Rose stood by the lever that would drop the floor out from under the condemned, magical sphere and all. She looked on, waiting for orders.

Silvermane hesitated.

Maple cackled. “Four Waffles, Captain! Four changelings!”

“What--?”

A number of screams rent the air, and Captain Silvermane suddenly found himself hurtling to the snowy ground below the scaffolding. Something had hit him in the back, and its weight was like an entire cart of apples being tossed at him by the winds of a tornado. He cursed and fought, kicking at the writhing form atop him, and finally managed to roll away from it. Narrowly avoiding the mining chasm, he came up on his haunches and took in the scene.

Strawberry Waffle was gone. In her place stood a timberwolf, three times the size of any specimen he had ever laid eyes on, it’s ghastly green eyes focused on him. It spoke, it’s voice a distorted mockery of the Waffle family daughter.

“Didn’t I say to leave my daddy alone!?” The beast snarled. “Now you’re going to pay, pony!”

A blast of Rose’s white fire exploded instantly upon the wolf’s shoulder, singing the wood of it’s body and eliciting a howl of pain. Silvermane took the opening and leapt forward to tackle the monster, surprised with the ease it took to send it sprawling. This one was in a menacing form, but it apparently wasn’t as physically adept as the one that stood ready to hang.

Shouts and hoof beats echoed about the area, but Silvermane had no time to see who had joined the fray or on what side. He found the creature’s throat, seized it, and began to squeeze; hesitating only when the monster converted its face to the guise of Strawberry Waffle, once again tearfully calling out for ‘daddy’.

An innocent filly. She might have lived a happy life, but instead she had ended up a mere snack for a monster – dessicated slowly and painfully, her body most likely never to be found.

Hector Silvermane felt something snap inside him. Stretched to its limit, his discipline snapped like a rotted rubber band, allowing a red torrent of blind fury to gush forth and envelop his vision. The changeling beneath him kicked. Caught off guard Silvermane was thrown back, but his last vestige of tolerance was gone. The creature became a jaguar and threw itself at him, fangs and claws to bear, but Silvermane didn’t so much as flinch. He was beyond fear. Beyond remorse.

With a powerful cry, Captain Silvermane bowed his head and impaled the creature with his horn directly into it’s maw. At the same moment, a stiff blade that could only be Caveat’s embedded itself into the changeling’s fuzzy back. Silvermane felt a disgusting slippery sensation as his horn smashed into the beast’s skull and went beyond, leaving the creature unable even to cry in anguish. Pierced to the grey matter and with its spinal cord severed, the changeling reverted to it’s true form – a rather scrawny specimen – and went slack, held aloft only by the head of he who had vanquished it.

Beyond rational thought, Silvermane shook his head violently from side to side, thrashing like a dog with a squirrel in its mouth until the black lump fell free. His helmet flew off, but he paid it no mind. Ponies were rushing about all over the place in various states of duress. There was no law, no order. Somehow the bubble around Maple Waffle had dissipated, and the large Pegasus, with a feral grimace, was atop constable rose on the scaffold dais, attempting to rip her horn right out of her head with a changeling’s fangs. Silvermane moved at a gallop, crashing into Maple sufficiently to knock him clear into the mining pit, from which he took wing and quickly recovered.

“You should have killed me when you had the chance Captain!” Maple cackled. “You should have killed us all!” Once I’m out of here, I’m going to go right back to ending each of you, one-by-one, and you’ll never, never find me aga—“

Maple choked. Glancing down, he found a large, smoldering hole straight through his chest, that was not part of a changeling’s usual look. Whatever organs he had there had been pulverized into green slime.

“And that’s fer Trotter, y’damned bug!!” Rose called, her horn smoking. “I’ll find y’all, and I’ll burn the lotta ya! So help me!”

Unable to retain his shape, Maple reverted to his original changeling form. Green ichor began to pour from his lips. His wingbeats slowed, turning into little more than convulsions, and he began to sink into the pit.

“…nghh…f-four ch-changelings…” Maple sputtered out his life’s breath. “…f-four Waffles…d-doom…t-too late…”

“NO!” A voice cried. Upon the dais was Buttermilk Waffle, her auburn curls flowing haphazardly around her. “No! No you won’t do this! My family!!”

Frenzied, Buttermilk leapt at Silvermane in an incomprehensible fury and began to batter him with her hooves. Unperturbed against the fruitless assault, Silvermane grabbed the smaller mare and shoved her into a post on the gallows, knocking the wind from her.

“You did this!” Silvermane accused. “You four are responsible for all of this! Posing as a family – with children – to earn our trust! Murdering in different ways just to throw us off! How dare you think you can waltz into Equestria and destroy our families, our loved ones, for a goddamn meal!?”

Buttermilk’s pupils shrank. “Wh-what are you…I would never—“

Silvermane slammed the mare against the post again, robbing her of speech. “Don’t LIE to me, monster!” He nabbed the noose in his magic and threaded her head through it as he held her. “You don’t want to show us who you really are!? You want to make us suffer as we watch our loved ones die right in front of us? I’ll make you change back!”

Buttermilk struggled, but the noose, well knotted by Rose, tightened with every thrash. The clinic pony began to choke, her hooves at her throat, wild panic in her eyes. “…n-…no…y-you’re….w-wrong…pl-pl-pleeea—“

Silvermane gave the lever a wicked kick, and the floor dropped out from under Buttermilk Waffle. There was a wicked cracking noise, and a moment later she was dangling from a rope, her only remaining movements a few involuntary twitches.

“Now you have to escape!” Silvermane shouted. “Show us! Show us what you really are!”

Buttermilk Waffle…swung.

Silvermane paused.

“…ch-change…” the captain muttered. “…show us, show us…what you are…f-four changelings, four Waffles…”

Nothing happened. A blast of magic took out the rope, but Silvermane’s own magic caught the body before it could tumble through the chute and out into the chasm. He held it close, his eyes meeting the bulging ones of the strangled mare.

“Change…dammit change!” Silvermane bellowed. He began to shake the corpse. “Show them! Show them what you really are!!”

But Buttermilk Waffle gave no reply. Like a marionette she hung in the glow of his magic, her tear tracks already beginning to dry.

“…no…” Constable Rose whispered. “…c-cain’t be…they…they turn back when they’re kill’t…”

Silvermane’s jaw was quivering. His haunted eyes glanced over Buttermilk’s shoulder. Zit stood, still near the jailhouse, with wide eyes. She made a protective symbol of the sun over herself and muttered something impercievable, while Chocolate Waffle just stood there, as blank and unreadable as ever.

“…I…y-your mother, I…” Silvermane tried to explain himself to the distant boy. “…I didn’t…didn’t mean, I…I thought she was…th-the evidence…she…”

Buttermilk’s body twitched, and the last of her breath involuntarily escaped her lungs. Silvermane hurled her to the floor of the dais and frantically went about the act of recusitation, but the perverse angle of her neck showed that she was beyond all help. Silvermane pounded upon her chest, forcing air into her lungs until Rose yanked the corpse out from under him with her magic and tossed it into the chasm.

“NO! What are you doing!? We can save her!”

“She’s done, Cap’n!” Rose shouted back. “Done ‘n gone already, let her rest!”

Silvermane tried to push his way past the grizzled old constable, but found her stance as solid as any stone. He watched, helpless and too hysterical for magic, as the corpse dropped into the patient dark. The air resistance caused Buttermilk’s wings to unfurl, and for an instant, she looked like a healthy Pegasus, casually drifting beneath the clouds to a safe landing.

Silvermane gave his all to summon up his nerves, but he had nothing left to give. Sobs wracked him, and he collapsed into the embrace of the old warrior who held him fast.

“…n-no…what have I…what have I…”

Rose shushed him, and then muttered: “…s’gonna be us all soon, Cap’n. At least it was quick fer her.”

Silvermane watched the body vanish from sight.

Author's Note

Maple Waffle has died. Maple Waffle was the changeling drone.

Strawberry Waffle has died. Strawberry Waffle was the changeling forger.

Buttermilk Waffle has died. Buttermilk Waffle was the nurse.

Captain Hector Silvermane
Constable Dusky Rose
Deputy Beat Trotter (Jailer)
Whatzit
Cadabra Smile
Lora Lore
Stringbean
Kitty Contessa
Whim (Partypony)
Maple Waffle (Changeling Drone)
Buttermilk Waffle (Nurse)
Chocolate Waffle
Strawberry Waffle (Changeling Forger)
Scoops (Reporter)
Specs (Watchpony)
Caveat
Beanie