Luna gave a small smile, looking at the figure hanging upside down, still strapped to the cockpit chair.

Eclipse had taken many forms in the dreams she had visited him in. Pony, human, fish, dog, at one point a manticore, but for Luna, the crossed arms and scowl he was giving her, despite his current predicament, had given ‘human’ a position close to the top of the list of the best she had seen.

The cockpit he was inside was from one of many fictional universes Eclipse had either read about or simply made up, a large, two-legged mechanized unit, with bird-like legs, rows of weapons and literal tons of metal for armor plating. Most of this was strewn about the current dreamscape the pair were in, having been blown to smithereens, partly thanks to Luna’s intervention.

She may guard foals from nightmares, but she could still have fun with a select few whom she called friends. Granted, Eclipse’s dreams were a preferred target thanks to the sheer variety of them, but that mattered little.

Finally, the human sighed in defeat and chuckled, acknowledging that Luna’s prank, filled with explosions and panic as it was, had actually been pretty fun. The dream blurred for a moment as Eclipse, again a pony, and Luna sat next to each other.

Luna enjoyed the mission reports, unusual as they may be.

She nodded and frowned as Eclipse finished telling her his progress thus far.

“So, there are more changeling hives than Chrysalis.” The princess nodded, understanding. “It makes sense, seeing as Chrysalis actually had a fairly small army. It was her deception that gave her the advantage in her invasion. But, these altered changelings: the beetles, scorpionflies and others. Her hive did not have any of these. If changelings truly evolve in generations as opposed to millennia, as you say, there are countless possibilities.”

Eclipse flashed a grin. “Yeah. Just imagine, as many changelings as there are insects. Scary thought, right? But come on, Princess. Chrysalis could have easily thought her hive was the only hive, that that was he rentire race. Thorn, he deosn’t even feed off of love! H eeats normal food and he said there are other changelings that feed off other emotions!”

“Indeed.” Luna agreed. “Variety is the spice of life. And,” she added with a slight smile. “if the personalities vary as much as the body and means of survival, Blackreach hive could become a good ally for Equestria.”

“I still get to blow up Nexus hive, though, right?”

“They are threatening Vangar. Eventually, they may turn to Equestria. They don’t even care for Blackreach hive.” Luna’s tone grew serious. “Given a week, maybe a few days more, a portion of the royal guard will be dispatched, headed by either my sister or myself. This is not the time to idle while the threat grows. Rally yourself and any allies you have gathered.”

Eclipse blinked. “So, do I still get to blow up Nexus?” He gave her a hopeful smile.

Luna sighed and rolled her eyes, smiling. “If you truly must be so theatrical.”

“YES!”

Eclipse rose, hearing some swearing outside his door.

Groaning, he cracked his neck, approaching the portcullis. It slammed open, missing him by inches as it swung past, revealing Aranna with Thorn standing directly behind her.

"Draw a map, for crying out loud! We'll handle it!" The griffin snarled, waving the changeling away.

"I have already pledged myself to aid in this quest. Surely you know something of personal honor."

"Yeah, changelings have none. You assume the forms of ponies and steal love from their families and friends!"

Somehow, neither of them noticed that the door they had opened had an unamused gray and brown earth pony standing in the middle of it.

"Only some hives and several mobile swarms have retained that genetic marker! Blackreach has evolved to feed on food just as ponies and griffins do, as have many other hives! We even made a point to keep our presence outside our caves at a minimum to keep beings like you from breaking down our walls!"

Aranna pressed her beak against the changeling's face "What proof do I have to trust your word?"

"What harm have I caused you?" Thorn shot back. The two growled at each other, and Eclipse was painfully aware that only Thorn's admitted pacifism was keeping them in check. It was fortunate that the griffin was aware of that pledge, or she might have turned the argument into a brawl some time before.

Eclipse raised a hoof, stepping between the two. They each stepped back, cast a surprised glance at him then turned away from each other with a huff. Eclipse sighed. Oh, this was going to be a fun trip to Nexus hive.

Aranna blinked, frowning at the pony who was riding on her back as she followed Thorn, the changeling’s wings emitting a light buzz as he flew. “Run that by me again.”

Eclipse sighed as he rolled his eyes. “Okay, look. Phonemes and morphemes are integral parts of language. They’re the teeny-tiny little cousins of syllables, alright?”

“Yeah.”

“They have nothing to do with translation." Eclipse said, his forelegs going wide as if he was unveiling some great mystery of the world. "Translating languages doesn't go by translating the phonemes and morphemes, like how Thorn claimed the changeling language translated to Equestrian.”

“So he lied and is leading us into a trap?”

“What?" Eclipse asked, thrown off by the blunt assumption. "No, no, it’s just--“

Aranna interrupted him. “You just said that he--“

“Stop!” Eclipse planted a hoof into her beak, stopping any further argument. “Don’t kill him. Yet. We don’t know why he’s keeping a secret. For all we know, he might just be trying to use us to save some family that had been indoctrinated by Nexus hive or something.”

Aranna was unconvinced. “And if I’m right?”

“His nightmare comes to life."

The sound of an electric guitar caused Aranna to jump, despite already being in the air. Craning her head, she saw Eclipse mid-rock show on her back.

"Dragged ya down below, Down to the Devil's show, To be his guest forever! (Peace of mind is less than never!) Hate to twist your mind, But God ain't on your side, An old acquaintance severed! (Burn the world your last endeavor!)"

Thorn quickly appeared, silencing Eclipse before he could continue. While the changeling hadn't heard their previous conversation, Eclipse's outburst was clearly heard by any living being within a seven point five city block radius.

Protesting through the changeling's hoof, Eclipse made a very pointed argument for why Thorn should remove said appendage, most of which was made up of some variation of 'mph!' Thorn grimaced. "Silence, you fool! We are not the only creatures in this area..." He trailed off, leaving the imagination to wander regarding what other creatures were there.

Aranna scoffed. "I'm pretty sure we can handle a few tiny creatures."

The deafening roar that split the air a second later said otherwise.

"Mountain manticore!" Thorn yelled, his insect wings becoming little more than a blur as he shot up into the air. His scorpion tail whipped around behind him, becoming little more than drag as he sailed up and away from the creature.

Aranna banked to the side, wings slicing through the air as she narrowly avoided the flying manticore's claw swipe. Eclipse gripped the griffin tightly, almost choking her with his hold.

"Kinda need to breathe, Eclipse! Get over the aerophobia!""

"It's not the flying that concerns me! It's the falling!"

"Use your stupid cloud ability!"

"Oh, yeah..."

The pony leaped away just as the manticore snapped its jaws at the griffin's tail, plucking out a few feathers. After a surprised 'bawk' of pain, Aranna flipped herself around and grabbed onto the manticore's face, her talons gripping its ears and mane as her back legs put their own claws into the manticore's neck and shoulders. The beast tried to pry her off of its face, but quickly pulled its burned claw away from her.

The phoenix-griffin smirked. "Hope you like it toasty!"

She heaved, pulling the flying monster into a sharp descent, the temperature around her rising all the while.

"Keep him on target!"

Looking down, Aranna saw Eclipse prepping a large cannon. Nodding, she aimed the manticore so it went into the barrel of the cannon, where Eclipse was waiting to pull the trigger.

Letting go of the flailing creature, Aranna spun away while the manticore tried to sting her with its tail, followed by another swipe of its claws. The beast roared in rage at Aranna's escape. Trying to slow its descent, the manticore didn't notice it's destination until it was already loaded into the cannon, with Eclipse shoving it in further before launch.

Pulling the trigger, Eclipse waited for the cannon to fire until it exploded instead, leaving an angry, soot covered manticore behind. Realizing that his plan failed, Eclipse switched to staying alive, putting all his power into defensive measures in order to hold off the many claws, pair of jaws and single, poisonous stinger of the manticore.

Aranna was coming in for another round with the creature, this time with her sword out of its sheathe. The manticore saw her coming, swiping its tail at her. She blocked with her shield, the sword in her grip arcing around and cutting off the end of the manticore's tail.

"Ooh..." Thorn muttered to himself as he flinched away, rubbing his own scorpion-like tail.

Howling with pain and fury, the manticore clawed furiously at the griffin, completely forgetting about Eclipse in its rage. The pony took advantage of this by sending a column of rock sailing around and slamming into the back of the manticore's skull. Shaking it off, the manticore continued its furious assault on Aranna, her shield taking a beating from the powerful strikes.

Thorn flew down, attracting Eclipse's attention and pointing to the severed manticore stinger. The pony nodded, going for the poisonous appendage while Thorn released a sharp whistle.

The manticore turned, giving the changeling a powerful stink eye. Aranna stood directly behind it, skirting around the manticore to see what was going on.

Thorn stood unwavering, doing nothing.

The manticore blinked for a moment, surprised. It quickly shook off its distraction, roaring and leaping at the changeling.

"Wazzup!?" Eclipse yelled, hefting the severed stinger.

The manticore turned a goofy smile on it's face. "Wazzu--" It was stung in the face by its own severed tail.

"WaaaAAAAGH! WHY WOULD YOU DO THIS!?" The manticore screamed, while Eclipse, Aranna and Thorn simply blanked on how they should react to the suddenly talking manticore. "I'M JUST TRYING TO PROTECT MYSELF, YOU JERKS!" Eclipse slowly backed away, the scene officially becoming too crazy even for him. "EVER SINCE THOSE NEXUS CHANGELINGS ENSLAVED THE REST OF MY HIVE, I'VE CONSTANTLY HAD TO DEAL WITH BULLSH--"

Thorn was on top of the manticore instantly, the creature pressed against the ground. "What do you know of Nexus hive? What happened to Icewind hive?"

Eclipse groaned. "Another changeling hive?"

The manticore whimpered. "Icewind was wiped out, bro. You just come down from Blackreach? Yeah, sorry to disappoint, but we had only just learned you guys were out there when Nexus swooped in. We were going to contact you, honest!"

Eclipse sighed in relief. "Never mind on the changeling trifecta."

Thorn fell to his haunches, visibly shaking. "Father..."

Aranna had sheathe her sword, but wasn't paying attention to much else other than the recovering manticore, who was really a changeling.

Eclipse tapped Thorn's shoulder. "You okay?"

"Our last conversation was me telling him how much I hated him..."

The manticore sat up, mind clearly at work. "Wait... Could it...? Dizzo, that you?"

Thorn raised his head slightly, both pairs of dragonfly wings twitching. "Shriek. My old friend. How did I not recognize you?"

Eclipse face hoofed. "Oh, come on! this is going in bad sitcom direction!"

The manticore disappeared in a burst of green fire, leaving a large and round changeling in its place. Other than his more rounded shape, he was just another normal changeling akin to Chrysalis' hive. "Dizzo! My man! Where you been, bro? Your pops went nuts after you skipped town, ten, fifteen years back? He was looking everywhere, dude! We all thought you were dead!"

"I... found Blackreach. I was unaware that I was missed."

"Blackreach?" Shriek jumped back. "They got Scorpionflies, too!? What about Fireflies? It's been months since I've seen one of the lamp-butts!"

"No, but there are beetles."

Aranna patted Eclipse on the back as he slammed his head into a rock.

Shriek seemed disappointed at the news of no firefly changelings, but perked up when he heard about the beetles. "Dizzo, bro, you gotta tell me everything!"

"My name is Thorn, now."

"I don't care if you changed your name to Jade Snakestrike, you're still little ol' Dizzo to me, man!"

At the mention of the odd and very specific name, a black and red pony poked his head out from behind the rock Eclipse was leaning against. Aranna frowned at the newcomer. Eclipse stepped between him and her, the two changelings still busy with their own conversation.

"Hey, buddy!" Jade exclaimed. "Haven't seen you since you blasted me out of that train! You ready to admit that you're a stu yet, or are you still in denial about the--"

He was interrupted by a sudden case of being blasted through the side of a mountain.

The two changelings turned, surprised.

Eclipse sighed heavily. "If that guy turns into a running gag, I might hang myself."

Aranna glanced at the ruins that was the previous location of Jade Snakestrike. "You know him?"

"Never buy the cheapest train ticket available." Eclipse muttered darkly. "I think that I might have been cursed. One more run in with bad comedy will prove it."

Author's Notes:

Bro, that started as soon as you woke up in Equestria.

Cheapest train ticket ain't got jack to do with it.