The changeling held a hoof in mid-air, still levelled expectantly at the empty glass of the one-way mirror. The pony with him followed his pointing hoof, then looked back at his prisoner in confusion. “What are you doing?” The pony asked.

“Already…here!” The prisoner repeated, his chains rattling and clinking as he pulled his hoof back and jabbed it out again. Once again, nothing happened.

The guard’s eyebrows furrowed. “Okay, how hard did I hit you? Because I didn’t mean…”

The glass suddenly exploded inwards, a swivel chair sailing through and crashing against the table. “What the-“ the guard managed, but the prisoner didn’t allow him to finish. With the pony’s back turned to the new distraction, the changeling slipped the small piece of metal he’d worked into the lock on one of his cuffs and twisted, the cuff snapping open instantly. With a flick of his wrist, the chain whipped out and wrapped around the guard’s neck, catching him right in the Adam’s Apple. Exerting a simple tug, the changeling whipped the guard back towards him while unleashing a single bolt of magic that knocked the guard’s helmet askew, exposing the back of his head to a single, incapacitating blow.

Gasping, the changeling wiped a dab of fluorescent green blood from his lip and glared at the broken mirror. A massive, but lanky, changeling stood just within the shattered frame, grinning in front of three beaten and bloodied bodies. The grin just added emphasis to the deep scar over his face, making his tall form seem even more intimidating. “Hey Bait, you called for a breakout?” He asked.

“Yeah Switch, yeah I did,” the smaller changeling hissed angrily, still wiping blood from his lip. “You wanted to take your dear sweet goddamned time with that!?”

“You seemed to have things under control,” the larger changeling shrugged.

“Oh right, yeah, I definitely had things under control while getting my ass kicked,” Bait grimaced before limping over to his counterpart, accepting a hoof up through the shattered frame and into the main room. Nodding, the pair took off out the door and dashed through the well-kept hallways of Canterlot castle, trotting over plush carpets and past marble statues without a second glance.

“So, you got the plans?” Switch asked, his scar pulsing with each gallop.

“Switch, please,” the smaller changeling grinned, exposing his one nubby fang. “Do you even have to ask?”

“Good, can I see?”

“Well,” a fluorescent-green blush spread over the smaller changeling’s face. “Sure, in a few days, when it passes through my system.”

“What’s…oh!” The larger changeling’s nose wrinkled in disgust. “Dude, nasty!”

“Well, maybe I would’ve had time to vomit them up if someling hadn’t stopped to powder their nose on the way to breaking me out!”

“At least tell me they’re protected somehow!”

“Of course they are! Whaddya take me for!? They’re inside one of my canisters: waterproof, easy going down, and hopefully, easy coming out…”

He cut himself off and screeched to a halt as they rounded a corner, forcing his partner to practically leap over his body to avoid slamming into him. “Dude!” Switch screamed. “What’re you stopped…for…”

He trailed off as he turned his head to where Bait was looking and caught full sight of a dozen spears, all levelled at them from the hooves of an equal number of guardsponies. “Shoot,” Switch grumbled.

One guard, a solid-white stallion in full-gold armor – the leader, obviously – stood up from behind the back, safe behind the line of spears. “This is your one and only chance!” He announced. “Surrender now, or we’ll run you through!”

“Uh…” Switch glanced out the corner of his eye at his partner. Bait just smiled knowingly, a faint, green light building in his eyes. Switch couldn’t help but return the grin as he turned back to the line of spears. “How about instead, you surrender to us? Trust me; it’ll save time for everyone.”

The guard smiled cockily, then leaned in to the line of ponies before him. “Turn ‘em into shish-kabob,” he muttered.

“Yes, sir!” Each stallion screamed, rushing the pair as a single line of stomping hooves and flashing weapons. Amidst a chorus of snorts and battle-fuelled yells, the changelings just stood there, apparently more interested in the tile and scanning their own hooves for imperfections than on the line of ponies descending upon them.

The guardstallions charged right over the changelings, and their commander grinned, believing he was perhaps just a few moments away from victory. He watched his guards’ lances approach the changelings, and his grin widened. Then he watched the lances begin to puncture chitin, and his grin turned into a triumphant sneer. Then he watched the lances pass right through the changelings, and his grin froze in shock.

The guardstallions nearly tripped over themselves while the changelings dematerialized, falling into a massive dog-pile. “Where’d they go!?” One yelled.

“Hey, hey! I see ‘em, over there!” Another cried out from beneath the pile of pony.

“No, no, they’re over there!” Yet another shouted, a spear poking up out of the pile and waving around futilely.

“Guys, what if they changed into one of us!?” A final pony shouted fearfully.

The guards all sat there in stunned silence for half a second, then they all pounced on one another, clubbing, punching, biting, and slamming each other with the flats of their spears. The group descended into absolute chaos with the enthusiasm of Shining Armor’s old high school Dungeons and Dragons club at a manga convention, interspersed with occasional cries of ”Ow! It’s me, you nincompoop!” And ”That’s just what a changeling would say!”

For his part, the captain just stood there, his jaw resting on the tile as his professionally-trained guardsponies ripped each other to shreds, falling into the kind of chaos usually reserved for soccer riots or shopping centers on Black Friday. When the dust settled, one beaten and bloodied stallion emerged from the pile of his unconscious comrades, his armor scuffed and his helmet askew, looked around, and laughed triumphantly. “I win!” He proclaimed. “I win! For Equestria!”

Then one of the decorative shields hanging on the wall promptly flipped off its perch and landed behind him, shifting in mid-air back to the large, scarred changeling in a quick flash. “You’d think so, but no,” he announced before his partner suddenly darted out of the pile with a lightning-fast spinning hoof kick that clocked the remaining guard across the jaw, sending a bloody tooth to land at his captain’s hooves.

The captain looked at the pile of unconscious ponies that used to be his unit, then back at the pair of changelings standing over them. He smiled. They smiled back. “Could you…” the smaller one said.

“What – oh! Yes, of course,” the captain said and, without any further muss or fuss, he bowed, removed his helmet, and brought it back down against the back of his head with as much force as he could muster, slumping to the ground.

Switch nodded to Bait. “Well, that went well.”

“About as well as it could have, I guess,” Bait shrugged, then the pair took off galloping again, shooting right by the unconscious captain as they pounded towards their destination.

Rounding a few more corners, the changelings came to a stop just within a dead end, pausing just short of a smooth, marble wall. “Okay dude, this is your cue,” the smaller changeling said, looking to his partner with expectation.

“Er…right…” Switch smiled unsteadily, then turned to the wall. “Okay…” he breathed in, then breathed out, then raised a hoof to his mouth. After a bit of fishing around, he pulled his hoof out again with a gagging noise.

“Oh, I don’t believe this,” Bait yelled, his hooves waving around in exasperation. “You didn’t practice like I told you, didja!?”

“Of course I didn’t! Who the hell practices vomiting!?” Switch shouted defensively.

“Besides anorexics?”

“That’s not practice, that’s a mental illness!”

“Look, just tilt your head back, I’ll get this,” Bait held out his hoof, which promptly transformed into a long, smooth cylinder with a nubby, easy-to-swallow end. “Like I always do,” he mumbled as he reached towards his partner.

“Now what the hell’s that supposed to – GACK!” Switch choked as the nub disappeared down his throat, and a split second later, a flood of bile chased after it, rocketing out his mouth and covering the floor.

“And you didn’t even avoid eating beforehand, like I asked,” Bait shook his head angrily, reaching into the spreading pile of puke to grab a couple plastic packets.

“Joe’s Donuts…can’t help myself…” Switch replied, wiping his mouth while Bait tore the packets open and dumped their contents on the floor. In a moment, he had a few gray lumps with strands of wire sticking out of them resting at his hooves. He set about sticking the globs to the marble wall, running more string between each of them until he had a ring a few meters across set up. He waved his partner off, who nodded, wiped his mouth again, and joined him as they ran back around the corner, Bait lighting off a tiny little spark of magic before they took cover behind the wall.

A powerful explosion rocked the castle, nipping right at Bait’s heels. He gave a frightened yip, nearly soaring into the air with the blast, only to be pulled to safety by a strong hoof wrapping around a hindleg, yanking him into cover as the shockwave echoed out into the hallway.

Bait looked over at his friend, who just smiled knowingly. “I think the fuse on that thing might have been a little short.”

“WHAT!?”

“I said I think it might have been a little short,” Switch said, somewhat more loudly. “Also, I think you might have blown out your eardrums.”

“WHAT’S THAT!?” Bait repeated, clopping his hooves against the wall by one of his tattered, black ears. “I CAN’T HEAR YOU, MAN, I THINK I BLEW OUT MY EARDRUMS! THE FUSE MUST’VE BEEN TOO SHORT!”

“No shit,” Switch smiled and rolled his eyes as the sound of approaching hooves clopping on the tile began to echo in the hall. “C’mon, time for phase two.”

“I THINK WE SHOULD JUST MOVE ON TO PHASE TWO,” Bait enthused, pulling out of Switch’s grip and hurrying down the hall, where a gaping hole now stood where a wall once had. “YOU READY!?”

“Of course I’m ready,” Switch affirmed, tapping his insect-like wings. With a flash of green fire, they transformed into a pair of green, veiny parachutes, lying flat against his back like a couple of wrinkled sacs. “Are you?”

“I’M JUST ASKING BECAUSE I’M GETTING READY,” Bait added, his wings following suit as he reached into a fold in his chitin and pulled out a pair of goggles, which he immediately snapped over his face. Taking a few, deep breaths, he approached the edge of the hole he’d just made, looking down. Beneath his hooves, the edge of Canterlot palace dipped off into a vertical drop, plummeting hundreds of feet down sheer, purplish rock wall to some green splotch that might have been a farmer’s field. Bait’s knees locked upright as he peered ahead, staring into the clouds passing by the castle. “JUST…Y’KNOW, GIMME A MINUTE!”

The hoof-clops drew nearer, and now a few voices became audible as well, whispering ”Where are they!? and ”How did they break out!? and the classic which would have drawn a smile to Switch’s face if their situation hadn’t been so dire: “Celestia above, what happened here!? Looks like the aftermath of one of Princess Luna’s midnight raves!”

“We don’t have a minute!” Switch barked.

“WHAT!?”

“Okay, y’know what? This joke stopped being funny a long-ass time ago,” reaching deep into himself, Switch grabbed a tiny bit of love and broadcast it to his friend, shivering at the icy-cold finger that ran up his spine as the touch of energy jumped into his friend, instantly racing to his ears. A faint glow appeared around the little, tattered black points, slowly fading into nothingness as they worked their healing magic. “Now, is that better?”

“WHAT!?”

“I ASKED IF THAT WAS BETTER, DAMMIT! CAN YOU HEAR ME!?”

At that, Bait turned and smiled politely. “Of course I can hear you, Switchy. You’re standing right there after all, no need to shout.”

Switch deadpanned at his partner, one of the corners of his mouth turning down slightly, then he gave the smaller changeling a good, hard shove that sent him sprawling right over the edge and into the abyss, his forehooves pinwheeling frantically.

“That was a joke YOU DIIIIIIiiiiiick…” Bait’s voice cried as he plummeted.

Switch only had time to treasure his vengeance for half a second before somepony behind him called: “YOU! Stop right there!” Then he also hopped over the edge and dropped out of sight, the smooth rock face of Canterhorn mountain whizzing by his unarmored chest before his mind could even adjust to the fact that he was falling.

Suppressing his initial disorientation, Switch twisted around until he was facing downwards, spotting a little black speck somewhere further along down the mountain. Rolling his eyes, he angled downwards and dove right at it, aiming for a spot a little to its left. Sure enough, Bait was thrashing desperately with his self-made parachute, twisting it into knots and tugging and pulling only to wind up even more entangled, and all the while his screams filled the air.

Grimacing, Switch dove at his partner, thankful that the air rushing through his ears at least drowned out his partner’s girly cries of terror. He seized the smaller changeling by one flailing hoof, pulled him in tight, and in one deft move, untangled him and deployed the parachute. Bait instantly shot over his head, the chute deploying and slowing his descent. Satisfied that his partner wasn’t about to make himself into a black stain on the face of Canterhorn Mountain, Switch yanked his own chute into position as well.

By now, Bait had calmed enough to stop screaming at least, and was gasping breathlessly as Switch drifted over to him, sailing at his side. Still gasping, Bait looked up at his partner and swallowed to clear his throat. “I don’t – I don’t like heights.”

“I know,” Switch replied neutrally. “Dude, you’re the one who planned this out. If you’re so scared of heights, why did the escape route involve a parajump!?”

“No other way…to get off Canterhorn…fast enough…” Bait panted, his chest rising and falling spasmodically. “Besides…I read that…overloading and confrontation…is best way…to conquer fear.”

“Hmm, well, is it?”

Bait took one peek down at the drop remaining, saw nothing but a couple hundred feet between him and the patchwork of farmland below, and instantly clamped his hooves over his eyes while suppressing the urge to wet himself.

“I’ll let you know when we’re back on solid ground, okay?” He tried to say this sentence jokingly enough, but it came out as a shaky squeak instead, so he settled for just drifting along in that terrible void, trying not to think what would happen should his wings snap and his magic be disabled somehow and leave him tumbling helplessly to his certain doom on the rocks far below.

“I don’t get it,” Switch shook his head. “How many times have we flown around the hive’s inner chambers, hmm!? Or over the Everfree?”

“That’s different! There, I’m in control, and there’s always a building or a tree or something just waiting for us, something to grab onto! Up here…” he trailed off, unable to finish his sentence. Up here, the world was just so very big, impossibly huge. Ask Bait to soar through the Everfree, missing treetops by inches, and he would do it without a second thought. Ask him to infiltrate Cloudsdale and run a few laps through the high school obstacle course, and he’d return with a “Wonderbolts #1!” T-shirt and a patch of lipstick on his cheek from one of the cheerleaders. Put him up here, though, where there was no reference point for him to focus on except for the cities that looked like toys somewhere far beneath him, and where he knew he was just hanging by himself with nothing to grab onto should his chute fail…

He swallowed and pressed his hooves even more deeply into his eyes, trying to imagine he was back home, in his little corner of the hive, with a book perched on his soft, black stomach. “J-just tell me when we’re on the ground again, okay?”

“Okay,” Switch assured him. “Hey, Bait?”

“Yeah?”

“We’re here.”

Bait looked down tentatively, and sure enough, the ground dangled a few inches below his hooves, a few blades of grass just out of reach. He turned, spying Switch standing a few yards away with a malicious grin on his muzzle and a little, green glow on the tip of his horn, signaling a levitation spell.

“You ASS!” Bait flailed around spastically. “You sonofabitch! How long!?”

“Oh, a few minutes,” Switch shrugged while grinning wickedly.

“DICK!” Bait waved his hooves threateningly as if he were trying to claw his way through the few feet of air between him and the other changeling. Any other time, Bait would be able to send his partner flying with a quick burst of his powerful offensive magic, or would be able to use his superior changeling magic to overpower the levitation spell through sheer, brute force. But at the moment, between the fear which had been screaming through his mind and the anger that burnt there now, he couldn’t even think to do anything but hover there and flail.

“Hey, you made me puke; I’m just leveling things out!” Switch stuck an accusatory hoof in his partner’s chest. “Friends don’t make friends puke, alright!?”

“You watched as those guards beat the tar out of me!”

“And then I saved you from your own stupid bomb!”

Bait narrowed his eyes and crossed his forelegs over his narrow chest. It was time to bring out the big guns. “Let me down, or I’ll tell the whole swarm about Mr. Sprinkles.”

Switch’s eyes widened. “You wouldn’t.”

“Try me.”

Instantly, the green hue around Bait’s body vanished and he dropped face-first to the ground with a low thud. Pulling his face out of the mud, he grinned. “I figured you’d see things my way.”

“Asshole. If I hear a word about Sprinkly around the hive…”

“Nobody’s gonna hear about Sprinkles, y’big baby,” Bait grinned and shook his head as the pair took off towards the lights of the closest village, slinking through the grass until they reached a dirt road leading through the town center. Adopting pony disguises, the pair easily slipped past the town border, creeping into streets emptied for the night and lit with only the occasional street lamp. At this late hour, not a single pony was awake in such a tiny town. Just as planned.

“Another job well-executed, partner!” Switch chimed happily. “Y’know: but for the fact that we’ve gotta wait for your digestion to spit out the goods.”

“Which actually won’t be long at all,” Bait whispered, holding up a little metal canister and averting all eye contact.

“Hey, you got it out! How’d you manage…oh, wait…” Switch looked to his friend, his nose wrinkling. A fluorescent-green blush crept over the smaller changeling’s cheeks. “You really don’t like heights, huh?”

“I really don’t like heights,” Bait replied, ambling over to the city fountain with the container dangling out in front of him.

“Dude, that is…just gross…”

“I know, I know, just let me check on the goods.” Bait unscrewed the canister and pulled out a small roll of paper. Tossing the canister’s halves aside, he spread the paper out in the dirt road, Switch keeping his eyes on the houses around him.

“So, we’re good?” He asked.

“Switch, my man, do you even have to ask?” Bait proclaimed proudly, holding up the large square of paper proudly.

Atop a series of indecipherable squiggles and lines, in the corner of the ancient, cracked paper, Switch could make out a small label in the corner: Crystal Empire proposed sewerage expansion plans. He grinned. “Right from the Canterlot Archives. Nice.”

“And they won’t even know what’s missing until it’s too late,” Bait said proudly, returning the grin as he rolled the paper up and stuffed it beneath one of his wings, tucking it safely amongst the fake feathers. “Because who would ever miss some ancient sewer plans?”

“Bait, my man, you know what this calls for?”

Bait arched an eyebrow. “You want to do it here? In the middle of a pony city?”

“You said so yourself: nopony’s awake at this hour in such a Podunk little town.”

Grinning devilishly, the smaller disguised changeling locked hooves with his friend. It started with a quick chortle in the back of their throats, building to a giggle and a snicker. Then the pair threw their heads back, preparing to unleash a torrent of evil laughter as they had practiced for hours before, their voices ready to roll off the building facades and bouncing throughout the town, when a high-pitched shriek pierced the night, echoing off somewhere in the distance and cutting them short. They blinked at one another, eyebrows hunching in concern.

“Did that sound like…” Switch started.

“Forget it,” Bait interrupted his partner, a hiss sneaking into the smaller changeling’s disguised voice. “Let the ponies deal with their own problems, we’ve gotta get back to the nest.”

“Yeah, for sure,” Switch looked around, the worried look spreading over his features. “Still, that sounded like a mare in pain, didn’t it?”

“Switch, what if it’s a pony trick, hmm? Did you even think of that?”

“How could that be a trick?” Switch arched an eyebrow at his partner, suddenly grateful to have an eyebrow to arch. “Ponies think we’re monsters, remember? Why would a mare’s cry for help lure us in?”

“Because…it suggests… dammit!” Bait bit his lip, and finally stomped a hoof on the ground in frustration. Switch didn’t outthink him often, but he hated it when he did. He stomped off, his magic grabbing the other changeling and dragging him alongside. “Alright, let’s go get ourselves killed on the off-chance that some random mare we’ve never met is in trouble.”

“I knew you’d see things my way,” Switch chimed, wrenching free of his partner’s magic and taking off with him, the pair weaving through darkened alleyways and dim streets with an ease that only creatures born in darkness could ever know.

Author's Notes:

Introducing a couple of our heroes: Bait and Switch, the changelings!