It was a beautiful day in Ponyville, with all the ponies going along their daily chores. The Cakes were baking their sweets with Pinkie Pie helping them, Twilight was busy with her books and princess duties, Rainbow Dash was taking care of the skies, and Fluttershy was caring for her animals. On Sweet Apple Acres, Applejack was busy harvesting apples with the help of her siblings, Big Mac and Applebloom. In her shop, Rarity was working on her clothes to sell to visitors and townsfolk alike.
In the middle of town, not too far from the Castle of Friendship, there was an empty house. It had been sold to an unknown pony that was supposed to move in that day, and Pinkie was setting up her Welcome to Ponyville Welcome Wagon. She was determined that this pony was going to have the best welcome he could possibly have. That's all they knew about him. He was a stallion. While she was preparing her welcome wagon, a newcomer was walking through the town, causing all the ponies who saw him to run and hide.
You, see, the new resident of Ponyville was a Changeling. He was one of the few changelings who didn't feed off of love, so he decided to leave the hive and hivemind and to go live wherever he wanted. So, like any changeling that was unfamiliar with the outside world, Shattershell decided to go to the worse possible place where a changeling could be. He was clueless about the danger he was in, however. He honestly thought that the place was rather nice and was eager to find his house. He was using his magic to levitate the luggage behind him, but was very confused as to why the ponies ran and hid. He shrugged it off. Maybe they were nervous of newcomers. He got to his house and looked up at it proudly. He was the first Changeling to own a house and not be disguised. It was a rather big house as well, but he managed to get enough money from working around the kingdom at various jobs. He had experience in a lot of fields, but he wasn't to keen on some of the jobs he had taken in the past.
Taking the key out of his saddlebag, Shattershell unlocked the door to his house and went in. He set the luggage down in the first room, which he saw was the living room, and decided to explore the house to get a feel of navigation. Meanwhile, Pinkie Pie and the rest of the Mane 6 were outside the house, ready to greet the new neighbor. Seeing the door was open, Rainbow decided to let herself in. Twilight, however, stopped her.
"Rainbow, you can't just walk into somepony's house, that's rude!"
Shattershell, who was currently in the upstairs area, decided that the room he was in would be a good work area. He went downstairs as Rainbow went back outside and used his magic to grab one of the boxes and bring it upstairs. Rainbow was able only to see the box glow with a magical aura and disappear from sight.
"Hey, looks like we have a unicorn! Let's hurry up and go greet the new guy."
Unable to stop her, Twilight could only watch as Rainbow zoomed in the house. She sighed and decided to follow with the others. Shattershell was setting the box on the floor and thinking how he was going to do this when Rainbow zoomed by. She quickly came back to the room Shattershell was in to confirm what she had seen. Yep, a changeling. In Ponyville.
She was about to attack when Twilight grabbed her and shushed her.
"Let's see what he does. Maybe we can find out something about Chrysalis from him." she whispered.
Rainbow wasn't happy about the idea, but saw the logic in it. The rest of the ponies watched as the changeling opened the box. Shattershell took out a typewriter and set it on the floor.
"How am I going to use this thing if I don't have a table?"
He decided that in order to get started on his work, he had to get a table from one of the other rooms.
"Ok, take one table from the other rooms, then I'll just use it until I buy a proper table for it."
Walking out of the room, he went into the dining room and took the table from there. He didn't see the girls spying on him, but he wasn't exactly paying much attention to anything but getting his house set up. Bringing the table into the room, Shattershell placed the typewriter on top of it. Nodding in approval, he went back downstairs and got his boxes and started unpacking, all the while the girls watching.
Eventually, he could feel their gazes on him and looked around. They managed to hide in time, but now Shattershell was nervous.
"Hello?"
No one answered so he went back to unpacking his cups and plates. He was rather uneasy now, however. He kept feeling somepony watching him. He kept turning around, looking for anyone that was watching him. When he finished unpacking, he put water in a kettle and set it on the stove. While that was boiling, he would deal with finding out why he felt like he was being watched. Looking around the house, he was unable to find anyone. The girls were doing their best not to be found by the changeling, and so far they were succeeding.
Eventually, Shattershell shrugged it off and went back to the kitchen to remove the screaming kettle from the stove. He sighed as he poured steaming water into a mug and put in some tea leaves.
"This is gonna be a long day…"
Rainbow was getting impatient with the waiting. She wanted some action. And just watching a changeling doing some simple things wasn't very exciting. She decided to give it five more minutes before she decided she was just going to jump the changeling and make him tell them what he was up to.
Right now he was just sitting there. He was completely open, no disguise on. Was he really that confident? One thing was different from what she had seen on most changelings with him, however. His chitin was covered in crack scars. It would seem like his chitin had broken and healed before. This meant one of two things since they knew next to nothing about changelings. Either his chitin was stronger than usual or weaker than usual. Wouldn't matter to her either way. All she needed to do was pin him down and they would get their answers. But what he was doing now confused them all.
He had gotten out six more cups and was filling them with water and tea leaves.
"I know you're there. Come on out."
He was looking towards them. They decided that they might as well go from scouting to fighting, so they came out, prepared for a battle. But they never got the battle.
"It's sorta rude to sneak into a neighbors house, ya know. I'm pretty sure that's called breaking in."
He didn't look very happy, but Rainbow didn't care.
"You mean how you and your friends broke into Canterlot?" Shattershell sighed in frustration.
"And of course, you use that incident. Ok, first of all, I wasn't part of that. I was against that. But the queen was desperate. And two, we were starving. So while you and your fancy ass friends were having your bucking tea and crumpets, we were dying."
"That still doesn't excuse what you did." Twilight replied. Shattershell decided that he didn't really like these neighbors.
"Ok, star ass, what would you do if you and your family were starving and a free source of food was right in front of you? You'd take it! But you guys live the high life, but the changelings that have to eat love to live have to starve, is that it? Because you guys are to bucking selfish to share your love with the poor 'Parasites' as we're called. Why don't you guys just go buck yourse-"
It was at this point the Shattershell had to duck from Rainbow flying at him.
"And another thing! Not all changelings are bad! Ya racist motherbuckers!"
It would seem that this changeling was someone who just didn't give a buck. As he kept ranting, the girls came to the conclusion that they would need to try different methods to bring him to justice.
After finally running the rude ponies out of his house, Shattershell decided he might as well finish setting up his house. He had his kitchen set up, so now he could fix basic meals. He was relatively new to cooking, so he was going to have to continue learning via cookbooks, but he didn't have a problem with that. His career was typing books, after all. He was always interested in a good book. After he drank his tea, he got back to work unpacking his stuff.
It was nearing the end of the day when he finally got the house all set up. Tomorrow he could focus on his work. Deciding that he was to lazy to cook, he decided to go to the local restaurant to eat. Walking out the door, he locked it behind him. He wasn't too sure what this place was like and he didn't want to be robbed. Walking through the town, he was thinking of what the best meal to get would be. Probably a salad would be best. And cheapest. For a while, he would have to be a penny pincher and buy the cheapest things. A salad with no dressing should be the cheapest thing on the menu.
Getting to the restaurant, he sat down and looked at the menu. As he thought the salad with no dressing was five bits for a small and ten for a large. Since he was rather hungry, he decided that the best way to go was to order the large and just not eat until dinner tomorrow. As he waited, no one came to take his order. In fact, no one was outside. So, he decided to go inside to get his food. Sitting down inside, he was getting looks of fear from the other customers. This didn't bother him. Wasn't his problem that they were racist assholes. Sitting at an empty table, he waited for his order to be taken. Looking around, he saw that it was a rather nice place. Maybe he could apply for a job here. If the owners weren't racist.
As he waited, he thought about all the other possible jobs he could take on to raise money. He could always grow flowers to sell in bouquets. Or start a little bakery. Writing isn't going to be able to keep him up on his hooves until he got his first novel out. Then the option of science came to him. He already knew a lot when it came to science, so it shouldn't be to hard. Sighing in annoyance, Shattershell looked around for a waiter and saw one serving a table. He decided to wait until it was his turn to be served. After another fifteen minutes, the waiter finally decided to come serve him, albeit hesitantly.
"Can I take your order?" Shattershell was happy that the waiter wasn't racist and didn't try to kick him out.
"Well, I'll take the large salad."
"Ok, what else?" Shattershell looked through the menu real quick, but saw nothing cheaper than the salad.
"Nothing else, thank you." The waiter nodded and went off to the kitchen.
The other ponies were looking at him weird. They were confused because they thought that changelings ate love, not physical food. But since Shells was a different changeling, he didn't apply to the rules. While he was waiting for his salad, the ponies that caused him trouble early that day came in, talking to each other. He decided that he might as well ignore them and took out a book. As he read, he saw that the ponies were coming closer. There was an empty table beside him, and it looked like they were heading for it.
'Oh boy, not these guys again. Can't they just leave me alone?' he thought to himself.
The group of ponies sat at the table next to him. The pink pony and shy one didn't do anything, but the rest of them glared at him. Rolling his eyes, he thought over the options of what he could do to earn money. Maybe he could bake stuff. Science could be a hobby that eventually pays off. Writing he would do at night before bed. Then again, maybe he should do the writing while he was on break. That would be the best way to write because if he typed before bed, his mind would be racing for the entire night. Then he would be tired the next day. Then again, growing flowers seemed to be a good idea as well. Maybe he should do all the options. It would give him the most amount of bits. Nodding to himself, he decided that's what he would do.
"That's what I'll do. That should give me an advantage." Talking aloud may not of been the best idea, with the eavesdropping ponies sitting at the table next to him, but he had the habit of talking to himself. They would just have to deal with it. After five more minutes of waiting, his salad finally arrived. It looked rather nice, so he decided to dig in.
Grabbing a fork, he started eating, annoyed at the staring the ponies where doing. He sighed in annoyance. Why didn't ponies know how to mind there own business? This was starting to annoy him, so he hurried up and ate the salad, and left the payment with a three bit tip. Leaving the restaurant, he went home to see if there was any flowers around his house. It would be cheaper getting flowers from the wild to use for his garden instead of buying seeds from a store.
He didn't find any flowers, so he decided that he might as well go search the rest of the town for them. He searched the whole village, but didn't find any flowers. Then those annoying ponies started following him. Why couldn't they just leave him alone? He shook his head. Typical ponies. Deciding to ignore them, he saw a forest ahead of him. A forest would usually have flowers in it, right? Going into the forest, he started searching for any flowers that he could find. He found some golden flowers and grabbed a few. Looking over, he saw pink, blue, red, and orange flowers. He grabbed a few of each and started heading back to his house. It was rather peaceful around here. A lot better than at the hive. He liked this place.
"Man, this place is amazing! I think I hit the jackpot. A nice place to settle down and enjoy life. Grow some flowers, bake some goods, type some stories. Maybe invent something that's useful. Who knows, I might even settle down one day and have a family."
In the bushes, a few yards away from him, the mane six sat, watching his every move. They wanted to know what he was up to. There was no way in Equestria that they would be letting him disturb the peace that they work so hard to maintain.
"What is he talking about? Starting a family? Is he gonna bring the hive here?" Rainbow Dash wondered. Twilight thought for a moment.
"Maybe. I think I have an idea of what his plan might be. He wins over Ponyville with flowers and baked goods, then he types a letter to the hive to let them know that it's ok to invade. I think that might be it. It's the only reasonable thing that I can think of."
Applejack wasn't to sure. "What about Thorax? He might be like him. A good changeling."
"But he isn't reformed like the rest of the changelings, AJ. He could be a spy for Chrysalis." Twilight responded. They all knew one thing, however. They had no idea what Shattershell was doing.
