“What a lovely but absolutely ridiculous sentiment,” Queen Chrysalis snorted as she gazed out the window to the ravaged streets below. Already her changeling army had overtaken the city. There was nothing that anypony could do now. However, the victorious feeling the changeling felt was only temporary, for at that moment two of her top generals burst into the room, their exoskeletons battered and bruised. One was missing a leg, the other was missing his head. This was not a problem, however, as changelings can survive up to three months without their head, and in that time can regenerate a new one.
“Your majesty!” bellowed the one-legged changeling, “We’re under attack!” Chrysalis immediately shot him down with a shaft of green energy.
“You idiot!” she screeched, “We’re the ones attacking! How many times did I explain this to you?! Now you’ve ruined my moment of triumph!”
“But your majesty…” the general muttered weakly, “We really are under attack…” Chrysalis fired another beam at his smoking husk, sending him into the wall.
“By who?” she growled through clenched teeth.
“Dogs…” came the raspy reply, “Rabid, mad, killer packs of dogs…” The general then proceeded to pass out. Chrysalis snarled indiscriminately and sent a blast at the headless changeling, who up until this point had been very confused. The other changelings in the room looked at their queen questioningly, not sure if and when they should begin panicking. Chrysalis quickly picked up on this, and was determined not to let their victory become another miserable defeat.
“Don’t listen to them!” she barked, “We’re fine! Everything’s fine! They’re just a couple of idiots! Everything is completely under my control!” Her reassurance of her victory inevitably proved false, as moments after she spoke, she noticed a series of loud and horrendous noises coming from outside. The Changeling rushed towards the window, blocking it before any of her minions could see outside. The sight that awaited her eyes made her simultaneously furious and frightened.
The City of Canterlot was now under siege by not one army, but two. The second army that was currently rushing down the streets seemed to be made of strange canine-like creatures, clad in rudimentary vests. They were among the ugliest beasts Chrysalis had ever seen, with huge ape-like forearms and weirdly clubbed tails. Clutched in their massive paws was a mixture of tools, weapons, and torches. They had shovels, swords, pick-axes, axes, mallets, pitchforks, every single kind of sharp, blunt, and edged object imaginable. Males, females, even puppies, had all banded together to form a wave of snarling, barking, enraged warriors that were currently ransacking everything in sight.
Chrysalis watched in shock as they bore down on her changelings, attacking with a fury so strong that it even made the war-hardened queen quake with fear. She backed from the window, trying to recover her wits.
“Your majesty,” quipped an unnamed changeling, “What is happening?”
“I’m…not entirely sure…” came the quiet reply. Chrysalis looked back at her captives. As they were looking down at the attack with horrified looks on their faces, Chrysalis felt her wings tremble with rage.
“Don’t look at them!” she shouted in Twilight Sparkle’s face, “Look at me! I’m the one who worked her wings off planning this invasion! I’m the one who took it over! Not the marauding pack of mangy mongrels!” As she spoke, several of her finest warriors were fired via makeshift catapult through the castle’s windows. The room suddenly grew very quiet as there was a loud crash several floors below, followed by the triumphant howls of the invaders. Seconds later a group of bedraggled Changelings came limping in through the door.
“They’ve breached the castle,” one choked as it fell over, “They ate all the donuts…”
“And drank all the punch,” wheezed another. Upon hearing this, Chrysalis flew into a rage. She had just learned that all the donuts and punch she had ordered for the Changeling Victory Party had been unceremoniously devoured by the unruly beasts.
“Those…dumb…brutes!” she screamed as her body was enveloped in a ring of green fire, “When I get my hooves on them, I’m going to tear them apart! They’ll be sorry that they ruined my day of triumph!” She turned to her minions, who were looking very worried as the sound of ragged paws could be heard tearing through the castle.
“Formation!” bellowed the queen. Her small group of guards and peons quickly made a makeshift front line in preparation for the upcoming assault. Chrysalis walked up and down the line behind them.
“My fellow changelings,” she growled viciously, “These uncivilized abominations of nature have stolen our victory, bested our warriors, and,” she paused with a twitch of her wings, “Eaten all of our donuts and drank all our punch. These acts are deemed unforgivable as dictated by the ancient code of our people! Therefore, these mongrels must be brought to justice! Kill them! Slaughter them all! Turn them white with fear! For this day will be ours yet!”
Though her speech was riveting and inspiring, it did little to actually aid the changelings the second the horde of dogs came barreling down the hallway. The majority of them almost forgot their mindless devotion to their queen as they saw the dogs leer at them with wild, half-mad eyes, their toothy maws frothing with foam.
The Changelings instantly morphed to take the form of their adversaries, and the enemy momentarily halted in confusion. But what the insectoid equines forgot was that dogs have vastly superior olfactory abilities compared to most creatures. Therefore they were able to tell who was on their side merely by smelling them. The canines made quick work of the much smaller creatures, as each was strong enough to hit them across the room with a single blow.
“Death to the whistle-beasts!” howled the dogs as they mowed down the shape-shifters. Chrysalis watched with her eyes wide in shock, not even flinching as a changeling nearly struck her head as it was thrown out the window. In mere moments the queen stood alone, surrounded by a pack of rabid canines. She was too utterly astounded by the ineffectiveness of her army to prepare an attack of her own. Chrysalis turned to the cocooned Celestia, her eyes wide in fear and rage.
“You knew!” she shrieked madly as she pointed an accusing hoof at the Princess, “You knew I was here! They were just outside the city, waiting for the right moment to ruin my victory!” Celestia was comatose, so was completely unable to verify the queen’s accusations. A piece of masonry suddenly whizzed past her head, nearly taking off her horn. The queen looked to see three dogs in the lead, the largest one ripping out chunks of the floor and hurling it at her.
“Get the whistle-beast queen!” snarled the second largest one. The mob behind him followed his lead as he rushed towards the changeling, who took to the air. As she zoomed towards the window, she heard her adversaries cry out in terrible agony. She looked back to see them clutching their ears. This greatly confused Chrysalis, as she did not know that it was her porous legs that caused them such grief. Nopony did, as it turned out, because while changelings appear to fly soundlessly, the wind rushing through their holey legs actually produces a whistle so high in pitch that only certain creatures can hear it. One particular species, known as Diamond Dogs, find the noise absolutely maddening.
Chrysalis thought she was going to make it, but when she was only inches away from the window she felt a set of jagged teeth clamp down on her backside. The changeling cried out in pain as she looked back to see a small, tan-colored runt of a dog gnawing on her rear end. In her pain and embarrassment, the queen veered off course and crashed into the wall. In the following moments she found herself hogtied and lifted into the air by dozens of coarse, dirty paws. The canines cheered and held their weapons aloft, and several members of the pack began a festive jig.
“Let me go this instant, you hideous cur!” snarled Chrysalis, “I won’t allow you to humiliate me like this!”
“Put her in the Cone of Shame!” cried the leader dog, referring to a cruel punishment devised by Diamond dogs, reserved only for the most serious of offenders.
“The what?!” cried Chrysalis. As if in response, the canines began chanting joyously.
“Cone of Shame! Cone of Shame! Cone of Shame!” they bellowed as they pumped their fists in the air. Chrysalis screamed as they carried her out of the room, their cheering and laughing disappearing down the hallway. Soon, the wedding party was left in a stunned silence, each member still unable to believe what had transpired in the past fifteen minutes. The soundlessness was broken when the bottom of Celestia’s cocoon suddenly fell out, and the solar princess plopped to the ground.
