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“Well… fuck.”

That pretty much summed it up.

The changelings swarmed out of the hive, crawling out from beneath some of the hexagonal splotches. Some of them simply dropped from the trees above, flittering down with a collective buzz, encircling the small group. They were outnumbered within a matter of moments, each and every changeling coiled and ready to pounce. Some of them were merely imitations of unicorns, earth ponies, or Pegasi, but some of them shared similar features to the one Ryan held. He noticed that the ones with both horns and wings were significantly fewer than the rest, but there were still a ton of them; twenty, thirty at the least.
And they were still coming.

Ryan and the ponies slowly spun in a small circle, backs to each other as they watched the still standing changelings warily.
“Twi? You shore ya’ planned fer this?” Applejack said nervously, head twitching back and forth as she tried to keep her eyes on as many of them at once as she could. For some reason, they still weren’t attacking.
“Well… look at the bright side…” Twilight replied with obviously forced optimism. “… At least we found the breeding grounds…!”
One of the changelings glared directly at Ryan, watching him as he held the struggling changeling alicorn-thingy aloft.

Thank god for watchin’ crime shows on T.V., he thought to himself gleefully.
“Okay, ya’ lil’ shits!” Ryan yelled out loudly, eyeing the changelings menacingly. “You see your little friend here?” he pointed with his free hand to the captured changeling, making certain not to let it wriggle free. “Any o’ you come any closer, an’ I’ll fuckin’ stomp him ‘till he’s flat!”
For a moment, nothing happened. Even one of the changelings clambering out of a large hexagonal hole stopped, dropping the door-like cover with a fwump as it scuttled over to it’s comrades.
Then, the changelings did something Ryan hadn’t expected.

“Ha… ha ha… ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!”
Ryan had never heard a changeling laugh before; it sounded forced. Hollow. They all stopped laughing at once as one of them stepped forward. Ryan used his free hand to hover over Twilight, who was nearest to him. More and more of the changelings swarmed over the hive, and the circle around them gradually grew tighter. Their cruel eyes centered in on Ryan as a sense of dread filled him, and one of them spoke.
“You kill one. Maybe. Maybe, you kill one. But all? No. No. You no kill all.”

Of all the stupid things Ryan had ever done…

They struck without warning, and Ryan reacted instinctively. He snatched a surprised and indignant Twilight Sparkle up from the ground, doing what he’d done for so many years.
Ryan Miller ran.

However, encircled and outnumbered though they were, he still had a place to run.
It might have been insanely, impossibly, unbearably stupid – but he had a place to run.
The hexagonal hole that one of the changelings had left open near the ground had no changelings standing in front of it, nothing to prevent them from entering. In hindsight, it was probably because the last thing they expected them to do was to charge directly in.

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“Put me down, put me down!” Twilight shrieked, battering Ryan’s arm until he dropped her. He collapsed against a sickly lime colored wall, breathing heavily. The changeling under his arm struggled angrily, still unable to free itself. Every time it attempted to call for help, Ryan would tiredly slap a hand over its muzzle, silencing it.

“Are you out of your mind?” Twilight breathed heavily, peering about. They’d (well, Ryan had) been running since Ryan darted into the hive, dodging this way and that down random tunnels.
A little trick Ryan had learned in Brooklyn.
If someone’s tailing you, you don’t have to go really fast to lose them. You just have to drive like an idiot, making all sorts of ‘mistakes’ and leaving misleading trails as you go, and eventually, your pursuers are going to screw up. It saves you a lot of energy, and makes them waste time backtracking.
Even though they had the luxury of knowing the hive, Ryan felt rather proud of himself for using bits of torn cloth from his shirt tossed down random tunnels as useful distractors. The low ceiling was making him even more uneasy, though, and the humid heat of the hive choked the air around them.

“Kid, I’m the only fuckin’ sane man here.” He stated bluntly, getting a better grip on the changeling under his arm. “… Would you cut that out!” Ryan yelled at the changeling, only to discover that Twilight had just shouted the same thing at him.
“… Uh, you first, kid.”
“For buck’s sake, Ryan! I – am – a – competent – young – adult!” she stamped her hoof angrily to accentuate, glaring at him. “For once in your life, will you just stop treating me like I’m a child!”
“No.” he responded flatly.

She balked at him, seething. “Why NOT?!”
“Have you seen yourself lately?” Ryan asked, deadpanning. “Because you sure as hell look like a kid. You fight like one, you sound like one, and you behave like one.”
Twilight merely stared at him, and he could tell that she was hurt. They were silent for a while, catching their breaths.

“… We need to get back to my friends.” She stated simply. Twilight sounded a bit colder than she usually did; and she always, always referred to them as ‘our’ friends, never her own. He realized that he’d pushed her a bit too far this time.
Too late, of course. As per usual.

Ryan snorted, standing uncomfortably as he clutched at the sullen changeling captive.
“An’ what, fight off a fuckin’ army of ‘em?” he grumbled, feeling at the walls around him for weak spots. There didn’t seem to be any more tunnels nearby, and if this one lead to a dead-end, it could wind up spelling trouble for them if they didn’t move soon.
“Ryan, they need us.” She said, her horn lighting up a little to provide assistance. He was thankful, but didn’t show it; just because the tunnels were dark didn’t mean he needed any light.
… Goddamit, I’m doin’ that again.

It was a nasty habit – being offered some measure of kindness, and greeting it with hostility. That familiar pang of guilt rose again as he saw how unhappy Twilight was, tiredly dragging her hooves over the slightly slimy floor.
“… Hey. Kid.” He said suddenly, an idea coming to him. He gripped the changeling, holding it up in front of him. Ryan wasn’t certain who was more confused; Twilight, or the changeling.
“What now, Ryan?” Twilight said cautiously. “Another ‘brilliant’ hostage negotiation attem – what are you doing?!”

Ryan gently sat the changeling down, patting him kindly on the head.
For a moment, it simply stared at him, uncertain of whether to flee or lunge at him and make him suffer.
“… Ryan…!” Twilight said dangerously, backing away and preparing a slew of defensive spells should the need arise.
“… Hey, kid.” Ryan exhaled lowly. “… Did you know, that if you force enough magic inta’ it, you can use a unicorn’s horn as a magical conduit?”

Twilight’s eyes widened in shock as Ryan grappled the changeling’s jagged horn suddenly, and Ryan reached out with his mind.
Because a crash course in learning how magic affects minds is always the best course of action.
For a split second, time seemed to stand still. For a very brief moment, Ryan was afraid that he was simply going to wind up squatting in front of the changeling and looking stupid until it zapped him. Instead, he mentally brushed up against the invisible shield around his mind, softly pushing out against it as he had done before. He could have sworn that Twilight was shouting something at him, but her voice was blurred. Almost as if she were underwater.
On the other side, he met something... unexpected.

Slithering up against his own extension of thought was the presence of the changeling. Its own… well, not necessarily a mind, per se. To Ryan, it felt more akin to a machine than anything else. Powerful, unstopping and rhythmic, but incapable of doing much on its own. Or at least, he first thought so.
Whereas he immediately sensed mild surprise within the changeling, it quickly shifted to a defensive strike against his psyche.
Fuck, I didn’t even know you could DO that. He thought absentmindedly as he swatted away the spear of thought with almost no effort. After fending off the pouring walls of chaos, something of such a small caliber was a simple matter. This seemed to actually unnerve the changeling a little bit, because it promptly altered it’s tactics.

Instead of protecting its own precious mental cargo, it mentally hurtled itself directly at Ryan.
And then the world imploded.

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Ryan expected the onslaught of chaos again; it was the same thing that he always saw whenever he tried the weird open-mind trick. Even when he experimented with it (which he still regretted) by sending out a single tendril of thought, the whirling dervish of overwhelming everything was still there to greet him.
Not this time.

The small shield around his mind was being torn away, ripped at and clawed.
And it hurt.
It hurt a lot.

Ryan instinctively tried to draw backwards in pain, and found that he couldn’t; he was linked, directly to the barrier. Quickly, he attempted to rebuild the flimsy barrier with mental effort, and for a moment, he thought he was saved. A couple of patches of the shield slowly began threading back together, barring the onslaught of force.
Only to be torn away, once again.

Ryan began to panic, understandably. This – this was the reason he hated unicorns. He hated unicorns, he hated magic, he hated anything that he couldn’t understand.
Now, he’d thrust himself unthinkingly into a danger he couldn’t even fully comprehend, and oh god it hurts it hurts it hurts!
Desperately cringing away from the shield-devouring menace, he threw up more and more of the barrier in futility as he felt bits of his mind being torn away with his only safeguard.
It was more than that – he could feel his identity, his essence, his very soul slowly being ripped away.
And devoured.

Very, very rarely would Ryan ever admit to being afraid. If he had a problem, he would either solve the problem or run away. He could do nothing of the sort in this situation. It is quite terrifying, being trapped. There are some that fear enclosure so badly that they refuse to enter tight spaces at all. If he survived, he could easily see himself becoming claustrophobic.
Then again, fear of entrapment and fear of death by entrapment are two very, very different things.

The mind of the changeling was powerful – small, but powerful.
…. That’s it.
That was how he’d escape; the changeling wasn’t just going for the shield, it was devouring everything that approached it.
Everything.

Okay, you ugly sum-bitch! EAT THIS!

Gathering as much of his raw frustration, anger, loathing, hate and fear (just a little), he drew it all inwards simultaneously.
It was… not quite the effect he was looking for.

The invisible barrier around him instantly failed as he drew in strength, leaving the changeling completely free to rampage directly at his very unprotected mind at A BILLION MILES PER HOUR.
Still, he could feel the energy coiling around him. The collection of emotional negativity wasn’t quite what he’d hoped for. In truth, he’d expected to simply pull in absolutely everything in his mind, and crush the changeling with it. Yell at the top of his lungs in a manly manner and shout Kamehameha! and be done with it.
Ryan’s mind, whereas relatively simple, was still human. Ergo, not quite that simple.

The impact of the hungry changeling’s mind against his own was what he was waiting for. He expected it, prepared for it. His initial plan was to use the collected energy to smash the little bug-pony-alicorn-monster-thing when it was too close to escape.
Instead, Ryan discovered something much more important about just how mind magic works.

Whenever a mind comes into contact with another, the two briefly share experiences; almost like viewing another’s soul through a window. Unlike the experience with Discord, who had claimed to merely be ‘lurking around the surface, watching the show’ or Celestia’s overhead sweep to search for the mad draconequus, this one was… different.
Able to watch both the changeling’s ‘essence’ (which was lucidly odd) and his own (which was lucidly disturbing), he could plainly see the massive differences between the two.
And several striking similarities.

For one, they both shared a similar ‘push’ or ‘drive’. Both were fueled by that same, basic instinct; survival. Need. Hunger. However, whereas suppressed within Ryan, the changeling had no such inhibitions. Sating his curiosity by exploring the depths of the changelings mind further, Ryan discovered precisely why it had no inhibitions.
It was empty.

He could feel it, see it from every angle, both within and without. An empty, clawing, yawning emptiness within that struggled forward with its every step.
Ryan saw it for what it was, for how little it truly had, and for one single, fleeting instant – for maybe the first true time in his entire life, Ryan empathized with the little monster.
He felt pity.

There, buried deep within recesses of memory, emotion, instinct, and some things Ryan couldn’t even identify, he found it. Hiding just inside of himself, almost out of reach – a single, solitary spark.
That was what the changeling wanted, what it desired; however, no matter how violently it scrabbled at him, they both knew that he would never get it. So, as Ryan was wont to do, he did something unbearably, incredibly, impossibly stupid. Something so unbelievably stupid, yet simultaneously, the beginning of one of the greatest, most important events in Equestrian history.
It was also one of the very, very few acts of genuine kindness Ryan had ever performed.
With a bit of effort, Ryan gently tugged at the tiny spark, coaxing it away from himself…

And gave it to the changeling.

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… What?
“... –an!”
… Can’t quite catch that.
“Ryan! Ryan!”
“Fuck, kid!” Ryan groaned, squeezing his eyes more tightly. The throbbing pain in his head only grew, slamming against the inside of his cranium like a violent midget with a jackhammer. “Stop screamin’!”
“I’m barely whispering!” she roared, stomping over to him with all the inconspicuousness of a giant lizard in Tokyo. Ryan could have sworn that the (quite frankly, icky is the only way to properly describe it) ground shook slightly as she did so.

He let out a low moan of exhaustion, and a sweaty hand slowly clapped around his eyes.
… Fuck, I can feel it in my EYES. Give it a while. It’ll be a migraine from he-FUCKTHEREITIS.
“Ryan, get up!” Twilight Sparkle nudged at him in hushed, hurried tones. He wasn’t surprised she sounded worried – hell, a few seconds ago, he thought he was going to die.
Not like he was about to tell Twilight that, of course.

“… Shit.” He cursed, slowly sitting up and rubbing his aching temples. “… What happened?” he asked, cracking open one eye. He could see that she looked on the verge of a panic attack, and the changeling was simply sitting there. Staring.
… Why do they always stare?
It took Ryan a moment to realize that there was something wrong with the changeling. The first thing he realized was that its large, bulbous black irises had changed to a (creepily) off-white. The changeling itself had retained its black coloring and numerous holes, but it didn’t look quite as… feral as it did before. As a matter of fact, from the way it was ogling him with its mouth hanging open, eyes much wider than should have even been possible, Ryan could have said that it gazed at him with a sort of… reverence.

“You tell me!” Twilight demanded a little more loudly, slightly more at ease now that she was assured Ryan was still breathing. “Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”
“… Uh…” Ryan mumbled, scratching the back of his greasy head. “… I, uh… y’know… fixed it?”
“Fixed it? FIXED IT?!” Twilight practically shrieked, jabbing one hoof at the changeling. It stared at her accusing hoof, head tilted slightly to the side. “Ryan, meddling in the mind of another is forbidden for a REASON!”
“Fuck, I dunno why you’re so damned butt-hurt over it,” Ryan shrugged, unwilling to drag himself to his feet. He felt more than exhausted – drained seemed more accurate. “Look at ‘im. He ain’t hurtin’ nothin’, now. Know why? ‘Cause I fuckin’ fixed him.”
“Do you even – I don’t – you can’t – UGH!” she threw up her hooves in exasperation, pacing back and forth frantically in front of them. The changeling drew a little closer to Ryan, nosing at him with bright curiosity. It’s wings fluttered momentarily, before it stopped mid-flap. It seemed to be pleasantly surprised that it even had wings, the way it was poking at them.
Odd. Ryan had never seen a changeling smile before, either. They had canines.
It was disturbing.

“Ryan…” Twilight began slowly as she pushed her mane out of her face. “You could have – phoo. Okay. Okay. Ryan, we can discuss this once we manage to get out of here, but right now, our friends need us.”
Back to saying ‘our’. That’s a good sign.
She tapped her forehoof against the ground agitatedly, peering nervously down the low-hanging corridor.
Hoof tap on the left. That’s a bad sign.
“Do you think you can pull yourself together long enough to, I don’t know, save my friends AND the fillies?”
“I dunno, kid. Kinda gettin’ mixed messages, here.”

She blinked at him, and then ground her teeth in frustration.
“You know what? Fine.” And with that, she began a quick trot down the corridor.
“H-hey!” Ryan called out, automatically reaching out for her as he drew himself to his feet. He nearly knocked the white-eyed changeling out of the way, much to the pony-insect’s surprise. “Hold up! Kid!”
“My name is Twilight Sparkle-“ she spat without looking back. “-and I am a competent – young – aduAAAAAAAGH!”
“KID!” Ryan yelled, limping down the dim (and slightly slimy) hallway after her. He couldn’t quite see her, but there were several flashes of violet light that ricocheted dangerously past him. Ducking as one of them blurred by in a blazing fist of purple energy, he spotted the little changeling back where they’d left him, staring in wonder at his own two front hooves while waving them slowly in front of his face.

Get to the kid, get to the kid!
“Hang on, Purple, I’m comin’!” he screamed, limping as fast as he could. He felt fear rising in his chest, pulling at the back of his mind.
Weak.
Soft, soft and weak.
And now she would die.
Just like the rest.
“HANG ON, KID!” he pushed himself harder, ignoring the throbbing pain shooting from his leg to his back. Finally reaching the end of the low hall, he grappled angrily at a corner, breathing heavily as he did so. More and more of the corridors branched out from here, leading into absolute darkness.
It was completely silent.
Well, aside from Ryan’s constant screaming.

“Kid! Kid, where are ya’!?”
“Here I am, Ryan.” Twilight said softly, trotting down the hall on his right. He beamed in relief, making toward her instantly.
“Fuck. I, uh… heh. I thought you were in trouble there for a minute, kid.”
“No need to worry,” she stated calmly with a blank look. “I handled those changelings well enough. My training prepared me for such. We should continue our escape.”
“… ‘Thought we was gonna go find your friends, first.” Ryan said lowly, his eyes narrowing.
“Yes, well…” Twilight said with a small smile. “I’m certain they’re fine. We should leave while we can – wouldn’t want to go alerting any mo – hrrk!”

Ryan didn’t like doing this to something that so closely resembled Twilight.
It hurt him. It really did.
But not nearly as much as he was going to hurt the changeling.
“Where. Is. She?” Ryan growled venomously, hoisting the Twilight lookalike into the air and slamming it violently against the wall. The fact that she looked so… hurt just made it harder.
“Ryan, I can’t believe you would say something like that!” she claimed loudly, looking him directly in the eye. A single tear collected at the corner, and her mouth tugged downward into an unhappy frown. “I… I don’t understand why you would hurt an innocent, defenseless little hrrrrrrk!”

The noise in question was caused by Ryan’s quite violent squeezing of its throat as he slowly pushed it up the wall, until its back hooves were no longer on the ground. Fortunately, though, he had a plan. A single hand wrapped around her violet horn, and he pushed as much effort as he could into reaching her mind and found…
Nothing.

He could do nothing.
There was a single moment where Ryan knew, without a doubt, that he’d lost whatever strange mind-touching power he’d momentarily held. And that confused him, to no end.
The changeling, spotting his evident surprise, lashed out as it lost its form of the purple unicorn, lunging toward him with an open mouth. He instinctively kicked the thing, knocking it away from him as it landed on its feet with ease. The rest of its disguise melted away, revealing it for the twisted mockery of a unicorn. With an angry hiss, it spat at him and a bright green bolt of fire spurted out of its curved horn.

… Shit.
He dropped to the ground as quickly as gravity would allow, but the fire was slightly faster. It singed the top of his scalp and left a slight burn on his back, from his left shoulder to his right hip. Taking no time to allow the changeling another chance at attack, he flung himself toward the much smaller creature and snagged one of its holed hooves.
It yelped, trying to kick him away as it withdrew. Sickly green light painted the walls as the changeling prepared to fire another blast at him, but Ryan snatched at its neck to redirect the blast.

A fiery bolt of energy rammed into the wall behind him, leaving a gaping hole in it. A couple of pieces of the wall fell to the floor with a hollow clatter, indicating that they were much stiffer than Ryan had previously supposed. Kicking one of the changeling’s hooves from beneath it as he pulled upwards from the neck, he dropped onto it and applied as much pressure as he could to the base of the neck while letting gravity work for him, for once.

The awful sounding crack! told him all he wished to know about how much more fighting the changeling would be doing.

With a satisfied grunt, he released the dead beast, brushing himself off. It had hurt like hell, and nearly killed him, but it wasn’t the worst scrap Ryan had ever been it.
Come to think of it, the worst one had probably been the one with a kid half his age and size, but that’s another story. Ryan stooped as he caught is breath, looking about at the destruction before turning his gaze to the dead changeling. It was the same size as the other ponies. For a moment, it had even looked like one of them. A horrible feeling shuddered into his stomach as he easily compared the frail thing to a child.

… Just like the others. Just like the fillies, or like Twilight.
A child.

Ryan promptly turned and retched.

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After several minutes of dry heaving and clutching at his shaking knees, Ryan wiped white knuckles over his pale mouth.
He sorely wished that he could have done the same thing to this changeling as he had the other – left it standing in wide-eyed wonderment. Instead, he’d slaughtered-
NO. No, no, no. It was self-defense.
Then you should have ran.
He tried to kill me!
You should have run faster.
It was him, or me!
You could have saved him.
I tried!
You should have tried harder.
I didn't have the mind-thing... I couldn't save it.
Some 'Superman' you are.

Ryan fought the urge to vomit again, but there was nothing in his stomach to heave up. Instead, he gritted his teeth, nudged the dead changeling out of his way with his (mostly) uninjured leg and limped down the hallway, too tired to call out Twilight’s name.
At the end of the hall, near the intersection, he found the white-eyed changeling steadily puttering forward, occasionally holding a hoof up in front of its face, or a wing. From the noise coming from it, it was… talking to itself?
“Quite the contrary, and almost certainly the centerpiece of cultivation.” The little voice sounding out from the changeling was strong, but quiet and refrained. Almost like a male version of Fluttershy, now that he thought about it. That, and for some strange reason, White Eyes had a light English accent.
“… Uh…” Ryan waved a small hand at it, afraid that it would attack him. Instead, the changeling beamed widely at him, smile stretching as far as it could as it greeted him.

“Why, good evening, good fellow! I am most pleased to make thine acquaintance, milord.”
“… What.” Ryan blinked.
“Oh, no need for bounding betwixt the boundaries of secretive shushes and selectively sustaining socialization, milord! Gladly wouldst I discuss the distressingly impending detail of mine intellectual damnation, the indefinable and unavoidable crutch that is awareness, had I but an inkling of time, Your Highness.”
“… What.”

The little white-eyed changeling had undergone nearly a complete reversal from the mindless beast that it had been before; and, quite frankly, it was a little more terrifying now.
“Alas, but I continue to blather and wax eloquent – might I ‘toot mine own horn’, milord.”
“… What.”
White-Eyes craned his neck and gazed up at Ryan in teary reverence, almost weeping in joy. “Verily, is the sight of the Lord and Creator beautiful – mine eyes can barely fathom the depths of kindness thou art capable of, the veritably vast sea of love and compassion such a-“
“I kinda just... killed one o’ your pals back there, so… I’m, uh…”

The changeling gazed at him in slight shock, mouth hanging open once again.
“… I’m just… uh, you know… gonna…. Go.” Ryan said lowly, jabbing a thumb over his shoulder down a random corridor. White Eyes drank in everything he said as if it were the word of God. “Uh. Sorry, ‘bout, uh… killin’ ‘im. I guess.”

The white-eyed changeling alicorn-thing promptly dropped to its knees, averting its eyes from Ryan as it kissed the ground before him.
“Oh, great is the humility of the Lord, who wouldst suffer the deaths of mine fellows and weep for their passing; nary a moment shall go by when thine Almighty Will is not praised and obeyed, all shall die in agony in the name of…!”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Ryan yelped, shocked that the little changeling had started worshipping him. The talk of dying in agony didn’t appeal much to Ryan, anyway. “Hold the fuck up – jus’ cause I go ‘round, killin’ shit, don’t mean you’re supposed ta’. It’s, uh… killing’s bad. Don’t, uh… don’t do that.” He began to limp away again in search of his friends, leaning against the wall for support. Which turned out to be a bad idea, because they were a little sticky in this aisle.
“Cosmic and infinite thine understanding be, oh Lord!” White Eyes cried out, leaping to his feet in joy once more. This time, he really was crying. “As thou haft spoken, such it shall be; to take life shalt be forbidden, as it is the first and most damning sin!”

… This shit’s gettin’ real weird, real quick.
“Yeah, that’s great… but, uh…” Ryan looked back to the changeling, but it was gone.
“… Huh.” He grunted, continuing his search. It wasn’t long before he heard them.
“Help! Help!”

With a sudden burst of speed and adrenalin, Ryan shoved the pain away and hurtled himself toward the noise, finding a struggling Twilight held between two of her captors. Each changeling on her side was of the pagasus nature, hissing angrily at him as he approached. Twilight was weeping heavily as she stood, one hoof reaching between the changeling’s hooves to reach Ryan.
“Ryan, help me!”

He immediately charged the changeling on her left, swinging angrily at it…
Only for Twilight to blast him into the wall with a burst of green light.
… Aw, fuck.

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He wasn’t certain what he was more furious about – the fact that the stinging pain creeping along his upper torso would most definitely add a new scar to his collection, or that he’d been tricked.
By the changelings.
Again.

The unicorn of the trio smugly began trotting up to the unmoving Ryan, who had left a slightly cracked dent in the wall and collapsed against the ground. Several more hard pieces of jagged wall littered the dirty ground around him, and so they couldn’t see, his hand slowly wrapped around a single shard.
“This one. Yes. This one. Take. Pod him.” His head was turned to the wall, but he was pretty certain that it was the horned-changeling that had spoken. Ryan wasn’t too sure what ‘pod him’ meant, but he wasn’t looking forward to it. He decided to display his unwillingness to be taken captive in as delicate a manner as possible.
He lunged upward and jammed the wall-shard directly into the throat of the changeling nearest him.
“Surprise, mothafucka!”

The horned-changeling lurched away, eyes wide, but too late – filmy black ichor began leaking down it’s throat as it tried to pull out the shard, only managing to jam it further into its throat in its haste. It made a sickening sqrick! Sqrick! as it did so, leaving the other two changeling preoccupied. For a moment, he thought that the little bug-fuckers would be horrified at watching their group leader die, but they merely hissed at him. One of the changelings lunged into his shoulder, attempting to bite down hard.
Unfortunately for the changeling, Ryan had a tendency of doing the same trick twice.

Never was much for originality, he thought sickly as he heard the satisfying crack! of the changeling’s neck. The other one watched it’s comrade fall to the ground, landing with a tiny splat in some of the ichor.
“… Yeah, I’m only gonna say this once.” Ryan cracked his knuckles, drawing himself up to his full height (or at least as much as he could with the stooped ceiling). “I don’t much know if that lil’ mind trick’ll work on pegasuses – peg-pegasuses? Pegasuses. Whatever. ‘Cause it didn’t work last time, so I’m gonna try’n be real fuckin’ nice.” he breathed heavily, towering over the unshaken changeling. This one had large, protruding blue eyes – and the pointy shards in Ryan’s hands moved ever so slightly toward them.

“Where. Are. They.”

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Luna gasped in horror, shaken from her reverie.

It was there.
This time, she was certain.

“Tia! Celestia!” she called out, magically pushing open the heavy and intricately carved wooden doors to her sister’s quarters.
She’d felt it, nagging at the back of her mind. Week after week, day after day, night after night. It was always there, picking and niggling at her. It made her worry, it made it difficult to focus on her duties; which was especially concerning, whenever she was attempting to carefully position the moon to avoid any accidental tidal influxes.
It had grown worse, over time. Picking at her, waking her from her sleep and poking into her dreams.

Princess Luna did not have traditional ‘nightmares’.
Instead, as she slept throughout the day, the ruler of the night would occasionally relive memories or experiences vividly. Some of which were hers, some she had seen from the minds of the innocent ponies she protected nightly.
Well. Almost innocent.

Certain memories were never meant to be seen by ponykind – terrible, awful memories, memories of violence and hatred and cruelty. Memories flowing from the Foul One. Sick, twisted abominations, screaming at her from the black abyss for sweet release upon the mortal coil-
-every night, every day, every hour, every minute, of every second.

Luna considered herself to be a very, very patient mare, especially since the ‘Nightmare Moon’ incident. But this was going too far.

“Tia! I wouldst speak at thee!” Luna’s voice echoed into her sister’s bedroom as the doors flung open, and to her surprise, she knocked aside no guards this time as she occasionally did.
Which was a little disappointing; she liked it when they bounced. Their armor clanked in an amusing manner that What is happening to me?
“CELESTIA!” Luna’s voice shook the walls, trembling slightly with her anger. Her wings ruffled dangerously and her heavy clop, clop of gilded hooves treaded over the smooth floor, until she finally drew close to her sister. Celestia herself was standing serenely on the balcony, watching the sun casting beams of light down on her city.

Her city. Never theirs. Only hers.
No. Enough of this – I shall not become so petty.

“Tia.” Luna said softly as she sat beside her sister. Celestia’s prismatic mane lofted backwards elegantly, dancing in the light cool breeze. Perhaps she simply didn’t know just how badly Celestia was hurting her with her presence alone, refusing to speak to her. Luna couldn’t quite bring herself to look at her. Of course, that didn’t matter much, because her sister had turned her head coldly.
Celestia’s silence was deafening.
A short while and a soft snuffle later, Luna asked “… Sister, why wouldst thou no longer have audience with me?”

“Meh, who knows?” Discord’s gray face poked out from beneath Celestia’s mane where her own head should have been. Bright yellow eyes with misshapen red pupils gleamed from beneath them, and a goat’s horn and antler jutted suddenly from her/his head. “MAYBE IT’S BECAUSE YOU’RE SO FREAKING LOUD!”
Luna screeched in horror, lurching backwards as she flared her wings.
She funneled all of her strength into a single, heavy beam from her horn and leveled it at the draconequus.
He caught the flaming ray in a single talon, looking a little bored. With a small flick, it turned into a flaming rubber duck, which he patted happily on the head before tossing it out the window to watch it fly away.

“Discord!”
Celestia’s regal voice blasted from outside as she landed on the balcony with a heavy thud, and the very sunlight around her seemed to quake with her rage.
“Surprise! Ooh, Ti-Ti. Looking like you’ve put on a little… weight.” Discord grinned as the fake body of Celestia fell away, dropping to the floor with a slight phwomp. From there, it quickly began to deflate. For the life of her, Luna could not discover why the fake blow-up Celestia was suddenly wearing lipstick, or why her mouth was wide open.

“Been pilfering the royal cake storage again, have we?” Discord asked mockingly as he drifted lazily just out of her reach, doing a little backwards stroke in a relaxed manner.
“Discord!” Celestia said again, power roiling around her. Discord was trapped – he had nowhere to run.
“Oh, you have no idea just how many times I’ve heard that name. And I missed it, so.” His toothy grin widened, and he cartwheeled into the air. “Didn’t you miss me?”

“How didst you escape thine imprisonment, abomination?” Luna spat at him, clearly upset at being caught surprised.
Discord tsk, tsked at her, scratching her lovingly under the chin with his bear’s claw. She slapped his paw away with one hoof, firing a blast of liquid energy from the tip of her horn. Instead of hitting Discord, who had simply stopped being in her way, however, it merely wound up setting Celestia’s bedding aflame.
The mad draconequus was barely even amused.

“Hm. Like I haven’t seen that one about forty-six times.” He grumbled, settling on the ground between the two and scratching his serpentine back with a loud belch.
“What is the meaning of this?!” Luna bellowed at him, stamping her hoof angrily. It was then that Celestia began to notice the signs; signs she cursed herself for not taking action upon earlier. Not from Discord - but from Luna.
“… You wish us to mistake you for Discord.” Celestia said in a near whisper, her head lowering dangerously.

The draconequus scoffed, offended. “Oh, come on, Ti-Ti. I’ve assumed many forms, I’ve played many roles, and even taken a few extra faces, but I’ve always been Discord.” The amalgamation of animals kicked his legs into the air, leaning back into an invisible recliner as he lifted a nearby lamp to his limps, blowing bubbles out the end.
“Then why display yourself to us?” Celestia asked, slowly circling him. Luna on the other side, although very angry, was equally keen to discover precisely what was going on. “Why now?”
“Puh-lease. If you watched more TV, you’d know that a good villain always comes up with a great distraction.”

By the time Celestia realized that it had never been Discord’s intention to escape, it was far too late for either of them to do the same.

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Author's Notes:

This chapter was a bee-yatch to write, partially because I'm working on several others at the same time.
I know. I'm a bastard.

Anywhoozles, whereas I always have fun writing Discord, it really is getting difficult putting the right amount of detail into a story without giving too much away. There are those of you, however, that are probably going to be a little unsurprised at the next chapter or two.

To those of you, I say well done.
To those of you that have no clue what's going to happen next, I both envy and pity you. On the bright side, you're in for a surprise.