Twi did eventually break from her stunned stupor and continued the tour. She lead me to the what’s left to show; the restaurant area. And while they have some high-end establishments. But one in particular caught my eyes. It looked like a giant gingerbread house, topped with a giant cupcake. As soon as I saw the saw the place I had to hold myself back from taking a bite out of it.

“THat right there is Sugarcube Corner, and it’s a bakery. I should also add that Pinkie works here as a backer” I see her giving me a look from the corner of my vision. “You want to try it?”

“YES!” Goddammit, I’m feeling a kid, I love and hate it. Twi snickers and takes me inside the bakery. Once inside the smell of freshly baked cookies, cakes, and other pastries fill my senses, and I get a few looks from the other ponies. “Alright, if I spend the rest of life on this planet, I officially wouldn't mind it.” Twi smiles. She instructed me to take a seat while she got… whatever she’s gonna get at the back counter. Then it hits me. *Why the fuck is she so nice!? Or ANY of these... ponies, for that matter. They keep the feeling of… general friendship, yet they act so much like my own kind. I need to get the bottom of this…* I can hear Twi talking to whoever was behind the counter. *There must some reason they’re like this to me…* I failed to notice Twi coming towards me as I was caught up in my thoughts. I was broken out of my train of thought when she cleared her throat. “Huh?” I look from wherever I was looking to Twi. She’s holding two delicious-looking bright pink cupcakes in her magical grasp. Me, deciding to act stupid… “What is that?” I’m a little ashamed for asking that.

“These, are Pinkie Pie’s special cupcakes.”

“What are they special for? Having too much frosting?” She giggles.

“That, and too much sugar.” Quickly snatch one cupcake from the purple mist. Much to Twi’s surprise.

“How did you do that!?” The whole place goes quiet and everypony looks at our table. “Hehe… Sorry.” Some ponies snort, and everypony goes back to whatever they were doing.

“Do you yell a lot?”

“No I don’t!” Everypony looks back to us. She clams up.

“Yes, you do. Anyway, I have no idea how I did… whatever I did.”

“You grabbed that cupcake from my magical hold.”

“You make it sound like it’s impossible.”

“It is, nopony’s ever been able to do that. Ever.”

“Then it must mean that I have some kind of… magical resistance?”

“That’s right actually...” I shrug.

“Eh… At this point, I know just as much as you when it comes to my… ‘magic’.” *Exceptt that time with the timberwolves, I have no idea what that was…* “And I think I can use magic.” I take an experimental bite out of the cupcake. My eyes widen. It was the most delicious cupcake I have eaten, ever. Mouth felt like a fuking party at full swing. My brain went blank and I adopted a blank look. I couldn’t think, move, or react at how amazing it was, except stuff the rest of thing down my throat. When I’m done I lick my fingers clean. “Ok, before we continue; I’ve had many backed god and things like that, but I have never, ever, eaten a cupcake that good before. EVER. Does Pinkie make ‘em?”

“Yes she does.”

“I am definitely coming here a lot when I get a job, and money.” Look to Twi. “Ok, continue.”

“Ok… You said you think you can use magic. Care to elaborate?” I nod.

“When I first woke up here, and was… ‘playing’ with Rainbow, I felt something flow through my body. I felt powerful. I still do, but not as much as before. That’s why.” Twi puts a hoof to her chin.

“Hm… just what princess Celestia said.” She mutters to herself, I don’t think I was supposed to hear that. But I did, at least I’m slowly getting more clues as to what they’re going to do with me. “Um… Ember, I need to… make a request.” I raise a brow, or feather at this point.

“What is it?”

“I need you to come with me so I can conduct a few test on your magic.” I chuckle.

“Yea- no.” Her eye twitches.

“And why not?” I give my ‘are you shitting me?’ look.

“This morning.”

“What?” I continue to look at her, it takes Twi a minute, but remembers that little event. Her cheeks turn a light pink and she looks down. “Oh...”

“Yeah, not gonna happen.” She picks her head back up.

“But it won’t be awkward this time. I promise!” She nearly shouts.

“I think we should take this outside before you get us thrown out for yelling a lot.” She shoots me a look of annoyance.

“Fine.” WE both get up and walk outside. “Like I said, it won’t be awkward this time. It’ll be different.”

“What will be different this time? Besides me being awake?”

“We’ll ask each other questions about any subject. And we’ll stop any time it gets uncomfortable.”

“And what tests will, ‘we’, be doing?” I’m still having issues with this.

“Just some experiments to find out if you can use magic, and for what area of magic you can do.”

“.... Alright, fine.” Do I really have a choice? I can tell she would bother the fuck out of me if I decline, and I’m living with her at the moment. I really don’t. When I agreed with her she grinned widely and a squeaking noise came from nowhere.

“Perfect! Come on!” She grabs me with her magic and drags me to her house.

“Knew I should’ve said no...” I mutter under my own breath…

Twi lead me to her house, and down the stairs into the basement, where I currently sleep. When I asked why we were down here she said, “I have most of equipment here.” and I chalked it up as ‘Equipment to study shit’. She turned on some of the machines and they whirred to life. It all just reminds me of all those Youtube videos and movies that made fun of old tech. I’m gonna miss all that tech we had… By now Twi’s levitating a clipboard in front of her, and I’m sitting on my bed.

“Alright, I’m going to start with a simple scanning spell.”

“Scanning what?”

“It’s a spell that lets me look at your anatomy and magic reserves, if you have any.”

“Just get it over with.” I can tell she’s getting a little annoyed at my attitude, but I can care less. She’s the one who made the bad first impression, not me. Next thing I know I’m surrounded by a purple mist, and I feel something flow through me, just like before, and I wanted more of it. It stayed so I decided to look around the room again, only this time I saw an outline, making a rectangular shape, and it looked, and felt, like something was inside, whatever it was, it was drawing me to it. Just then the mist quickly went away. Twi’s expression went from annoyed, to surprised, then cautious. This whole I was watching her, and she failed to notice that. “What?” She jumps.

“What?”

“Is there something wrong with me? The faes you were making weren’t… Pleasant.”

“Oh! That! Um… You seem to have a lot of magic inside of you. More than the average unicorn.”

“More than the average unicorn? That’s weird, if it’s supposed to mean that I’m really powerful.”

“You… kind of are. The amounts of magic within your body rivals my own.”

“Cool!” Now I’m getting a little excited, I just want to see what I can do with this new magic of mine. “I want to see what I can do with this magic, anything in here I can test one?” I look around the room. Twi snorts and she levitates a beaker from a shelf.

“One basic magic ability is levitation. Try levitating this glass beaker, and try not to drop it.” She set the beaker on the floor. “Oh, and try to use a part of your body to channel the magic through, it allows you use it to full effect.” She taps her horn.

“I get it, but… How do even concentrate on my magic in the first place?” *How the fuck are you expecting me to know how to ‘channel magic’ when I’ve never ucking used it?*

“Just imagine the beaker in your head, and when you feel the magic flowing through you, focus it on some part of your body, try your hands first.”

“Got it.” I do just that, I close my eyes, create a mental image of the entire room, and focus on the beaker. I feel the magic flow like Twi and focused it to my hands. I can feel it going to my hands as the beaker floats. My eyes open to reveal the beaker floating in mid-air, covered by the same grey mist from the timber wolf incident. Just not as strong. “I’m doing it. Holy shit. I’m using magic.” At that point I’m bound excited, awestruck is more like it. I shale to collect my thoughts. And I saw that I was holding my hand out. I turn it so the palm was facing up, and I curled my fingers up, bringing the beaker closer to me. “Just in the fucking movies!” I’m basically filled with childlike amazement. To say I was elated is an understatement. I gently put the beaker back to the floor with one, smooth, motion of my hand. As soon as the grey mist disappears a purple mist covers it, as it goes back to its rightful place on a shelf.

“Good, good… Now… try teleportation.”

“You can teleport with magic?” Still having a hard time believing, and accepting, all of this.

“Yes,” Twi nods “just think of where you want to go, and focus your magic like before. Try teleporting to the main room upstairs.”

“Yes ma’am.” I say in a mock tone. I do what she said, created an image of the room, felt and focused the magic flow. All-of-a sudden, I felt my stomach lurch as my surrounding changed. I also felt a burning sensation at my backside. I look back and down and saw that my tail feathers were on fire. “Whoa shit!” I quickly grab them and pat the fire out. “Now It have burnt feathers...” Just then the black disappears as the burnt feathers regrow to their original size. “Thank you Twilight. I needed all that extra sugar.” I then hear a combination of hoof-steps with foot steps. Hoof-steps from downstairs, and footsteps from upstairs.

“Twilight? Is that you?” A small, boyish came from upstairs. The thumping gets louder as the same little dragon from before comes into view, it looked like he was resting, or something. We lock eyes and he freezes. We stay like that for a few seconds. “Hey, you’re that… thing, from before.”

“Yeah, and it Ember, not-” Twi comes up from the hall downstairs.

“Oh hey Spike! You’re back!” We both look at her.

“Thank you misses obvious.” We say at the same time. “That was weird.” We did it again. “We did it again!” And again.

“But seriously, who, and what, are you?” The newly named dragon asks.

“Name’s Ember, and I’m a human.”

“Oh! So YOU’RE the new guy everypony’s been talking about!”

“I’m what everybody’s talking about? What have they been saying.” My tones turns a little flat, and serious.

“Not much, just that you’re a new creature. And some say that you’re a monster, and others say you’re really nice. OH! I just remembered.” He rushes down the rest of the stairs. Surprisingly not falling down. “It it true you saved Appleboom from a pack of timber wolves?” I nod.

“Yeah, it is. That’s where I got that things from.” I gesture to the bandages.

“Really? What happened?”

“One of those little bas- buggers managed to bite me at the base of my wing, tearing the muscle. I’m probably mostly healed up by now.”

“That awesome!”

“Yeah-” Twi cuts in.

“That’s enough you two, Spike needs his sleep. It’s getting late.” I look outside a window, it shows the sun resting over the horizon, and it’s getting lower.

*How is the sun visibly getting lower!?*

“Twilight, I think we really need to do that question thing.”

“Tomorrow Ember, I’m pretty sleepy myself.” She lets out a big yawn, trying and failing to over it with a hoof. “Night Ember.”

“Night Twilight.” I head back to my temporary room, the basement. *Perfect.* I make my way downstairs to the basement. Leaving the lights on, I go to the thinly lined out rectangle in the wall. *Now to find out what this is… Maybe I can push it?* I walk over to it and do so, and surprisingly, it gives, making rock grinding against rock sounds. I hear a click and the birck move on its own, it sinks into the wall deeper. I can barely see it moving it to the side and something slide forward, a glint showing through the darkness. I step back A little as a little platform. Just out of the wall. It reveal a small grey and red medallion. At least, that’s what it looks like. It’s triangular in shape a union at the top-middle, wings flared on each side. An actual triangle acting as the base for the unicorn with wings, and the red gem inserted in the middle. *So this is what was drawing me to it…* I get closer to the little platform and slowly grab the medallion. As soon as I make contact, I feel raw power run through my very being. I jump back out of shock. I look at my hand, then the medallion, and back to my hand.

*Don’t know what that was, but it felt… Good…* I grab the medallion and examine it. And again I feel a massive amount of power flowing. *Does this really hold that much magical power?* I suddenly get this feeling, like what you feel after someone says yes after a really serious question. *I guess that means yes. I wonder if I should put it on…* And it may also have some form of sentience. Maybe… The thing happens to have a metal chain acting as a necklace. I put it on, as soon as it rests on my chest it sinks into me. A red glow emanates from my chest as warmth encases my entire body. It feels like I’m laying on clouds, and I’m loving it.. The feeling lasts for a few seconds, even my vision tints red a little. “That felt… awesome.” I give my body a look over. “I wonder if anything changed.” I check out every part of my body, nothing. “Looks like nothing, maybe my face… I need a mirror.” I feel a surge as a full body mirror appears in front of me, encased in a red mist for a second. “And it looks like this medallion’s gonna help me out big time.” I look at the mirror, more specifically my eyes. They changed from a bright yellow to a semi-bright red. “Hm… I wonder if anypony’s gonna notice that… Or if I can change it back to their original color...” A surge of magic later and my eyes are back to their original color. “Thanks.”

I snap my fingers and the mirror disappears. “Wow. I fucking love this thing.” I look down. “Just wonder why it sunk into my body. Probably to hide itself, but why hide in the first place... Meh...” *I just want to have fun with my new powers!* I feel a pulse of excitement. *Looks like I’m not the only one. Lets go! To the Everfree!* I snap my fingers and my stomach lurches again, though not as bad as the first time. “Gonna have to get used to that.” I feel another surge and magic flows to my mid-section. “Or not, man I really love this thing.” I look around, I’m in some clearing within the forest. By now the sun’s complete gone, letting the moon fill the sky with its brilliant night. “Dammit, I wish my wing wasn’t fucking damaged.” Warmth flowed from… somewhere, and into my wings. They feel powerful. I stretch them and the one covered in bandages breaks free, the sounds of fabric ripping fills the air. The tattered bandages fall to the floor and I take a look at my wings. “Holy shit!” *They got a muscle upgrade! I fucking love this thing!! I wonder if it can that to my whole body...* No surge, no warmth… What the fuck? I shrug. *Must only apply to damaged body parts… That’ll be useful!* A wave of happiness washes over me. *And I’m really going to get along with this thing.* I think excitedly. A roar sounds out from my right.

“The hell was that?” Another roar sounds out, it may have been my morbid sense of curiosity, but I decided to go see what was happening. It took me a minute, but I managed to quietly get through the foliage. Even though I still made a shit-ton of noise. Whatever was attacking something didn’t hear, thank the universe. When I made it to where the noises were coming from, I stumbled across a particularly weird and sad sight, I’m really fucking thankful for night vision. A huge lion-looking thing was looming over the cowering form of some kind of pony-

*What the fuck are those things!?* The big lion-thing was wings, and a scorpion tail. I have no fucking clue what that is. The little foal-looking thing looks like a bug and a pony bumped uglies, and that was what came out. Looks like a bug pony; black, shiny skin. Weird, grey eyes, a big grey stop on its back. It even has both wings and a horn, but the horn is all gnarled, it is this time that I notice that it has holes in its legs. *How is it not bleeding out?* I put that thought aside, right now I have to do something, I think… Yeah, the big fuckers gonna kill it.

“Heeelp mmeee!” The bug-thing buzzes out. Just like how a bee would talk, if they can. That little shout was enough to get me feral again, this time with the help of the medallion. It covered my hands in a thick, red mist. Shaping it to look like massive claws.

*Just in case…* I let out another primal screech as I burst from the foliage and slam myself into the lion thing, sending the thing sprawling across the ground. It then slammed into a tree, it quickly got up and looked in my direction. When we locked eyes it roared again, then charged at me. I sidestepped and barely dodged it, while at the same time letting my new claws rake across the big thing’s side, it howled in pain as it stopped and fell to its side. I think I sliced one of wings off when I did that. Yeah, I did, didn’t mean to do that. I look at the big lion-thing; it’s side has four large cuts bleeding profusely. Any human being would vomit at this sight. Not me, or anyone who’s a world war three veteran for that matter. We were too young for that shit…

Anyway! Moving on! I saw that the mountain of orange-red fur wasn't going anywhere. So I went over to the now terrified bug-pony… thing. When it sees me looking at it, it freezes. The magic claws go away and I return back to normal.

“Hey, it’s okay.” I take a step closer to it, it stands up and steps back. “I’m not gonna hurt you.” I adopt a soft tone. I kneel down to look less intimidating, I didn’t plan this far ahead. “Are you ok?” It continues to stand there, trembling with fear. After what feels like an eternity if registered what I said and nods.

“Y… yes. I’m okay.” It sounds like its voice has a buzzy quality to it.. Or like how bees talk in movies.

“Good, what’s your name?” I have no idea what to do at this point besides talk softly and make no sudden moves.

“I… I don’t have one.” What?

“What?”

“I don’t have a name.”

“Why not?”

“My mother never gave me one.”

“‘Your mother?’” It nods.

“Queen Metamorphosis.”

“Queen Metamorphosis, you mother’s a queen?” The bug-pony nods, that made my brain freeze for a solid ten seconds. “What… are you?”

“You don’t know what I am?”

“I’ve never seen, or heard of, anything like you and you’ve never seen anything like me. I think it’s fair we ask each other who we are.” The thing… ‘sat on it haunches’, as Twi and Ap have told me, and huffs.

“Good point. I’m a changeling.”

“Wha-” A loud roar cuts our conversation short. I whip back around to see the big fucker standing where he once lay. Blood coating half of its face. “Enough of this…” I held my hand out, I feel the same power from before, but it all flows to my hand as large spike shoot out. Impaling the beast my times over. It roars in pain and falls back to its side. A single, dying breath sounded out before it passed. I take a few calming breaths before looking back to the… changeling. “Sorry about that.”

“It’s okay...” It says slowly.

“Good, how about we get out of here before anything else comes by?” I didn’t care what this bug was, or what it was doing here. I just wanted to get the fuck out of this god forsaken forest. The bug nodded slowly and began to follow me, I had to tell it to wait there so I could fly above the canopy of trees to see where Ponyville was. As I was looking around I heard buzzing noise as the changeling flew up next to me. “That makes getting back easier.” The changeling doesn’t respond. I shrug and look about the forest. The moon was starting to set down down on the horizon. It’s brilliant light swallowed by the approaching sun. There was just enough light to spot the town, the town hall poking out over the treeline. “That way, we should get there before sunrise.” I fly off towards the town, I look behind me and see the changeling having a bit of trouble following me. *Guess they’re not fast fliers…* I slow down a little to let the little thing catch up and stay at this pace. I decided to talk.

“Do you want a name?” The changeling looks at me confused.

“What?”

“Do you want a name?” I ask again, slower than last time. The changeling… I can't tell whether it’s thinking or not. Those grey luminescent eyes make it impossible.

“Yes.” It says after a minute.

“Ok, what gender are you?”

“I’m a girl, why?”

“Where I come from, we have gender-specific names… How does ‘Chrysanthemum’ sound?”