Rusk slipped through the mass of bodies, squeezing past the traffic. He couldn't be late!

Rushing into the room, he was happy to notice that he wasn't. He lucked out, the teacher hadn't arrived yet. Levitating his small notepad and pencil onto the desk, he rested back on the chair, his hooves going behind his head.

Rusk knew this day was coming. It was the last month of education for him, and the final test was to go out on a real hunt and gather love for the Queen. Everyone knew that.

He swiveled his head as the door opened and the teacher plodded in and rested her rump on the office chair at the front of the room. She lit up her horn as she levitated a book over to her, flipping it to a certain page.

Some more students trickled in, filling up the hall. Rusk noticed one of his best friends, Fey, came through the doors and sat next to him. The male changeling and Rusk had grown to become friends after Rusk helped Fey with his project..

Next came through Flitter. She was carrying her notebook and pen and went to sit behind Rusk.

Said changeling smiled. He always kind of had a small thing for the female changeling, even though much of the class disliked her.

She wasn't a mean grub, no, but some of the changelings threw harsh words at her like she was nothing. That didn't stop Rusk from liking her personality. Underneath the chitin-like fur was a kind and smart changeling, who tried her hardest and excelled at doing so.

She smiled as Rusk looked back at her, and he quickly averted his head to the front of the class. The teacher had stood up and was now looking at the class.

"Good sun-up, little ones," she said, "let us start by reciting the phrase. Go!"

"Love is food, not for good," the class droned in a mishmash of bored and enthusiastic voices. Rusk gazed left at his friend, who had a deadpan expression.

"Alright. Now, you know your final project is arising. Everyone here knows to feed off love through the multiple towns of Equestria. May that be through imitating someone they love, sex or other means, you must at least bring something to satisfy Queen Chrysalis."

Rusk sighed. He will hate this task, but a decent hunt sounded kind of fun. The thrill of going out and harvesting love from somepony was amazing, the adrenaline of avoiding being caught heightening his senses.

He only had a week to wait - he was so excited! He decided once the class ended that he would practice perfecting his pony form, for he had yet to correct the colors. He was thinking of gray and white, then again that would make him seem a bit old.

Maybe white and blue? Yeah, maybe. Imagining the stallion in his head, he sighed and shook the thought out.

The teacher was answering multiple questions of the upcoming task. Had he been daydreaming that long?

Suddenly a small chime echoed through the halls. Some changelings rocketed through the hole in the back of the hall as soon as the sound reached their earholes. Rusk himself decided to wait until the traffic calmed down, scrawling notes into his small pad.

"Rusk?" Said changeling swiveled his head to see Fey and Flitter staring at him as he wrote with his magic.

"Yeah?" he mumbled, shutting his notebook.

"You wanna go now or next week?" Fey asked, getting a chuckle from both Rusk and Flitter. Rusk stood up, shoved in his chair and shrugged. "Now sounds good."

As the trio exited into the hallway, Flitter spoke, "So, what are you guys gonna do for the test? Like, what town are you going to go after?"

Rusk inwardly smiled at the tone of her voice. Flitter had an amazing voice - and even better of a singing one, when she rarely did sing. Rusk shrugged and said, "I probably will play it on a whim. The pony I'm going in as probably will take a bit of planning. I just can't seem to get the colors right."

The three had already stepped out into the main hive, the caved roof spiking down in stalactites. The hive was like a large tunnel or cylinder with ends that tapered both ways. The buildings were carved out of the, despite that the insides were much more comfortable.

"Can we see it?" Fey asked, cocking his head slightly.

"Sure, I guess." Rusk quickly glanced around to make sure the area wasn't too crowded and let his power take him over. The green flames started at his hooves and swiftly worked their way up, only disappearing when it went over the now invisible tip of his horn.

Rusk was now a white pegasus stallion with blue hair, the longer mane cascading down the right side of his face, not quite covering his eye. His eyes were a light shade of green, and his cutie mark was that of a cloud that cascaded partly up his flank. He gave a curt smile as Flitter buzzed around him with her insect wings.

"Not bad!" said Flitter, her hooves touching the ground once more. "Just change back now, we don't want to attract too much attention."

The flames licked up Rusk's body, returning him to his black shell and bright blue glowing eyes. Flitter nodded in approval. She turned to Fey and asked, "What do you think?"

Fey shrugged. "I can't really give much input, okay? I would have said something otherwise." He stood up from where he was sitting, against the side wall of the institute. "Let's go outside again!"

"Are you serious? Again? I hate the forest," said Flitter, her wings twitching uncomfortably. "It gets into my hoof-whistlers."

Fey rolled his eyes. "Fine."

Rusk sighed. "Don't we have work to do anyways?" He opened his notebook with his magic, flipping to the farthest page written on and reading aloud. "Work: prepare pony forms and choose town to hunt."

"Bit overpreparing for the test, though," quipped Flitter, "I mean your pony form is good, and isn't it just kinda random what town you'd want to hit?"

"You could say that, but there is no harm in preparing early!" said Rusk, his wings buzzing in preparation to take off. "Come on, let's go home."

The short flight to the residence district did not take long, and Flitter quickly waved goodbye as she swerved down to the cut-out in the wall, leaving Fey and Rusk alone, buzzing not too far away.

Rusk said his goodbyes and ducked into the hole, the pheromones emanating from it marking it as his home.

Landing and casting his notebook aside, he entered the small place. A single bed resided in the corner, and a desk sat next to the entrance.

Changelings didn't feed off pony food. They fed off love, and enough was being harvested that there was the smell of it in the air. They must have filtered it again into the air of the hive, letting the changelings feed on the residual love.

Rusk flopped onto the bed, sighing. This was going to be a long week.

Little did he know that he had to be torn so bad by a life-changing decision soon.

[hr]

"And what did you do?" Fey queried Flitter.

"N-nothing really. I fed off the love of some gray mare. She was a pretty easy target, considering how retarded she was."

"That's not a very nice thing to say," said Rusk, gnawing his fangs into a rubber cylinder, his sharp teeth easily penetrating the material.

"But she was! She had this weird lisp and her eyes were all crossed. She didn't even pick up on the slight lack of knowledge of the character," Flitter defended.

"Yeah, but-"

"Quiet, sssubjects," a voice hissed, garnering the small crowd's attention.

A tall dark figure loomed above the smaller changelings. Her coat was jet-black, and her mane was a bioluminescent green and bore many holes and knots. Her holed legs were tall, and her face and long fangs secured the look of a true royal changeling.

All the changelings bowed in tandem to Chrysalis, the leader of the changelings. She smiled at the eager group, and spoke, "Rise." They obeyed without a second thought.

"You are very honored to have me grade your assessment," she began, "as little a changeling would feed me directly. All of you have love to give to me, correct?"

A chorus of "Yes, my queen," echoed throughout the crowd.

"Very well. Organize yourself in a line, and make it fast." The room buzzed to life, changelings putting themselves into line.

Rusk ended being behind Flitter and in front of Fey. They had been together when the speech began, it was no hard task to stick together.

Thus began the long and grueling progress. Male after female fed his or her love to Chrysalis as she visibly grew less weary and more steadfast.

"Flitter, come forward," said Chrysalis, the changeling already standing before her. Chrysalis lit up her horn, and her pupils started flashing dimly.

Suddenly the queen's horn fizzled, crackling with electricity as she howled in either physical or mental pain. Flitter was flung across the room, landing and skidding on the floor.

Chrysalis stomped over to the terrified female, scowling heavily.

"And why do you have no love and only anger?"

Flitter gulped. Her glowing blue eyes seemed exceptionally wide, and she scrabbled back with her hooves.

Rusk had his mouth open, forced to watch the spectacle. His friend - no, his best friend - was being pinned by Chrysalis, her entire carapace shell rattling in fear.

"I should kill you for such an endeavor! You know what happens if you fail the Assessment!" Chrysalis howled, and as on command two armored changelings started to drag her by her forehooves.

Flitter was screaming. Her voice shrilly cried out to get the two to stop. The armored males scoffed and grabbed her harder, dragging her along her rump towards a side passage.

Rusk turned to his friend, Fey, then suddenly whipped his head around as her shrill cry called Rusk's name.

Oh, how much he could wish to help. But Chrysalis had frozen him in place, her mouth open wide to receive the love that seeped from Rusk's reserves.

As soon as he was released and out the door, he broke in a gallop, firing up his horn as he instinctively shifted into secondary vision.

Secondary vision let's you see pheromone trails, all very distinguishable. You could only track pheromones if the one emitting them wanted to be located.

In this case Flitter's trail lit up like a beacon, her pheromones highlighting over the others. He quickly took after it, barely aware of Fey calling out to him.

[hr]

Where had these guards taken her? The trail overlapped and stacked upon itself multiple times, leading to one of the exits, but they kept running into dead ends to only reverse and go in a different direction.

Maybe she put up a bit more of a fight than he thought.

Walking through the halls he noticed that a lone changeling strode across the roof, its horn lit up as it trotted along. With a creeping feeling, Rusk picked up his pace, skipping places where Flitter's trail left off only to come back again.

This time he found himself staring at a steeply sloping tunnel. Her pheromones alone dragged up the tunnel, the guards' ones already veered away.

Rusk was about to stick his head into the opening when an acute hiss was heard. He wheeled backwards to be staring muzzle to muzzle with an Elder.

Elders were respected, older members of the Hive. They had serviced for many years and were known for their experience in anything.

And yes, Rusk was staring into the muzzle of one.

"You have proven enough," the changeling grumbled in a gravelly voice, "you must leave. Chrysalis will be sure to hunt after you."

The Elder made no move to attack. Rusk raised an eyelet, giving a puzzled look.

"You and the female's bond holds strong, friend. You must learn to run and hide, and stay disguised within the ponies. Even though I may follow Chrysalis' command, she never spoke of bringing you back to her.

"Therefore, I am giving you a chance. The time you leave will start a great hunt for you, for you, youngling, would change the face of changelingkind.

"You think Chrysalis has shown you her wrath. You know nothing yet." A loud clatter was heard and the Elder swiveled his head back and then back to face him. "Go now. You must leave. Make sure to hide your pheromones." The Elder spun around and stalked off.

Rusk was thrown into a dilemma. Leave, and risk the unknown? Or stay, and live with knowing that his friend was out there alone?

He shook his head. The words of the Elder echoed in his mind, bringing him to his conclusion.

He will go. He will be betraying his own kind, but he will go.

Rusk plunged into the dark tunnel, the warm earth pressing against him as the clanging drew closer.

Suddenly, the dirt crumbled and gave in behind him, sealing him in darkness. He heard muffled voices and hisses, and a sharp crack.

Uh oh.

I have already written most of this story on FiMFiction, so until I catch up, I will try my best to upload a new chapter every few days. Unlike FiMFiction, however, I will probably have to respond to user reviews in the author-notes section of the chapters.

I'll catch you all in a couple days! (I have all the docs uploaded, so this should be a piece of cake!)