Cell Unit White POV

It was getting pretty boring standing here on guard duty, but after the great amount of trouble the captive was in order to even get in here, I knew it had to be done. Besides, chances are likely once everything was nice and secure over at Canterlot, I’ll be sent some relief and finally get to go stretch my legs and wings.

I went over to where I had left some food supplies in case the pony I was guarding was to wake up in a state where he’d starve without it. I’m not sure why Chrysalis hasn’t decided to kill him yet when she clearly sees this individual as a threat. Might have something to do with that Chaos magic she was going on about. She was pretty insistent on avoiding letting our own magic come into contact with it unnecessarily. At this point, all this thinking was sending my brain down a rabbit hole and starting to form a headache. So, in response, I sat down to rest a bit, making sure my head was looking at him in case I heard of anything, not that I thought I would at this rate. He’s been out for days now, it’s a surprise he hasn’t woken up from lack of food.

You’d think being hungry enough would wake you. Then again, maybe the hunger hadn’t become so painful to keep him from sleeping. If not, perhaps he was so far past that he no longer had the strength to fight past the pain.

Letting out a soft sigh, I lay my head down, closing my eyes slowly, only to be interrupted by the sound of chains rattling and hoofs hitting the floor. I snapped my eyes open and lifted my head to see the captive somehow managing to slip out of our most secure restraints with great ease. After letting out a yawn, the now freed captive started to stretch his legs as I could hear the popping and cracking of his joints echoing through the room, followed by his stomach already making demands.

Now free and limber, something had enticed him to start moving towards my general direction and without saying a word as he approached the food and water stored on a small table beside me. He clearly was either still waking up and was too mentally exhausted to acknowledge my presence or he didn’t see me as a possible threat as he went to lap up the water from the bucket.

Normally, this would be a pretty good chance to strike at someone, but I could feel an aura emanating off him that just felt blatantly threatening. It all felt instinctual, like another sense warning me to stay back.

Even scarier, I don’t believe he was the one intentionally making that aura, but rather something from him or about him was creating this reaction, either it be survival instinct or something else about him. Either way I had no choice but to wait and see where this all goes.

Back to Spirit

I dropped to the floor with a resounding thud, landing on my hooves as I regained my balance, working out the sore muscles and stiff bones as I stretched my body in every which direction, letting out a nice yawn as I did so. Barely spotting some water ahead of my droopy eyes not wanting to fully open, I slowly made my way over, my body aching for the precious liquid as I dipped my muzzle in the bucket, lapping at the water greedily as my body was unconsciously desperate to get however much moisture I could possibly take in. Letting out a soft sigh of relief, It took me a few moments to notice the company I had in the room.

“Oh yeah, you’re one of those extra-color ones that jumped me when all I wanted was my bag.” I teased, seeing her flinch a little from the sound of my voice.

It seemed she wasn’t big on talking much with others she doesn’t quite know, or she was just following orders. Works out for me either way if that’s the case. If she didn’t want to speak, she can remain being one less distraction for me while I’m finding the exit since I had a feeling this might take a while, unless…

I turned to face her as I noticed, from how close she remained and how she refused to take her eyes off me, that she had planned to keep an eye on me. I didn’t mind, since there wasn’t anything she could do to stop me if last time was anything to go by. However, if she’s gonna follow, I gotta put her to use somehow.

“Hey, where’s your armory?” I asked her, knowing that unless they had the courtesy to grab my stuff for me, I needed something to hold me over for now.

She sighed, not having expected that to be the first thing asked of her. Regardless, she got up on all fours and took the lead as I followed suit.

I noticed that she frequently was looking back at me with a quick glance from the corner of her eye.

“Something on your mind, or am I really that much of an oddity to look at?” I asked.

While I am aware ponies don’t have the same magic I can use, nor do most have wings and a horn, but looking over myself now, not only did I notice I was naked and stripped of the likely destroyed suit I was wearing before everything happened. I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised, though I never did take the time to look my own body over since the beginning of everything.

It’s been so long, but I could see lots of my messed up fur spots showing many scars from my adventures up till now, and boy, I was covered all over in them. There was a cluster of them on both my forelegs, a few less on the rear legs, my torso seeming to be patterned with scars, my chest as well. I can only hope there were none on my face since a suit wouldn’t cover that.

Ponies with a lot of scars were a rare oddity as far as I was aware, even in the guard. Likely due to all the peaceful times they have had over the many years before I was ever in the picture, but nonetheless, that makes it where if they show on your body, you stick out like a sore thumb. Not that ponies had thumbs, as all four of their limbs ended in hooves. Unless they had wings, but those limbs had feathers, so… You know what? Fuck you. I don’t need to explain this. You know exactly what I mean.

Anyway, in response to my half-joke question, she indeed actually did answer.

“Sir, looking at you, I’m starting to wonder why you go through all this trouble to help others. I can see clear as day that you plan to go back and stop everything, but with a body like that and likely the history that comes with it, it would usually mean one of two things for you.” She began saying, her voice clear, polite and it sounded like she was also meaning to convey respect as she spoke. “Either you’re a hero, which seems unlikely since if you were, the ponies would have been talking about you so much we would have definitely heard of you before, or it means you’re seen as a monster, an abomination or a freak of sorts. We know ponies are pretty good at hiding it when there’s someone they’re treating like that just to keep up the persona of being kind and accepting to all.” While that last part was rather interesting and hinted at some history I get to dig at later, I sadly couldn’t help but chuckle at her response.

“That’s a fair bit of thinking you’re doing right there. I’ll return in kind to sate some of that curiosity. You’re right, I’m not normal. I could be a hero, I could be a monster. I don’t really care to take credit though, so if you’re lucky to see enough I’ll let you decide for yourself. Either way, I’ll confirm for you that your judgment is leading you on track to making a fair assessment.” I teased, not dropping too much for her up front, but I’ll give her credit on what she’s pieced out so far.

I had known this the whole time; sure, it was nothing new. Sure, I’m a hero. I beat Discord and whatnot. Also, looking at myself from another’s perspective, yeah, I guess I am a monster. I defy magic laws to the degree to be able to use Chaos magic. Perhaps being a monster does a better job of explaining why I don’t have a normal life. It’s easy to see just by looking around any town during my day-to-day life how abnormal everything about me has been. If anyone I knew had the circumstances I had, they’d have lost their mind long ago. As we walked the black carved tunnels, she now looked deep in thought. She might not initiate talk much on her own, but I can see she’s just as much a thinker as Twilight when she gets into it.

Leading me into the Armory, I looked around to find the place pretty empty, which makes sense considering, under my assumption, the reason I haven’t seen any changelings other than the one I had led me in here has been sent over the Equestrian border.

“That fucking cunt.” I mumbled in a soft voice, cursing out that queen bitch for the mild inconvenience before looking over to the white girl in my company. “Hey, this can’t be it. This seems to be a standard armory room, for common foot soldiers, which you aren’t, along with the friends I saw you with. So where’s the good shit?” I asked, still not in a good enough mood to keep my profanity in check.

She let out a soft sigh, looking like she just wanted this to be over with, or at least what I assume though it's quite hard trying to read the facial expressions of these changelings. “It's around here. The door is hidden but I'm sure you can find it and open it. Normally you need a special level of magic to open it but I get the feeling that'll be no problem for you. Only hint I'll give you is to check the back wall.”

Well, it's all I have to go off of, so I went to the back wall. There wasn't much lined up against this wall, just a few crystals glowing green to help with the room's illumination. I took my time investigating, tapping the tip of my hoof against the wall as I explored various spots. From the first tap I could tell there was empty space on the other side of it, indicating there had to be something on the other side. It took a bit, but eventually I occasionally tapped my hoof against what looked to be a hole in the wall that was perfectly circular. There was no indication of having to do so other than a odd feeling calling me to do so as I leaned forward and slowly inserted my horn into the hole. It was a perfect fit. After a moment, there was an unpleasant feeling of magic actually attacking my horn, taking me a moment to realize it was changeling magic, but the attack only lasted for a second before a quick feeling that could be compared to sand paper rubbing against my horn washed over before it all stopped. I took my horn out and the wall started to open like a door to the next room.

“It's as the queen said. That's quite the trick you got there.” The changeling commented, leaving me both a bit confused, and with something to poke her brain about.

“I'm not sure I follow. I didn't do anything.” I informed her.

“The queen did mention, but changeling magic and chaos magic, or dark magic since they go hand in hand, don't exactly get along with each other, so your magic cancels out our magic. the only oddity with you though is that your dark magic seems to do it on its own accord, which is rather strange since dark magic likes to consume and take over the user rather than protect them.” She informed me, her logic checking out with what I know so far with how using dark magic usually pans out with those bold enough to use it. However, it acting on its own accord in reaction to changeling magic is new info for me to add to the puzzle, along with it being related to Chaos magic. I might be able to poke discord about it later. He spoke to me as a statue before, so if he isn't too butt hurt about his loss earlier, I might get him to speak again. “Either way, there isn't much in there, but there should be just enough to outfit yourself.” She added, at least adding on some good news. I had planned to use dark magic to fabricate something if it came down to it, but it would be a pain to play that off later if normal ponies saw me using dark magic.

I entered the newly opened room. It was circular in shape and along the walls were five smaller indented rooms, four of which had empty armor racks and what I'd assume to be mount racks for weapons. The fifth room however seemed fully kitted out. The fact there was a fifth at all was interesting. “Hey, including you, there were only four of you in your squad I fought you earlier. is the last one out sick or something, or did the queen forget to pack her personal toys with her?” I had to ask, cause from the quality of the armor or weapons, I don't see them breaking or even wearing down in the long run in fights against even the royal guard, so even if they over worried enough to make a backup set, it would be weird to only make a backup set for one of them, and it's highly unlikely they belong to the queen cause it sure as hell wouldn't fit on her.

“We're a specialized unit. Our training, fighting style, tactics, and roles are personalized and specialized to each member of the unit. We're a pretty recent project of the queen and there was going to be a fifth, however before she could pick a fifth, the queen saw what she deemed to be the perfect chance to start preparations for the invasion and so never finished the project. So far the roles are a tank, a heavy hitter, a support and a scout. I'm the support unit. Our team was originally designed to be able to operate on our own, so this set was meant for the fifth role, a leader who can operate as a jack of all trades and would receive everyone's training.” After speaking, she just seemed to stare off as if remembering something.

I took the chance to look over what was available to me. There was a lack of armor which wasn’t surprising. Can’t make armor for someone if you don’t know who you’re making it for yet. Thankfully, due to the nature of the cell unit they intended to make, there was a variety of weapons to collect along with sheaths for them. Got a few daggers, a pair of shortswords, and a standard sized sword, however there was a most interesting weapon in there. A fancy looking bladed ring hanging in the armory with a handle on it. It seems to come with a special strap for the upper part of my forelegs with a hook to hang the ring on. I went ahead and took it. Now that I’m satisfied with options to show off if I wanted to since I didn’t really need weapons to fight, I turned back to the tag along changeling. “Alright, I’m ready to leave. You can either come with me or stay here. It doesn’t really matter to me.” I offered, mostly out of boredom.

Author's Note

I have to say, it's been a hell of a life and a hell of a writers block. So much so I decided to post this as is and start thinking of the next chapter. I know it's been sadly slow, and so has my life and the new challenges that has been popping up over the last 6 months. I say this every time, an I try, but Imma keep trying to keep throwing myself at this whenever I have the spare time. If you're reading this, I hope you still find this entertaining somewhat, as cringe as my writing has been up till now