Chapter 7: Dead Cats
Fur Grimwald Eugustor the first was a rather odd person. Unlike many other people, he seemed to radiate an aura of complete calm, yet deep animosity towards anyone whom approached him. His appearance was nothing however, when compared to his accomplishments- one of his most recent of which was lying before him in a revolting manner that would send anyone with even a hint of dignity running away in shame and disgust.

He looked down upon the prone, unconscious form of Chrysalis- former queen of the changelings and aggressor of Equestria, now reduced to a slobbering, semi-cognitive mess only good for storing love energy until her body gives out and her usefulness is expended.

After taking another moment to think over how difficult it had been to break her mind and will, as well as remembering the glorious satisfaction that came with it when he finally succeeded, Fur turned and left the cell, signaling to the changeling guard on duty outside to lock his newest prize back up. Soon he would have her changelings give him an army, and then he would begin to make his move. The time was almost right and soon... yes, very soon now; and then....

As Fur stepped into one of the main chambers of the hive he was reminded exactly why he despises working with changelings, even if he was now essentially their king.

He looked at the dead non-changeling bodies laid out before him. These were spies that had come too close to uncovering their location. They had been set up to seem as if they had died of natural causes and their carcasses fed off of by wild animals. He nodded at the guard and the corpses were dragged by drones out into the wilderness. Nobody could know they were here, that he was here. Not yet.

He made his way back into the heart of the hive where the newest batch of changeling proto-queens was currently training. He wanted them to be his eyes, ears, and hooves in the field. They would be trained to fight, survive, and most importantly, obey.

Noticing his presence, they all lined up and groveled before him as he made his way to the throne at the far end of the room and sat, before motioning for them to rise. He scrutinised each one of them thoroughly. Even a hint of weakness was a bad sign, but could be dealt with in time. Those that didn’t improve or, god forbid, showed the slightest hint of disobedience, were immediately sent to join Chrysalis in her chamber. If there was too many of them, the older, weaker ones were culled off to make room for their younger counterparts. And even among the proto-queens that made it through training, some of them would be molted forcefully into queens only to join Chrysalis anyway.

Such was the cycle of the new hive; birth and death. That which was not useful was destroyed, that which opposed them was destroyed, that which was not destroyed was made useful in any way possible. It was the new way of things.

Fur pointed to two of the proto-queens out of the batch of 17 before him, one of the original 18 already having been killed previously for its weakness, and the two were taken away to the ‘blank room’ as the changelings called it, a room no sane changeling dared enter unless they wished to suffer the same mind-melting torment as those that joined Chrysalis. Even the room itself had special plating that prevented changelings’ innate telepathic communication from passing through.

Fur watched as the group of 17, became 15 and the two proto-queens were dragged off. Some would go with horror etched onto their faces, others simply giving in to their fate, either out of hopelessness or knowing they weren’t good enough for his purposes. Others yet were dragged off with looks of excitement, as if they were looking forward to their... “future”.

Whatever the case may be, or what the changelings thought of it, he didn’t care. Fur was proud of the blank room. It was originally a prison for those that remained loyal to Chrysalis until the end. But when her mind had broken and she gave in, those physically near to her did as well and acted as psychic projectors of that same idea. Any changeling that walked in there was subjected to the months of torture, psychological rewiring, and personality rewriting Chrysalis went through in a matter of mere minutes.

An impressive feat, to say the least, though one that would send any sane pony running for the hills. Good thing changelings are only as sane as you allow them to be.

And the best bit? Changelings were no longer as starving as they once were, the holes in their bodies beginning to show signs of healing, the size of them diminishing as time passed.

A combination of sending blank drones to just within the crystal heart’s range of effect to fill up on love before returning to the hive, and his better management of their resources was brilliant, and allowed them to produce hundreds of changelings a week. The only thing they had any trouble with was finding enough subjects to continue the production of drones, workers, and proto-queens. They had kidnapped hundreds of creatures in the past months, but even now Fur still had to “donate” from time to time. He shuddered at the memories. It wasn’t an unpleasant experience, that was certain when it came to changelings, but it was still slightly off to what little remained of a normal pony inside his wretched mind and soul. Good thing that he wouldn’t retain that bit of himself for much longer.

Overall, production was going well. Soon he would have an army of unquestioning soldiers that would die at the drop of a hat if he ordered it to be so. And his experiments with changeling excretions were progressing as well. He’d already perfected a type of spit-on armor out of the resin changelings produce, and liquid emotional energy was a treasure trove of discovery with thousands of possible applications, but by far his best work was on changeling queen pheromones and poisons. A biproduct he’d been working with for a while turned out to be greater than what it was a biproduct from. Now, it was nearly ready for mass-scale production, by which point nopony, not even those cursed alicorns, would be able to stop him. They would fall, Equestria would fall, the whole world would fall, and only Fur would remain. Fur and his kin would rule the planet until the end of time.

It was so close now, he could almost taste it.

Someone entered the room and groveled before him.

“My king, everything is going as planned. The Griffish Isles are almost ours, and Abyssinia is ready to fall.” The figure stated.

“And what of Equestria? What of the alicorns?”

“Equestria will soon be ready to fall. Everything has been set up as you ordered, and the plan is falling into place...” the gryphon looked upwards with the green eyes of a changeling queen glowing in its sockets; “...Your majesty.”

Fur leaned back on his throne. “I hear there is a royal wedding coming up between a certain two princesses and a peasant colt.” Fur leaned forward, looking the ‘gryphon’ right in the eye. “Let’s say we give the chap a little something for the occasion?” He asked with a wicked grin on his features.

“I think that’s an excellent idea, my king,” replied Tallon.

Author's Note

I wanted to put in a parody of the Lion King’s “Be Prepared” where changelings replaced hyenas, but copyrighted song lyrics aren’t allowed and I ain’t gonna risk it. So, just imagine that if you want to.

~~Expect more from Fur in the “near” future.~~

NEWS:
This chapter originally had elements from "A Substitute Demon" (Graphic content: where changelings were more akin to real-world insects and the evil overlord (no spoilers here~) turned changeling queens into mindless egg sacs (for all intents and purposes)), which I decided would be a little too dark for the rest of this story as it is currently. As such, this chapter has been modified to make it less... icky.
If you want a story more like the original, go read A Substitute Demon for yourself (it's a great book right here on FimFiction!)