Sideboard of Harmony

by FanOfMostEverything

Wedding Bells of Velis Vel

"Princess Celestia cordially invites you to the wedding of Princess Mi Amore Cadenza and..." Twilight gasped, looking up from the invitation. "My brother!?"

"You have a brother?" Pinkie asked.

Rainbow Dash looked at her, surprised. "You didn't know?"

"How could I have known? When did brother-having become a thing that Twilight did, and how did everypony but me get the memo?" She looked about the group suspiciously. "Does anypony else have some siblings they'd like to bring out into the open? Or are we just leaving this in canonical uncertainty until new merchandise forces a wavefunction collapse?"

"It's not that big a deal, Pinkie," said Dash, trying to hide her discomfort behind a soothing tone.

The party pony scoffed. "Well of course you'd say that. You're the least familially defined out of all of us! At least I can infer the name of Fluttershy's mom, but you? You're awesome ex nihilo, a cipher, a mystery wrapped in an enigma wrapped in the visible light spectrum. For all we know, you—" Her rant was interrupted by the magical insertion of a cupcake into her mouth.

As Pinkie chewed, Rarity smiled, pleased to see that her gambit had worked. "Feeling better, dear?"

As the pink mare nodded, Twilight smirked. "I hope you appreciate the irony of you demanding that I make sense.

The planeswalker swallowed and shrugged. "I'm just the comic relief character. You're the protagonist among protagonists. We're supposed to know your backstory best. You can't just spring a sibling on us at the end of the second season."

Studiously ignoring most of this, Applejack asked, "Yer just sore 'cause y' never knew t' invite 'er brother t' any parties, ain'tchya?"

"Partially, yes," conceded the other earth pony.

"Well, it isn't like he would've attended anyway," noted Twilight. "He's captain of the Royal Guard. He's in charge of every guardspony in all of Equestria. He's way too busy for something as trivial as a party held by somepony he's barely heard of."

"'Trivial'!?"

"Seemingly trivial?" Pinkie seemed to find this acceptable, but Twilight then took up her abandoned umbrage. "Of course, if he's too busy to tell his only sister that he's getting married—"

"I'm holding you to that 'only sister' line, Sparkle," warned Pinkie, eyes narrowed.

Spike smirked. "And isn't this coming from the pony I have to remind to eat now and again?"

"Speaking from experience," offered Rarity, "I know how easy it is to forget even those closest to one's heart when faced with the demands of one's work. If your brother is anything like you, perhaps he's simply been consumed by duty."

"Why?" demanded Twilight. "What could possibly be so important?"

"Y' mean b'sides his weddin'?"

"Um..." Long experience helped the others react to Fluttershy's overture. All fell silent and turned to her, but none made direct eye contact. The gentle pegasus pointed a hoof at the capital. "Maybe it has something to do with the purple bubble around Canterlot?"

Everypony looked to the capital. The indicated bubble was faint, but definitely there. Twilight thought aloud, disbelief heavy in her voice. "That.. that's a single gigantic force field. What's going on?"

"I haven't heard a word about this," marveled Rarity.

"After y' rubbed shoulders with darn near everypony who's anypony?" Applejack doffed her hat. "Must be some kinda emergency. Ah hope they're all okay."

"Why hope?" Dash leapt into the air. "We gotta get over there right now, see for ourselves!"

Twilight nodded grimly. "You're right, Rainbow Dash. Spike, take a letter."

"A letter?" cried the pegasus. "How is a letter going to get there any faster than me?" Spike gave her a withering look and puffed out a bit of flame. The speedster gave an awkward chuckle. "Oh. Right."

The purple mare smiled despite herself and began to dictate. "Dear Princess Celestia,

"My friends and I just noticed the enormous shield encompassing all of Canterlot. We are naturally quite concerned, especially in light of the news of my brother's wedding, which he apparently felt wasn't important enough to share with little Twiley ahead of time..." She noted her friends' expressions. "Um, scratch that part out."

The dragon smirked again. "I'm getting a sense for tangents. I stopped writing after 'upcoming wedding.'"

Twilight pretended not to notice her blush. "Good initiative. So, from there: Since we are already on our way to Canterlot to aid with the festivities, is there any way we could help with whatever threat has caused the heightened state of alert?

"Your faithful, concerned student,
"Twilight Sparkle"

The scroll was quickly finished and incinerated, all seven anxiously watching the smoke.

"Do you think anypony is hurt?" Fluttershy didn't direct her question, simply voicing her anxiety.

Twilight smiled reassuringly. "Don't worry, Fluttershy. Shining Armor may have taken a turn for the inconsiderate, but he's still one of the best knight-captains Canterlot has seen in the past century. Protection is literally his special talent. I'm sure he's got a plan worthy of Mashy Spike-Plate himself."

---

"Seriously? A shield that only you can maintain? That's your defense strategy?"

"Only the passive defense. Princess Luna is investigating the threat every day."

Twilight nodded. "Okay, that explains why you aren't asking for her help. What about Princess Celestia?"

Her brother shook his head. "Between keeping watch over Canterlot and keeping the country functioning, she barely has enough time to preside over the wedding."

"And you didn't ask me for help because?"

Shining Armor sighed. "Like you said, Twiley, only I can maintain the shield."

"And that doesn't strike you as an obvious weak point in the security," deadpanned the mare. "Look at you, Shiny! You almost collapsed after that last recharge!"

"It's the best option we have," he insisted.

His sister groaned. "Fine. Proof by counterexample it is, then." She sent a beam of light towards the top of the barrier. Unlike the stallion's single burst of energy, this was a thin, consistent stream.

Twilight frowned as she considered the incoming data. "Wow, you really went for quantity over quality, didn't you?"

Armor gave her an indignant glare. "I had to encompass all of Canterlot in one spell."

"Uh huh."

"You think you can do better?"

She smirked. "I already said I was going to, didn't I?" The thin beam of magic thickened and brightened. The mare reared up, then began to levitate, arcane power outperforming gravity. The shield seem to shimmer and fuzz. Closer inspection would reveal magical symbols cascading down its surface like an ideogrammatic waterfall. After several seconds, this gave way to the grid pattern of the barrier, which shifted to one of tessellating hexagons.

As Twilight drifted back to the ground, her brother cautiously asked her, "What did you do?"

Her smirk shifted into a self-satisfied grin. "First, I gave the shield much greater ontological independence from your magic. As it was, it was a miracle that it stayed intact while you slept.

"Second, I added a pair of recharging subroutines to ease active maintenance requirements. The first uses the ambient magic in the air and the Canterhorn to replenish the shield. With just that, you shouldn't have to sustain the spell more than two, maybe three times a week. The second turns the chief weakness of this kind of barrier, a sustained siege, into an energy source. It's a kinetithaumic converter. Anything that hits shield recharges it. It's not a perfect conversion, of course, but it should increase the spell's functional duration in such a situation by at least fourfold.

"Third and finally, I closed all of the loopholes and back doors that I used to effect the changes. 'I less-than-symbol three Cadence' does not a secure password make."

Shining Armor was agog. "How..."

"Element of Magic, remember? I can tell this abjuration to sit, roll over, and play dead, and that's without hacking it." Twilight gave her brother a fond hug. "It's good to see you again, BBBFF. We need to do this more often. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got a wedding to plan."

---

Later that evening, Twilight walked away from sounds of merriment, head down and heart heavy. "Looks like I really am on my own." Her friends were too caught up in their new positions as bridesmaids to listen to her tale of creepy magic that made her beloved brother's eyes go all...

"Twilight? Hi!" A perfect example came trotting towards her.

"Ditzy Doo? What are you doing here?"

The pegasus frowned. "Well, gee, nice to see you too."

The purple mare shook her head, trying to backtrack. "I didn't mean it like that. I just wasn't expecting to see you in Canterlot."

The blonde grinned. "What can I say? When you know ponies in high places, sometimes they want you to come visit."

Twilight tried to look happy in kind. "So, are Address Unknown and Dinky here?"

Ditzy scowled. "As much as I'd like them to be, no. Address doesn't trust the new mailponies to lick stamps unsupervised." Her expression lightened. "As for Dinky, she wanted to spend some quality time with her dad, and I can't really blame her for that. Besides, she still has school." The scowl returned. "But that stallion, ugh! Do you know what he said when I told him we were invited to a royal wedding?"

"What?"

"'That's nice.' Can you believe that? We could get invi..." She trailed off. Twilight's facade had crumbled to the point where she seemed to be carrying the weight of the world on her withers. "Are you okay, Twilight?"

"No, Ditzy, I'm not okay. In fact, I need your help."

The pegasus paused as she considered this for a moment. "Well, okay, but I'm not sure how I can help with the wedding prep."

The unicorn shook her head. "No, I need you to help me prove that Cadence is evil!"

"...What."

"She's changed, Ditzy. She's not the pony who foalsat me. She's a demanding, deceptive, duplicitous..." Twilight paused, perhaps searching for more sinister "D" words. "She's just not right! Not for Shining Armor, not for anypony!"

Gently as she could, the mailmare asked, "Did you ever consider that you might be overreacting just a little?"

"I am not overreacting! If anything, everypony else is underreacting! Go and see for yourself!"

Ditzy considered this. "You know what? I think I will."

Twilight went from grousing to gratitude in the blink of an eye. "You will? Oh, thankyouthankyoutha—"

The pegasus held up a hoof. "But. If I can't find anything wrong with her, will you at least promise to consider the possibility that you're wrong?"

"...All right."

"Good. Where can I find her?"

---

"Halt! Who goes there?" Luna's voice cut through the night as she answered her own question. Glowering, she called, "Be swift in your duties, Ditzy Doo."

The pegasus smiled to herself. The princess couldn't fairly object to her presence, not when Luna herself had composed the oath urging couriers to brave the dark of night. Still, best not to flaunt royal authority. Ditzy accelerated to a brisk trot as she approached Shining Armor's quarters.

A knock at the door summoned the stallion. "Yes?"

"Telegram for Princess Mi Amore Cadenza."

"I'll take it."

She shook her head. "Her eyes only."

Armor gave the mailmare a flat look. "I'm the captain of the Royal Guard and her fiancé. I think you can trust me."

Ditzy wingshrugged. "Sorry, sir. Gotta give it to her in person or it'll self-destruct."

The groom gave the universal sigh of contempt for red tape. "Fine. Just a second. Cadence!"

"What!?"

Ditzy held back a wince. That tone did not bode well for the "not actually evil" scenario.

"Mail for you! Top secret!"

"Well stop shouting about it, then!" The alicorn came into view, glaring at her allegedly beloved. "Honestly..."

"Not evil" was dismissed there and then. To Ditzy's eyes, the princess was a shape of blue magic that overlapped with something that was obviously not Twilight's foalsitter. Not unless the unicorn was repressing some memories. The tendril of bruise-purple energy that was flowing out of the retreating Shining Armor and into the creature only underscored its not-Cadence-ness.

"Yes, what is it?" barked the impostor, shaking the pegasus out of her reflection. This close, there was a weird two-level effect as true and false voices spoke as one.

"Telegram for you, ma'am."

"Well, let's have it."

Ditzy shook her head. She'd made a plan in case Twilight had been right. Now it was time to put it into action. "I'm afraid that it's a singing telegram, Your Highness."

Not-Cadence raised an eyebrow skeptically. "A top-secret singing telegram."

The pegasus put on her most gormless face. "Yes, ma'am."

The alicorn said nothing more, simply slamming the door in the messenger's face. At least, she tried to. A hoof in the doorway sent it bouncing back and applied a spell that had been prepared earlier. When the faker tried to shut the door a second time, it didn't budge.

As the deceiver struggled against the "equal and opposite force" enchantment, Ditzy appraised her forehoof. "I think you chipped it. I hope you're proud of yourself."

Not-Cadence seemed on the verge of physical assault, her horn layered in overglow as she futilely strained against the immobile door. "Go away!"

"Not until I've delivered the message, ma'am."

The bride-to-be snorted in frustration, then relented. "Fine. Sing, then."

Ditzy nodded and cleared her throat. "Ohhhh..." Then, in a decent imitation of the Royal Canterlot Voice: "SECURITY ALERT! SHAPESHIFTER DETECTED! KNIGHT-CAPTAIN ARMOR HAS BEEN COMPROMISED!"

The gratifying wail of sirens began to echo through the night. As the false princess stared vacantly at her unveiler, the pegasus smiled. "I have to say, ma'am, that really is a marvelous glamour. Visual, tangible, auditory, even olfactory. I'd test for a gustatory element, but that would be rather forward of me."

"Who... How?"

The mailmare bowed. "My name is Ditzy Doo. I am something you couldn't have planned for."

"What's the meaning of this!?" Shining Armor stormed towards the entryway. "You madmare! Do you think this is some kind of sick joke?"

Ditzy nodded towards his fiancée. "You tell me."

The guardspony frowned. "Wha—" The question died on his lips as he looked at the false Cadence.

"Darling?" she asked plaintively, not realizing that her earlier struggles with the door had burnt away the disguise around her jagged horn.

The unicorn's fury transferred to her. "What have you done with— urgh!" A sudden migraine cut off the shout.

"Hmph." The alicorn sent a surge of sickly green at her suitor, swelling the parasitic bond between them. "Down, lover boy." Shining Armor collapsed, his breathing labored. She turned back to the troublesome pegasus. "As for you—"

"Yes?" Ditzy smiled among the guards that had flooded to the alert. "What about me?"

Luna glared at the impostor behind her subjects. "Vile creature! You will—"

Whatever the night princess wanted her to do, Chrysalis decided that she would hiss and launch a concussive wave of magic. Ponies were sent flying as she made her escape.

That escape was quickly unmade as she went crashing back to earth. Luna shook her head, horn aglow with gravimancy. "Why do they always try to run?"

"Now!" croaked the changeling.

Half of the guards immediately righted themselves and rushed at the moon princess. With her attention divided, her gravity spell was weak enough for Chrysalis to overcome with a pittance of her stolen power. Dropping her damaged disguise, she turned and fired a blast at the other alicorn.

Luna was not as powerful as her sister. She also had four equinoid insects worrying at her flanks. However, she had the advantage of not being the one who fired first, and that made all the difference. With a thought, she summoned a dense cloud of darkness in the beam's path. It glowed a sullen green as it absorbed the energy.

The tattered queen kept pouring it on, confident that she would overwhelm the trifling defense. Then a voice cut through her concentration. "You have quite the ego, don't you?" The insectoid's eyes flicked to one side. The pegasus again? "I can fix that."

A wave of blue power, and the creature was sent staggering. It paused. It couldn't feel its magic! Its wings! Its... its... what else was there? What had it been doing? Why?

Incapacitating the last of the lesser changelings, Luna looked to her foe and balked. All identifying features had been wiped from the creature. All that remained simply... was. No wings, no horn, no tail, not even facial features. Just a blank living shape, staggering in confusion.

"That won't last for long," Ditzy warned. "What will you do with her?"

The alicorn considered this for a moment. She pointed her horn at the nameless thing and whispered, "Sleep." As it collapsed, she answered, "For now, she will be incarcerated. Come dawn, I will confer with Celestia. We must locate the real Cadence, and this fiend likely knows her whereabouts." She nodded to the grey mare. "You have done well this night, Ditzy Doo."

"Only at Twilight's insistence."

"Indeed? Then you are both to be thanked." The pegasus yawned, and the princess smiled. "Tomorrow. For now, rest. There will be much to do."

---

"Ugh..." Chrysalis grudgingly returned to consciousness. To her relief, familiar sensations assailed her. Horn. Wings. Hunger. After the nightmarish loss of self, even the gnawing emptiness in her proventriculus was welcome, even if it did mean that she'd lost her host.

"My Queen, can you change?"

She looked up. A pegasus guard, interchangeable with his comrades. Of course. She probed her magic as she struggled upright. "I can manage."

The armored pony's eyes briefly flashed green as he nodded. "Good. Match my form. We must make haste." He produced a ring of keys and unlocked the cell.

Chrysalis struggled for the needed power, having grown accustomed to feasting on Shining Armor. Still, she managed to compress herself into the lesser changeling's twin. "Thank you, my child."

"What is the plan, my Queen?"

The disguised creatures fell into step together. "A direct attack is impossible now. We must begin at the edges. Insinuate ourselves in the frontier, then move inward. Absorb the hives that have hidden themselves amongst the Equestrians. If we cannot take Canterlot with guile, then we shall do so with sheer numbers, an infestation one lucky mare cannot stop." She grinned beneath her borrowed shape. Let the ponies think they swatted her. She would return, leading a swarm beyond their wildest dreams.

"She was not lucky, my Queen."

The drone's droning interrupted Chrysalis's enjoyable fantasy. "Then what was she?"

"Smarter than you," answered an all-too-familiar voice. Ditzy Doo emerged from beneath her disguise, the insufferable taste of smugness filling the stunned changeling's mind. "Did you get all that, Your Highness?"

"Every word." Luna came into visibility just behind them, exuding resolve from every pore.

The changeling queen gaped at this for a moment. "I... How..."

"You'll have plenty of time to think on that," noted the moon princess. She focused her will, and the floor opened up beneath the other sovereign.

Chrysalis dismissed her disguise in a moment and began buzzing her wings for all she was worth, but the pull of the void beneath her was stronger yet, swallowing her whole. A midnight-blue muzzle surrounded by swirling stars watched her fall as a foal would watch a bug, impassive and unafraid.

---

Eventually, the darkness consumed everything, and the sense of falling slowly came to a halt. Details began to resolve themselves, mostly rough-hewn stone and discolored but sturdy bars. The cell the changeling queen had found herself in before had been relatively pleasant. Sparse, but tolerable. Now she wasn't in a prison. She was in an oubliette. Ponies weren't put in here with the intention of taking them out. She didn't think Canterlot had a place like this. Judging by the lack of bones, it hadn't seen use at any point in the recent past.

Chrysalis sat up in the dingy little cell. Her empathic sense was picking up something curious. Somewhere between sight, taste, and telepathy, it normally detected sources of succulent love, sustaining compassion, and the other, less palatable contents of the emotional spectrum. Now it detected something like a shadow without a body, a patch of motile blandness.

She moved close to the bars, seeking the source of the anomaly. Presumably, it was the pair of approaching figures. One was familiar, the infantile mare who thought Pin the Tail on the Pony and the Chicken Dance were suitable entertainment for a royal wedding. Chrysalis made a mental note to lay a clutch of eggs in that one's abdomen once she escaped. The other was unfamiliar, a donkey if she wasn't mistaken. One with either a good stylist or an excellent toupee.

As the two got closer, the disconnect registered in the queen's mind. The pony had been sickly sweet with unbridled joy. Now she was so utterly unemotional that she blended in with dungeon's stone walls. Hmm. Might as well get the facts straight from the horse's mouth. "Pinkie Pie. To what do I owe the pleasure?"

The mare who locked eyed with her was a stranger. Mane so straight it seemed iron, coat an oddly drab shade of magenta, and expression of such complete and total apathy that Chrysalis felt a little hungrier just looking at her. Her voice might by some stretch of the imagination be considered similar to the party pony's. "Chrysalis. Hive-Queen of the Changeling Swarms. You have been found guilty of abduction, conspiracy to invade the sovereign nation of Equestria, impersonating a member of its royal family, and at least one count of magical domination of another's will."

The accused smirked. "'Found guilty'? I didn't know I had a trial."

The earth pony continued, indifferent to the aside. "You have all but declared war on Equestria. You have insinuated malicious dopplegangers into its armed forces. And worst of all," and here a hint of rage slipped into her voice, "you. Hurt. My. Friends."

"Uh-huh." This was hardly the changeling's first international incident. "Tell it to someone who cares, dear."

For a moment, hatred filled the pony, inedible but thrillingly spicy. The donkey laid a hoof on her shoulder, and the anger abated. Pinkamena's next words were even more measured and monotonous than before. "In their mercy, the Princesses are willing to reduce your sentence if you cooperate. If you refuse this mercy, you invite their wrath. Do you understand?"

Chrysalis rolled her eyes. "Yes, yes. Let's get this over with." Honestly, what was the worst they could do? This land was so filled with love, there was no way its inhabitants could even conceive of true cruelty, much less practice it.

The mare betrayed no reaction to her irreverence. "Very well, then. Cranky, I leave her in your capable hooves."

The donkey nodded. As the dampened pony departed, he considered the prisoner. "Well, I suppose I should introduce myself. As you may have gathered, my friends call me Cranky. You can call me Mr. Donkey. I'm going to ask you a few questions. If you answer them and those answers check out, you could be out of here in as little as a few days. If you don't or if you lie, well, Princess Luna said something about a trip to the Moon. Then we'll see if you're feeling a bit more cooperative."

The queen wasn't paying attention. "What happened to her?"

He grumbled to himself a bit before answering. "Friends are very important to Pinkie."

"So somepony died?"

A sigh and a shake of the head. "Changelings."

Chrysalis glared. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"For a race that feeds on love, you have almost no understanding of it. Thanks for reminding me of that."

"'Reminding'?"

"I've wandered the world for more than forty years. You're far from my first changeling, Missy."

Cranky's emotional neutrality suddenly made a great deal more sense. A pit formed in the queen's stomach "You're starving me."

He nodded. "I'll be the only one coming in or out of here. There are safeguards in place to ensure that your drones can't sneak in using my form, and I'm not telling you what they are."

She gave a fanged smirk. "We'll see about that."

The donkey sighed. "I'm going to be blunt: We both know that, given a plentiful food supply, you'd have a lifespan of thirty, maybe forty years. Looking at you, I'm guessing you'll manage twenty at most, and you've already lived through about ten of them."

"Nine and a half." The changeling self-consciously ran a hoof through her perforated mane.

"Uh huh. The point is, no matter how generously the Princesses commute your sentence, they aren't going to pardon you completely. They may decide to exile you instead. However, if you don't cooperate, all you have to look forward to is a slow, agonizing death by inches over the next few weeks. I've seen it happen. It isn't pretty."

She backed away, horrified. Such a sight should have traumatized an Equestrian for life. How could this one recount it without a flicker of emotion? "There's no way your Princesses would allow such a thing!"

"Oh?" He quirked an eyebrow. "According to them, they barely tolerated changelings when you kept yourselves to preying on those dumb enough to wander near that blighted dustbowl you call a home. You really think that after trying to declare Equestria your new hunting grounds, they'll let you off with a slap on the pastern?"

"I was only doing to feed my children!" Chrysalis cried. "All I was trying to do was to help my subjects! Surely they understand that!"

"They do. More importantly, they understand why you're in this situation."

"Huh?"

Cranky shook his head. "You've forgotten, haven't you? Hazard of short generations, all too easy to lose knowledge. Changelings weren't always pony-shaped love-locusts. The Chasm of Lies wasn't always a parched wasteland. You did this to yourselves."

"That's a lie!" The queen threw herself against the bars. "That's a damned lie and you know it!"

He didn't even flinch. "Rosedust was a real pony."

She gasped, backing away from the donkey. "The Ever-Ravenous One?" Her wings reflexively buzzed in benediction.

"Queen of the Flutter Ponies," corrected the donkey. "Records are spotty. This was at the very end of the Pre-Discordian Era. It's something of a miracle that any survived at all."

"What happened?"

"Where is Princess Cadence?"

Chrysalis was silent for a moment. Then she snarled and made a horrible sound, half furious whinny, half hissing spiracles. "You miserable little mule! You think your little stories will trick me into telling you where she lies?

He shrugged indifferently. "Worth a try."

"When my children release me, your fetid carcass will be used as nesting material for the new larvae!"

"Well, Matilda and I were going to have to adopt anyway."

The changeling's rage redoubled, leaving her a flailing, hissing, incoherent wreck. Cranky watched this dispassionately for a time before turning to leave. "Enjoy the Moon." Three, two...

"Wait!"

So predictable. "What?"

"I... Tell me of Rosedust."

He turned back. "I thought that was just one of my little stories."

"That doesn't mean it isn't true."

The donkey nodded. "Point. Will you tell me where Cadence is?"

Chrysalis's mind roiled with internal debate. Finally, she sighed in defeat. "Release those of my children who you have imprisoned and tell me her story, and I will."

"I'm just the interrogator. I don't have the authority to make that kind of deal. Still, I'll take your offer to the Princesses. After that, no promises."

The changeling was still at the surprisingly sparse mercy of her captors, but at least now she had hope. "Thank you." The only answer this got was a series of increasingly distant hoofsteps. Still, saying something kind and actually meaning it had been novel. Even... nice.

---

Pinkie reached for another tissue. Once she learned about the changelings' ability to feed on emotions, she knew exactly who to call. After all, if Cranky had been able to resist her charms, that big nasty bugpony didn't stand a chance! That he had experience with the creatures from his decades of travel was just icing on the cake.

But then he had explained that anypony had to be just as unfeeling when dealing with the captured queen. The pink pony had had episodes of emotionlessness in the distant past, usually coinciding with civilization-ending plagues and continent-ravaging firestorms. But she'd left that mare long behind by the time she closed the time loop that contained much of her life, slipping back into her childhood a moment after she left it.

At least, that was what she'd told herself. The incident on her birthday had hinted at the globe-scouring sourpuss, but infused as she was with the Element of Laughter, instead of an indifferent eschatological ennui, she had entered a silly, surreal state of psychosis. But this...

Technically, she didn't have to be the one to read off the changeling's charges. One of the Princesses could have done it, or one of her friends, or even Shining Armor himself. But they would all be hard-pressed to restrain themselves, and that would give the shapeshifter something to use to get into their hearts and their minds. That couldn't be allowed to happen.

So, Pinkie did what had to be done. She separated herself from Laughter and again became the Pink Pony of Death, destroyer of worlds. It had hurt, worse than she'd expected. Now she sought solace and healing. Given that the current gloomy mood seemed set to persist until Cadence was found, she did so through the only way she could that didn't involve a party. "Another."

Donut Joe quickly complied, bringing the mare her fourth Deluxe Donutopian. "You wanna talk about it? One baker to another?"

"Right now, all I want is to heal the wound in my soul with a poultice of fried dough and frosting."

The stallion said nothing after that. He'd learned long ago not to bother customers when they waxed poetic.

---

Cadence sighed. That horrible creature had taken everything from her. Her form, her love, her hope. It would've taken her life if she needed to eat or drink. As it was, her functional immortality just meant that she would suffer eternally. She pondered just trying to end everything. She wouldn't die until she was killed, but it would be so easy. Just find an unstable spot in the cavern, buck it, and welcome blessed oblivion...

No. No, she had to keep going. If not for herself, then for Shining Armor. Somepony would notice. The impostor would slip up. Surely, it was just a matter of time, right? Right?

"Cadence!"

Oh, wonderful. She was going mad. She thought she might, though she'd hoped it would take centuries and not weeks. She wondered what she would be like as a Nightmare.

"Cadence, can you hear me?"

Wait a moment, that voice... Could it be? "Twilight?"

A plane of precious crystal that had so recently displayed her own mocking face presented a wonderfully familiar unicorn. "Cadence!"

"Twilight, is that really you?"

"We captured the fake you! The others have been trying to get her to tell us where she'd taken you, but I decided to try and track her magic signature and I found residue from a scrying spell. I followed the trail and, well, here you are!"

Cadence smiled for the first time since her imprisonment. It was Twilight, alright. Who else would answer that question with a methodology? "I'm beneath the castle, in the old abandoned gem mines, but I don't know how deep." That was the lock on her cell. As long as she didn't know where she was, she couldn't risk a teleport. Ending up inside a solid object would be just as lethal for her as for any mortal pony.

The purple mare frowned in thought. She brightened as she struck upon a solution. "Hang on, I'm going to try to turn this into a gateway." Her face vanished from the massive stone, replaced by a magenta glow. The light was unsteady and irregular at first, then began to stabilize. As it did so, it changed a bit in hue. The princess couldn't quite put her hoof on how, but it seemed more... masculine.

Soon, the light was brilliant and stable. A shout could be heard from the other side. "Cadence!"

Her heart leapt. "Shiny!" Without a second thought, she followed it into the light.

---

"And with that, the fate of the Flutter Ponies was sealed. The rest you likely know already." A hint of pity flickered in the donkey's heart for a moment before it was snuffed out.

Silence followed for a time. Finally, Chrysalis spoke up. "Well? Aren't you going to ask me where your precious princess is?"

Cranky shook his head. "No, they managed to find her earlier today. The wedding'll be back on once she's recovered."

"What!?"

"You didn't think you were our only lead, did you? That Twilight kid managed to magic her up like a rabbit out of a hat."

"Which is good news for you, aberration." Luna strode into view, positively aglow with restrained fury. Cranky promptly prostrated himself.

Chrysalis glared at the alicorn. "What now? Did you find an even more humiliating cell, or are we just going to cut to the chase?" She raised her head, exposing her neck. "Go ahead, if you think you have the ovarioles."

The moon princess raised an eyebrow, then channeled her magic. The insectoid braced herself... and braced herself... and kept bracing herself. Finally, she gave a derisive laugh. "Couldn't go through with it, could you? I knew you Equestrians were soft! You're practically begging us to feed upon you."

"But you will not," stated the younger diarch.

"What makes you so sure?"

"I would not do anything so crude and self-defeating as harm you, Chrysalis. Your absence would be noted and another changeling would step in to take your place. No, I am going to do to you what you tried to do to me."

The changeling frowned. "I don't understand."

"You were going to take away my beloved subjects. Justice dictates that I separate you from yours."

The queen was horrified. "What did you do?"

"Chrysalis," proclaimed Luna, "by Our authority as Princess of the Moon, Avatar of Night, and Mistress of the Quiet Void, We have marked thine very soul with the Glyph of Banishment. Thou mayest never enter the borders of Our lands, and never shall those who dwell there offer thee succor or solace. Thy name art Pariah, thy homeland nowhere. Now begone with thee."

With no further fanfare, the changeling queen vanished.

The alicorn noted the prone figure to her right. "You may rise, Cranky Doodle Donkey. You have done us a great service. And by us, I mean my sister and me."

Cranky swallowed and shakily got to his hooves. Nervously adjusting his toupee, he answered, "W-with all due respect, Your Highness, I really didn't do much of anything. Twilight Sparkle found Princess Cadence."

"True," noted Luna, "but you have reminded Chrysalis of what she and her people once were. Perhaps now they will strive to reclaim the glory that once was theirs."

The donkey couldn't help but glance at the empty cell. "I-if I may ask... where did you send her?"

She looked in the appropriate direction. "Close to home, but far enough away for her to have time to think on her way back."

---

The Drackenridge Mountains are many things. Steep. Cold. Harsh. None of their many qualities are particularly hospitable to changelings who suddenly manifest atop the range's highest peak.

Chrysalis shivered, wind whistling through the holes in her hooves. "Oh, th-th-they will p-p-pay for this ind-d-dignity. Th-th-they will pay." She stomped a porous hoof to emphasize the point, unsettling a round lump of basalt and sending it rolling into the appendage. With a crimson flare, it reshaped itself. "Huh?"

She leaned down. The rock had become a gorget not unlike one of the pony diarch's, but this one seemed tailored for her more svelte physique. Hewn from polished obsidian, it spoke of power to be found and wielded even after hitting rock bottom. Especially after hitting rock bottom. Her crown was replicated on the front in jade.

The queen slipped it on. For being made of volcanic glass, it was surprisingly comfortable. It even filled the void in her gizzard somewhat. Chrysalis smiled. If they thought trying to take Canterlot had been daring, they hadn't seen anything yet.

---

Chrysalis, Changeling Queen 4UB
Legendary Creature — Shapeshifter
Flying
1U: Until end of turn, target creature you control becomes a copy of target creature and gains all creature types. The "legend rule" doesn't apply to that creature or to creatures with the same name as that creature this turn.
1B: Target creature gets -0/-1 until end of turn. Chrysalis, Changeling Queen gets +1/+0 until end of turn.
3/3

Mi Amore Cadenza 4RW
Legendary Creature — Unicorn Pegasus
Flying, lifelink
3RW, T, Tap another untapped creature you control: Mi Amore Cadenza deals damage equal to its power plus the other tapped creature's power to target creature or player.
3/3

Comments

[DreadedCandiru2]

This would have been a way cooler season close-out than the one we got. Kudos and Internets!!!

[Royal Brisk]

Mi Amore Cadenza's ability should have "If Shining Armor was tapped as a result of this ability, deal damage to all other players and all creatures you do not control."

[Roadpony the Loud]

...Oh god she found an Element of Discord

[Chaosglory626]

Twilight's force field is pretty amazing. The Kinetithaumatic converter is a nice touch. All it needs to compliment that is a mana buffer so that magic thrown at it also powers it, then it would be perfect.
I love how Ditzy tricked Queenie, that was such perfect trolling.
I was kind of hoping for the full back story of the changlings, maybe you can do that later. Awesome reference to Binky Pie.

All around great chapter. Keep up the good work.

[Crosshair]

Wow, a DREAM VALLEY reference! Cool!
Aw, why do you keep making this series so awesome? I can't even play MagicTG anymore and you keep making me all curious!

Still, I really wanted to hear about RoseDust the Devourer. I find the recent Fan revivals of G1 to be incredibly interesting, (like check out "The Elements of Harmony and the Saviour of Worlds") and the idea that the Deus Ex Machina Flutter-Ponies of G1 somehow got turned into the Changelings... Well, I've no doubt that's a story I want to hear more of. Just as you made Discord an SUCCESSFUL (!!!) attempt to make a less evil entropy Avatar, perhaps the Elements of Discord... well, perhaps they won't have to be evil either. They just have to BE. After the epic confrontation of course. (Tales of Mystara described the concept of Entropy to be corrupted: Laughter, is the UNCORRUPTED version of Entropy, which breaks normal patterns to avoid stagnation, enabling and encouraging growth)

I'm a little sad that Crysalis didn't get to hear about the lost legend. It must be horrible to be a queen of what seems like a broken people. (Unlike celestia, Such a short lifespan means Crysalis would struggle to even figure out what's best for her people: less experince at leadership) It seems like learning of thier history might even be a way to start the... i don't know, redemption of the Changling species. It's entierly possible that the Changelings could be integrated peacefully into society, but... well, I like the fact that you've held that balance is important in this story.

I also would find it REALLY cool if you work in other aspects of G1 which, despite it's many flaws, had conceptually COOL villians. (Tirac, Grogar... *shudder*.) A little fan interpretation goes a long way! Google "where I watch My little Pony" a episode by episode sort of parody/more badass imagining of the whole g1 and all of FiM. Megan, the human hero of the series... heh... Girly as the Character was, she could be a damn heroic plainswalker (I don't know much about them, but it seems from your stories that most plainswalkers still have mortal flaws. Less good and bad, just people with differing veiws and goals. Like, it's easy to imagine a WHITE plainswalker whose philosiphy makes them a tyranical, opressive ruler.)
Megan as a plainswalker... I hope I don't sound preachy, but I think it'd be fitting that the most pony related Plainswalker after Derpy could most embody the spirit of the series: doing good, fighting evil, but not being naive or loosing one's ideals.

Anyway, can't wait to read more!

[Thespurgin]

554779 oh GOSH... looks like the author decided to continue that plotline after all!

[Proginoskes]

The Element of Ambition. And Velis Vel is of course the perfect MtG reference for the Wedding Debacle. Also, I wish I could tell Chrysalis that raising the Changelings to their former place is a far more worthy ambition than any feat of arms.

... And nice work sneaking the "changeling clause" onto Chryssy's card!

[kajisora]

I so love to see the changeling threat handled competently (on either side, or both)
also, was that a Binkie Pie reference?

[Blissey1]

Please tell me we're gonna get to see Ditzy reunited with her mother?

[Bronze Statue]

Every time I read "Mashy Spike-Plate," I have to 'walk in order to find my sides again...

[Whiteeyes]

2515068 Well to be fair he was a philosopher, not a military strategist so that aw probably about what he'd have come up with too.

[InMyMind]

Oh! Another element of chaos.

[wulf95]

That Chrysalis card is WAY too easy to use for infinite combos. I'm not sure whether I like it more or less because of that...

[DragonMaus]

Out of curiosity, what would the card for 'the Pink Pony of Death, destroyer of worlds' look like?

[FanOfMostEverything]

7102709
As it happens, I have made a few unhappy Pinkies. Here's one of them:

Pinkamena the Humorless 2BR
Planeswalker — Pinkie
+1: Pinkamena the Humorless deals 2 damage to target player unless that player discards a card.
-1: Target creature gains deathtouch until end of turn and must be blocked this turn if able.
-6: Target opponent gets an emblem with "If you would lose life, you lose twice that much life instead." (Damage causes loss of life.)
3

Not quite on par with her during her darkest days, but that was before the Mending.

[yamgoth]

"When my children release me, your fetid carcass will be used as nesting material for the new larvae!"

"Well, Matilda and I were going to have to adopt anyway."

These lines fly over my head. Like, I'm thinking some morbid humour is being implied here, but don't think I'm really getting what it is. Don't suppose you could explain why Cranky says that, Foamy? I'm thinking that he thinks him and Matilda are too old to have kids and his outlook of his remaining lifespan are rather grim, but he accepts it. Told in deadpan, it's funny?

Confusion.

[FanOfMostEverything]

7138056
I find blasé reactions to grandiose death threats more amusing than I probably should. (Also, Matilda is probably the donkey equivalent of post-menopausal at her age. Post-estrupausal? I assume that's a thing.) Plus, I love the idea of badass adventurer Cranky, no pun intended. I really should do more with that, especially since it turns out it's canon.

[yamgoth]

7138060
*laffs*

I figured out the joke. Only took me a few hours. So Chrysalis's new progeny will use Cranky's corpse as nesting material and Cranky is like meh, it'll be like he and Matilda adopted them

I blame the bs I put up with at work. Hampers whatever brainpower is there.

(Also, Matilda is probably the donkey equivalent of post-menopausal at her age. Post-estrupausal? I assume that's a thing.)

Sometimes the words you make up frighten me a smidgen. Mostly they evoke a sense of curiosity and amusement.

Plus, I love the idea of badass adventurer Cranky, no pun intended. I really should do more with that, especially since it turns out it's canon.

When it seems too cliche to write a story about Daring Doo, just go ahead and instead shove Cranky in there in the same situation. Undoubtedly Ahoizotle would have entertaining and over the top reactions.

[Cursed Quill]

Correction offered without malice.

then began the stabilize.

then began to stabilize.

[son_of_heaven176]

Thy name art Pariah, thy homeland nowhere.

Conjugation error. "Art" is second person singular. You need third person singular: "Thy name is Pariah." Or you could consider something more authoritative: "Thy name shall be Pariah."