Outside the Ashlands

Cinder and Dactylus stared at each other awkwardly as they continued slowly shaking hands, sweat pouring from their brows. "So uhhh…" Dactylus said nervously. "Are you going to breath fire on me now?"

"No... Are you going to lay eggs in my eyes?" Cinder asked shakily.

"What the heck? Of course not!" Dactylus said in shock as he pulled his hoof from her grasp. The bug pony looked justifiably offended at that comment. "Why would I ever do that?"

"I mean... you are a bug pony thing..." Cinder tried to explain as she took a step back.

"First of all, I am a male, thought that would be pretty obvious! Secondly-" Dactylus started before he was cut off by Cinder.

"I'm sorry ok? Sheesh." Cinder said as she crossed her arms over her chest. "I'm just a little nervous because I've never seen a changeling before jeez."

Dactylus sighed and shook his head. "It's fine. Lot's of the pony upper class say worse things...." He said with a complete lack of enthusiasm.

Cinder decided she needed to change the subject. "Soooo..." She started as she leaned to the side, peering past Dactylus towards the statue of the taller changeling and the whip, which was now sitting in the center of a small shrine in front of it. "What were you uhhh… doing to yourself."

Dactylus perked up with a frown and stepped to the side, blocking Cinder's view. "That is none of your concern." He sternly voiced as he brought his face an inch away from hers.

Cinder took a step back with her eyes wide open. "Uhhh… are you sure or..." She started before Dactylus silenced her with a hoof pressed against her mouth.

"Yes." He curtly said.

"O-Ok." Cinder replied slowly. The awkward silence returned full force as the two continued to stare at each other for what seemed like hours.

"Sooo… Cinder..." Dactylus said as sudden determination flashed in his compact eyes. "Are you evil by any chance?"

"What?!? Of course not!" Cinder shouted at him. Dragons weren't evil! They were just superior to all other races! Well... actually... According to Ash, apparently Changelings were equal to Dragons.

"Good!" Dactylus said as he suddenly straightened himself up, grinned and started walking past her. "I'm going to introduce you to my little sister. She's always wanted to meet a dragon!"

Cinder was hesitant as Dactylus walked past her. The Dragon Lord and the General would certainly not want her deviating from her mission! She had to reach Ponyville! The second the changeling had his back to her, Cinder turned and raised her leg as if to run.

The collar around her neck suddenly squeezed tightly, cutting off her airflow. Blood red letters shot out of it and into her line of sight. "Follow him." They spelled out simply, before shooting back into the gem in the center.

"Are you coming?" Dactylus asked as he turned his head to look at her.

Cinder coughed as her magical collar loosened allowing her to catch her breath again. "Y-yeah! Just a second!" Cinder said as she turned and ran off to join him.

The dragon and her new unexpected companion slowly walked down a winding dirt path through the forest floor. Along the entire way Cinder found her eyes drawn to her surroundings.

She found herself loving the plants and animals she saw, from the towering oaks, to the adorable bunny she saw jump past them. (Ignoring the fact that when she first saw it, she ended up latching onto Dactylus's leg out of fright. Dactylus had to spend several minutes explaining to her that it was just a mere rabbit, and no threat at all.)

It was noon by the time the two of them arrived atop a hill looking down at a rather large clearing in the center of the forest. Cinder could make out a small hamlet at the center of the clearing, made up of barely two dozen or so houses. The Hamlet was odd in appearance to say the least.

Half of it seemed to be made up of wooden houses with thatched roofs ,Which she had been drilled in exactly how to burn to the ground in her youth, while the other half were ovular in shape and made of stone. They appeared to be shaped like beetle shells actually. Minus legs and antennae of course.

Those were probably where the Changelings lived actually. It only made sense because of their whole buggy appearance.

"Whelp, there it is. My hometown." Dactylus said with a smile as he turned to Cinder. "You like it?"

"It's a lot better than the place I grew up in..." Cinder lied. The Dragon lands were much better than this group of highly flammable matchboxes and stone bugs.

"Where was that?" Dactylus asked as he started walking down the hill to reach the hamlet.

"A hole underground..." Cinder said. Ok, the Dragon lands were great. She just lived in a bad part of it.

"Uh huh... yeah I can see that." Dactylus said with a nod.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Cinder grunted back, her eyes narrowed.

"That my village is better than a hole underground." Dactylus replied.

"Oh."

"What did you think I meant?"

"Something not nice."

The two continued a minor banter until they arrived at the entrance to the small village, a small cobblestone pathway leading up to a center plaza. The two of them were very suddenly stopped by the somewhat intimidating sound of buzzing wings above them.

They both looked up in time to see a changeling in silver Equestrian Guard armor slam down in front of them. He rose to his full height and stared down at them with anger in his compact eyes.

"Who goes there?" The changeling said in a very deep and intimidating voice which caused Cinder to visibly flinch. The yellow dragon found herself once more latched onto Dactylus in fright.

"Spinneret! I thought your dad told you to stop pretending to be an Ecotes! You keep scarring Butterfly." Dactylus said with a frown as he gestured to Cinder with a hoof.

"Oh that's butterfly?" The scary changeling said with a... little fillies voice? There was a flash of light as the guard transformed into a small pink changeling, only slightly larger than the one she had seen in the forest earlier. "Sorry, I thought that was a mean dragon that was holding you hostage!"

"Dragons are extinct Spinneret. Everyling knows that." Dactylus sighed as he pleadingly cast a glimpse over to Cinder.

"Nuh-uh! I saw one yesterday." Spinneret replied with a frown.

"That was just a really big bird if anything." Dactylus said before he grunted. "Shouldn't you be playing with Lightning Shine right now?"

A neon yellow unicorn colt suddenly ran up to 'Spinneret' and tackled her from the side. "Caught you!" The pony yelled as Dactylus ushered Cinder to move. The taller changeling started to quickly shimmy away from the colt and filly while their attention was on each other.

"Hey no fair!" Spinneret shouted. "We agreed that all games had a truce in place when I turned into an Ecotes!"

"But you weren't an Ecotes when I caught you." The colt explained cheekily.

Spinneret grunted before turning her head over to Dactylus and Cinder who were practically running now.

"Hey Dactylus!" She shouted, prompting them both to freeze in place. "Can you and Butterfly come play hide and seek with us? It's boring when it's just us two..."

"Maybe later!" Dactylus hesitantly called back just before the two left earshot.

"What was that about?" Cinder asked as Dactylus pried her off him.

"Oh those two. They're the only kids in the village besides Butterfly, and they get really annoying about my 'playing with them.'" Dactylus said with a sigh as he turned his head.

"No I mean why did you call me Butterfly? Also, mind if I ask what an Ecotes is?" Cinder asked as the two closed in on the village center. The little drake was honestly surprised at the village's population as she glanced around. It seemed rather equally split between ponies and Changelings as the groups went about their business not paying the two much mind besides the occasional smile and wave.

"I told you. Butterfly likes dragons. And the Ecotes are the Changeling equivalent of soldiers I guess." Dactylus said.

"That's kind of a weird name for them..."

"Oh well, the scientific name for soldier ants is Ecotini, so we replaced the ini with es to make it sound intimidating. Boom, soldier ant soldiers." Dactylus said as the two passed a large flagpole in the center of the plaza.

Cinder found her eyes drawn up to the flag waving in the wind. It was the Equestrian flag, that much was certain. It had the two, apparently retired, princesses Celestia and Luna circling a sun and moon combo thingie. The weird thing about this particular flag however, was the fact that in the center of the sun and moon was what looked to be the cyan silhouette of a changeling's head, which, like the statue in the woods from before, had two mandible like antlers.

"What's with the flag?" Cinder asked as she stopped in place and craned her neck to stare directly at it.

"Oh, that's the flag of the Ocelli. It's a faction of Changelings that lives here in Equestria. Named after our founder, Ocellus." Dactylus said as he too stopped. "The head in the center represents our god, Thorax. Most of the Ocelli live in a big old city a couple dozen miles to the north east of here. It's called Succoria."

Cinder cocked a sudden eyebrow. "You mean that statue in the woods was Thorax?"

"Yeah."

"That's not how I pictured him honestly." Cinder said scratching her head.

"You've heard of him before?" Dactylus asked with honest surprise in his voice. "And here I was thinking you lived under a rock your entire life."

"I did though..." Cinder replied.

There was a crack as Dactylus hit himself in the face with a hoof. "It's just an expression, now come on." Dactylus said with a sigh.

The dragon and changeling finally arrived at their destination, the largest house in the village. It was one of the beetle shaped one and had two large double doors in front, alongside some screen windows, and a rocking chair on a small wooden porch. A pile of firewood sat drying just off to the side of her vision, which struck her as fairly odd considering the fact that she had never experienced the concept of 'cold' in her life.

"Wait out here. I'll go get Butterfly." Dactylus said as he opened one of the buildings double doors and stepped inside.

It took approximately five seconds before Cinder heard shouting from inside which prompted her to open one of the doors and peek her scaly head inside.

Dactylus was angrily staring down a red Pegasus teenager with a messy purple mane who was sitting smugly at a table in what seemed to be a kitchen/dining room. An archway towards the far wall opposite the door she was at seemed to lead further into the house.

"You're back pretty soon Dactylus. Your punishment must have been pretty quick today huh?" The Pegasus said in a rather devious voice.

"Shut your mouth, heathen." Dactylus replied, which caused the Pegasus to slam her hooves onto the table in front of her and stand up.

"Don't call me a heathen you fanatic!" She yelled back at him.

"Atheist!"

"Cultist!"

"Harlot!"

The Pegasus loudly gasped before they both suddenly turned to the archway and simultaneously screamed a single word;

"DAD!!!"

Cinder found herself gasping when, suddenly Pupa and Magenta, the two adults she had met in the woods earlier, came running through said archway. "What? What is it?" Pupa or Papa or whatever his name was said with great worry.

Dactylus and the Pegasus pointed at each other. "He/she called me a Harlot/Cultist!" The said, once again simultaneously, using a different word respectively.

Magenta sighed and sat down, clasping her face with her hooves while Pupa simply pursed his lips. "Guys... We talked about this. A lot."

"She started it!' Dactylus grunted, just before there was a loud creak as the door Cinder was hiding behind pushed forwards and Cinder fell through, face planting onto the stone floor of the house.

"Butterfly." This time it was Magenta speaking. "We also talked about you not leaving the house alone, and not disguising yourself as a dragon. It could scare people."

"Woah!" They all heard from their right, causing all of them to turn over to the kitchen proper where the purple little hybrid was sitting in a tall stool, coloring with crayons. "Mommy! Papa! That was the Dragon I saw out in the woods!" She excitedly shouted.

Magenta, Pupa and the Pegasus turned their heads back to the dragon lying on their floor. "That's not one of your friends pulling a prank on us, right Dactylus?" Magenta asked in shock.

"Dactylus doesn't have any friends." The Pegasus said equally shook by the sight.

Pupa's compact eyes rolled back as he suddenly fell backwards onto the ground unconscious.