I stepped off the train with luggage in hoof into the crowded station that was known as Mane station central Manehatten and froze. There were so many ponies gathered in one place, it felt like I just walked into a sea of Equines. A plethora of tastes assaulted my senses; from sweet and salty to zany sour and even downright disgusting, all gathered in the same place.
“Just focus your taste buds on one of us,” Doctor Loveheart said from behind, “You should be able to do so with your horn.”
I looked at him confused and kind of green. “What horn?” I asked.
The sudden realization flashed across his face. He turned toward Skipper. “Passion!” He called, “Go help your lover; he doesn’t look well!”
Skipper, aka Passion jewel, came rushing toward me with a hug. “Aww, you poor baby,” She cooed, “Let me make you feel all better.” She immediately started snuggling at my sides.
How the hell is cuddling suppose to help? I was about to turn toward to the doctor when I realized something: a lot of the tastes have gotten masked! How the hell did that happen?! Wait, no; better not dwell on it. Questioning things like that will only give me a bigger headache.
The doctor tapped my shoulder, “Come now, we need to take a cab to Elm and Crook street.”
“A cab?” I asked dubiously. Beside the train, I had yet to see any other form of automation.
“It’s a cart pulled by an earth pony,” The doctor answered, already anticipating what I am going to say.
When we first got on the train, I had Loveheart give a lengthy explanation with excruciating detail on how the train worked without the use of compressible gases. It turns out that magic does play the role of physics in this universe in more ways than one. The gist of it is, instead of burning fuel, the pistons work by charging a magical gem set at the top of its cylinder. When the piston strikes the gem, it turns the magical energy into mechanical and pushes the piston down and does an entire cycle which in turn charges the gem with magical energy until the piston strikes the gem again and repeats the cycle. Perpetual motion at its finest; something that only seems achievable with magic.
The only problem is that the design has yet to be miniaturized so automobiles had yet to be invented.The next thing I know I am standing in front of the station. I looked at Doctor Loveheart perplexedly. He shrugged, “You were zoning out so we guided you outside.”
“Silly Support, getting distracted by a choo-choo,” Skipper joked.
“Oh,” I realized, “Then what are we still doing?”
“Waiting for a cab to come pick us up,” The doctor stated.
“And is it that hard to find a cab around here?” I asked.
“Very,” The doctor replied, irritation in his tone.
And he was right. Five minutes into waiting and not a single one of those taxi cabs stopped in front of us or even gave us the time to ask them. While waiting, I started looking around trying to acclimatize myself to these new surroundings. What was the gorgeous neoclassical architecture of Canterlot and the unique style of the buildings that gave one an aristocratic feel has been replaced by skyscrapers of steel and glass. Manehatten was a tall city with buildings that literally reach to the sky. It was one of those places that makes one feel small just by existing, despite feeling lifeless for the most part.
Don’t get me wrong, the city was abuzz with ponies; mainly earth ponies, though one could find a unicorn here and the odd pegasi flying there. Unlike Canterlot however, even with a bit more diverse populous and the fact that it never suffered a crippling invasion, the city had an odd grey hue to it and the ponies didn’t seem as cheerful as in Canterlot. I have been sitting here for nearly ten minutes now and have yet to see someone smile.
But maybe that’s just big city blues. I mean, I barely just walked outside the station and know next to nothing of this place in order to like it. A cart being pulled by a bulky stallion stopped in front of us.
“Finally!” Exclaimed Loveheart as he went to talk to the driver.
At that moment, the cart door swung open and a casual green unicorn mare wearing a white feathered hat stepped out of it. She looked at me and smiled; I greeted her back by nodding my head.
“Book! Passion!” Loveheart yelled our aliases, “We have our…” However his expression turned into shock when he saw the mare, “…Chrysie?” He suddenly exclaimed.
“Heart?” The mare turned around, surprise on her face as well.
BOOOOOM!!!
An explosion sounded and I turned to see all hell breaking loose. Ponies were running around for their lives, cracked windows now littered the tall buildings, and fires were spreading from multiple sources.
And in the middle of it all, changelings fighting each other.
“Well isn’t this peachy,” I moaned. And here I thought this was going to be a normal day.
A changeling landed in front of me and hissed. I gave him a perplexed look, “Uhhh,” I pointed at a random pony, “that guy insulted your mother.” The changeling turned toward the pony who screamed in fright and scampered from view. The changeling turned back at me and hissed.
“Okay, that didn't work as well as I hoped,” I mused out loud, “How about we negotiate?” The changeling took a threatening step toward me when a massive green bolt of energy struck him on his head and he fell... lifeless.
“Hey!” I protested, “What did you do that for?” I turned to where the green mare used to be standing.
Wow, where did that changeling came from? Beside the fact that she is as tall as Celestia, her color scheme was the same as Loveheart; perhaps too much so.
The changeling looked at me agape. “Would you rather be dead instead?”
“Just ignore him Chrysie,” Loveheart had shed his earth pony disguise for his more combat ready changeling form, “And tell me what is going on around here?”
The changeling named Chrysie turned toward Loveheart, “Not here; there is a barricade up ahead where we can talk safely there!” With a single leap she started running, “Over here!”
Loveheart chased after her leaving me behind. I turned around in search of Skipper, but I couldn’t find her. “Skipper!” I yelled, but my voice was drowned with all the hubbub that was going on around me. I walked around a bit until I spotted a changeling's tail hiding behind a lamppost.
I went to the lamppost and tugged at the tail only to have Skipper jump at me. “Support!” She exclaimed in fits of tears and relieve.
“Are you done?” I took her head and turned it toward Loveheart, “Then follow him.”
In a single heartbeat, Skipper scurried toward Loveheart who was urging us to follow him to what appeared to be an opening in a carapace semi dome. When did that appear there? I was sure there was no such structure mere moments ago before the explosion.
Another explosion ripped at the other end of the street. I sighed; running is going to be a drag. I distinctly remember being a bad runner on two legs, and I have never tried running on four yet.
As I walked after Skipper, two scuffling changelings landed on the spot where I found her, an energy beam passed overhead and exploded on a nearby wall, glass shards fell onto the street to my side, and a wall fell in front of me just as I was about to reach the barricade.
Just as I was climbing over the wall of debris in front of me, Loveheart flew up to me, anger in his eyes. “What the hell are you doing?!” He asked with panic.
“I will not waste any physical activity unless I have a probable cause,” I replied with indifference. Another explosion ripped the street behind us sending a hot, sharp glass fragment flying just a hair’s width from cutting Loveheart, steering him into a panic mode. He grabbed me by the shoulder and ran as fast as he could toward the barricade.The moment we were in, the barricade’s door closed after us.
Loveheart looked at me dumbfounded. “Have you no sense of self-preservation, man!?”
“Not sure, might have left that when I became a changeling,” I jested.
Loveheart mouth fell open. “You’re unbelievable!”
“Heart!” The tall changeling named Chrysie returned, “What in Tartarus are you doing with a Nirvana spawn and a discorded ‘ling?”
A discorded what now?
“I came here to help you sort this mess out; it turns out you are only making it worse!” Loveheart scolded her, and she looked ashamed.
“I am not making it worse!” Chrysie reacted defensively, “I made an agreement with the mayor to clear the city from the discorded changelings because of the trouble they caused.”
“The mayor knows you are a changeling?” I asked.
“Oh, he knows,” Chrysie replied with a naughty smile, “He is one of our favorite customers.”
Uugh, sorry I asked...
Chrysie turned to Loveheart a bit puzzled. “Um, Heart? Who is he?”
“Oh right, I think an introduction is in order,” Loveheart waved a hoof toward me, “Chrysie, I’d like you to meet Support Pillar,” He then did the same gesture to Chrysie, who's expression changed from suspicion to interest, “Support, I’d like you to meet Queen Chrysalis, whom I sure you don’t need further introduction.”
“Charmed,” The Queen said giving me her hoof, a predatory smile on her face, “I’ve heard so much about you, Support.”
“Oh?” I took her hoof in mine and gave it a small peck, “And what, may I inquire, have you heard?”
“Just that you managed to make Celestia and Luna miss out on their precious night without lifting a hoof and mocked the entire Equestrian science society with a ludicrous theory, and even ended up distorting a mistake to make it so that you would be correct.”
…
Distorted a Mistake?!?! How dare they!! None of those idiots were even awake when I made that mistake! and had they asked me about it, I would have owned my mistake as a mistake instead of hiding behind the shadow of a cute, purple unicorn with sexy smarts who was accidentally knocked unconscious by…
BOOOM!!
“Well, I do aim to please,” I forced out. Personally I want nothing more than to give it to those snooty uptight idiots who questioned my credibility; with exception of Loveheart, of course.
“What about me?” Skipper raised her hoof high.
For a moment there, I thought Queen Chrysalis was going to slaughter Skipper on sight, “A defective ‘ling is of no concern to me,” She answered venomously making Skipper visibly shake, “Heart, why did you bring her here?”
“I thought you liked using ‘defective ‘lings’ to your own purpose,” Loveheart sneered by imitating her tone, “Or are they only defective when they don’t obey your command?”
If the flames raging inside Queen Chrysalis’s eyes weren’t enough of an indication of her intent...
“If I may interject,” I walked in front of the Queen and Loveheart who seemed mildly disappointed by my action of saving his butt, “Loveheart has yet to tell me anything that happened. may I ask, why did you call Skipper over there a defective changeling?”
Queen Chrysalis barely shifted her glance at Skipper who smiled with all her innocence and waved all naive-like at her. “She is a by-product of the destructive artifact that Discord gave me; an unnatural abomination that caused grave illnesses during the invasion.”
“Abomination?” I asked, “Never mind, who is Discord?”
Queen Chrysalis looked at me astonished, then turned toward Loveheart, “I thought you brought him to help!” she yelled with a crack in her voice.
“I did,” Loveheart replied calmly, “I thought it would be wiser to have you explain things. He’s good at picking hidden emotions apart, and I doubt I would have conveyed the stupidity of your decision as well you could.”
With a frustrated shrill, Queen Chrysalis turned toward me, “Okay, tell me what you do know.”
I shrugged, “Let’s start with nothing and go from there.”
Queen Chrysalis twitched, her shocked expression speaking volumes. Suddenly a wide smile adorned her lips. “Loveheart, my dear,” She spoke with a unique flavor of acidity and empathy, like someone plotting revenge, “Would you be a dear and take over the battlefield for me? All the preparations are done and all you need to do is give the signal to our ‘special’ forces to move when all the discorded changelings have shown all their cards. Is that understood?”
“Yes, yes,” Loveheart waved his queen away and went to talk to the changelings behind him.
“Is that a wise idea?” I asked, “To leave everything to him?”
“My brother is a good commander and all of my changelings respect him more than they respect me,” Wait, Loveheart is the Queen’s brother?! No, I will interrogate him about that afterward. “If you’d follow me. This place is too noisy for an interesting conversation.”
I nodded and followed her. Skipper flew next to me. “Is there anything I should do?” She asked.
“Keep an eye out on Loveheart,” I told her in a somewhat hushed voice, “he’s been keeping too many secrets from me and I want to know why.”
With a nod, Skipper went after Loveheart while I went along with Queen Chrysalis. Just as we walked into yet another trap door that lead to the underground sewers, I decided to open the conversation.
“Sooo your highness, any ideas why Loveheart has yet to tell me anything?”
“He probably doesn’t trust you enough or he most likely believes that he can’t convince you of anything,” The queen rubbed her forehead, her expression turning from anger to frustration, “Who knows? Who cares? You are in the middle of this mess whether you like it or not.”
“I’m in the middle of what exactly?” Hopefully, this is the last time I will have to ask this question.
“You are in the middle of a war between me on one hoof,” With a burst of her flames, an abstract image of her appeared, “my sisters on the other hoof,” Two more images of two changeling appeared, however they looked a lot different than Chrysalis. one had a better build with sharper edges and wings resembling that of a hornet. The other was a lot more petite and had had beautiful butterfly wings.
“And the entire Pony kind on the third hoof.” The third image was of princess Celestia.
“That is quite the mess we got there,” I remarked, “How did you get yourself into all..." I gestured to the floating images, "this, if I may ask?”
“The war between my sisters and I is nothing new,” The three images of the three queens formed a circle and brandished childish weapons against each other, “It started after the death of our mother,” An image of her mother appeared. From the image alone I could tell that the mother was big; probably bigger than Celestia. her horn wasn’t as twisted as that of the sisters, and her wings didn’t even look insect like; in fact they looked bat-like to me. Despite her impressiveness however, the changeling was trapped inside a crystal.
“So, it’s a battle over resources,” I mused approaching the flickering lights of the images.
“Close, but no.” A bright light emanated from her horn blinded me for a moment. After a few blinks, my eyes adjusted to the light spell. “We are constantly fighting over these babies.”
A movement caught my eye; it felt like that of an insect.
“What was that?” I asked, a creepy crawling feeling running under my skin. My eyes darted left and right at the multitude of chirping and clicking sounds.
Chrysalis giggled, I turned to her and…
OH MY GOD, What in the hell is that?!?
The centipede was huge! Bigger than Chrysalis even! It crawled from behind her and into the focus of the light spell, before standing like a snake and rearing it’s… Why does it have a pony head??!!
“My mother specialized in living transmutations allowing her to create a wide range of defensive and offensive creatures,” With a small pat on one of its legs, the centipede-pony-thing turned back and returned to the shadows.
“What,” I asked, my breath finally catching itself, “In all that is heaven and holy! Do You Need That For?!”
“Why, for protection of course,” Chrysalis cheered, “With these creatures here, none would dare to mess with our hives and has allowed us to grow in peace. But after the war, each and every queen had monopolized one type of these creatures, so we can only thrive in only one type of environment.
“My centipedes allow us to live on flat surfaces, but the badlands are infested with Nirvana’s spawn who outnumber my hive ten to one, the woodlands are Zephyre’s domain with her Arachna-lings utilizing the deep tree cover to lay their traps, and the north is too cold and dangerous; my youngest sister Vedalia is barely scraping by as it is.”
“So you guys moved to the city?”
“The cities have proved useful and can be easily protected, but there is a big problem. we can’t expand as easily as we would like,” With a burst from her horn, a map of Equestria rose. With it, there were cities with pins over them and cities without. All in all, there were only three major groups of pins. “Moving a large number of changelings from one city to the next proved challenging; ponies would get suspicious very quickly, so we managed with each hive fending off its own without any help.”
“Must have been tough,” I remarked. It was easy to see the troubles she could go into; each hive needed to be highly independent and capable militaristically in a society that seemed too centralized. A paradox that can bring down such style of governance.
“It was,” Chrysalis agreed, “With transportation so difficult, each hive needed to control its population more so than usual. Because of that, we were always short on changelings. Despite that, we managed things; peacefully, might I add. The real problem began when Discord broke out the first time. He gave one of my most vulnerable hives in Fillidelphia a weapon, a mirror to be precise. Should they ever be in trouble, one of my ‘lings would walk into the mirror and would clone himself without the trouble of having to raise an army.”
That… doesn’t make any sense; it breaks the law of conservation of energy. Where would the mass of these new changeling come from? How was it possible to replicate internal organs without any means of seeing them? Why am I still questioning things based off of my knowledge? I thought I stopped doing that. Okay, let’s look at this from a strategic point of view.
“so basically, you can have an army ready on the get-go."
“Exactly, a very useful tool indeed,” The map then zoomed in on one city in particular, “After Discord was trapped in stone again, Zephyre decided to move in and take the mirror for herself. In a panic the overseer of the hive decided to use it. It was a disaster.”
The image showed a changeling using the mirror, and when he got out there was two of him, “We won the battle, but the mirror kept creating more clones,” Suddenly, another changeling came out, and another, and another, “In a panic, the overseer tried to smash the mirror with an axe,” The image of a changeling with an axe appeared near the mirror. He threw the axe which struck the mirror then ricocheted back at the changeling, hitting him squarely in the face. “As you can see, it didn’t go so well.”
“Then what happened?”
“I went there two days later and used some heavy magic and a lot of resources to blow it up.” The mirror was then buried under a pile of dynamite and blew up in what could only be described as nuclear fashion.
“Wait, so the mirror kept making changelings for two days straight?” That can’t be good.
“Yes,” With a wave of her hoof the images disappeared, leaving me with the queen under her light spell, and whatever was crawling in the back of those sewers, “What was once a hive of five hundred became a hive of fifty thousand.”
So that’s where their numbers came from. “One thing I’m not sure though, how did the ponies get involved and why did you invaded them?”
“Oh, that is easy. When fifty thousand changeling came into existence practically overnight, the ponies noticed. So they sent Princess Cadence to Fillydelphia to negotiate; needless to say the negotiation didn’t go as planned.” Chrysalis was rubbing the back of her neck as well as avoiding eye contact.
“What did you do...?” I asked, suspicion in my tone.
“I accidentally, without any thought or previous planning, totally running on intuition then, I…”
“You kidnapped her and took her place in Canterlot?” I interrupted, annoyed at this turn of event.
“It’s all that little pink abomination’s fault!” Chrysalis snapped, “She wanted to integrate them into their perfect pony society; give them jobs, homes for themselves, names, even have them go to school! Can you imagine the horrors they planned to subjugate my changeling to?!”
“Yes,” I deadpanned, “ The horror of higher education, how dreadful...”
“I just couldn’t accept it,” Chrysalis waved dismissively, “So I decided to use force, and the rest is history.”
The more time I spend with this short-sighted tyrant, the lower my IQ will get; I need to wrap this up quickly.
“You mentioned something about some changelings being discorded, may I ask what those are?”
“Oh, you mean like your friend?” She pointed above; I nodded, “These are the changelings that came out of the mirror.”
“And why is there so much hate toward them?”
The moment I asked this question, Chrysalis’s expression changed, “Every hive have a preferred emotion to feed upon. Mine is love, Nirvana is excitement, Zephyre is wanderlust, Vedalia is warmth. These changelings, the discorded ones like you companion, feed off of pain.”
“My queen!” A changeling suddenly interrupted us, “Loveheart gave the signal and the centipede-lings are destroying whatever remains of the discorded changeling out there!”
“A queen’s job is never done,” Chrysalis muttered, “If you’ll excuse me, I need to corral the centipede-lings before they go loose on the city.”
“Thank you for your time, your highness,” I said with a courteous bow. What the hell have I gotten myself into? A war this complicated is not something I am willing to either commit to or be part of.
“And Support?” I looked at Chrysalis who was halfway out of the sewers, “I know my brother is secretive and kind of manipulative, but he has good intentions. He wouldn’t drag you into this if he didn’t take your best interest at heart.”
“Thank you for your concern, my liege,” I replied to her, “But that does not alleviate my worries one bit.”
Aww yeah!
Hmmmm..........Someone needs to teach Chryssie or the whole changeling species about the wonder of technology and stop relying on monsters. That and stop the war.
This seems to be a trend amongst changeling stories, to have changelings rely on their natural abilities instead of technology, and have much less infrastructure.
Well I feel that the cannon characters where acting a bit off for the most part. Chrysalis seem to be acting more as a slightly pretentious buffoon then an imperious devious queen that lay low Celestia and nearly toke over Canterlot. For Cadance, who tried to open negotiation with them, that she believed that they could be integrated into their society she doesn't sound like the same pony that seemed to be disgusted by him and tried to link pillar to her soul to subjugate him to her will. Granted she must have been still traumatized about what happen to her in the caves and see the Changeling now as threats to her well being in the entirety. But, it still comes as a surprised that the ponies did know about the Changelings before the invasion for which it was said at first that it was the wedding that they first reviled them selfless. The openness of the conflict between Changelings feel foolish to say the least seeing that they are all branded enemies of Equestria now for which they should be hiding rather then fighting with each other now.
Whoa, that's a lot of world-building you're throwing at us at once. Also, you keep mentioning her having three sisters, but only two show up in her little hologram explanation about who's involved in the war.
If i was the protagonist, i would run back to ponys...
Well, considering how much the protagonist had suffered since this story began, I can see why Skitter lives to hang around him. And also why she resorts to violence quickly.
Based on the preferred emotions per hive listed, what emotion does Support feed off of?
7115841
The Princesses tried to exterminate him on the basis of what he was, in a sham trial. I wouldn't trust them at all in his position without some major concessions from them. Other ponies may be alright, but their government I'd be very wary of.
Your really good at writing stories, I would love to see more
So was it chrysalis' changelings that attacked the populace of canterlot or was it the discorded changelings? Or both?
7115796
It's because we don't know enough about changeling to know whether they use technology or not, beside they are predatory in nature and design so it does lend a lot of credibility to that trend.
7115797
One thing I can say to that is that I didn't handle the canon princesses that well from the start, I was going for is clueless politicians trying to show they have a handle on the situation, instead I got... whatever the story portrays them to be.
Back then, princess Cadence wasn't afraid and had an open mind to what they can be, instead she got captured.
7115798
That's my attempt at foreshadowing, Chrysalis has three sisters, but the war is against two of them.
7115895
He is a Nirvana spawn as mentioned before the trials, so he feeds off of excitement.
7115907
Thank you, and I'm glad you enjoy it.
7115963
I would spoil the next chapter but, it's a minor detail anyway: Chrysalis leading the discorded changeling
i see, I won't say anything for now then and wait till the next chapter, but I will say I'm thankful for supports somewhat layed back outlook on events. He is going to need it.
He should write up another proof, fixing his mistake, for his inevitable encounter with Twilight.
At least he is getting some answers.
Warmth is an emotion now? I have heard certain feelings described as "warm" and others as cold, but I've never heard of any emotion that's called just warmth. I genuinely have no idea what to imagine under that.
Wait, did they say all the Discorded changelings?
Skipper Run!
7116387
Not an emotion per-say, but once you get from a cold environment to a warm environment your body releases a small amount of endorphin which acts on the blood vessels dilating them in order to allow warmth to enter inside the body.
This is also the reason why you get a warm fuzzy feeling when you're in love.
So, no warmth is not an emotion, but the feeling of warmth is still a viable food source.
7116541
You know, that's actually something you could have an interesting debate over. Do changelings eat feelings, or do they eat emotions? Sense impressions versus subjective internal mental states, as it were. Qualia? I think it's called qualia. If it's the former, which the ability to eat the feeling (rather than the emotion) of warmth would suggest, it kind of makes you wonder why they can't just eat something commonplace but intense like "the feeling of warm sun on your fur" and never go hungry again.
Something for the main character to contemplate at some point, maybe.
7116562
First : I learned a new word
I think it's a great idea and a good premise I can use in future conflicts, so thank you.
7116842
My pleasure, glad to hear the idea was helpful. I'm looking forward to seeing it come up in the story.
An interesting approach on making a combustion engine. However, you are introducing the concept of perpetual motion and that right there... Heh heh, prepare for a mechanical physics and engineering rant.
Absolute perpetual motion is darn near impossible for several reasons, the first being friction. Since we are using pistons, there is friction between the sides of the pistons and the walls of the cylinder and engine block which would slow down the power generated by your gem. You might have a thin layer of oil to help alleviate that issue, but even that wont completely eliminate it. The second one is inertia. Since we are working with a train, the pistons are going to be huge to create enough displacement and power to move everything forward. This means that a huge amount of energy is going to be needed just to push the pistons down on their first stroke. The third issue is the heat generated from the friction of all the parts. Even in our most fuel efficient motors today, all of them are terrible at converting all the potential chemical energy in gasoline into mechanical energy; only about 25% in total. You're going to losing a ton of stored energy through heat loss. The fourth issue is the energy recapture system. The pistons are mainly used to drive the train engine and whatever it is towing forward. Unless you set up a different system that piggy back's off the reciprocating motion of the pistons to run a secondary generator of some kind, you are not going to be charging anything. This is why we have alternators (our miniature generators) in cars turned by a series of pulleys and a belt to recharge the battery.
Then again, I am assuming that the magical gem is like a battery, the train engine runs in a somewhat similar fashion as a conventional internal combustion engine runs, and that they all work off of the same mechanical laws as we have in our world. But since magic is involved, I'm stuck in the same situation as Support is; that being, nothing we know is really true anymore and everything is thrown out the window.
Because magic: where you don't have to explain squat...
7116981
I could have added that the lost energy from the motion of all the parts and the frictions caused by that motion and the inertia of the device, are filled in with earth pony strength and then provided an in-depth description regarding how exactly that works and what contraption do they use and how they got over the problem, I mean there are conductors on the train, they have to have a function at one point or another.
But I didn't for two particular reasons:
The first is that our main protagonist has yet to understand the nature of magic and is only looking at it from a mechanical standpoint.
The second is that the chapter was already exposition heavy with enough world building that should have been stretched over two if not three chapters, I don't want to add a lecture to it as well.
7117060 All in good fun.
If you want me to delete the comment, I can...
7117072
of course not!
The funnest part of reading a chapter on Fim is reading the comments behind them, who knows what twisted minds will read your comment and say, "huh, the guy has a good point," And will stand up for it?
7115963
7115972
If discorded changelings are used in the invasion, ;) then that would explain the changelings' attitudes that were locked up for the time being. Also, since Skipper is one herself that would also explain why all of her disguises are of the flirtatious and sexual which got Support into more trouble than usual.
Chrysalis was pretty over reactive if that was the case between her and Cadence, but if one were to give some thought that the changelings there only liked pain, possibly from when that one changeling tried to destroy the mirror but killed himself, I can see how that would end badly for everyone if they were to suddenly one day become murderous to fill their need. But the contradiction lies in Skipper that maybe there's more to it in how she and the other feeds than just one kind of emotion. So Cadence's proposition isn't so bad...
I made notes on a mana-turbine engine.
*Shrug.
Oh no . . . Changelings that feed on pain? Great, now i'm thinking about changelings into BDMS. They'd definitely . . . .
Stupidity.
7118521
The End.
But no, clearly not
A few pages ago I aired some complaints. Another poster asked me to either back up a particular point of mine or asked me some specific question, it doesn't matter which. What matters is this: I don't care to do it.
It isn't that I just don't care about backing up my points. It isn't that I just want to state my opinions and have them be accepted as fact, no. I, for awhile, thought that I was going to do it. By the time the question was asked to me, a new chapter had been posted or a few months had gone by or whatever, but I had definitely forgotten enough information that I could not really form a coherent argument to support my points with specific and well organised details and quotations, anymore. I would have had to go back and re-read your whole story in order to get a refresher on all the relevant information in order to prove the existence of whatever plot-holes or inhuman-characterization I was talking about. I was going to do it too, and then I read your next chapter.
One reader commented and chose to complement you on your pacing. That reader is right. Your pacing just feels right. The story doesn't grind to a halt or suddenly move faster. That is because it is ALWAYS fast. Like, it's really really fast. Like, the main character understands less and makes fewer decisions than Alice from "Alice in wonderland", and the things are being piled on top of each other, one after another. At this point, that is just how your story IS. Your story is a giant bag of A.D.D. and you need to love it and care for it anyway. The story is fun, ok? The story is good, in that it is entertaining and mostly not incomprehensible. I continue to want to read new chapters of your story... but.... I'm also kind of not invested in it... in a way.
Look, it seems to me that most of your story is not being planned for ahead of time, is that correct? Actually, don't tell me the answer to that. It seems that this is a work of whimsy. As a result, things are just HAPPENING and BLINDSIDING us and there is almost NOTHING the main character can do that can even be considered so much as a true decision, since he can hardly even get the necessary information to make intelligent decisions. He just stands around and objects to everything like he is in a "the straight man and the funny man" act and the whole universe is playing the roll of the funny man. I mean, you have a whole chapter about him sucking on some guyes face(no homo). (-<-look at that thing I just wrote, like, what)
Was that important? Was that interesting? Was that fun for me to sit at home and imagine while looking at a computer?
Doesn't matter! Look, even in this chapter, you just suddenly added a new plot element retroactively. Now "discorded" changelings are a thing. Now, it turns out that I didn't understand the world as well as I thought I did. You keep doing that. You introduce new shit in such a way that everyone but the reader and the main character always already knew about it.
Only now do I notice that the best example, celestia and luna already knowing about him, is gone. For real, that chapter was kind of important. I said I "wished I could" sweep it under the rug...but I already read it...and celestia and luna turning out to NOT be the kind of characters that I thought they were worked very well to make me feel lost and confused and helpless and outraged and betrayed at oc murder-pony-mother-figures, just like your main character feels, which is a good thing.
So, in conclusion, keep adding shit that retroactively makes us wrong and keep changing the main character's motivations, expectations, understandings, locations, and social status at the drop of a hat and keep doing weird shit. At this point, it's just the way your story is! Keep consistent, in the name of themeing. The saving grace of this story is that whatever stupidity we think we see, we know that we don't know anything and we are wrong about everything. Keep the chaos flowing and Fuck the details. This is the kind of story where you were like "the doctor was the king" and I was like "yeah, that checks out"
7119473 What? I'm talking about how Chrysalis didn't want an education?
What is going on?
I had a dream about being this story last night. Pillar sang Mika's "grace Kelly" when he confessed his love to twilight.
It was so fitting. And awesome. Awesomely fitting.
7119473
Well, to put it in retrospect, I never expected this story to have such success in the first place. Especially since, as you mentioned it, I didn't plan it out entirely.
I think the detail that really bugged me in my own story, and made me hesitant about whatever original plot points I originally thought of, is the portrayal of Celestia and Luna. That is the detail that I never planned in the first place, and am still struggling on what to do with.
That chapter you mentioned (I didn't delete it by the way, just unpublished it) had such a negative reaction that I thought I'll shelf it for the time being until I get a better idea on what to write in it.
The pacing problem is, for the time being, unavoidable. I don't have the skills to figure out how to fix the pacing or even find what went wrong in the first place, and everyone who keeps hammering me about the pacing have yet to give me a single clue as to where I should start looking to try and fix it, not that I expect them to by the way.
I am sorry that the story doesn't live up to your expectations and that you lost interest in it, I truly am. But if it is one thing I am convinced of is that abandoning a story midway for whatever reason in the same manner as I have done with three other stories of mine isn't going to make me a better writer. I thank you for your rant, it at least gave me an insight into what I should be looking to fix in whatever future project I might plan on doing.
As for this story, well it's going to remain an entertaining mess until it's last breath.
7119785 just binge read this! Love it! Can't wait for the next chapter!
Wow... Skipper seems so happy and friendly to feed off pain... Wonder if she might be different in that regard? Perhaps thanks to our dear Support?
7119785
when I said I lost interest, I was trying to talk about something really specific. I meant that, like, the little details of the events of your story are now basically to-be-forgotten. I've just reached this mindset, reading your story, where I don't care about consistency so much, which means that I didn't care to make a detailed argument anymore, but also means that every single event in your story is going to be treated as though it was as important and as relevant as suck-face. I'm basically just along for the ride at this point, is what I am saying, but I probably wont be thinking to hard. No other story had ever really managed to make me do that.
7119708
Well, since you were non-specific, I took your single word response to be applied to EVERYTHING and treated it like it was a summary of the whole story. I then slapped a "the end" on it, expressing agreement and mocking the story. Everything after that was directed at the author..
7120937
From what you are saying, if someone went into my story with the intent for analyzing it to the core he will be disappointed, but if he started reading on the premise that this is a story where you can only enjoy it if you don't think about it too much, then he is in for a treat?
Wow, I just wrote my own version of Jojo's bizarre adventure... I did not expect that.
I'm completely honestly lost in what's even happening in this story anymore.
populace (populous is an adjective)
My compliments to the editor.
So in a way, the Changelings were like the Mob. So long as their activities didn't get too rambunctious with their vices, they were actually something of a stabilizing influence in society and ponies either didn’t notice or didn’t care.
However, when the “Mob Boss” died, and the infighting began, shit went south!
I wonder if the Queen Mother is really dead or just magically stuck in stasis by one of her kids.... Encasing her in crystal seems a rather magically expensive and risky way of "assassination" that could be done much easier and quieter with arrows, blades and/or poisons.
(Although, crystalizing Chrysie's mom is rather an odd pun)
Keep up the good work this is one of the more interesting takes on changelings I've read so far. I await the next chapter with baited breath.
...
No compressible gases?
I don't care if the train runs on magic or what, but there can't be an absolute lack of compressible gases. I say this because they all seem to still be able to breathe. Maybe they just don't understand the nature of compressible gases enough to use them for power.
7115972
Does that mean getting rid of extra changelings was part of the invasion plan all along? Either win, or as second best outcome lose the discorded 'lings?
7224370
Yes
7246663
For someone whose name starts with apathy, you sure are getting worked up over my story.
7246663 I know right! The fact that they can't understand that the changelings need love to live is so frustrating. And the fact that it's been like 2 months since last update XD
How does thw next chapter going along?
7297378
On it's way.
webtrax.hu/myfacewhen/faces/my-little-pony-friendship-is-magic/soon-sweetie-belle.jpg
7297416
7297518
Fingers crossed.