Author's Note

I decided to move my short stories from this story to a separate fiction. If you want to know how the Grand Illusion ends, it is there.

I hope you enjoy those stories and this chapter. Also, after you read this chapter, would you please tell me what you think? That would be delightful and helpful even if it is criticism.

Chapter 3: Buzz Off

Equus Bravo - Minos Peninsula - Iona - Nyantsu’s Tent

The accountant Autumn Wright stirred from her sleep. A draining sensation rolled through her entire body. She rested on the only clean bedsheets the cat woman Nyantsu could afford. Room-temperature fresh water in a vase laid at her feet. The roots that acted like talons dipped into the water and drank the liquid greedily. The dryad got up carefully but still faltered.

“Hold it,” the classical philosopher and war veteran Thomas Mackey coolly commanded. His voice had a quality to it that made him seem authoritative no matter to whom he spoke. “You were dehydrated. Drink this.”

The postmodern philosopher and former citizen of German Democratic Republic Bodo Stein handed Mackey a makeshift stone mug full of water. The dryad took a single sip but then started cough and vomiting. Saltwater exited her system and fell on the dirt floor of Nyantsu’s home. When she finished evacuating her body of the poisonous water, Autumn sipped the water once more. Sips turned into loud gulps, and the mug went from full to empty in span of a few moments.

“More,” she rasped. Nyantsu took her only mug from the accountant and the scampered off to fetch more water.

“Why don’t you just transform back into a changeling? That way you won’t feel thirst.”

Stein’s suggestion surprised the group. ‘Is it really that simple?’ the other two thought. Autumn made the transformation, which only took a moment as it was her natural form. The thirst for water ended and she no longer felt like she was being drained.

“I need love,” the dryad stated with a small cough. “I am nearly empty.”

The two philosophers looked at each other.

“Autumn was just as fine as we were before she left. Perhaps her changeling essence was being drained in order to keep her alive.”

“A distinct possibility, Mackey. We won’t know exactly how our new bodies work until we have more information.”

“We should probably start getting her some love.”

“Nyanstu could probably offer her some.”

“Or we could just give her some of ours.”

They nodded in agreement with the latter option. The two closed Autumn in a very awkward hug and let their instincts guide them through the process of love sharing. They had to stop abruptly time to time because Autumn would get greedy and start draining too quickly.

‘I don’t want to end up like Phallanx,’ Bodo thought with a shiver that ran down his whole spine. When they finished, the three sat down, and each quietly stared at different corner of the sparse tent. They could hear the faint sound of a little bell jingling between the periodic bleating of the goat outside. Bell got louder fairly quickly as its owner approached.

Suddenly came a scream, and a mug full over freshly drawn water smacked squarely into the Autumn forehead upon which the mug shattered. Nyantsu, who had entered the tent in an understandable rush, jumped onto the addled changeling. Bodo was too shocked to react, but the ever cool-headed Thomas held the cat person back by wrapped his arms around her shoulders.

“Let me at it. That monster destroy my village and stole my tom.”

“I don’t know what you are talking about,” the war veteran stated.

“Can’t you see she is a monster. We have to kill her before she kills all of us. That is what their kind does. They infest a town and then suck out all the life from it, leaving only a husk behind.”

“Autumn isn’t going to hurt anyone in this town,” Bodo interjected. “We are all leaving for Equestria.”

“You must be changelings too,” Nyantsu inferred. “I have to stop you before you destroy Equestria, you heartless monsters!”

She started thrashing in Thomas’s arms with renewed vigor. The worse thing was that they couldn’t neither defend their own kind nor say they were completely clean themselves. The group was forced to conquer Equestria after all.

“Hey, we might have plans for Equestria,” Bodo began, trying to defend his group. “But I can assure you that Equestria will be better off if we get our way without interference.”

‘From a certain Queen, that is. Nothing says a conquered country has to be a hellscape. We will just dominate the country by making the institutions we put into it stronger and more popular than the native Equestrian ones.’

“Liars!”

“I can assure you—”

Before Dr. Bodo Stein could finish, Autumn had bucked the cat person hard enough her changeling hooves to knock her out. Thomas set the unconscious feline down where Autumn had slept only a few minutes prior. Their eyes flashed green as Chrysalis’s mind control forced them to consider killing Nyantsu. They all in their own way rationalized why they shouldn’t and swallowed down the urge to murder.

‘Maybe she can be convinced to help our side,’ the postmodernist hoped.

‘We can use her to become better fighters,’ the classical philosopher argued.

‘She saved my life so has already aided in our mission,’ Autumn weakly concluded. Out of the three, she had the least objective reasons for preserving the cat’s life but the greatest personal one. The mind control tore at the changeling as she struggled against the imperative to ensure their mission completed successfully.

After Autumn resumed her dryad disguise, they left the tent. Bodo noted that the locals didn’t quite care about their unique ability to shapeshift, but the others didn’t want to take any chances. Outside the tent, they saw a lone goat tied to a post.

It was at this point that Autumn realized she hadn’t just assumed her disguise with her signature magical staff but also a book. Before the dryad could even read the title or tell the others, a voice caused them to go stock still.

“Oi, over here!”

Turning towards the voice, they found the bearded minotaur Major of Iona.

Equus Bravo - Minos Peninsula - Iona - Mayor’s House

Quick to take the Mayor away from the scene of the crime, the three disguised changelings went with the minotaur to his oceanside house. As they went there, Autumn passed the mysterious book to the other two. The title said it was How to Become Wise by Puddinghead. The philosophers questioned her where she found it, but the dryad said they would talk about it later.

“So you wanted to talk business?” the bearded bull asked with raised brow to Mackey after they had all gotten seat in his house. There was tea but no biscuits this time.

“We do, but please direct your questions to my esteemed colleague, Professor Wright.”

The dryad made a confused face.

“Mackey wants me to perform a concert with my illusion magic and human music, so that we can make the big bucks and get those expensive tickets,” Bodo clarified. “We need you to figure out how we are going to do this.”

“Um...okay,” Autumn uttered. The minotaur smirked at the unsure businessplant.

‘They will be putty in my hands,’ Kraghorn thought.

“First things first. We need discuss venue. How about the old amphitheater?”

“...Cost?”

Kraghorn smirked even more. He procured a small pouch of coins. “Consider it already paid.”

“Hey, that is my money!” Bodo Stein jumped from his chair, and Autumn pulled him back down with her right long arm.

“I don’t remember giving you permission to perform on our streets,” the Mayor pointed out to the musician-philosopher.

The dryad waved it off. “This is acceptable. Is this for use of the amphitheater?”

The Kraghorn nodded.

“We will agree under the condition you have it cleaned before we have this concert.”

The Mayor frowned. He had expected them to do the cleaning. “Of course,” he said with an offended tone. “What kind of minotaur do take me for?”

“So about ticket pricing….”

“You won’t charge a single bit to any minotaur who lives in Iona.”

Bodo jumped from his chair again. “I am not performing for free, you cheap—.”

The dryad sighed and pulled the philosopher down again. “I assume you want us to charge out-of-towners.”

“Yes, I can’t have you taking money out of Iona, now can I?”

“This is also acceptable. I assume you will also have your chefs cooking the local delicacies.”

The dryad leaned forward in her chair. It was far too small for the eight-foot plant person. Kraghorn rubbed his forehead. Her leaning had emphasized their size difference, and he was thinking that he might not be the one in charge anymore. He had expected the foreigner to be a pushover, but he was beginning to get intimidated.

“Of course, we will be cooking the best meals,” the Mayor stated while pulling at his beard. “We wouldn’t want to leave out the restaurants from this opportunity to bring much needed bits to our town.”

“Good because I had a look around town, and what I saw I wouldn’t feed my enemies. Also, all those fish parts have to go. No one wants to eat around rot and death.”

Kraghorn began to get indignant but swallowed his anger.

Thomas Mackey made a small motion with his fingers, which seemed all the larger because he made it. “Oh, I noticed that too. It is a shame really. They are throwing away parts of the fish away that make for some interesting dishes. When I was in Vietnam, I really liked nuoc mam.” His two companions stared at him. “I was the culinary specialist. I tried a lot of dishes, so that I could make food for my comrades in arms.”

“Looks like you might need a culinary specialist yourself, Mayor,” Autumn pointed out. “How about we hire Mackey here out to you in exchange a modest fee?”

“We are not giving you a single bit.”

Autumn only smirked at this. Her uncertainty was all gone now. “Then I assume you wouldn’t mind us keeping all the proceeds related to the concert.”

“Absolutely not,” Kraghorn barked. “Fifty-percent. You need us to get to Equestria.”

He had done his research on these three, and his fellow towntaurs had been all ready to tell him what they knew of them. That is how he found them in the shanties outside of town earlier.

“We get all of the proceeds,” the dryad countered, not haggling up an inch. “You are wrong. We don’t need you. We can just go down the rails to the next town by foot and get a better deal. You need us as your town needs anything to reverse the new capital outflow. Let me guess, the neighboring towns buy your fish products at a discount and then charge you a premium for necessities like medicine just because you don’t have access to other buyers while they can buy fish from any of the other villages on the coast here.”

Kraghorn sat stock still. At this point, Autumn’s head was almost directly over him since she was leaning so far forward. “Twenty-percent or leave.”

Autumn almost agreed but her eyes flashed green. The dryad got up and walked to the door. “Bodo, we are going.”

The musician-philosopher got up sheepishly. Even he was intimidated.

‘What about me?’ Mackey thought. He didn’t like being left out. It was bad enough that he didn’t know his special skill yet.

As the accountant the rusted doorknob, the Mayor called out. “You keep all the proceeds, but we get Mackey’s help for free. The amphitheater and festival ground will be ready in a week.”

Autumn didn’t even turn around. “Excellent. It is a deal, Mayor Kraghorn,” she purred as she walked out the door. “Take good care of the old geezer for me as we prepare for these concerts next week.”

Bodo Stein just stood by the door wide-eyed until a long wooden arm pulled him out by his ponytail.

Mackey watched the scene before him with a calm face. If Mackey could sweat, he would have also shared in wiping his brow with the bearded minotaur. Instead they shared a moment of eye-contact which communicated a truth that needed not to be communicated between the two. That was Autumn knew that the Mayor would cave and take Mackey.

Equus Bravo - Minos Peninsula - Pretty Much Everywhere that wasn’t Iona

Autumn Wright and Bodo Stein went town-to-town for the next week. At each town, Bodo would street performances and Autumn would sell leaf tickets, which she made with her dryad powers. The fishing villages tended enjoy Bodo’s renditions of romance and country songs, which meant a lot of Johnny Cash and Freddy Quinn. The upstream towns preferred jazz, swing, and, surprisingly, rock ‘n’ roll. Bodo tried his best to do some Louis Armstrong, Cab Calloway, and Benny Goodman, but had no trouble with introducing these towns to rock. Autumn suggested he play something more contemporary.

“Like what?” Dr. Stein asked.

“I don’t know. How about dubstep or techno?”

The postmodern philosopher looked as if he was going to puke, which was physically impossible since he became a changeling.

“Sure some dubstep may be good,” the ponytailed man replied. “But most of it is amateurs confusing robots fartings with music.”

His awareness of dubstep had actually surprised the dryad. She didn’t expected someone so old to even know it existed.

Bodo explained how his interest in music developed during his childhood growing up in Eastern Germany. Western was all over East Germany, but their bands had to follow strict rules like only playing in Germany and having their songs censored. He had grown up in Dresden where they had the least access to western sounds. When he was old enough, he moved out that town and closer to the border where they had access to the television and radio of what the government called Klassenfeind or the enemy of the working people. One of his childhood heroes was Frank Schöbel, who was one of East Germany’s biggest celebrities. His twenties were filled with the underground music scene where he played in a metal band with some of his other friends. Even after Reunification and coming to America to become a philosophy professor, he still kept up with music and played occasionally. His students often called him the Rockstar Professor because of it.

One of the thing that kept bothering Autumn in each town was the fact everyone went topless.

“You’ll get used to it,” Bodo soothed his comrade. “I doubt Equestria is any worse.”

The dryad didn’t respond as leaned heavily upon her staff as her legs didn’t want to cooperate for a moment. The philosopher laughed at her reaction and then sung a famous Robert Grave’s poem at her expense.

One town in particular gave them a lot of trouble. It was called Bucktown and was populated by Cyclopean yuppies. Their laws made it illegal for homeless people to be anywhere. The two changelings were technically homeless and bitless. That meant they could not legally sit down on the benches, use the public bathrooms, sleep outside, or perform in the streets. As Bodo explained, they lacked the right to exist even if the cyclops of Bucktown recognized their right to live. They had to use more roundabout methods to advertise their concert in Iona. This mostly consisted in talking to the local newspaper and passing out leaflets (posters and signs were also illegal). They also gave free tickets to the critics, hoping that their reviews would inspire more people from Bucktown to attend their later performances. (It wasn’t like they were only performing one concert after all.)

Between towns, they talked. First they talked about the mysterious book Autumn had gotten magically. It was currently with Mackey. The accountant would have gone back to get it, but that would have ruined her performance. They speculated about Arachne and the other dimensions they might have access to in the future.

When Autumn ran out of things to say about her weird dream, Bodo asked the accounting professor about her career and where she had learned to negotiate like that. She explained that she had always been good with math and business sense. When she was Luther Wright, she had her pick of careers. Looking down the list of courses at her local community college, she had merely picked the first one that fit her. That happened to be accounting, which was literally the first one on the major list. Wright went into managerial accounting as her career.

Her first job had placed her in a manufacturing company where she had to measure costs and provide periodic reports to her manager. That manager quickly learned that Wright had a knack for business and asked her for advice in all manner of topics. That was how the former human had gotten a understanding of marketing and business negotiating. When their company got bought out, she got eliminated in the consolidation. She then became an adjunct professor of accounting at Marble University and the rest led up to the present.

Finally, the discussed their mission. They got slightly sidetracked on how they might subvert Equestrian culture with music. This led to Bodo proposing anti-princess music so that they could sway Equestrian youths away from their benevolent dictators. Autumn suggested using the metal genre as she didn’t remember any Equestrians playing that and Bodo had mentioned he played in a metal band before. Bodo added that he would enjoy setting up a ‘battle of the bands’ as a way to metaphorically beat his way to the top of Equestrian music culture.

However, they concluded that should pace themselves as: 1) they didn’t know how well received Bodo’s music would be and 2) the professor was no music genius. He could copy excellently, but his own stuff needed a lot of work. It would have been easier to get one of Equestria’s many music savants and teach her heavy metal.

By the end of the week, they were exhausted. The two had slept outside almost every night in order to save bits. Once they had to fight off roadside robbers who had heard all about the ticket money they had gotten, which was about three hundred bits by the end of the week. Bodo didn’t have to use an illusion of a dragon to scare them off. All he had to do was constantly mess with their sense of touch to make their feet feel like they were or were not touching the ground, and they would trip. If you had ever walked up or down a staircase in the dark, you know what it is like to expect a step and it not be there. Autumn was no slouch with her staff either. Its incredible length allowed her outdistance all her melee opponents. When they returned back to Iona, the two took a much needed rest on Kraghorn’s dusty but soft couch.

Equus Bravo - Minos Peninsula - Iona - Amphitheater

The Mayor kept his word about cleaning the amphitheater, but that was it. The three changelings had to do everything else including setting up garbage disposal to educating the food vendors how to work the aisles. Tables were set up for the family section and the expensive ticket section. Everyone else would sit in the stands. It was a rush job, but the three even got the streets through town cleaned with the townstaur’s help and the absolute imperative to succeed in their psyche.

The evening came and those who bought tickets from the other towns came trickled in. It wasn’t a full house on opening night as most people didn’t respect Iona, seeing it was a dirty town. While they weren’t impressed, it wasn’t nearly as bad they thought. Some of Thomas Mackey’s recipes had actually turned out very popular though nuoc mam was more of an acquired taste.

Bodo was stationed as master of ceremonies and stood on the stage playing pleasant guitar songs while people entered to the amphitheater and took their seats. Autumn was mingling with critics from Bucktown and other VIPs. That left Mackey.

“What am I supposed to do? More cooking?” he asked.

“You, my dear rival and colleague, are my bodyguard,” Bodo told him during a short break. He gave the man a firm pat of the shoulder and then caressed his hand as it actually hurt to apply any force to the rigid man.

Thomas was incredulous.

“Just take off sweater and the shirt...and the undershirt,” Bodo suggested. Geez, how many shirts can one guy where. They aren’t even real. Out of his fancy clothes, the former soldier’s muscles were exposed. It wasn’t odd due to the topless custom of Iona. Autumn and Kraghorn gave Thomas a thumbs up each in encouragement and appreciation. “Excellent. Now don’t change a thing. Stand right where you are, and if someone looks like they are going to cause trouble, stare at them. Yes, just like that.”

Honestly, Thomas wasn’t doing anything he wouldn’t normally do sans his missing shirts.

The concert began without a hitch. Bodo opened with La Bamba. It was just him playing at first, but it grew exponentially more robust as he conjured more illusions to play and sing with him. One of the things he had discovered was that he could channel a crowd’s appreciation directly into his illusions instead of using it for food. The bigger and more appreciative the crowd, the more powerful the illusion. When the vocals kicked in, the Ionians got up and danced up and down the aisles. Some out-of-towners joined in, but most understandably kept seated and ate their food.

The postmodern philosopher opened his next song with a small speech.

“Hello everyone! How was that! Excited. I would be for we have a full evening of music from beyond the stars for you tonight. I am Doctor Bodo Stein, and I will be your master of ceremonies tonight.

“For our next song, I am going to play Die Gitarre und Das Meer by Freddy Quinn. It was a song from my youth. It is about a sailor named Jimmy Brown whose only friends are his guitar and the ocean. Using them as wingmen, he pursues his one true love Juanita. No other woman will do. As for Freddy Quinn, the man was once caught in a middle of a great war between a powers who wanted to rule the world. He used his fluent English pretend to be an American and get taken as a refugee.

“I can relate to the song because I come here with only two trusty friends at my side, and I will never swerve from my true love [philosophy] either. Like Freddy Quinn, I find myself far away from home with the fangs of a tyrant at my back. I too needed [and still need] to hide my identity to find safehaven in this world.”

The song began simply, and just like La Bamba, it became so much bigger. The crowd found themselves on a ship, rolling in the ocean waves. Stars fell from the sky and serve as lanterns. Couples kissed during the song while children chased after stars.

The applause afterwards was enough to feed and make the three changelings crackle with new power.

Bodo summoned illusions of Ray Charles and some background singers to play Hit the Road Jack.

During it, Nyantsu and two other cat people came to cause trouble.

“Lordy, we don’t have to fight,” Thomas told them.

“Don’t we!” Nyantsu shouted, disturbing the patreons next to her. She held in her hand a broken light blue collar with a bell on it. It was the one that had been on her neck. “You see this. It is broken. That means my tom is dead. You and your kind killed him.”

“Your kind is like a plague destroying everything that comes in their wake,” one of her comrades added.

Before he could say anything in response, Nyantsu pelted him with a stone hard in the shoulder. Whether it was his changeling chitin underneath or the power boost from the crowd, the stone shattered against his body, leaving only a scratch.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” the classical philosopher stated coldly. His eyes flared with green fire. There was no going around the imperative. Something strange had also happened. His hand had erupted in flame as well. Before he could question what was happening, the mind control kicked in, and he rushed the closest cat person. The tom was so surprised by Thomas’s sudden burst of speed that he didn’t even put up a fight when the philosopher placed his hand upon his forehead.

The burning hand branded the cat. Not his body, but his brain. Thomas could see all the inner workings of the cat. He could kill him, erase his mind, enthrall him, steal his memories, or even give him some. It was simultaneously the best teaching tool and the most horrible weapon the man could imagine. Having enough control to pick the ‘giving memories’ option, Mackey impressed upon the cat some his memories.

The cat simply curled up the ground and whimpered.

“What did you do?!” Nyantsu shouted as she prepped another stone in her slingshot.

“I taught him some sympathy for the devil,” he replied with icy tone and a flaming gesture. The other cat person had the good sense to retreat. “I will say this once: My comrades and I have done nothing to you and your tom. We three find the treatment of your people by the changelings abhorrent. We must complete our mission in Equestria. You can either join us or stay out of our way.”

“I would rather die than join you!”

“So be it. I give you one more decision: take your comrade and go or face a similar fate.”

His hand itched with the need to claim her. The foreign feeling disgusted him to his core.

‘Grab her head. Enthrall her to my swarm like I did her tom. Remember him. He was the cat who I fed upon when you first met me,’ came the voice of that vile temptress of queen through his mind. It wasn’t really her, but the magic she left inside him. He could somehow tell.

Her comrade convinced her to retreat as some bystanders were Ionians who didn’t take kindly to someone hitting their favorite non-minotaur cook. (He was the only non-minotaur cook in town, but the point stood.)

“This isn’t over,” Nyantsu declared. “I will chase you all the way to Equestria. When I get there, they will all know of your kind and how you destroy everything you touch with your unquenchable thirst for power.”

With that, they took the catatonic cat with them and got out of town.

‘You better hope I don’t see you again in Equestria. Jiminy Crickets, you were lucky I regained control in time to not mind melt you,’ Thomas thought ruefully. ‘At least now I know my special skill. I hope I can use it for more good than evil.’

Illusion Ray Charles had just finished his song, and Bodo started thanking all the major people who made the concert possible, including Mackey, who didn’t want thanks after that ordeal.

Master of ceremonies Bodo ended with a real showstopper in the form of illusion Nicholas Brothers. Their tap dancing was nothing the likes anyone in the Minos Peninsula had ever seen. They danced on the tables, pleasantly surprising the VIPs. When they did their splits routine down the amphitheater steps, they made all the bulls wince.

When they finished, the stomping was deafening. The Mayor came back stage all excited after the show. They discuss tomorrow show. Thanks to the critics’ awed reviews, tomorrow’s show sold out. They had enough bits by the end of the week to buy three-and-half tickets (three thousand and five hundred bits). Kraghorn didn’t want them to leave, saying that his town needed them.

“You need to stand on your two hooves, Mayor Kraghorn,” Doctor Thomas Mackey advised. The two had gotten close during their time together. The old, narwhal-fighting minotaur could be said to have become addicted to the classical philosopher’s cooking. “Make your own shoe. You must have local talent you can raise up. The theater isn’t going anywhere.”

The three left with much fanfare. The train station was packed. The same minotaur cashier who had incredulously told Autumn the ticket prices tried to deny their bits — more because he didn’t want to count three thousand bits than because he liked them.

The only thing Autumn could think as they entered the Pony Express 999 was what would come next. ‘Well, this ends the tutorial. We are about to face the politicians, millionaires, and royalty of the most powerful nation with only the ideas in our head and a few hundred bits. Our plans will not be enough. We will need help if we are going to succeed. It is time to prove friendship really is magic.’