Spreading Out - Part 12
"You are doing it." Shining Armor was adamant. "Me and Cady run the army—and I might say we did a good job, considering—Princess Luna already did her job as the Queen's Right Hoof." He smiled at his sister. "Come on Twily, you are a princess now."
"But I…" Twilight gave a sigh, interrupting herself. "Alright. But what am I meant to say? 'Welcome back, by the way you have just been conquered by—" She mumbled the last words into Shining's forehoof while he hugged her and tried to stop her saying anything. Shaking her head, she glared up at Shining. "What?"
"Maybe Princess Luna would be better." Shining conceded the point. "Twily, this is important. I just spent weeks, and lives, freeing these ponies." He knew a slightly clouded expression flowed over his face. "I don't want to have to tell them we are invading." The last he spoke very quietly.
"Would… would we really have to do that? They are ponies, not monsters." The reminder that there had been a mortality rate in all this sank home for Twilight. She put things together. "Our Queen commanded it, didn't she?" Her brother nodded. "And this is up to me. Okay. I will try."
When Twilight walked toward Princess Radiant Hope, Shining followed at her side—if slightly behind. Seemingly out of nowhere Princess Luna walked up and took Twilight's other flank, and Cadance took his side. He leaned over and nuzzled Cadance's cheek, just once.
"Princess Radiant Hope." Twilight's voice was not commanding—not quite. She ran quickly through all the ways she could phrase this, and dredged up some official-sounding things she remembered from a book. "I would have a word with you."
Hope turned to face the entourage from Equestria. Princess Twilight had addressed her as a princess, which was reassuring. Having to face Princess Luna and another alicorn was less so. "Of course Princess Twilight." Radiant Hope stepped closer to the group of powerful ponies. "What can I help you with?"
The relaxed nature of the reply momentarily put Twilight off guard. She tried to rally her thoughts and steer the conversation. "Equestria, under the guidance of Queen Chrysalis, would like to extend its hoof in welcome."
"Sombra destroyed us." Hope hated having to say it, but from everything she had seen of her kin she could no longer deny it. "The Crystal Empire has nothing, we barely have our lives." She turned her gaze to Shining Armor. "And I hear I have a Prince of Equestria to thank for that. I already came to Equestria for help initially. If you would have the Crystal Empire as an annex, I certainly wouldn't be opposed. But there will be conditions, of course." Smiling, Radiant Hope saw that she had gained a minor advantage over Equestria's spokesmare.
Twilight fumbled again, unsure about the quick capitulation; it didn't feel like capitulation at all. "Perhaps we should discuss the conditions?" With the biggest smile Twilight could muster, she gestured for Princess Radiant Hope to a table where they could sit together.
Shining stood with a princess on each side of him, but only one made him want to lean in and snuggle her. From the corner of his eye he spotted a familiar crystal pony approaching them. "Shifting Spray. I was glad to have your help."
Shifting snorted. "What is going on now?" His head tilted so he could keep his eye on Princess Radiant Hope, but though he could plainly see her there was a dark alicorn between him and her.
"Princess stuff." Shining said it as easily as he would say "stallion stuff." "Princess Twilight and Princess Radiant are discussing relations between Equestria and the Empire, as far as I can tell."
Out of earshot of the others, Hope sat down at a little table with Twilight opposite her. "What does Equestria want with us? If it is a tithe… we are a long way from being capable of supplying such."
"What? No." Twilight blushed a little. "All we," the realization that she spoke for Queen Chrysalis suddenly hit Twilight, "we want the Crystal Empire to grow. Queen Chrysalis only has one requirement of the nations under her." Pausing on the statement, Twilight made sure Radiant Hope was almost at the edge of asking what it was before she continued. "That changelings be accepted within your borders, and that they be allowed to feed."
" 'Feed'?" An almost-panic started to grow in Hope's thoughts; she began to wonder if all of this—the ponies, the friendly army, everything—was a setup for her to give her country to a bunch of monsters. "What do they feed on? It mustn't be trivial or you wouldn't have mentioned it."
"Love. Happiness. They feed on positive emotions. But!" Twilight lifted her voice a touch to keep the other Princess' attention. "They will be careful, it neither hurts nor harms." She couldn't help but smile a little more at thinking of all the changelings she had met.
"But they must be allowed to? What happened in Equestria? When I left—a thousand years ago—it was only ponies living there. What changed to have the whole nation living under another species?"
"Queen Chrysalis didn't think Princess Celestia was doing enough to defend Equestria." Twilight hated saying it, but she knew this—at least—was the full truth of the matter. "She approached Princess Celestia, several times, and wasn't happy with how her warnings and offers of help were received."
"She staged a coup? I notice Princess Celestia is… missing." Hope gestured to Twilight's companions. "What was done with the deposed princess?"
"Well, after Queen Chrysalis beat her in a magic duel—one our Queen practically cheated at—Princess Celestia vowed that if Queen Chrysalis put Equestria in danger she would fight back. But now, according to Equestria's new official charter, Princess Celestia is in charge of the civil side of Equestria." Twilight wasn't sure what she would have done if her teacher had been exiled or imprisoned. "Queen Chrysalis delegates, she admitted Princess Celestia knows how to run Equestria better any anypony else."
It was a lot for Radiant Hope to take in. She thought about it. "I need to meet this queen before I can say for certain. I trust you, Princess Twilight, but it is not you who I will be giving my ponies to."
The weight of her station eased, and Twilight breathed a sigh of relief. "I promise, the changelings are just ponies too, mostly. And you have my word that you will be safe in Equestria." A sudden pang of need hit Twilight, and stole a gasp from her. She needed more honey.
Radiant Hope leaned forward holding out a hoof. "Are you well, Princess? Here, let me help you." Without thinking further, she lit her horn and reached her magic forward through her hoof.
Power poured into Twilight the moment Hope's hoof touched her own. Her eyes flew open and pure white magic poured out from within. She stared at the other princess, and felt her strange power pour through her. Feeling little changes being made here and there, Twilight could do nothing to halt the energy. She trembled in place, but until the magic was done with her she was merely a passenger. At last Hope's magic receded, flooding back into its owner and letting Twilight slump in her seat.
"Oh my stars, Princess Twilight?" Radiant Hope had expected a case of flu, or a sniffle; what she had found was a major systemic attack on the Princess from within her own body. Weakness flooded Hope, she felt herself start to slump back in the chair as loud hooves approached rapidly.
"TWILY!" Shining Armor moved faster than either of the alicorns—despite their wings. He was at Twilight's side and cradling her in his magic, hugging her to him to keep her safe from whatever threat had attacked. "Princess Luna, guard us please." Command voice or not, Shining Armor was not prepared to keep pony egos safe while his sister was in danger. "Cadance, what happened?"
"Princess Radiant used a lot of magic on Twilight. I'm not a doctor Shiny, I don't know what she did to her." Cadance not only wasn't a doctor, she wasn't overly practiced with her magic at all. She checked the obvious things; Twilight was breathing steadily, and had a pulse.
"Stop, please Princess Luna." Shifting Spray stood between the dark alicorn and his princess. "I failed my Princess once, with Sombra. I won't do it again."
"I helped teach Hope." Luna disregarded the other princess' title, she liked to think she was her friend. "I just wish to check what she did, nothing more. You have my word I will do nothing else." She looked into the Lieutenant's eyes and saw one of the bravest ponies she had ever known.
"Your word?" Shifting was so close to trembling he had to lock his knees to not fall down. He had seen Princess Celestia and Princess Luna fight Sombra; had seen them defeating him before the displacement happened. When Luna nodded, his honor was preserved. "Nothing more, then."
Luna stepped past Shifting Spray and reached for Hope with her magic. "Nothing bad has happened." She recognized the state immediately. A thousand years of exile and imprisonment was not enough to make her forget what Radiant Hope's aura looked like when she saved a pony from death's door. Luna looked to Shining. "Take Twilight to a room," she tuned back to Shifting Spray, "and take your princess to her own room. She is worn out after a major healing. I kept my word."
Shifting looked to Princess Radiant Hope, then back to Princess Luna. His problem was clear on his face apparently, judging by the look on Luna's. "Please, can you help me. It would do my Princess' honor no good to have one of her guards put her to bed."
"As you request." Luna found herself quite liking the stallion, even liking the slightly clipped way he talked. As she lifted Hope in her magic she realized why; he spoke like ponies spoke a thousand years ago.
~~~~~+++++~~~~~
Twilight's head was sore. She reached outwards from the painful place where her mind resided and upgraded the report to "everything was sore." Magic was out of the question, but she poked her snout out from under the blankets on the soft bed she was in.
"Twilight, you're awake." Cadance stood up and approached the bed Twilight had been recovering in. "I will get Shining, and Princess Radiant Hope." She turned from the bed and opened the door to find Shining slumped asleep against the wall outside. "Shiny…"
"Wait I…" Twilight trailed off as her sister-in-law trailed away. "What happened?" She wasn't asking anypony in particular, just trying to work through what happened. "I was talking to the princess. Then I felt hungry and… Come on Twilight, what happened?"
"You were sick, I tried to heal you." Radiant Hope walked into the room while Shining got a good talking to by Cadance about finding a good place to sleep. "There was something very wrong, Twilight. I need to check that I got all of it."
Twilight stuck her head out of the covers properly and looked at the crystal unicorn beside her bed. "W-W-Wrong? Uh…" She weighed up what she should say. "I… I ate something I shouldn't have. Changeling royal honey." She blushed at the memory of the flavor. "I didn't know what it does to ponies." She saw the confused look on Hope's face. "Changeling royal honey… produced by Queen Chrysalis, will turn ponies into a changeling."
"That explains this, then." Radiant Hope lit her horn and reached a gentle hoof up to lightly press to Twilight's nose. There was more; she felt the spread of the strange stuff the moment she reached into Twilight with her magic. "You didn't want this change, did you Princess Twilight?"
With her eyes wide open, Twilight couldn't pull back from the gentle boop on her nose. It took all her energy just to open her mouth. "N-N-No…"
"Here, relax." Hope pressed her magic in, opening her flood-gates and letting it pour into Twilight's body. She wasn't taking chances this time; Hope had been resting for a day now, and she was more than ready to fully clean Twilight Sparkle's body. The infection was tenacious, it clung to Twilight in ways that Hope had never felt before. At last, she had to relent.
Twilight felt like she had been turned inside out, washed with a hot sponge, and then turned back again. "What is that?" She slumped down completely in the bed. She pulled the blankets back up to hide as much of her head as she could and still have her nose out.
"Is Twily okay? Twily, are you okay?" Shining rushed up to the bed and set his head down on the pillow just like he did when Twilight was too sick to go to school. "Hey Twily." He pressed his snout against the bridge of her nose.
"Don't you dare." Twilight's mouth barely moved, but her nightmares were filled with memories of soft noses poking her, then all the covers being pulled off at once. "If you think you are pulling that stunt on me now you have another thing coming." She wished fervently that she had the magic to hold on to the covers.
"Nah, not going to do that. I only did that when you were pretending to be sick." Shining breathed warmly over his little sister's cheeks. "Princess Hope said she is going to try to burn all that changeling stuff out of you."
"I almost had it all on the first go. There was some more left this time, but another try… later…" Hope smiled a little, "would be for the best. I trust you were the only pony infected?"
"No…" Twilight poked her head out now, and displaced Shining's head a little. "Scootaloo, but she is completely changed. Queen Chrysalis said it goes faster in foals." A memory of the filly's reaction to there maybe being a cure came to Twilight's mind. "I don't think she wants to be a pony."
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Yes, the terrible HIATUS!
Why? I have a LOT of stories to write. I have a ton in fact. There is 6k words of a new Trixie x Dash fic, as well as nearly a dozen ideas. So, Shining Chitin Redux is moving forward to Tuesdays, and Thursdays are going to be for new things.
Changeling slime cures quickly, eh? Sound like it could have applications in a larger version of 3-D printing.
Is this the kind of hiatus that most fics never recover from?
8040355 I hope not. Okay, how about a deal? If I don't come back to this before September I will spend every free day writing just this until another section is done?
Nuuuuuuu, not the dreaded hiatus! You monster!
8040399 come back i beg of you
8040399 just write one chapter of this story every other day
Aww. I kinda want twilight to transform into a changeling.
8040516 No, I can't step up my writing of this. I was already writing one chapter a week, I am not going to do every second day.
Oh hey, transformation cancelled! Whoda thunkit?
Celestia will be delighted, we're sure. Wonder how that will affect her ability and mastery of the dark magic? Hmmm...
We're pretty sure Scoots didn't act like her change was bad, Twilight and company are probably projecting...
Man, if the only stipulation for joining a country was to let their citizens in and be natural... Heck that's a steal of a deal!
Keep going! ;)
Chrysalis, now that you don't have the guilt of accidentally converting her hanging over your head, perhaps you could explore other feelings a certain purple mare inspires in you?
8023228
Alright first of he technically didn't kill the princess. Also his backstory is based off of the canon of the Fiendship is Magic comic book special #1 in which there are a few details that ponies didn't know. The way Damaged has written it it is set up to go along with that without copy pasting the story and not going against the canon of his backstory and I specify backstory because the comics also handled his second return (the show's directors recognize it as canon and stated that's why no more Sombra for the show which is why I consider it canon despite arguments against it). As such I feel I can safely say that what actually drove him to choose his path was something in compound with everything else as he was on a razor's edge about it all. As I don't know if the Damaged plans on going into any more details of Sombra's backstory all I can say is 'Spoilers!'. But I like the way it's been handled in this story because by simply showing a side of Sombra that cares about others as his final moments it hints that there is more to his story than what was revealed.
Edit: BTW where was he supposed to go? The Crystal Empire was isolated and the Crystal Heart's power spread throughout all the land.
TLDR: Don't be so quick to judge when you might not have all the details.
Nice nuance here.
Uhh? Cadance? No nevermind just realised she's talking to herself by this point.
orig03.deviantart.net/fc27/f/2017/081/9/f/queen_chrysalis_glue_by_lynx318-db35rqh.jpg
You made a story that I have been binge reading for 4 hours now... I have to get up in another four... I can honestly say...
It was totally worth it!
Awesome story, can I please have some more??
8217451 More is coming. The next chapter is in planning.
awwwww but i like twilibug.....dangit you got my hopes up *Grumble*
I... she's being cured? Just like that? Tossing out an interesting plotline?
9180259 It was always meant to be a tease. Besides, the Elements are a little too Deus ex Machina not to have done so.
Where is my girl Eye spy yo she be making my day ten folds XD