Chrysalis

by Horsetorian

Chapter 2- Sleep

It was a month later that Celestia told me, in her most excited whisper, to come to the Canterlot Gardens an hour before sunset. As she left to finish whatever business held her, I could see her guilty grin and the twitch that seemed to say if she weren’t royalty, she would have bounced down her halls at that moment. I couldn’t help staring, and only noticed my jaw slightly agape after a few seconds.

The breeze flowed through my hair, plucking innocently at a few strands. Light trickled through perfectly trimmed bushes, vines crept curiously up ancient stonework.

These details were but the crudest of background noise. The real beauty was in the individuals strolling worn cobbled paths, the hushed whispers between close friends, the laughter of foals and the sighs rich with exaggeration of their tired, happy parents. Couples wandered aimlessly, the old statues little more than a petty pretense for a few hours together. I wandered, not knowing where I was, not wanting to be anywhere else. At a perfect distance, I could see ponies older than the stones on which they walked describing times past to the youngest, wide eyed fillies. Tears over scraped knees and bruised hearts mingled to give a touch more life to the greenery that hid them so well.

I stood, almost dazed. I had enjoyed watching others before, but proximity to princesses made it almost impossible to appreciate the individuals. Almost everypony wore a mask for royalty. This was as close as I had ever come to seeing real ponies besides Luna and Celestia. Before I had seen little more than the slightest imperfections up close; whatever violent quakes held the mind on the inside were smothered until they were little more than tremors.

As I took in this newfound beauty for the first time, a royal guard quietly addressed me, before leading me to the furthest portion of the gardens. Beyond the last rigidly cut hedge, there was a hill. On its peak sat my sun and my closest friend.

I ran, free of notice, free of invasive eyes, to my confidant and the pony I revered more than anything, the pony I owed any happiness I could claim as my own. I regreted the weeks I had spent avoiding her, wondering what lengths could ever repair my selfish hesitance. Had I been a more emotional pony, I might have wept.

Celestia’s presence meant Luna must have been forgiven, or had never needed to be in the first place. I looked at her, quickly glancing downwards.

I stood on a checkered blanket. A basket with a loaf of steaming bread sat nearby.

Celestia had delayed meetings, made excuses to the richest members of Equestria, postponed ruling her country for a precious several hours to host a picnic for her sister and an orphan.

I knew I wasn’t worth a minute of the land’s most kind and powerful master. I didn’t know what to say, so I chose to remain silent. Gratitude would make light of such a kind gift. I had nothing to offer in return, but my debt to her was already beyond what I could ever return. I settled with Luna on one side, and Celestia came to my other side.

We faced Celestia’s prize, her beautiful yellow orb brushing clouds and the very ceiling of the world with hues dancing from blue to purple to red to orange. Night came, with a thousand lights like pinpricks in the gorgeous cloak of blue that blocked a light unimaginable.

I watched as the sisters spoke to each other. Clearly, though they lived under the same roof, they hardly knew each other anymore. Small talk was slow at first, painful to hear.

An hour passed. Masks broke. Soon, the centers of my existence, the two most powerful beings in the world, were giggling like the littlest foals, poking fun at royalty and their pompous life. I had never seen either of them like this. The masks Celestia wore for her millions of subjects, the jealousy that had begun to swallow Luna, pretenses and shields dropped.

I may as well have been between babbling fillies. There was no where I wanted to be more.

As I listened to the two dearest voices I had ever known, I blinked... only to find myself waking up in my room. Not a dream. Sleep had merely cut short the best moments of my life.

I could imagine myself, discovered asleep at Luna’s side, carried gently to my room and tucked in with the utmost care.

I already missed both of them.

That evening had been the ultimate bliss, but preservation was not one of Time’s habits. I revisited that spot many times, alone. It was bittersweet, at best. What had once filled my being with joy greater than I could express left countless caverns and chasms in its wake. Memories were but drops where once had been oceans.

Not that these occupied my mind for very long in the years following; there was little quite like it to remind me. Life went on as normal at first. Magic and flight became easier, though it was clear that neither was a particular talent of mine. I enjoyed learning the tricks behind blending in with a herd, an art that dabbled in magic, but was mostly one self taught and natural. It allowed me to wander when Celestia and Luna were busy, to explore the lives of their kingdom, without attracting the attention doomed to follow anypony with a horn and wings. In the market, I studied the sea of individuals, learning volumes that said almost nothing about the kingdom as a whole.

Any kingdom has its years of plenty and its poor years. Famine, natural disaster, warring neighbors, all of these things come naturally in a kingdom’s cycle. Most ponies are, unfortunately, too short lived to appreciate this. They think that their’s are the only problems that have ever existed, the first of their kind, unique in every way. The price of a sack of flour goes up a few bits and the kingdom panics, looking for divine intervention.

To them, I suppose it seemed a real threat. Memory lasted only a few generations, and hard times were few. Just as Celestia and Luna had ended the chaos of old, ponies expected them to provide peace once again, and perhaps even more important, consistency. Ordinarily citizens chose what change they encountered, and variation was self-inflicted. With the nation facing so many problems at once, the ponies felt robbed of a great security and deserved freedom.

Celestia did her best to calm her terror-stricken citizens. Their worry pained her, no matter how trivial or unnecessary. The times we spent together learning magic and flight became tense, despite her best efforts to hide the stress.

As if that weren’t bad enough, ponies started to notice me again. I had become a constant, someone always seen around the princesses but never interesting enough to acknowledge. Now they were frightened, wanted more leadership and a firmer rule. They were so naive as to assume that the gift of a wing and horns was the same as a crown.

Commoners could be tolerated. It was the way Celestia began to look at me. Suddenly it was more than a handful of distressed nobles who expected me to do something, to save them. It was her. As though she expected me to save her, to save the kingdom itself, from these trivial trials. I could ignore mortals, they were merely desperate. Celestia knew me, understood who I was. She should have known this crisis was beyond me. I couldn’t do anything to help her, young and clueless as I was. How could she expect me to offer the sun anything it didn’t have already?

Meanwhile, Luna grew distant. It wasn’t hard to guess why; with everypony looking to Celestia for an answer or wondering who I was, the princess of the night was once again forgotten, seen as little more than a figurehead.

The difficulty was in helping her. Even to her best friend, Luna was often as prideful as any royalty, and more stubborn than most. She thought she could pretend that there was nothing wrong. Having seen through Celestia’s facade, Luna’s own mind was easy to see. I was one of the few who noticed.

Luna wouldn’t talk to me. The kingdom expected me to be a great leader. Celestia expected... something of me. More than I could handle. Nothing was right anymore.

It’s alright now. Everything will be alright. I pen this, as it will be my last message to the world for a while. No, I have no intention of dying. Merely sleeping.

Let me explain. Long ago, there was a unicorn. A brilliantly mad fellow who spent years alone in the woods. Convinced nature would teach him true wisdom, he recorded a library’s worth of books on plants and animals. How I stumbled on his library, whether by fortune or chance or destiny, I don’t know, but I found what I needed.

Caterpillars, he observed, went through a sleep, a stasis. He called it a cocoon, a chrysalis. They slept for a long time, only to awake as butterflies. The cocoon perfected the caterpillar, made it into something beautiful and full and ready to accomplish its purpose.

The stallion tinkered with a spell, a powerful one, to put a pony to sleep for weeks, months, years. To create a cocoon. Old and frail as he was when he discovered these insects, he chose not to attempt his spell, fearing it would kill him before he awoke. Solitude, he claimed, was the key to wisdom, that the time spent away would be spent in meditation. The emerged pony would be wise beyond any peers.

As far as I know, I am immortal like Celestia and Luna. I can attempt what this unicorn only dreamed of. I can transcend these petty problems, I can grow into what Celestia needs instead of what she has, I can learn enough to save the kingdom and Luna and make everything alright again.

I have practiced the spell for a while, but have yet to attempt it myself. I believe I’m ready. I will hide myself somewhere out of the way, remove any inconvenience.

I only need to sleep for a while, and then everything will be like it was before. I will emerge with the power to set everything as it should be. Like it was during the picnic. Just Luna and Celestia and me.

Only a hundred years, and everything will be like the picnic.

The cocoon opened, and the pony stumbled into sunlight for the first time in a century. If you could call it a pony. It was shrunken, its puny body full of holes, barely functional. Its coat had changed from a beautiful silver to an empty black.

It was surrounded by a wasteland, one which it failed to recall.

It crawled to a puddle. On the other side of the water stared a monster, with insect-like eyes and wings, a rotten corpse, an aberration. It cringed at its wide eyed stare, stumbling back a few paces.

It was hideous. Disgusting. Beyond even pity.

Unlovable.

Desperate, the creature peered within itself, swam in its innermost thoughts, explored its heart in the hopes of finding something worth saving. Instead, it found bile, hatred, holes and rot even worse than what pierced its hooves and wings.

With this realization, the last shreds of light in its soul were shut out. They did not belong in this home.

Its existence was unforgivable. Incapable of love, or being loved, but hungry. So hungry. It couldn’t summon the strength to care for itself, but still it needed love, needed to be something. The pains were worse than material hunger, but did not weaken its body like a physical ailment.

It could not be loved. Instead, it saw something loved that passed by, and chose to be it. It stretched its form as far as it could, fueled by self-detestation more than anything else. Any pain suffered to create this hollow image was worth it. Any form would be better than this one. Any lie more satisfying than this reality.

Chrysalis wandered off in search of food, her minions barely out of sight.

Author's Note:

Thanks for reading. As before, point out any mistakes, make tips, but be honest.

Have a good life.

Edits: took the advice of Someguy987 (concerning commas) and that of another friend (or at least tried to, concerning character) , perhaps some other little things.

and i do not wear glasses. just the pony profile.

Comments

[Someguy987]

It was a month later that Celestia told me in her most excited whisper to come to the Canterlot Gardens an hour before sunset. 

You forgot some comas

It was a month later that Celestia told me(,[here]) in her most excited whisper(,[and here. Without the comas the sentence flows together and sounds kind of awkward]) to come to the Canterlot Gardens an hour before sunset. 

[Horsetorian]

1952674 thanks. i think i fixed that. if you dont mind pointing out other oopses you happen to notice, that could be nice. have a grand life.

[Femto]

I really like your take on Chrysalis, but I have a question: how are her minions not far behind since she barely just left the cocoon?

[Horsetorian]

2058438 shhh. keep watching, so to speak. and feel free to point out all the issues.

[Shikogo]

Interesting start, and intriguing take on Luna. I'm really excited for any chapters to follow, because I think it's now when the real fun begins.

I've got but one issue: "I saw this particular pegasi in a field of turnips, and noticed he was blank." Since this isn't plural, it should be "pegasus".

Apart from that, great!