Spike threw the empty bowl aside and turned around to watch the home movie again only to find all the film tape taken out of the reels, all tangled up and a mess on the floor "What in Frostbite's name just happened here?!"

He then started hearing guitar and flute music, and saw it coming from a yellow glow and bubbles inside the present box "Welp looks it time for my next present!" Spike declared then running over to the box and looking inside, the glow died down a little when he looked in, the glow and bubbles was coming from deep in the box, he dug around and pulled out a square shaped, green and orange striped present with a yellow bow

"Say what's this?" Spike wondered before unraveling the bow and found a book titled Places Of Equestria, when he flipped the book to its first page it magically flipped to the middle page where he found the source of the bubbles, guitar and flute music, it was coming from a miniature Thorax, wearing a suit despite being non-anthro, blowing bubbles out of a pipe and currently playing a small black umbrella like a guitar.

The changeling was playing the umbrella guitar, behind an Equestrian map, he then switched from playing the actual umbrella like a guitar to playing the handle like a flute, he briefly played the flute and then switched back to the guitar. "Salutations Spike the dragon!" Thorax greeted having noticed the drake and stopped his performance.

"What's for breakfast, or as you dragons say, what's cooking" The bug pony greeted "Thorax, nice to see you again did you ship yourself in here with my presents?"

"Well actually I delivered them myself, and once i got to your door I shrunk and teleported myself into the Places Of Equestria book, one of your presents." Thorax explained "Imagine meeting me here, say Spike have you ever been to The Changeling Hive!"

"No while i've certainly heard of it but I've never been there myself." Spike explained, Thorax took the pipe out of his mouth "Ah the Hive bright colors. colorful residents, beautiful architecture. nice-" he was suddenly interrupted by Screwball walking past and then around him, still singing her theme song, then grabbing his bubble pipe out of his hoof with her mouth.

She continued to sing her theme while blowing bubbles out of the pipe, and walking up the wall, on the ceiling, sliding down the wall and trying to pull the page to the side, which almost causes Thorax to fall over.

"Hey I paid 20 bits and waited 4 months for that bubble pipe!...oh pardon the interruption Spike, that crazy pony is Screwball she's coo coo crazy, a very stupid creature, but that's besides the point tell me have you ever been to The Hive?" the changeling asked again while walking to the edge of the page only to find Screwball gone

"No I haven't" the drake responded "Oh I'm so sorry for you, tell you what how about we kill 2 ponies with one rock, wait that's not it...kill 2 dragons with one boulder...kill 2 yaks with one bullet... kill 2 griffons with one spear...kill 2 changelings with one love blast. kill 2-" he trailed off

"It's kill 2 birds with one stone" Spike corrected "Eh I was half right on my first attempt, here's the plan help me get my bubble pipe from Screwball and in the process I can show you the Changeling Hive." Thorax offered "Sounds like a plan" Spike accepted

"Hey Spike have you ever been to The Changeling Hive?" the changeling asked starting to sing, the dragon nodded his head "Have you ever heard of changeling culture?" Thorax then split into four identical clones that copy each other's actions. "Uhh-uh" Spike responded shaking his head

"Well lets go then!" The clones said in union, before stacking up the top one, pulling a mallet out of nowhere and hitting Spike on the head but instead of making him dizzy and seeing stars, it shrunk him down to the size of the four identical clones.

"Do you like beautiful landscapes, and bright colors?" They asked, the third clone then changed his suit to a tourist outfit, wearing a tropical shirt, a pair sunglasses, ad a camera around his neck "Of Course!"

"Have you tried changeling branded soup? That's right we changelings even have our own brand of food" All four clones claimed followed by the second clone changing outfits from a suit to a grocery worker, and pulling a cart behind them, it then handed Spike a bowl of luke warm soup.

He took a sip of it and grew a suspicious look on his face "Have YOU been to the Changeling Hive?" the drake countered, The clones seem to stop copying each other, the seconds clone asked the first clone, and he shook his head, the one that asked first also shook his head, they asked the third one and got the same respond, they all then asked the fourth one a what do you know he also shook his head, so the first one concluded that Thorax had never been to The Changeling Hive.

"No!" the all said in union, they all combined back into one Thorax, wearing the suit

"Yeah you see when we first met and after I was released from prison I didn't return the the hive, while it did recover from war, I decided to live among ponies, you know be the odd one out, while I lied about me going to the Hive I didn't lie about the changeling branded soup, bet you'll find a changeling pull a cart of canned soup, I've actually never tried one so that soup i handed you was just bought from a local grocery store." Thorax explained rubbing the back of his head blushing a little.

"Well let's go!" Spike exclaimed, grabbing Thorax's hoof when running past him. The page then flipped from the Equestrian map to a page that was completely blank except for a set of train tracks, there wasn't a station or any buildings around the tracks.

"Weird they're usually a train here, but what's more weird is that I remember buildings being here" The duo then heard a train whistle, and found Screwball as the driver of The Pal Express, Equestria's train ride, with the changeling's bubble pipe still in her mouth.

The drake and changeling barely had any time to react before they were both flatten like a pancake from being run over. "Hey grab on!" Thorax said reverting back to his 3D form, Spike grabbing onto his hoof, he then opens his umbrella and inhaled deeply before letting out a gust of wind which propels them and allows them to grab the railing of the last train car and hop on.

"Knew you were too heavy to carry on my back so that's why I devised a back up plan," Thorax informed Spike, closing his umbrella and placing the handle in one of his suit's pockets.

The duo then walked to the front of the car and opened the door, jumped a small gap and made it to the second to last train car, they kept on repeating this sequence until the reached the locomotive where they found Screwball blow the train whistle, the bubble pipe still in her mouth, still singing her theme song

Thorax attempted to grab her but the filly teleported away by simply hopping, Spike let out a stream of green fire but Screwball stepped aside and then proceed to roast a skewer of a dozen sausages over it, then swallowing all 12 of them in one go.

The chaotic pony then hopped and teleported to a comedically large red switch, she then pulled it which caused the Pal Express to stop very fast and very suddenly, which caused the dragon and changeling to be flung out a open window, up a hill and into the dirt.

"Welp at least we're here." Thorax said weakly as he and Spike got up, brushed the selves off and kept on walking, they tripped and start sliding down a large rocky hill, before going off a ramp with launched the duo really high up into the air "Hang On!" Spike wrapped his arms around Thorax as he opened his umbrella and they glided down safety to the ground. Spike was honestly surprised the umbrella didn't turn inside out.

When they landed they heard hooves clopping, Spike then found a bunch of colorful changelings clapping their hooves together not only that, there was banner saying Welcome Home King Thorax, colorful decorations and table off food one table had changeling brand canned soup. "Oh yeah Spike something I forgot to mention is that i'm the leader of the changelings basically their king now."

"Welcome home King Thorax!" A male changeling greeted "And this is-" he trailed off "This is Spike my dragon pal!" the king responded.

"Hey if you're wondering the reason why I never told you i'm the king of the changelings, when I first mentioned the Hive is because I don't really care about being a king, i want to be as humble and down to earth as i can be, you know live a normal life, not to boring but not too exciting." He whispered over to Spike.

"Alright every changeling, while it's nice for you all to celebrate my return, I really don't need a of this" Thorax announced "Awwwwwwwwwwwwww" the changelings said disappointingly as they took down the banner, decorations and a dark changeling with red horns and purple eyes dumps the changeling brand canned soup, along with other plates of food into a cart.

Spike walks over and goes to grab a can of soup only to trip on a rock, hit his chin on the rim of the cart and faceplant into a muddy puddle. The drake takes this time to really in take in the beauty the hive, he really liked the colorful architecture of the place just like his friends said, when he grabbed onto a rock to get up he found his claw stuck to some sticky goo "What's this?"

"Oh that's changeling slime,,something we produce and comes out of our mouths we used it as a weapon during war, but after war we basically took it out of our systems, literally cause i'm pretty sure modern generations of changelings don't even have it and pretty sure even the ones that still have it don't use it" the humble king explained.

The purple and green dragon at first tried to shake it off his head to no avail, then he placed his second claw on the slimed claw, but this just creates a slime bridge connecting the 2 claws together. The drake the places his foot on the bridge but this ends up being a bad decision, while it stretched out the bridge one of his feet gets stuck in the slime.

He the added another foot in hopes that enough force will break the bridge, he strained lifting his arms up and stretching his legs. In the end his plan worked, but not in the way he wanted, after he broke the bridge his face, feet, legs, and chest all got covered in slime.

"Let me help you" Thorax offered no wanting to see Spike suffer more "No don't worry I can get out myself" this statement is immediately jinxed as he trips on another rock and not only faceplants into another muddy puddle bust also smears the goo on more of this body.

He tries to get up with the changeling goo not stuck to his body and the ground, after straining a little to get up he faceplants back into the mud. Gathering all the strength he has the drake then runs way, around a rock, zigzags around three trees and into a bush.

Spike stops to catch his breath only to be yanked out of the bush crashes into all three trees, hits the rock and face plants into the puddle, the splash was big enough to even cover Thorax in mud, "Alright you can help me now" he informed the down to earth king, slightly muffled

Thorax lit his horn, and blasted out a laser which instantly made all the changeling slime/goo disappear of his body "Seriously you have magic i thought the only magic you changelings had were transforming magic, and that horn was just cosmetic." Spike said brushing himself off

"Yeah while we changeling do have magic in our horns we don't use it a lot since transforming is a lot more powerful." the changeling king claimed "What do you mean more powerful, you can't disguise yourself as other and only transform into intimate objects."

"Oh yeah" Thorax stated before turning himself into bomb ready to go off, Spike knew he wouldn't have enough time to run away so he took cover by putting his claws over his head only for the a explosion of multi-colored confetti to happen "Gotcha!"

"That was a good one not gonna lie" Spike admitted "I'll never turn myself into a explosive bomb cause if do and go off I also die in to process" the changeling explained

Spike then spotted the changeling pulling along the cart of food, he then pulled a green mallet out of nowhere and went to hit it only to slip on a half eaten cupcake a changeling dropped, did a back flip and face plant into yet another mud puddle. "Hey King Thorax while i know you don't need a whole party you could at least try my donuts." A female changeling offered, with a tray of donuts around her neck.

There was so many different types of donuts on the changeling's tray, the classic glaze, blueberry, vanilla frosting, strawberry frosting, chocolate frosting the ladder 3 with sprinkles, powdered and many more but the one Spike had his eye on was a glazed donut coated in ruby shards.

Thorax grabbed the vanilla frosted with sprinkles and Spike grabbed the glazed, ruby shards one "MMMMM! Jelly filled!" both creatures coincidentally said in union.

Spike still wanting to try the changeling bran canned soup snuck on the changeling pulling the cart of food and reached inside only to find and grab Screwball by the neck Thorax's bubble pipe still in her mouth. Thorax quickly trots over and grabs his bubble pipe back from the filly but in the process knocking over a lantern into a bush which starts a fire.

The duo tries to stomp out the fire but Spike ends up burning his foot grabbing the bottom of it with his claws and hopping around and Thorax ends up burning both his front hooves. Panicking Thorax opens his umbrella grabs Spike's claw and blows into his umbrella, which propelled them away.

A few hours later

What at first started as simply worry and paranoia about if they returned to the hive they could be held accountable for the fire and may be hated for the rest of their lives by every creature, turned to guilt feeling extremity bad about what they done and the fact that i was over a bubble pipe, but in their defense it did cost Thorax 20 bits and he also had to wait 4 months for it just in time for Spike's hatch-day.

This guilt was so bad it took away their happiness both figuratively and literally as the duo had lost their colors, which were replaced by different shades of blue. Thorax blew very few bubbles out of his pipe as he and Spike walked along a trail, both frowning, heads down and blue.

Screwball saw them in their sad states and got an idea, she directed the 2 creatures down a trail of platns which they walked down very slowly, she followed the trail which led to and underground cave, she came across a Maulwarf, but she simply snapped her fingers and the monster turned into a table, the filly then spawned a bunch of cafe furniture into the cave.

The chaotic pony then did some complicated mathematics, before pulling out a white rectangle board, then threw it away and pulled out a identical one, she wrote something on it before nailing the board onto the rim of the underground cave naming it The Music Cafe.

By the time she was done the dragon and changeling had walked into the cave cafe, she showed them their table but they just looked at it before walking past, she then pulled both the chairs out, teleported in front of the duo and swept them into the chairs and into the table.

She then gave each one a menu, Thorax slightly raised his eyelid before dropping it, a bubble he blew hit a picture of a spaghetti and meatballs. Spike simply stared at his menu, pointed at something random before dropping his eyelid as well. Screwball came back with a plate of 3 tacos for the drake and a bowl of spaghetti and meatballs for the humble changeling king.

Thinking they might want seasoning the looney filly poured some Liquid Love onto the spaghetti, and seasoned the tacos with powered rubies and crystal/gemstones. Spike just simply started at his food as for Thorax his head fell and face planted on his food

Thinking they might want entertainment instead Screwball ripped both their menus, came back with cabasa and shook it with turned Thorax purple raising his mood, she then turned it into a pandeiro and banged it which turned him orange fixing his posture, she turned that into cuica and hit the bottom of it with turned him green, suddenly all those ladder colors combined, and gave Thorax his color and happiness.

As the changeling ate his spaghetti, the crazy pony strummed a guitar with turned Spike purple and fixed his mood, 4 birds then popped out of Screwball's cap and started humming which turned the drake a dark green and also fixed his posture, finally she turned the guitar into a bongo and banged it turning him a light green, he grabbed a taco and ate it as the ladder colors combined and gave Spike his happiness back.

Spike tried to join Thorax who was dancing and blowing bubbles like he could before, Screwball then grabbed the dragon's tail and pulled it causing him to start bouncing along the ground. Both creatures went up a set of stairs and started dancing on a counter, going claw in hoof and going in circles.

Screwy then lifts the counter revealing that it was actually a music staff, tripping the duo. The screwball poured the cabasa into a cup like a liquid, threw the pandeiro up into the air where it split into 5 smaller pandeiros and went into the cup, finally she chopped the cuica with a knife.

She then trotted over the 2 dizzy creatures, placed them into 2 cups, one of them with the music mixture, put the cups together and mixed them up. She then poured Spike into a green glass, the liquid coming out green along with the liquefied dragon, and then poured in the liquefied Thorax the cup grew 4 times the size and went Screwball jumped in the liquid turned purple.

The duo at first had no idea where they were a first but when they started hearing music and a piano playing itself, they swam over to it, the king used his umbrella handle to grab land and then used it to grab Spike. They both started dancing along to the music. Thorax opened his mouth which caused bubbles to come out and caused him to crash into Spike and knock him off.

He grabbed onto a platform below the piano only for Screwball to pop out if nowhere and knock him off with a bat, luckily Thorax grabbed him again with his umbrella handle.

All of a sudden the music stopped, Screwball then came out of nowhere again and teleported them to this random forest "Now where are we?" Thorax asked only for both to be knocked away by Screwball banging on a bongo, they ran away only for the screwy pony to appear in front of them banging a smaller bongo, when they ran away they came across her again this time playing a double bongo.

Out of nowhere massive versions of the instruments Screwball was playing the duo earlier to surround them. The ladder pony then started somehow blowing a massive bubble out of a flute which knocked the massive instruments away. Once it popped she then painted the leftover smaller bubbles different patterns which then turned into butterflies.

2 massive butterflies chased after Spike and Thorax, the changeling pulled the dragon back with his umbrella handle only for the butterflies to grabbed them, revealing that they're just marionettes controlled by Screwball riding a quarter note like a unicycle.

The pony eventually made the butterflies drop the 2 creatures, who then landed on a beam note that was riding on the staff, once the coo coo pony had reached the end of the staff, she pushed it which caused the beat to become extremely bumpy, she then pulled out a pencil, drew a whole and filled it with water.

Both creatures fell into the water hole which then disappeared. Thorax then poked a small hole with his umbrella tip which then broke into a massive hole, that spilled on Screwball and then Spike landed on her causing her to bounce away. The duo then found themselves back at the self playing piano.

As they continued to dance, Screwball lit a stick of dynamite and placed it under the piano which resulted in a explosion, although the piano was destroyed and then came back together, Spike and Thorax were launched out of the glass and out of the Music Cafe right as Screwball snapped her fingers and boarded up the place.

With their happiness and color back along with their guilt and regret gone, they went back to the Hive which had suffered pretty bad fire damage, Thorax strummed his umbrella like a guitar which changed every Changeling's mood, they all started dancing as music started.

During all of this the donut female changeling from earlier came up to Spike and Thorax and offered them another donut Spike grabbed a chocolate one and Thorax a strawberry. Shortly after that the dark changeling offered Spike something out of hid chart which and of course he grabbed the changeling brand can of soup "Thanks big brother!" Thorax says grabbing a cupcake out of the cart.

"Big Brother?!" Spike says before hitting the can against his head, that unintentionally opens it, he then proceeds to drink the soup straight out of the can, as Thorax secretly used his magic to fix the Hive's fire damage since other changeling were using their magic to fire fireworks.

By this point both had forgotten that they were in a book which in reality just had teleported them to the Hive. suddenly and very unexpectedly the book closed. Thorax managed to wiggle half of his body out of the closed book, grab Spike's claw open and blow into his umbrella.

"Can't believe this whole time i've could've just asked that changeling for a can of soup." Spike thought as he and Thorax were propelled out of the book.

"Hey Spike pretty sure you still have some more present to open!" Thorax reminded the dragon "MORE PRESENTS!" Spike exclaimed before running over to his present box and try to run up it only to fall. "What...uh oh i'm a midget, i'm small...Thorax you're a midget too."

"Don't sweat it Spike nothing a little black magic can't fix." Thorax claims blowing bubbles out of his pipe, he then does some kind of ritual dance, which causes the ground to shake followed by a bunch of zombified changelings dressed in armor and/or solider uniform come out of the ground.

"SPIKE WAKE UP!" Thorax yells causing Spike the jolt awake and look around for any zombie changelings "You passed out when the book closed good thing I got you out."

Spike walked over the present box and tried to climb up it only to slide down and tear off some rapping paper. "If we want to grow from midget size back to original size, to open your next present, i know just the spell" Thorax claims the lights going off and a spotlight appears, he does a dance luckily this one is more energetic like than ritual like, eventually one of his hooves are coated in a golden light, he put that hoof up to his mouth, which grows him back to original size "Now you try!"

Spike snaps his claw the lights go out but the spotlight appears next him, he walks over to it only to slide past it, he tries again same result, he resorts to having to pick it up and put it on him. He does his own energetic dance and gets on of his fingers to glow, except when he puts it up to his mouth his whole claw inflates.

"Oh yeah i forgot to mention i haven't adjusted the spell to work on anthro creatures so just keep on...doing whatever you're doing until you get it right." the changeling informs Spike. The dragon tries the move the spell to his chest but it ends up in his finger, he tries again it ends up in his tail, the his head, his eye, his stomach, finally he slightly moves the spell up and once it touched his chest his whole body inflates up to his original 4 foot size.

"Thanks Pal!" Spike thanks hugging Thorax "But Spike remember your presents!" the humble king says "My Presents!" the drake exclaims.