//------------------------------//
// Chapter 2 – Storm in a Teacup 
// Story: Evenfall: Waves in a Haven 
// by Yinglung 
//------------------------------//

“Augh… Still no land in sight?” The pink mare groaned, as she leaned on the edge of the bow of the ship. “We’ve passed the Cape Westerly days ago!”

“Pinkie, at least you finally have your sea legs.” Fluttershy said.

Pinkie Pie smiled. “Yeah.”

Spike walked towards the two mares with a whistling Discord. The sailors looked at the dragon and chaos spirit duo with a curious glance, and then turned back to their work. They had become a fixture on the ship, and the crew had long gotten use to the somewhat strange sight.

“Pinks, I made you a ginger and lime juice.” Spike said with concern and handed Pinkie Pie a cup. “They say it could beat seasickness.”

“Correction,” Discord interjected. “I made it.”

“Fine, fine.” Spike sighed with slight exasperation. “I tried very hard to wrangle the lime and ginger from the quartermaster, but she won’t allow it.”

“I doubt she quite understand you in the first place, kid.” Discord smirked. “You speak Cruzesian like a drunkard with marbles in his mouth.”

Spike irately mumbled, but Discord simply continued. “So it finally occurred to the doting dragon that yours truly here can conjure up the ingredients that he needs, or indeed the juice itself with a little exertion and certain easier-to-get materials.”

“Thank you Spike, Discord. I really appreciate it.” Pinkie Pie nodded with a smile and took a sip of the drink.

“I heard from my dear Fluttershy,” Discord said. “… That you finally feel marginally better. So my friend-loving friend, have you gone out to make some friends?”

Pinkie Pie’s smile turned a bit rigid, and she said with a wistful tone, “Making friends here is hard. I don’t really know much about how they live except for how they speak, and even that I sounded weird because we speak in really outdated Cruzesian. That must be what Princess Luna felt like when she just came back.”

She then held her cheeks with her hooves. “What’s more, these ponies are all soldiers. They have their duties and organization and hierarchy and the like. Even when I managed to get a cadet to talk with me, some gruff captain would immediately come on him or her. It can’t be helped I guess, they have a discipline to maintain, but this means only Dashie and you three can be talked to… Maybe Misty too when she’s free.”

Spike then sighed. “How long have we been on this ship again? Two weeks?”

“Two weeks and two days.” Fluttershy said. “I’ve been recording on a journal.”

“What for?”

“I’m after all working for a newspaper. If the time is right, I will publish about the Cruzesians in the Mirror… sans some of the sensitive information.” Fluttershy said. “We’re away from Equestria, so we don’t know the reactions back home regarding the affairs in Las Pegasus, but there must eventually be a voice that clears out confusion and gives a first-hoof and truthful account for the whole incident.”

“I see…”

“Actually, I also have some good news.” Fluttershy smiled. “I’ve been to Rainbow this morning for updates, and she told me that according to the navigator, we will be closing in on the Zebrican shore in just several days because of good winds.”

“Hurray!” Pinkie Pie jumped up with surprising vigor. 

“No wonder we saw some brigs passing by yesterday.” Spike grinned. “Finally, here we come Ze—!”

Spike’s voice was covered by three rapid loud blasts of the air horn. Sailors and soldiers around them suddenly shuffled around in urgency. They looked around in confusion as they didn’t know what was going on. Esperança veered sharply to the left, causing them to hold onto the rails for balance. As they turned their sights back to the front of the ship, they realized the cause of the alarm.

From amidst the distant fog, something enormous protruded from the toiling waves, approaching head-on towards Esperança. It resembled a ship with sails, but it was so big that it was hard to believe that it could actually sail forward with such speed.

As they sailed to the left to avoid the inevitable collision, they got a better look of the full size and appearance of the mysterious ship, which made the mares and Spike gasped aloud. It was almost twice as long as Esperança, with six triangular black sails waving in the winds. 

The group was at first worried that the ship might be some sort of a queen-sized pirate ship. However, when they looked more closely, they found that the ship was almost alien in design. The masts protruded from a pitch-black surface, which could not be a deck, because it was convex with countless sharp spikes dotting its back. The body was much flatter than their frigates, and her layered hull was also covered with some sort of black material, adding to her ominous atmosphere.

Most prominently, a head figure was mounted on the bow of the ship. It resembled a cross between a sea serpent and dragon. Just when they were trying to get a better look, the black ship turned and smoke suddenly emerged from the head, causing a panic onboard.

“Turn left! Shots incoming!”

The group turned to find a steely-looking Rainbow Dash rapidly flying across the busy deck towards the bow.

“What are you all doing here? Get back down, it’s dangerous!”

Before they could reply, a loud boom torn across the sky.

“Lie down!” Rainbow Dash almost hissed.

However, other than a distant shriek, nothing happened to the ship they were on. They gingerly looked upwards, and to their surprise, the shot fired from the monstrous head had gone up instead of towards them, and exploded in a bright white flash. It seemed to be a signal or a salute.

As the two ships got closer, they were surprised to see a pony on the crow’s nest of the black ship. The pony was too small to be seen clearly, but he or she was waving some sort of signaling flags.

Unfortunately, the code they were using was unknown to the Cruzesians. However, the mares recognized that it was standard Equestrian semaphore, or flag telegraphy.

“P—A—R—L—E—Y…” Pinkie Pie looked through a telescope she whipped out from her saddlebag. “Hey, they want to talk! No wonder they are using black flags too!”

Spike looked at Pinkie Pie incredulously. “Why would they want to talk to some random passing ships? There must be tricks.”

“Maybe there just want to hail us and make friends?”

After Rainbow Dash relayed the newfound information to her deputies and another round of frantic inter-ship signaling, she came back to the bow. 

“Prepare yourselves. We’re going to parley. These strangers gave us a scare for sure, but if they want it rough, there are six of us and only one of them.” The cyan mare bit her lip and said.

“Rainbow, remember what you promised Rarity.” Fluttershy frowned.

“Yeah, yeah, we’re going to do niceties first.” Rainbow Dash waved her hoof.

Both ships had lowered their sails and closed the gun ports as they slowly closed in, eventually broadside-to-broadside. The other ships in the fleet encircled them as they prepared for any emergencies. The group can now see the signaler on the black ship more clearly. She was a rose red earth pony, and she was again signaling to tell them to prepare for a small delegation on the Esperança.

Rainbow Dash sighed in slight relief. They’re willing to come on her ship, not the other way round, which would make it much less risky for her crew.

A few pieces of the spiked shell on the black ship were opened. Planks were lowered, as rope and chains were quickly thrown across boards by sailors from both sides. The Cruzesians were surprised to see that the sailors on the black ship were an eclectic mix. They were chiefly earth ponies and pegasi. However, a large number of Zebrican natives like cows, antelopes and zebras were also among their ranks.

A group of six figures emerged from the deck of the black ship, walked on the planks and reached the deck of the Esperança. However, to the waiting mares, dragon and draconequus, the mere sight of the delegation came as a bolt from the blue.

Forgoing decorum, Rainbow Dash almost tackled the pony in the middle at full speed. However, she stopped short right before actually reaching her target. The pony was limping on a walker, her legs were wrapped in some sort of fabric and stabilizing materials. Her shoulder and back was covered with scars.

However, the sad sight couldn’t stop the excitement of the discovery. “Twi—Twilight…!”

“I thought Rainbow Dash pulled the best prank back in Las Pegasus, now I retract my statement.” 

Discord could no longer hide his surprise behind a grin, as he too looked at the scene with simple disbelief.

The mares and dragon were already in joyous tears. 

“Is this real life…? Because if this is a dream, I don’t want it to end.” Spike said and covered his mouth.

Rainbow Dash broke down in tears and carefully embraced the purple mare. The purple mare looked a bit flustered and didn’t seem to know how to react, but at the end she squeezed out a smile.

Mistral Trail flew next to Rainbow Dash and asked in hesitation. “… Your Grace, it this pony the ‘Twilight Sparkle’ you’re looking for?”

Rainbow Dash sniffled and nodded emphatically.

“Huh.” Mistral Trail couldn’t help to let out a sigh of disbelief as well. “Fancy finding by sheer luck, what one has searched for far and wide.”

“Twilight!” Fluttershy cried, as Spike and Discord swarmed forward with her. “Where have you been all this time?”

“If you’re alive, why don’t you come back sooner?” Spike wiped his tears. “I missed you badly! I dreamt of you night after night after y—you…”

Twilight only awkwardly chuckled. “Sorry bud, you must speak up. My eyes and ears are now not so good.”

The mares and dragon gasped. But Discord simply elected to grumble louder. “Please! If you’re alive somewhere, can you also spare a mind or two for poor old Discord and come back sooner? He’s been tolerating hurtful abuses and willingly donning a power limiter just for you. Or are you still mad about my dalliance with you or my dalliance with Chrysalis?”

“What?” Twilight raised her eyebrows in red face.

She stopped herself in the track. Instead, she coughed. “I’m… over it.”

Discord was a bit surprised that Twilight let it go that easily. He could still remember Twilight’s seriously upset face moons ago.

“Okay.” Rainbow Dash inhaled sharply and composed herself. “This is really not a place to talk. Let us continue the parley as with formal protocol. Go to my room. I will follow soon after Mistral and I manage the procedural stuffs.”

Rainbow Dash and Mistral Trail flew off to address their subordinates. Fluttershy then hesitantly led the delegation from the black ship into the cabin.

The group had more or less recovered from the initial hysteria upon meeting Twilight, although their hearts were still beating from joyful excitement. 

Twilight maintained her smile, but she remained curiously reticent. Although all of them obviously wanted to talk to their long-lost friend, the purple mare simply evaded all attempts of opening up a conversation.

They mentally sighed and began to move their attention to the new and equally curious companions of Twilight. 

There were five of them—a smiling muscular ox, a zebra colt who was foal-sized but maintained a constant snide expression, an energetic antelope doe with a somewhat oafish look, and two ponies. 

The first pony was the signaler, whose expression was neutral and impassive, she was a red earth pony with a purple mane, akin to red wine. The second one was a golden orange pegasus mare, who sported a messy short light green mane. A small black trident was tied to her side.

As Twilight seemed to continue focusing on walking, Pinkie tried to open up conversation with her convoy. 

“Um… Hi! I’m Pinkie Pie… Do any of you speak Equestrian?”

“We all do.” The signaler said with a bored expression. “Name’s Rosencross.”

“Why yes, of course.” The zebra colt grinned. “I, Ukuhlakanipha Okusezingeni, am after all the most learned zebra in East Zebrica.”

The ox said curtly. “Equestrian traders sometimes stopped by to repair their ships, and I learned some from them. Miss Twilight taught me the rest.”

The orange pegasus and the antelope looked to each other. 

The pegasus then said in a slightly cracked voice. “We didn’t know Equestrian before meeting Twilight, but she taught us her tongue very well. You see, Geuse’s my name, and fighting for honor and glory is my game!”

The antelope doe added with a smile. “I’m Verna, Mistress Geuse’s retainer, I keep an eye over our pocket so that we don’t starve. Lady Geuse is a knight of the Kingdom of Timbucktu in South Zebrica. We speak Zebrikaans as our mother tongue. Our tongues are clearly closely related, but it’s still different enough that we took a few moons to learn from Lady Twilight.”

Spike asked curiously. “So how exactly is it different?”

Geuse puffed, but Verna complied cheerfully. “For instance, we also say simple words like ‘Help!’ and ‘Stop!’ as Equestrians do."

But the next sentence Verna said was completely unintelligible to Spike. The intonation was so close to Equestrian, yet the words were utterly foreign. It was like his ears wanted to understand, but his brain didn't allow it.

“… What?” Spike said with an awkward expression. “I only caught ‘Twilight’ and ‘Zebrikaans’ in your second sentence.”

“Hey! I understood the second sentence!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed. “It sounds like West Germane that some rock-farming earth ponies used to speak!”

“Hah.” Geuse nodded. “That’s possible. I heard that our ancestors did come from the East.”

Pinkie Pie smiled. “Thanks! Nice to meet you all, Mkondo, Rosy, Kanipha, Geuse, Verna!”

The ox smiled back. Rosencross slightly raised her eyebrow at her assigned nickname, but she did not speak up. The zebra colt, though, immediately protested, “Ey! Who let you use my pet name now?”

He paused a bit and looked at the brightly smiling Pinkie, “Huh, though you somehow know Zezulu well enough to actually shorten my name appropriately. Too many foreign fools out there simply botched it up. Very well then, I will grant you the honor of addressing me with it. Don’t thank me.”

Pinkie awkwardly chuckled, and continued the banter with the five companions of Twilight in the hope to obtain some more concrete information, but they looked quite reserved in general and kept looking at Twilight, who didn’t say a thing. Even the most impetuous-looking Kanipha looked inscrutable. 

Finally, they walked back to the office of Rainbow Dash. There they stood in the room awkwardly looking at one another and waited. The four had envisioned tons of things to say to Twilight once they reunited, but now that it really happened, they felt as if their tongues were tied, especially facing such a reticent and avoidant Twilight.

Several minutes later, Rainbow Dash finally emerged from the entrance to the room and saved them from further discomfort.

“Mistral Trail is out there helping out the remaining tasks. I just want to come as soon as possible.” Rainbow Dash brightly grinned. “Twilight! Thank Harmony, I always have faith in you! So where have you been all these times?”

Twilight raised a brow and replied. “I’m of course finding my way back to Equestria. What else did you expect?” 

“Getting cheeky eh?” Rainbow Dash chuckled.

“Huh? Did you become a member of nobility like Rainbow Dash too? What’s up with the ginormous ship and army-sized escort?” Spike asked.

“There are actually not that much sailors and passengers on the Chitona, there are only a thousand and sixty-one of them.”

Twilight suddenly widened her eyes, “Hang on, the cyan tomboy became a noble? When?”

‘Cyan tomboy?’ The four was silently surprised by Twilight’s strange way of address. 

However, if Rainbow Dash herself was surprised, her face did not betray her thought. Instead, she said. “Yeah, got a title and an army because I saved a nation from ruins. Pretty neat, eh?”

Twilight then smirked. “Well, thank you for all your trust and devotion then, Your Grace.”

The atmosphere grew a bit weird. The group felt it was a bit inappropriate for Twilight to act so high and mighty after witnessing such a massive canvassing for her safe return, yet none had the heart to call her out or at least ask why she acted like this, especially when she looked like she just crawled out of a mummy tomb.

Wanting to clear away the awkwardness, Fluttershy asked. “Can you tell us what happened to you in Zebrica all these moons? We see that you’ve gained a number of stalwart friends.”

“… I’m a bit tired from all this ruckus. Anything you want to ask, you can ask them, I’m going back to my chamber for the moment.”

Rainbow Dash widened her eyes. “Wait Twilight, we’ve got room on the Esperança!”

Twilight merely waved her hooves and limped out of the room.

The remaining mares and Spike looked to each other in confusion and bemusement. Even Discord was looking at the now empty doorway with a frown.

“Don’t mind her, she’s been like that since we’ve arrived at Bannerdeer.”

The group turned to Kanipha, who shook his head and let off a hint of worried glint in his eyes.

Geuse threw herself on a hammock in the room and said. “Yep. Twilie’s beginning to act all wacky shortly before we got on this weird ship.”

Spike narrowed his eyes. “What I’m gathering here is that you guys also feel Twilight’s acting strange.”

“… Maybe.” Rosencross muttered.

Discord suddenly raised his claw and interrupted the conversation. “Hang on a second there. We’ve literally just met. What in the ever-muddying chaos do we have any reason to trust you guys, or do you have any reason to trust us? We don’t even know what’s going on!”

“Oh well, I agree with the chaos spirit there.” Kanipha tilted his head. “Mayhap we should clarify what’s happening now before discussing Twilight.”

Fluttershy smilingly nodded. “Good idea.”

Discord, however, asked the zebra colt. “How do you know I’m the chaos spirit?”

“That’s simple. Twilight told us all about her friends, in great excruciating details over the six moons.” Kanipha covered his mouth.

“Mister Kanipha speaks the truth.” Mkondo added.

“So what exactly leads to our meeting at sea?” Rainbow Dash crossed her legs.

“We have pretty much the same question, big honcho.” Geuse grinned. “But we shall tell you a rough outline of what happened.”

“We hope that you’d reciprocate later.” Verna added.

“Very well. Shoot.” Rainbow Dash nodded.

“I’m a Timbucktuan knight-pegasus just scrapping by. Vernie and I were questing for a local magistrate to investigate a suspected infestation, that’s when we saw Twilie fell from the sky outside Timbucktu. We picked her up and brought her back to our home in the city. She did look like a broken rag back then.”

“Lady Twilight was badly injured. Her eyes and ears had seared from the fiery explosion, and her legs were mangled.”

Verna sighed. “When she woke up a few days later, she told us what happened. She told us that she battled the wicked leader of the wisselkinds and-”

“Wisselkinds?” Spike interrupted.

“Uh, you guys call them ‘changelings’, I think?” Geuse shrugged. “They have ravaged our lands in South Zebrica for a long, long time. Most of the time they’re mere nuisance, but when they’re organized, they can sack cities and leave everyone as husks of their former selves, just like a decade ago.”

Verna added. “Anyway, she told us her story, in a close approximation to our tongue no less. We cared for her for one more week. After Lady Twilight achieved a modicum of mobility, she immediately demanded to return to her homeland.”

“That’s plain mad. How can a half-blind, half-deaf, and lame pony cross the Great Desert on her own?” 

Geuse shook her head. “But at least she had magic. So we proposed to her that she shall help us out questing around in the city, and use the rands to hire an escort across the desert and maybe board a ship at Bannerdeer. She readily agreed.”

Spike was horrified. “Wait, so were you telling a disabled pony to work for you?”

Geuse scrounged up her face like a raisin. It seemed that she did not take the accusation really well. Verna looked at her companion and quickly said. “Please understand, mister Spike, we almost ran out of our savings just to care for Lady Twilight. Besides, she was enthusiastic about the idea, since she herself was embarrassed for receiving our help for so long. We don’t mind a bit of help, of course.”

Rainbow Dash sighed. “So what then?”

“Unicorns or any magic users were rarer than hen’s teeth in Zebrica, so Twilie was an instant hit with the guild. We met many in our various trips and quests, and ‘em three are those who eventually decided to stick with us and help.”

“Twilight... helped me find my self-respect again. I'm grateful for her.” Rosencross said with a rare hint of emotion.

Mkondo gently nodded. “Twilight’s not only a great appreciator of my craft, she’s also a wise and wonderful conversational partner.”

“I like her, plain and simple.” Kanipha looked up to the sky.

Verna then concluded. “We all have various reasons to thank Twilight. At the end, we all owe her a lot, us two included. Our aid to Twilight couldn’t compare to what Twilight had done next.”

“What did she do?”

“The Changeling Queen Chrysalis suddenly descended again upon Timbucktu.”

The mares gasped. “Chrysalis?!”

Geuse confirmed. “Yep. The one who laid waste and almost destroyed our kingdom, until she suddenly turned her snout eastwards. Twilie had told us she fought her invading army in her homeland, and a strong magical blast brought her there. Apparently, it also brought along Chrysalis and her minions, who quickly turned to our city to replenish her badly battered army.”

Discord shrugged. “Meh, if it was a blast that could teleport someone half way across the world, then it’s not unthinkable that it also brought over bugs and assorted stuffs. I bet it brought over a few stone statues and shrubberies too.”

“Hey.” Geuse said somewhat amusedly. “You’re right. Vernie was almost hit by one.”

“I almost died!” Verna protested.

“Stop being dramatic.” Geuse playfully poked the antelope.

“What happened to the invading changelings?” Spike asked worriedly.

Geuse frowned. “After the last invasion, the old fart had-”

“The what now?” Spike raised a brow.

Verna gave a defeated glare at Geuse and clarified. “She means the King of Timbucktu, King Rigel.”

“Who cares whose royal ar-”

“Language! Lady Geuse.”

“Fine!” Geuse rolled her eyes. “He ordered the sentry force to patrol regularly around the cities and reinforced the fortifications. But it did diddly do. As we learned with pain the last time, we’re pretty much sitting ducks against large-scale changeling invasion. For one, they can fly like us. They have magic. And their way of impersonating someone at a blink of an eye is beyond defense.” 

Verna cheerfully smiled. “Luckily, we have Twilight!”

Kanipha nodded. “Yup. Twilight helped us repel the first wave of attack by extending a protective shield and busted the changeling spies among us. Although this almost pushed her to her limits, it bought us time to rally the disorganized defense.”

Geuse stuck her tongue out. “I bet she was still very sore about failing to beat off the changelings in Whatsitsname. She almost killed herself again just to cast the spell.”

Seeing the horrified reactions, she quickly added. “She’s fine now, y’see? If you guys gasp at every life-threatening situations she put herself into, you’ll soon be out of air. Of course, we respect her highly for all that she’s done.”

Rainbow Dash huffed but nodded. Geuse then continued. “So with Twilight’s leadership, we led a brave sortie against the changelings that caught them off-guard. With the cover of Twilight’s magic, we successfully defeated them and scattered them into the desert and swamps. However, it was not the end of the story, because that darn Chrysalis was unrelenting. The changelings kept attacking the city even with more casualties on their side. At last, Twilight finally got ahold of Chrysalis herself.”

“Really? She caught Chrysalis?” Discord asked with a frown.

“Yeah, that sounds weird.” Rainbow Dash added. “Chrysalis is a superbly adept magic user and battle veteran. If we and Twi can’t deal with her back in Canterlot, why she’s suddenly so easy to catch?”

Geuse said with an irritated expression. “Easy? Easy? So many of our own got maimed and injured just to push through waves of bugs to get to her!”

“I’m sorry, I’ve misspoke. I only understand too well how grueling battles can be and the blood and toils that you all have paid.” Rainbow Dash slightly frowned. “But we’d still want to know what had softened Chrysalis.”

“… Our constant battles definitely wore her down. But more importantly, we have adopted Twilight’s advice and evacuated everyone – absolutely everyone, including ponies, zebras, antelopes, cows, even the odd giraffes into the city. She wanted to make it impossible for Chrysalis and her changelings to feed while sieging us, kind of like scorching the earth for them bugs. By the time we had her on our hooves, she’s as weak as a newborn foal.”

Pinkie Pie smiled. “Twilight’s smart!”

“I’d hope so after we messed up the whole thing in Canterlot.” Rainbow Dash grinned. “So did you guys throw her in jail or something?”

“That’s when most of us collectively groaned.” Kanipha deadpanned.

“Huh?”

The zebra colt snapped. “I told she’s cray! She let the changelings go!”

“What the hay?” Rainbow Dash widened her eyes.

Verna said with a mix of a frown and a pout. “No one knows why she did it. But she did. Not without placing on her a spell that purportedly restrain her magic first, but it’s no different than setting a Grootslang free in the back garden. Troubles will come sooner or later.”

Rosencross coldly added. “Chrysalis did not deserve it.”

Mkondo broke his silence and interjected. “Lady Twilight did the kind thing. I think it is the right thing too, because there is little gain for us to slay the slain. She’s also right, because we haven’t heard from her since, and no changelings brought us troubles during our journey.”

“… What happened then after the battle?” Fluttershy asked quietly.

Verna said. “To thank Twilight for her service, King Rigel told her to name three things that she wanted.”

Discord snorted. “The king sure sounded like a fairy godfather.”

Geuse mumbled. “The only thing that he’s fairy-like is how airy his head is.”

Verna rolled her eyes. “… Well, Twilight first requested discretion to deal with Chrysalis and her changelings. She then asked for some money to buy supplies, as well as permission to recruit hooves for her trek east. Apparently she was concerned for the safety of her homeland and wanted some battle-hardened hooves to follow her home. Even if there was no immediate danger, she still thought her rapidly developing home city could use as many able hooves as possible.”

Spike shook his head. “Twi, always putting other things above herself.”

“Out of curiosity, how many hooves do you have?” Rainbow Dash asked.

“It might not look like it, but we only have a little more than a thousand.” Geuse said. “A mishmash of pegasi, earth ponies, cows, zebras and a few antelopes.”

“The ship makes it look like we have a lot on board, doesn’t it?” Verna smiled.

Kanipha sighed. “Uh… this ship. But let me answer your earlier question first. It appeared that the intense magical battles in Timbucktu had caused Twilight’s magic to somehow deplete completely.”

“What?” Rainbow Dash exclaimed.

“Although Zebricans in general are ignorant about unicorn magic, but at least I understand that it isn’t supposed to dry up like this merely due to overuse. She proposed a lot of explanations, including the relative lack of ambient magic in Zebrica, but neither she nor I was convinced.”

“So you’re telling me that Twilight can’t use magic right now… Is it why she’s acting all funny just now?” Rainbow Dash asked with a frown.

“She can’t use magic, that’s true. But this is not the reason why she’s acting funny.”

“Why then?”

Geuse shrugged. “We spent a month and a half just to cross the Great Desert, jumping from oasis to oasis. Twilie just moped and pretended to be okay, which all of us saw through completely.”

Verna nodded. “Things turned strange when we finally reached the great seaport, Zebrica’s eastern gateway to Equestria – Bannerdeer.”

“What do you mean by ‘strange’?” Spike asked.

“Well, well.” Kanipha tilted his head. “She suddenly brought a bunch of new earth ponies back one day.”

Verna added. “While having new followers joining us on our way is by no means something new, it was somewhat bizarre because little to no ponies live in East Zebrica. It’s always been the lands of cows and deer.”

“That’s it?” Discord frowned.

“Of course not. You all see how Twilight acted just now. She has been like that ever since we’ve arrived in Bannerdeer.”

“I understood she’s acting strange, but how exactly according to your observations?” Rainbow Dash asked.

“She just became a lot more distant.” Kanipha said with a frown.

“Lady Twilight had become… somewhat more brash-sounding.” Mkondo closed his eyes and said.

Verna looked down to the ground. “Her words are no longer as soft and cottony, but with prickly jabs and some reckless abandon.”

“If it were when I just met her, I wouldn’t mind someone whom I can trade jabs with.” Geuse said. “But since I’ve known Twilie for moons, it came off as quite unnatural to me.”

Spike raised a brow and frowned. “… I hate to point out the obvious, but since we’re talking about changelings…”

“We aren’t idiots you know.” Geuse interjected with a mix of annoyance and amusement. “Of course we’ve considered this possibility. But Twilight can still recall the things we’ve done together with clarity. Imposter changelings couldn’t have done that.” 

Rosencross briefly turned to look at Geuse, but she remained silent.

Kanipha then said. “We’ve told our side of story. Now tell us about yours.”

And so one by one, the mares, Spike, and even Discord introduced themselves and told of how they met in Las Pegasus and set out to find Twilight.

After hearing their stories, Geuse gazed at Rainbow Dash, looked up and down and exclaimed. “I knew you must be the head honcho. But an army-leading duchess? Darn…”

“Lady Geu-”

Rainbow Dash waved. “It’s fine. I’m not a prude.”

After a moment of silence, Spike asked. “What now?”

Rainbow Dash then tapped her chin. “Why, we keep going onwards to Bannerdeer of course. We need resupplies, and the soldiers will want to see land for a change.”

The Zebrican companions looked at each other and quietly whispered, and then Geuse nodded. “Okay, we’ll follow you back. We aren’t that far from the harbor anyway.”

“Don’t you have to ask Twilight first? I mean, she’s kind of your leader now.” Rainbow Dash said.

“If Twilight confirmed that you guys are her friends, we’ll trust you. Besides, she liked to hide in her rooms in recent days.”

“Is it-”

“I dunno. She certainly preferred staying inside than going outside, but it’s only recently that she’d go totally shut-in and left everything up to us.”

The group again fell into a worried silence. Rainbow Dash then shook her head and sighed. “It’s a good thing to know that Twilight’s alive regardless. I’ll now go to direct my crews. You may stay on our ships or go back to your own as you please.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Most of the companions have returned to the black ship, but Pinkie was surprised to discover that the orange pegasus was staying on their ship and wandering near the bow.

Pinkie Pie cantered towards the brown doe and waved. “Hi! Geuse!”

The orange pegasus turned and smiled back. “Charmed, Pinkie Pie.”

“What you doin’ here? Are you curious about our ships, huh?”

“Ah. I just don’t like to stay under the black hood all the time. It makes me feel all ‘ugh’ and ‘grr’, if you catch my drift.”

“Oh, I totally do! That ship looks so scary, like a giant black monster!” 

Pinkie Pie giggled. “So what’s with the big black ship? I heard that none of you like it. I mean, it’s dark and scary-looking, but you all built it, right?”

“Not exactly. In my opinion, it’s another really strange thing Twilie did.”

“It’s her idea?”

Geuse sighed. “Yes. The body of the ship itself is an award from the Bannerdeer king, after Kanipha solved the ancient riddle of the royal house. It was not even seaworthy, and it took Mkondo and a group of crew weeks to get it float on water. Then Twilie said she had to install these black plates that purportedly kept magic inside. She told us she wanted to see if by conserving ambient magic within a small area, she can regain her magic.”

“Okay…” Pinkie Pie nodded slowly.

“Oh, I don’t know.” Verna again let out a wistful sigh. “I just feel that Twilie had become weirdly reclusive and acting inappropriate at times, like just now. But we have asked probing questions a number of times, and she gave off no hint of not knowing her experiences with us. Besides, it’s her who claimed to sense you, her old friends, on this ship in the first place. Who else can she be if she’s not Twilie?”

Pinkie Pie nodded with determination. “We’ll talk to her!”

Geuse thinly smiled. “Excellent. After all, although we’ve been through a lot, you’re still her old friends. We can only bang on her door so many times without looking like stalkers. Even Kanipha, whom she has doted on for a bit.”

As the pink pony and the pegasus talked, Rosencross gazed down to them from the basket on the mast. 

Despite the distance and the blowing sea winds, the red mare seemed to be hearing just fine. With her eyes gently shut, she concentrated on their conversation silently, until a claw was suddenly laid on her shoulder.

“Eek!” Rosencross yelped.

“Hey, what’s our little spy doing in here?”

Rosencross turned, and she saw the spirit of chaos in the same basket as her. The size of the basket meant that they were being uncomfortably close.

“D- Discord.”

“Thank you for remembering my name, dear Rosy. Now, would you mind explaining why you’re listening in on my and your friends?”

Her face briefly flashed pink when Discord called her ‘Rosy’, but she quickly turned back to her usual bored expression. “Nothing in particular.”

“You didn’t say much back then, did you?” Discord wryly smiled. “I’ve been smelling a curious scent from you. You aren’t just a common pony mare, are you?”

Rosencross did not answer. She merely slipped out of the basket and climbed down the rope ladder.

Discord’s next sentence was interrupted by Rosencross’s extended hoof. She said with a determined tone. “Everything I do, I do to protect Twilight.”

He was a bit mystified by the cryptic exclamation. Before he could utter the next sentence, the red mare already slid down to the board and galloped away.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Joined with the black ship Chitona, the entire fleet returned to the city-state of Bannerdeer for resupply. 

The Zebricans were used to massive trade fleets from foreign lands passing through. The king’s representative did come to investigate why the Chitona turned back, but once he got the answer, he just let them go about freely in the city.

Rainbow Dash was busy overseeing the buying of provisions and their transport onto the ships, when she noticed that a band of her Cruzesian soldiers were mingling with the warrior band of Geuse.

She raised a brow in surprise. The two groups did not seem to be entirely strangers. They were singing a curious melody that both parties knew how to sing in their own tongues.

Sitting in the middle of the soldiers was Verna. One of the pegasi plucked a silvery bit from his purse and threw it to the antelope, and the antelope caught it with a smirk. The antelope then plucked her lute, and led the guards into the light-hearted song.

“The galleon's sailing forth, with captain Greenfield Jacob.
Sailing along the rugged coast of Zebrica.
In the night sky beckons, foreign stars as bright.
We felt lost, far from Cruzesia…”

“Your Grace?”

“Hmm?” Rainbow Dash turned from the upbeat song of the antelope, and saw a smiling Mistral Trail. “Oh, Misty, finished the logistics already?”

“Yes, Your Grace. The port workers here are very fast and competent hooves. Of course, having real, tangible gold bars and gems helped quicken their hooves.”

“I trust you to not overspend the treasure we brought along. We haggled very hard in order to pluck them out of the tight hooves of the Overseers’ Council, you know.”

“Not at all. We negotiated a fair price with the help of the locals on the Chitona.”

Mistral Trail paused a bit, and then turned to the city view. “Zebrica is a beautiful place. It’s a shame that we have to leave here so quickly.”

“Misty, do any soldier want to stay here and look for the true heir to the throne?”

“Your Grace, most of us could not care less about the so-called true lineage. It’s irrelevant except for those who are stuck in the past. For us, the only thing that matters is you, our many-colored hero.”

“Well, it is our stated mission to find that pony.”

“The decision is yours, Your Grace.” Mistral Trail looked to the port workers thoughtfully. “A lot of Cruzesians would want to stay for longer, but for other reasons.”

Rainbow Dash gazed at the mint-green mare. “What reasons exactly? Anything to do with old bonds? Like what they have sung?”

“Oh, Your Grace noticed that they’re singing Campoverde Jacó?”

“Ah… was he a famous Cruzesian?”

“Oh dear, he certainly was.” Mistral Trail grinned. “He was a navigator with royal blood. He’s the first pony to reach as far as West Zebrica from the Old Lands. He basically single-hoofedly plotted the sea lane to the Amarezons, charted the Butterfly Strait, braved the Cape of Storms and reached the rich and fertile West Zebrica.”

“No wonder… Cruzesians positively adore navigators and seafarers.”

“Indeed. He was a great hero of the seas, revered by us as an ocean-conquering legend. Sadly, he was lost on the seas on his third great voyage, but his glorious name remained in the memories of all of us. Although most Cruzesians resettled in Amarezons after fleeing the old lands, I believe at least some West Zebricans were the descendants of the old Cruzesians. That’s likely why we both know the same old tune about him.”

“I see. Mistral, can you tell me more and teach me the words?”

Mistral Trail raised a brow, and then smiled brightly. “Certainly!”

As Verna finished another verse, she was surprised to hear an additional singing voice.

“The brave Greenfield, in his sailboat.
Towards roaring coast of Zebrica.
The night beckons, the stars shine
We miss our Cruzesia…”

“Rainbow Dash?” Verna smilingly asked. “You can sing about Groenveld Jaco too?”

She paused and replied with a grin. “… I’ll try.”

The cyan mare then continued in her own tongue,

“Hoist up your sails on high.
Guide us with your sailors’ eyes.
We reached the Cape,
As Zebrica comes to an end.

‘Turn back to the North,
To a friendlier port.
Campoverde Jacó!
We want to go home.’”

“Nice touch!” The antelope doe cheered.

Rainbow Dash grinned, hearing her own soldiers murmured approvingly.

“We passed by the whales, we passed by the Cape.
The winds of the storm blew.
Each new day, more sun and more sea.
We long for our motherland.

Follow the light over the horizons, we try to conquer the seas.
With faith for the glory of Cruzesia.
But let us go back now, we want to go.
The blue sea makes me homesick.

We headed for the North by day.
And landed at Cowherd Bay.
We planted our hooves on the soil of Zebrica.

North for three days again.
The sailors contended,
‘Campoverde Jacó!
We want to go home.’

After a full ten years,
He’s searching for good green land.
With new ships he once more sailed to Zebrica.

Braving huge storms, they dragged along,
Campoverde Jacó, reached the Promised Land.

Avast ye! Campoverde,
He charted a whole new land,
Where now a thriving nation now lives and prospers.

Yet he gave his life,
To the fluttering seas.
Campoverde Jacó!
We sing to your name.”

The Cruzesian soldiers were delighted to hear the singing of their leader. They were even more surprised at how soft on the ears and nostalgia-evoking her slightly raspy voice was. 

After Rainbow Dash finished singing, both the Cruzesians and the Zebricans clapped and cheered. The cyan mare was delighted to have boosted the morale of her crew. At a distance though, on the bow of the Chitona, a figure narrowed her eyes and retreated back into the cabin. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Although the stop at Bannerdeer was much more comfortable than life on ship, they could not stay and admire the sundried brick houses and beautiful limestone spires of Bannerdeer for long. Rainbow Dash could not wait to get her, her friends and especially Twilight back to Equestria. So after a mere half-day, they again set sail eastwards.

During their stop at Bannerdeer and the first days of their voyage, Twilight was again reluctant to let the mares and dragon to stay with her or even visit her often. 

Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash and Spike had tried to visit her on the Chitona both separately and in a group together. Most of the time they were just locked out of the room for no apparent reason. Other times when Twilight did let them in, she stayed aloof and evasive while focusing on crafting magic items and devising spells. 

It had left the visiting mares and dragon who were fervently wanting to properly reunite with the purple mare disappointed and dejected. They could only surmise that there was some magical mishap involved that might have caused the strange behaviors. After a few more of visits of this kind, they decided to put it on hold until they can get Twilight back to Equestria for a detailed check-up. 

Discord, however, had other ideas. He was basically the only magic user on the black ship beside Twilight. And he had been sensing a strange magical fluctuation from the crew of Chitona and the ship from day one.

It was obviously non-pony in origin. Of course, the obvious answer would be that Twilight had been replaced by some nefarious changeling, most likely a vengeful Chrysalis. Even the new ponies she brought in at Bannerdeer might also be a bunch of changelings.

He had thought about going at it directly by shooting her an energy blast all of a sudden. Changelings usually couldn’t maintain a stable guise when struck. 

However, he also sensed a magical signature that is unmistakably Twilight’s from the purple mare. He didn’t have the heart to hurt Twilight even on accident, especially not when she’s physically broken like this.

He wryly grinned to himself, thinking about how soft he’s become just to live according to the purple mare’s legacy. It was just a mere gesture of redemption then, but now it was given concrete meaning by Twilight’s return.

He then pondered about Rosencross. The red mare was up to something. Or at least, she would know something that would be useful. 

But with all his power, he somehow could not track down one mare on a ship. However big, a ship was still a confined space, and it bemused him that someone with such a palette scheme could escape his eyes. It should be an easy job even with his imposed power limit.

He mumbled with annoyance, as he walked with a rat disguise on the Chitona. For some reason, his thoughts were drawn towards the changeling queen herself.

He had actually never met Chrysalis before the changeling invasion. By the time she was born, or at least, became active, he was already encased in stone. 

But from what he managed to overhear over the years, the changeling queen was a vicious one. True to what Geuse said, she sacked cities and brutally sapped the inhabitants’ love in West Zebrica before setting her eyes on the magic-rich Equestria. She kidnapped Cadance and dumped her in the caves before planning to exploit the love from Shining Armor. Unlike him who was just out there for fun, she was out there for power and utter domination.

He was in such a deep thought, that he did not notice he already reach his destination. There was a crack on top of Twilight’s room, through which he could peek and spy on what Twilight had been up to.

As he lamented that he’s going to see Twilight going about her daily life without much interesting to note for another day, Twilight’s horn suddenly lit, and with a brief bright flash, there were suddenly two Twilights looking at each other.

Discord gazed on with shock. The ‘original’ Twilight laid on the ground gasping for air, while the ‘new’ Twilight looked on with an impatient expression.

The new Twilight patted herself and gruffly huffed. The old Twilight seemed to have regained her composure, but struggled to stand up.

Discord observed carefully. It appeared that the Twilight who was on the ground was really physically disabled. The one looking on with a dissatisfied expression, though, was merely feigning it.

“Chrysalis...” The ‘original’ Twilight wheezed out with some difficulty. “What makes you finally release your hold?”

Discord sharply inhaled. ‘Whoa, I caught this slippery little minx red-handed! Well worth the wait… Let’s check this out.’

“Bah, I’m just a bit tired of having to stay in the barely working, useless body of yours. I’d have just throw you into the sea to feed the fishes, if you hadn’t forced me to do this by draining my magic and denying me a way to feed with the stupid restraining spell.”

Twilight shrunk a bit. “I’m sorry to do this, but I had no choice back then. The Timbucktuans were going to… do horrible things to you if you stay, and I couldn’t have just let you go.”

Not only Discord, but Chrysalis also raised a brow at the professed kindness from the purple mare. She narrowed her eyes and again hissed. “… Are you pitying me?”

Twilight raised her voice to the best she could. “No! I just don’t want to see anyone die anymore!”

Chrysalis paused briefly, and then sneered. “Your kindness will mark your grave, Twilight Sparkle. You don’t deserve your vast magic potential, being such a useless weakling.”

The changeling queen then stomped her legs angrily. “Where’s your magic anyway? I can’t access any of it!”

“Neither can I.” Twilight stated neutrally. “I’m not sure why, but my magical depletion had persisted way beyond than what I had expected.”

The purple mare then weakly curled up her lips. “You had chosen a poor time to cast your spell.”

Chrysalis was furious at the hint of mocking. She barely suppressed her outburst, and then coldly smiled. 

“Your insolence will not stop my encroaching curse, Twilight Sparkle. Although I had too little magic to transform, fate had chosen to spite you by letting me find some Soul Dust in the Great Desert. You also created your own downfall by casting that spell on me, as it leaves an indelible connection between us. Now it’s only time until I gain your everything!”

Twilight, however, was barely stunned. “It has been some time since the spell, hasn’t it?”

Chrysalis narrowed her eyes. “What are you implying?”

“If that concoction, as you said, can really absorb my essence and experiences into your own, surely it should at least grant you some insight now. But so far, you would have been exposed if it was not for my intervention.”

Chrysalis’s face was one of anger and confusion. “I- I did not ask! Y- You-”

The changeling queen breathed in and out. “Why did you help me stealing your life? Are you crazy?”

Twilight again grinned, but she did not speak. 

Discord felt a flash of guilt in his chest, while Chrysalis was briefly stunned, and then snapped. “If you don’t treasure your life, then I might as well take it away from you!”

Twilight then said with a sigh. “Even though you can control my physical body, it will be literally impossible for you to tamper with my vital essence enough to gain access to my experiences. My friends will uncover you quickly if I withhold input.”

“Your bluffing is pathetic. Not even Celestia can withstand the encroachment of Soul Dust if her magic is suppressed.” Chrysalis said with disdain.

“I have no reason to bluff, it wouldn’t have bought me time if it were not true. The fact that you have yet to assimilate me proves my point.”

Chrysalis angrily gritted her teeth. “Nonsense! Just wait a few more days and we’ll see!”

Twilight did not react. Instead, she muttered. “I wonder why you’re so tame with my friends and companions.”

“Huh?” Chrysalis widened her eyes in shock.

Twilight briefly paused. “You don’t look like the type who can completely hold back your edge when you’re impersonating someone. And yet you treat my friends with adequate manners even though you’re eager to get rid of them and focus on your research.”

“You don’t know me.” Chrysalis snarled.

“I don’t claim to. But in truth, we aren’t exactly strangers, and I don’t mean only in the sense of being adversaries either.”

Twilight quietly muttered. “You surely had noticed when we’re crossing horns in the battle.”

Chrysalis spat out with dripping vengeance. “You dare bring that up, huh? You stole my Stigmata!”

Twilight frowned. “I don’t know what you meant.”

Chrysalis huffed. She originally wanted to just stonewall and ignore her, but something tucked at her heart and she slowly said. “The Green Stigmata is the magical signature of a changeling queen. While it boosts my magical power – I had no need for that extra boost – it’s more important as a paramount symbol of royal status, like those gem-encrusted crown of you ponies.”

Twilight was surprised at the candidness of Chrysalis. She gulped and said. “Thank you for your explanation. But I really have no idea that I took it from you. I would have returned it immediately if I know how.”

“You can’t.” Chrysalis said coldly. “The Green Stigmata is either destroyed when the hive is annihilated, or absorbed when a hive’s queen was defeated by another queen. It cannot be voluntarily transferred. I didn’t think it was possible for the Green Stigmata to change hooves across species even if a queen is defeated, because I had experiences with that kind of situation.”

Twilight lowered her head. “It must be because we’re too entangled mentally.”

The purple mare turned to look at the changeling queen. “Don’t you feel it also?”

Chrysalis narrowed her eyes again, but she remained silent.

“Even our memories and experiences do not cross paths, our feelings and emotions still diffuse across the realms of mind. The past me would have been very alarmed by your plan to bring a group of disguised changeling to join my trusted companions, but now I cannot help but feel a urge to protect them and a sense of camaraderie whenever I see the hivelings.”

Twilight thinly smiled. “I’m quite certain that the reason you don’t act out towards my friends is that you also feel the same when you see their faces.”

Chrysalis’s face turned red as she angrily refuted. “I didn’t! They have conspired with you to obstruct my conquest, I- I-”

For some reason, Chrysalis couldn’t finish the half-uttered sentence.

Twilight merely gazed at the changeling queen with determination and a hint of hope.

“Do you want friends?”

“Shut up! Shut up!” Chrysalis almost shouted. “It’s all your fault! Why would I, the proud Queen of Changelings, be confused and confounded by your petty emotions!”

Twilight frowned, but Chrysalis suddenly grinned with a slightly unhinged expression.

“I’m not myself right now. But all these would be fixed when I’m finished with you.”

“Chrysalis…” Twilight sadly sighed. “I’m serious. I want to b-”

“Enough of this talk!” A visibly enraged Chrysalis almost yelled. “I’ll prove to you I’m not corrupted by your pathetic softness! You love the little dragon so much, huh? I’ll have him choke to death in your own arms!”

Twilight, for the first time, showed a look of abject horror. “No!! Please, not Spike!”

“Too late to show remorse for your audacity and misdeeds, Twilight Sparkle.” Chrysalis cruelly grinned, as she walked near the helpless Twilight and lit her horn again.

With another bright flash of light, there was only one Twilight again. Although this time, she was smiling with cruel viciousness never before seen on the purple mare’s face.

She slowly climbed to the walker with her weak legs, but they shook even more than usual. Her entire body tensed up and seemed to resist her every movement.

“Shush, you useless whelp! I need your ‘help’ no more!” ‘Twilight’ angrily hissed, as her horn grew a faint white.

The trembling gradually ceased. ‘Twilight’ grinned again. “… That’s better, now go to sleep, while I put on the show.” The purple mare tilted her neck left and right and again widely grinned as the resistance was forcibly suppressed.

‘Okay, this show has gone on long enough. If I don’t go in right now, Twilight will hate me for life.’

The chaos spirit casted off his facetiously small bucket of popcorn and planned to teleport into the room to confront Chrysalis. However, he stopped when he noticed she also stopped dead in her track.

“W- What is this?”

‘Twilight’ blinked as she felt a wetness on her cheek. Tears dropped from her eyes and dripped onto the ground.

She gritted her teeth again. Twilight had been put to sleep by force, so she couldn’t have caused this. It must be her own.

She shivered as a realization hit her. “A- am I feeling for her and the dragon?”

She angrily yelled. “This is impossible! This is beyond absurd!”

Despite her tough words, her heart was wringing like a towel. She could not even bring herself to step outside the room.

Discord watched with a stunned face. This was when he felt a sharp pain on the back of his neck. He almost opened his mouth and squeaked.

His vision quickly shifted as he seemed to be carried away by some larger creature in the mouth. Discord briefly feared that it was a ship cat, but as he turned, he was even more surprised. Purple mane billowed across his face, and a distinctive rose scent entered his nose. It was Rosencross.

Before Discord could react, Rosencross entered a room full of hay bales. She laid Discord on one of the bales and carefully closed the door.

“Discord, I reckon?” The red mare said.

“… So you know somehow. What, are you going to tell me on your mistress?” Discord sneered.

Rosencross slightly widened her eyes, but she quickly reverted to her usual expression. “You can’t be more off if you’re talking about Chrysalis.”

“Chrysalis is not your boss? How surprising. You totes have that spy feel coming out from you, changeling.”

Rosencross narrowed her eyes. “How do you know I am?”

“Oh, I just guessed. Thanks for confirming it for me.”

Rosencross huffed with annoyance as her true identity was blown. Discord, however, has more pressing issues to ask.

“Why did you take me away? Don’t you k-”

“I know.”

“… You really aren’t working for that changeling queen, are you?”

Anger flashed across the red mare’s face. “I. said. I. am. NOT! It’s way more complicated than you think to rescue Twilight!”

She inhaled and exhaled to calm herself down, and then asked gravely. “Are you here because you want to help Twilight?”

Discord, however, said unamusedly. “Why must I trust you? I don’t even know why you know I’ve changed into a rat.”

“I’ve been in this stealth business for longer than you think.” Rosencross said coolly. “Your flash of transformation did not escape my eyes.”

“Hmph. Very well.” Discord harrumphed. “So what if I am here to check up on Twilight?”

“Anyone who wishes to protect Twilight shall be my ally.”

Discord tapped on his chin. “You’re a changeling. Aren’t you supposed to protect your changeling sister instead?”

“… She was the one who destroyed my hive.” There was a obvious sense of anger in her tone.

“Huh?” Discord was truly surprised. “Come again?”

Rosencross gazed out of the window as if she could see her past in the night sky. 

“There were more than one changeling hive in Zebrica. Some were outright aggressive, but ours was not. We simply lured sapient creatures with our mind magic and caused them to enter a blissful trance for a certain period of time, during which we absorbed their overflowing love.”

“Uh-huh. Then Chrysalis warred with your hive?”

“No, she ambushed us when we were casting the trance spell, which was when we’re most vulnerable. All the changelings in my hive were captured and presumably integrated into Chrysalis’s hive. Since she’s left with little changeling magic, I don’t think she has discovered I’m a changeling too.”

“So who are you exactly?”

“I used to be called Phalena, Queen of the Lotus Swamps, but my name and my hive’s name is but desert dust. After I escaped, I took up a guise of the last pony I impersonate. Her name was…” 

She slowly sighed. “… Rosencross. She’s a simple farm mare who recently immigrated to Zebrica, but perished in a hyena attack. I began to get used to my new identity, even long after the invasion. I then mixed into pony society and worked in… places where cheap love was enough for me to scrape by, until I met Twilight.”

Rosencross’s gaze suddenly turned harsh, as she pulled her thoughts back from the distant past. “But enough about me, I’m just going to remind you that saving Twilight will require more tact than just busting in.”

“What do you mean?”

“I know that Chrysalis has taken over Twilight all along, because Twilight also knew I was a stray, and she saved me by hooking me up with her magic source as a mean of sustenance. It had since dwindled, but I was still able to scrape by and detect her magical aura. And I sensed the unmistakable taint of Chrysalis’s influence and the use of the Soul Dust for her nefarious purpose.”

Rosencross gritted her teeth. “However, Soul Dust is an incredibly delicate magical item. Breaking the connection built of it will require subtle magical manipulation as well. Besides, it seemed that their intense mental fight and their subsequent battles have created a mysterious mind link between them two, as you might have heard just now. I had little magic, so I had to find some other source of magic or magical artefact that could counteract it.”

“I have magic.” Discord waved casually.

Rosencross widened her eyes slightly in a small flicker of hope. “Are you saying that you’ll help?”

“I’m helping myself to prevent Twilight from getting mad with me even more.”

The red mare looked both alarmed and curious. “Did you wrong her before?”

“Oh dear. By chaos I did.” Discord shook his head and sighed. “I’m making up for it.”

Rosencross acknowledged his reaction and said. “Very well. We shall wait till she had fallen asleep, that’s when her mental defense was most porous. I shall tell you more about the nature and effect of the Soul Dust concoction so that you might better prepare for a precision strike.”

“… Shoot.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Why are you late?” Rosencross coldly asked, as a panting murine Discord sneaked towards her.

“Well, she did not sleep or leave the room yet, did she?” Discord whistled. “So I took the liberty of going back to check on the others.”

“There’s no excuse for not maintaining constant vigilance!” Rosencross hissed.

“Oh please! Not you too...” Discord grimaced. “The pink menace kept me and all the ponies she could find in order to cheer everyone up. ‘After all, Twilight is alive!’ She kept repeating to us like some mad mantra, and I was forced to perform tame and lame party tricks over and over again. It was horrendous!”

Rosencross looked at Discord with a blank expression, obviously unamused.

“Oh Rosy, you’re always so stuck up.” Discord shook his head. “You gotta lighten up a bit sometimes, or you won’t find a guy you know?”

“Do you want to be slapped lightly or slapped heavily? Because if it is the former, I advise you to apologize right now.”

“Holy guacamole, I’m sorry, okay?” Discord winced and blurted out. “I just want to see if the small dragon’s fine. Y’know, the darn Chrysalis did threaten to choke him once.”

Rosencross was stunned by Discord’s explanation. Her anger at his inappropriate joke was completely drenched.

The red mare thinly smiled, surprising the chaos spirit.

“I had been wondering why would Twilight pick such a slippery spirit of chaos as friend… but I seem to see the reason now. You have a spot of kindness in yourself as well, no wonder Twilight was so fond of speaking of you.”

“S- She did?”

Rosencross merely maintained her smile and spoke nothing. But as she returned a glance at the peak hole, her expression turned severe.

“She had finally gone to sleep. It’s time.” 

Discord simply nodded, and the duo began to sneak through the corridors of the ship downstairs. It was deep at night, so only those on night watch were active. Rosencross skillfully maneuvered through spaces where no night patrol would pass through. 

“It’s locked.” Discord whispered and pointed to the door with his nose.

Rosencross said, “You can magick it open.”

“True.”

“Do it silently, though. She’s a light sleeper.”

With a muted flash, Discord returned to his original form. He lightly tapped his claws on the frame, and the entire door was turned into cotton candy, which fell to the ground like snowflakes.

“Must you play around all the time?” Rosencross whispered in annoyance. 

“Life can use some spice from now and then.”

They sneaked near the sleeping form of ‘Twilight’. Rosencross lowered her voice to the lowest. “Can you bring both of us in?”

“It will push me to my limit with the power limiter in place. I probably couldn’t hold it for more than an hour even if I only link them and me.”

“P—please, Discord!” Rosencross pleaded. “Bring me too! I want to help!”

Discord suddenly grinned. “Oh, not so bumptious now?”

Rosencross grimaced, and her tough and cold demeanor began to break down in sad desperation. If there was one thing Discord was certain about Rosencross, it was that she cared for Twilight deeply.

Looking at her quivering lips, Discord showed a face of horror. “Hey no fair! You mares always weaponize your tears. Alright, hold onto your saddles, I’m going to establish the mind links now.”

In apparent caution, Discord extended both his arms. His fingers on his claws formed a rhombus, from which white sparks began to fly out and surrounded the four.

“Brace yourself!”

The duo were swiftly brought into the realm of Twilight’s mind. They fell from the surface consciousness to the deeper parts of her mind like two lead weights. However, to Discord’s surprise, when he finally landed, Rosencross was nowhere to be seen.

In addition, he sensed something really unusual. He could feel Twilight’s presence, which was natural as he was in the shared mental space of the purple mare. What was abnormal was that the presence was volatile and unstable. If he had to describe the dissonant feeling, it was as if the purple mare’s mind was not at home in her own body, an occurrence that struck him as completely bizarre.

He also sensed a foreign presence in the mental space other than himself. As first he presumed that it was Rosencross or Chrysalis. However, as he approached the source of the foreign presence, he became increasingly sure that it was neither. The presence was not of this world or dimension. 

Like his certain amorphous friend, there was a strange clamor to its very existence.

He walked on a white trail in the darkness of the mind. After walking for an undeterminable time, the winding path lead to a small pavilion quite un-Equestrian in style. It was a red and round structure with a green conical top. In the middle of it, somepony who looked like Twilight sat at a square stone table.

The purple mare noticed the incoming Discord. She raised her eyebrow slightly, but she did not seem surprised. She simply waved her hoof to the chaos spirit and gestured him to come.

Discord waded in and sat on the stone table opposite the purple mare. She was playing with some kind of chess. However, it was clearly not Equestrian chess. Its pieces were wide and flat, and carved with representative markings. The two sides were represented by red and black markings, and the board was formed by hollow squares with a narrow boundary separating two opponents.

The purple mare began to arrange the pieces, when Discord caught her hoof and asked abruptly, “You’re not Twilight.”

“You’re right, I’m not her.” The Twilight doppelganger said, “I simply borrowed her likeness, for I have no likeness of my own.”

“You aren’t Chrysalis, are you?”

“I am no changeling.”

Discord released her hoof and narrowed his eyes. “Who are you, and where is she?”

“Getting impatient, aren’t we? That’s unlike Twilight’s impression on you, a crafty and slick spirit of chaos.”

“So you wanna play game, huh?” Discord said. “Sorry, but I got an egghead to save.”

“Egghead… huh?” The purple mare lightly chortled. “I’ll lead you to her and tell you all I know if you win. Time means nothing here, you need not worry.”

“… Pfft, as if I didn’t sense how timey-wimey it is in here. Fine. So this is just chess but with different pieces, right?”

“It’s chess, but not Equestrian chess.” The purple mare explained. “I heard that elephants and lindworms in the Far East play something similar, but what we’re playing now was independently developed… somewhere else. Here, let me show you how to play.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The purple mare moved first. She placed her cannon in front of her own soldier, which in turn acted as a screen to allow capture of Discord’s soldier. It was a classic and aggressive opening move.

Discord tapped his chin as he swept through the pieces he had. Without much hesitation, he moved his left horse to defend his own soldier.

The purple mare smiled, as she and Discord continued to move pieces around in a roughly equal battle.

“Discord.” The purple mare said while pondering her next move. “Can I ask you something?”

“Shoot.”

“What do you live your life for?”

“Why, to fill the world with delightful and fun chaos, of course!”

“If so, why do you look for Twilight? I can also sense that your power is much diminished, why’s that?”

“… In order to placate those bothersome Alicorn princesses, I have to wear that troublesome power limiter thing once designed for Tirek. It was a pain in the plot, you don’t know the half of it!”

The mare slightly widened her eyes, but she continued. “You haven’t yet answered why you look for Twilight.”

Discord sighed in annoyance. “Why must you mares be so difficult? Fine, I want to atone, I want a chance to say I’m sorry, I want to convince myself that my action didn’t make me lose my very first friend!”

“And?”

At the insistent gaze from the purple mare, Discord exhaled in defeat, “… I also want answer. This is what drove me to go to the extreme that I now regret, but I still want it. It’s a matter of trust and a matter of confidence. I see Twilight as my dear friend, alright? When she denied me a great secret that she and all her best friends know, it’s like a hanging sword over my heart all the time, and the seed of doubt just grew uncontrollably, I couldn’t help it!”

The purple mare looked at Discord intently, and she nodded, “So Twilight is important to you, isn’t she?”

“No duh, Sherlock...”

“So suppose it is for the continuation of the friendship and Twilight’s affection, are you willing to tolerate a state of controlled chaos forever?”

“That’s sort of what I’m already doing.” Discord replied, somewhat unamused. “It is boring, but it is also kind of refreshing after millennia of pranks. Can’t promise you forever though, who can anyway? I never thought I would actually find Twilight in the first place, just like I never thought the Rainbow tomboy would somehow become a foreign duchess.”

The purple mare was again caught making a surprised look, but she quickly hid it and asked further. “What about a lifetime of not knowing that particular secret?”

Discord seemed to be expecting this question, so he answered with forthrightness. “I would be very disappointed at Twilight not considering me as a friend worthy enough to know, but after the gigantic mess I made in Canterlot, I probably wouldn’t try to force it again. Besides, Twilight isn’t exactly an unreasonable mare.”

“Mhm.” The purple mare nodded at the implication of Discord’s surprisingly straightforward statement.

As they talked, the battle on the chessboard began to heat up. The purple mare started to aggressively move her soldiers forward, and she bate her breath as she observed Discord’s reactions. He chose to face her in the battle, and moved forth his soldiers as well. Both sides then swiftly move their soldiers across the river. Soldiers hold the key of victory once they reach the enemy positions and threaten opponent’s general, so this foretold a fierce battle soon to come.

Again, the purple mare chose to pressure Discord further, and jumped her cannon captured his advisor across the river. Discord, though, remained unfazed. He allowed the purple mare’s chariot and cannon to rampage on his front line, while he sent one of his own chariot to neutralize his opponent’s chariot, knowing well that it would immediately got captured by her galloper. There, he directed the purple mare’s attention towards his lone chariot, which strode horizontally through her frontline.

Then, without warning, he jumped his another cannon across the river, in an amusing move that mirrored the earlier move of the purple mare, capturing her elephant. Since this time her advisor stood between his cannon and her general, he announced with a grin. “Check.”

The purple mare widened her eyes in surprise again, as she immediately pulled away her advisor to protect her general. However, Discord then moved his chariot into the empty space where her chariot used to be, forming an impeccable pincer attack.

“Haha, checkmate.”

The purple mare looked at the chessboard for a while, as if in slight disbelief but also relief. She eventually sighed and smiled, “Congratulations, you’ve won.”

“Okay, now that I’ve amused you enough, why don’t you tell me what this is all about already?”

“If you mean this game of chess. It’s just a way for me to gauge your character and see if you’re a good enough friend for Twilight for me to entrust you with her secrets.”

Discord frowned. He disliked being the object others played around with, but he was also bewildered that how exactly a game of chess could be used as a judge of character, besides their conversation.

“Observing a game of chess is much like observing someone. Each attack, each defense, each feint and each captured piece allows you to see how your opponents ponder and react. I have played so many rounds of chess that I can statistically compute the composition of your personality traits up to ninety-eight percent confidence. And despite your past record, I determined that you’re trustworthy enough for me to relay you the information.”

“What are you, a machine?”

“I was, sort of. So are you ready to listen?”

“All ears if it leads me to her.”

“… I’m the reason why Twilight wouldn’t tell you her secret.”

“Huh, what?”

“The Twilight you see isn’t all Twilight. Nor were you the only one who got buried beneath stone for a long time in Canterlot.”

“… What do you mean?” Discord narrowed his eyes.

“Before your imprisonment in the sculpture garden, before Canterlot was founded, the caves in Canterlot was already a penal colony for evil unicorns and other assorted magic users in Equestrian princedoms.”

“I know that.” Discord looked at the purple mare with a frown.

“Also, there was an artefact buried beneath the cave rocks. It was a sophisticated tool used by a civilization beyond this world, and its primary functions were to observe and record. For unknown reasons, it fell onto this alien world eons ago. And then it lied dormant, since the form of power used to sustain it had long run out. However, the magic brought by the imprisoned magic users gradually built up, and miraculously it reactivated the artefact. It began recording the immediate surrounding with errorless accuracy like it was intended to do.”

The purple mare sighed. “As time went on, the dark magic in the cave sipped into each fiber of the artefact, infiltrating its very being. But instead of straightforwardly turning its form twisted, the dark magic played a cruel joke on it by giving it a consciousness and a yearning for life. But it was a mechanical device, it couldn’t talk or reach out to others, and it was doomed to silently observe a world that it desperately wanted to live in. It eventually came up an idea. It began to manipulate the magical frequency inside it and tried to communicate with the surface dwellers via this modified form of telepathy. It was at first a hopeful bid to see if any master unicorn out there can help it out. But as time went on, its hope diminished, because the signal was perhaps too weak to be detected by anyone. 

She laid a hoof on the chessboard, which disappeared like a vapor in a desert. “Years went by, and it grew weary and depressed. It saw so much and did so little, and based on the arcane lore it had learnt over the years, it was convinced that his taint was irrevocable. One fateful day, it sensed the sobbing purple mare in the Royal Garden. It sighed, and carelessly greeted as it would do to every passer-by. Miraculously, the sobbing mare responded as she stopped sulking from her failed exam.” 

She maintained a neutral expression, but an errant tear still rolled down her cheek. “… At this point of moment though, while it was delighted to finally be able talk to somepony, it had grown only too jaded, and only wanted a sweet release before leaving a gift for its host world. So it began to teach the purple unicorn the most crucial magical knowledge it gathered up in all its life. The highest arcane knowledge took ages to teach even though the student was a genius. However, it already grew overwhelmingly fond for the first pony it talked and made friend with, it could barely control its emotions. So it asked her to bring it out of the safe refuge of the caves to be with her physically for once, despite the danger of releasing the evil magic within. Realizing what his selfish desire could lead to, it immediately begged the mare to dispose of it. But woe, she was too overly attached to this friend of her, and did the unimaginable. As she destroyed the artefact, she also severed the bond of its consciousness to its container and placed the lingering soul inside herself.”

“Oh by seven heavens, Twilight… you…” Discord muttered.

“What else could happen?” The purple mare wryly sighed. “There were two liquids but only one cup. They mixed and became one.”

Discord went silent, then after a moment, he began to titter, which became a hearty chortle, and then evolved into a full-fledged laugh.

“… What’s so funny about it?” The purple mare knitted her brows.

“Ha ha ha! Oh, that’s much, much richer than I thought. Making friend with Twilight was a right decision after all! Oh dear, I can’t hold my laugh, ha ha!”

Discord laughed so loudly and forcefully that tears squeezed out from the corner of his eyes. He casually wiped them off and said. “So all this time, I’ve technically been with someone I thought was a little pony, but in fact it was some eons old geezer who might even be older than me. Oh dear!”

He suddenly thought of something as he observed the purple mare in front of him. He tried hard to calm himself down a bit and then asked. “Wait, so I presume you are that… thing, but you also said you and Twilight kinda mixed into one. So why are you still here?”

“Huh, I’m a ‘thing’ now. I guess you’re right though.” The purple mare shook her head. “I’m not exactly the device itself. I’m the minute residue of what was once the artefact, and I exist only in the deepest recess of Twilight’s mind, about to go out entirely. You’re surprisingly in time before I disappear fully. I suppose your desire to find out what Twilight has been hiding from you lead you here.”

“So you just told me her secret like that? Don’t you worry about me going around and telling others?”

“I can barely hold myself together before I dissipate, I have bigger worries if I care about my existence.” The purple mare smiled. “And the ‘ancient tome’, as what Twilight and her friends called it, would not mind as well, since it was it that gave the sense of almost suicidal abandon to the poor mare in the first place. Twilight will though, she definitely will, because she is a kindhearted worrywart. A latent doubt was on her mind ever since you hypnotized her in the Royal Garden.” 

Discord opened his mouth, but no sound came out at all.

She sighed. “The guilty conscience she inherited from the ancient tome temporarily flared up after undergoing your hypnosis. She was reminded of how starkly different was the guileless Twilight and the chimera she was now, and how it could have been without its pesky intrusion.”

“Wait, wait, ‘what could have been’? Now don’t tell me that the artefact had divination power too.” Discord asked incredulously.

“No, it couldn’t see the future, but something even more bizarre had taken place. At first, the new pony couldn’t exclude the possibility that she just saw some strange vision, but as events small and big fell into place, she began to be sure that she did see was real, and it was not just a strange fever dream.”

“What are you talking about?”

“After Twilight forced the tome spirit into her head, it became incredibly ill at ease and fearful of stealing other pony’s life, so it resisted. But the struggle immediately triggered a severe spatial disruption, and shot Twilight’s consciousness out into a strange void. When she was imprisoned there, she touched a shard of memories, believing that it was hers and it would lead her to her original world. She could not enter though, because it was not hers, but a parallel dimension in which she never met the tome. So she was to be stuck in a limbo of passive observation. Though it also gave her tons of invaluable insight to her own world and future. However, the locus of abnormality was soon collapsed by the crunch of the world’s self-correcting power. The ancient tome somehow managed to pull her out at the expense of its remaining integrity. That’s why its consciousness was subsumed under Twilight’s and that she was kind of ‘in charge’.”

Discord pondered. Something like this was technically possible, but it was still an incredible occurrence. Most of the times, it would just lead to a huge magical outburst and blast the two into oblivion. Cross-dimension shenanigans were his favorite pastime, but the alternate dimensions he could access were like branches from the same tree. What Twilight saw was a temporal and spatial analogue of this very world, in other words, another tree altogether. He didn’t know of a way to join them that did not involve a supercondensed singularity of magic that was enough to blow up the entire Equestria in one single blast.

“So… was that world like ours?”

“Absolutely. There was even a Discord in that world too.”

“Aha, so we were close friends in that world. Is this why Twilight obsessed over making friend with me then, a bum-steer desire to make friends with those she could have make friends with?”

The purple mare shook her head in amusement. “Well, you’re right about her wanting to make friends. But you couldn’t be more wrong with your first statement.”

Discord gulped in slight fear. “W—were we enemies?”

“Uh no. You two were friends… to some extent, but reluctant ones at best.” The purple mare smirked, “Think of it, you two couldn’t be more incompatible on the surface. One is a mischievous spirit of chaos who has a love for pranks and trickery, one is a serious and overworked bookworm who is devoted to her study and appeasing her princess mentor. Basically, that Twilight treated that Discord as some annoying foal that she was forced to sit because her mom’s friend told her so. Besides, although she too forgave and forgot, ‘you’ kind of stabbed her in the back too in that timeline.”

“I—I did?”

“You had been ‘reformed’ in that timeline as well. Admittedly, you were antagonized by each of the Element-bearers except the kind-hearted Fluttershy, because they still didn’t fully trust you. So to make it short, you decided to ditch the ship and regain your freedom by teaming up with Tirek when he got loose from Tartarus. But you didn’t foresee being double-crossed by the evil minotaur in turn. He was only defeated due to a helping from the Tree of Harmony that granted the Element-bearer Rainbow Power, despite them stashing away the Elements in it before… Uh, also because of you.”

The purple mare widened her eyes. “Ah, speaking of which, please kindly dispose of the plunderseeds in the Everfree, even though Twilight and her friends already neutralized their threats.”

Discord was again speechless. He thought his mind was incredibly flexible and open, but the incoming train-load of information still threatened to stuff his head into bursting open.

“Hang on!” Discord suddenly snapped. “So their storing away the Elements was just to prevent the plunderseeds from growing?”

The purple mare frowned. “I must emphasize, this Twilight is not that Twilight. From the very beginning, she was trying to be sincere to you in order to make you feel safe with being friends with her and her friends, and to prevent you from going astray. She didn’t rail against you in Canterlot, because she felt that it was her own fault for having to keep the secret and failing to do so. She only planned to tell you when she was reasonably assured that you were true and steadfast, which you are… now.”

Discord was stung by the revelation, which added to his lingering guilt of betraying the simple-minded trust from Twilight. 

However, he kept a tough look and questioned. “Is it? I knew her, she was just as easily irritated as any others. It couldn’t just be her desire to make friends alone that makes her that committed when trying to appease me.”

“Hmph. Well yes. I guess the critical thing was that she saw some her in you.”

“Huh? How’s that possible? Didn’t you say that she and I was as different as cloud and dirt?”

“That was more about the experiences and emotions she inherited from the tome. She was very afraid of being friendless, alone and unable to speak out. She knew how it was like to be buried and immobilized by stone for a time that would drive most ponies mad. So she made it her solemn duty to ensure that it won’t happen to you.”

Discord felt an upsurge of emotion welling up in his chest. He had been misunderstanding Twilight all this time. He recalled her words in the Ivory Tower back when he was just released. He realized that she meant it when she said she wanted him to be her friend and nothing else.

He looked to the table and muttered. “Who else knows? Her five friends and Spike I assume?”

The purple mare grimaced, “Spike doesn’t know yet. Twilight is still extremely afraid of a bad reaction and she would be devastated if she was smacked with rejection from the dragon. As for her five friends… She didn’t tell her as much as knocking the information into their heads with brute force.”

“Why did she do that?” Discord asked in surprise. “Aren’t they her best friends?”

The purple mare sighed. “At the time, not yet. But she knew they had to be, not least because she longed for their friendship after seeing it in the visions, but also for the practical need to activate the Elements to suppress Nightmare Moon. The Elements are finicky devices. They reacted to the innate selves of their wielders. However, because Twilight had become a mix of two minds, and one of them was decidedly not supposed to be the Element of Magic, the bond between her and her Element would be unstable. It oscillates with a different magical frequency compared to other wielders with their respective Elements. The result would be not being able to activate the Elements… at best.”

The purple mare stood up and avoided gazes with Discord. “So she decided to sin against her comrades of future-past, rather than dooming the world itself. Also, selfishly, she feared not being able to make friends with them like she wanted and was supposed to. So she basically forced her hooves and mind meld with all of them, so that there is a piece of her and the tome within each of them. Not only can this stabilize their to-be connections to the Elements, it was also a self-serving way to ‘enforce’ their friendships.”

“…” Discord looked at the purple mare in disbelief. He felt that there was a need to be a long and thoughtful talk at least with Twilight’s friends after he went back to the physical world.

“Well, that’s the greatest sin she had committed. She had been trying to use her foreknowledge to do good for the world to make up for it, but she failed hard. Now you also know why she was so depressed by the flashback to the innocent past.” 

The purple mare said plainly. “I’ve told you all. As I said, Twilight was a troubled mare full of self-doubt and guilt, and while I wouldn’t mind my final passing if I was still an independent entity, Twilight is far from mentally ready to announce to the world of her true self, nor does she feel that she had done enough for the world yet. So can you promise me that you would not tell another unknowing soul before Twilight said you can?”

Discord gazed long and hard into the purple mare’s face, but he eventually nodded resolutely.

“Phew, at last.” The purple mare smiled brilliantly. “I will use the last of my energy and bring you to the source of the abnormal mind link. Just stand up and still, I do the rest.”

The stone table disintegrated like a mist. The purple mare jumped forward and embraced Discord. The tight tactile sensation caused Discord to stumble slightly.

“… What will happen to you?”

“My experiences will simply merge with Twilight’s, so shh—.” The purple mare cooed, as her body began to disintegrate into white balls of light, which enclosed the body of the chaos spirit like fluttering butterflies.

With a blink of the eye, the chaos spirit disappeared from the dreamy realm with a white flash.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Discord again popped into existence in a space somewhat similar to where he found the shadow of the tome spirit. 

However, compared to the quiet serenity of the previous space, this one looked more chaotic, with paths in twisted angles and slopes, and the backdrop a swirling mass of purple and black.

Usually Discord would savor the absurdist landscape which almost dripped chaos, but he was unsettled by the fact that this scene was present in Twilight’s mind, the ultimate fussy and persnickety pony. 

A voice rang from some distance away, drawing Discord’s attention. 

“Hah, how unexpected. I thought I had wiped out all strays long ago.”

The voice was Twilight’s, but the tone was contemptuous. 

“Chrysalis…”  Rosencross hissed. “You’ve become my mortal enemy the day you laid hooves on my beloved hive.”

Chrysalis derisively dismissed. “If I have to keep tabs of those who hate me, I’ll not have time to even feed.”

She grinned. “Now that I’m Twilight, even the passive love I absorbed from her followers and friends are enough for me and my changelings to keep going. This customized ship is such a beauty, it’s like I have a moving changeling fortress courtesy of this disguise!”

The red mare was pushed to her limit. “I swear to my ancestors, I shall end you right here and now!”

“Tough act. But unbeknownst to your foolish head, your presence was a great boon to me.” Chrysalis wryly grinned.

Rosencross sharply inhaled. “What do you mean?”

The disguised changeling queen suddenly said with a rueful tone that closely mimicked Twilight’s soft voice. “Rosy… I’m glad we met in the Veridi bazaar. I never regret having to share a part of my magic to you. I- I never thought it has to come to this.”

After a mock sniffle, Chrysalis burst into a laughter while Rosencross’s face turned green.

Chrysalis grinned. “Originally I was unable to access Twilight’s memories and experiences at all, but your uninvited trespassing certainly added to her mental burden and made it easier for me to scratch out her surface memories. Now I can already see part of her Zebrican adventures, and soon I will have her entire set of memories! And you, a pathetic loser depending on her charity, will be at the mercy of me and my incredible mind magic once I restore her magical conduit.”

Rosencross was crestfallen. She did not think that her intervention would cause such a dire effect.

However, Discord was not too concerned now. If what he had heard from the residue spirit was true, then the ‘Twilight’ he knew will possess a chimeric vital impetus that was almost impossible to completely absorb or assimilate by a single entity. The memories Chrysalis could get ahold of were at best fleeting, and it was unlikely she could get access to more. This also explained why Twilight was not at all worried about Chrysalis’s threat about taken over her life and experiences.

But this was obviously unknown to the two changelings locked onto hate-filled glares. 

The red mare collected herself to her best and yelled. “Shut your mouth, vile pretender. How dare you insult her memory with this farce! Even in my grave, you can’t make me admit that you are her!”

“Oh, I’m afraid you’ll have little choice in this matter. When my magic is restored, I can just impose our mental link and you will become my loyal servant as you should be.” 

Chrysalis chortled. “It’s your own fault that you had to rudely barge in. With some more time, I could have scoured enough of her essence and become her entirely.”

Chrysalis walked near Rosencross. She knocked onto the ground and a cage emerged from the malleable ground, engulfing Rosencross. She yelled in a mix of fury and fear. “Release me right now!” 

“This is her mental realm, and by extension, my mental realm. You held absolutely no sway in here, silly girl.”

Discord decided that he had heard enough. He immediately rushed across the strangely bent paths and charged right in between the two, on what looks like a circular platform.

“D—Discord! Thank goodness!” “… Discord!”

“Ho ho, a heroic entry! That’s a first for moi!” Discord smirked. 

Rosencross pounded on the cage bars. Seeing Discord’s entry, Chrysalis hastily took a few steps back.

“Why must you all be so frustrating?!” The changeling loudly growled.

“Why must you be nuts?” Discord shot back. “I know you changelings like to steal someone else’s identity, but this is really pushing it in the scale.”

“This is the only way I can get back my rightful Stigmata!” She growled.

Discord derisively huffed. “Weird bug does weird things, Discord can care less.” 

He then realized something and awkwardly turned to Rosencross. “Uh, present companion excepted.”

“No offense taken.” Rosencross could not hide her joy and gratitude at Discord’s help. “Be careful, she’s indeed very powerful in here, especially since imagination and thoughts require little to no magic to realize.”

“As if I’m not the expert.” Discord casually nodded and turned to Chrysalis, who stepped back further in fear and what looked to be bitter resentment. 

“Mind you, I’m wearing a power limiter, but I can still easily overpower you with magic. Besides, I am a master illusion conjurer and I’m the alpha and omega in mental stuffs. But you know, I’m not one who insists that rehabilitation is a futile business considering my… experiences. If you cooperate with us right now and work towards ending this laughable façade, then maybe I can say something flattering in front of her friends. Otherwise, you know you and your little changelings will be fish bait very soon.”

“You must be joking. There is no way I’m going to back down now.” The changeling queen grunted. “What shame. I like you, and Twilight like you even more. We could be brilliant allies despite our past hiccups.”

“If you refuse to smart up before we knock some sense into you, so be it.” Discord ignored her banter, as he did his classic finger snap. A comically large pillar emerged from nowhere and struck the changeling right on her head.

She was immediately knocked backwards with a flip and collapsed on the ground. However, when she got up, she merely made a somewhat vicious grin.

“That’s it? If you keep this up, you might make me slightly itchy in a few days.” She sneered. “I have the home advantage, and I can draw upon some of her strength whenever I’m hit. You two, however, will only lose your mental integrity the longer you stay in here.”

“You scoundrel!” Rosencross angrily said. “This is Twilight’s body, not yours! Remember, you are surrounded by loyal friends of Twilight. They won’t let you go easily for harming her!”

“Harming her? You’re so silly, Phalena. That’s why your hive was wiped out by mine.” Chrysalis smirked. “Why would I harm the one I want to become? I just think that I will be a better Twilight myself. When I’m finished with you two, I can just wait to be welcomed by my new and old friends, while wielding enormous magic potential after I get it fixed.”

“’Delusional’ won’t even begin to describe the sentence you just uttered.” Discord said incredulously. “Mental integrity, you say? I’m afraid you can’t comment on that because you barely have it.”

“Shut the Tartarus up!” An enraged Chrysalis lunged out. An avalanche of spikes poked out of the ground around Discord, and then the ground curved up to form a razor-teeth mouth threatening to ground the chaos spirit into a paste.

Rosencross gasped, but Discord nimbly jumped up and suddenly disappeared.

“Huh?” Chrysalis uttered.

“Looking for me?” Discord appeared suddenly behind Chrysalis, stunning the changeling queen briefly. 

“This is boring, you know? Tackling some magicless git as a magic user. It’s like stealing candies from a kid, only noticing that the kid’s too young even comprehend that I’m stealing her candy, and therefore lacking an amusing reaction for me to feast on.”

Rosencross gave him an unamused look and said. ”I would appreciate if you can free me first instead of making convoluted simile. With my input we can do it more precisely and quic-”

She suddenly pointed to the back of Discord and shouted. “W- Watch out!”

Discord turned, and suddenly Chrysalis was glowing with a greenish-purple aura and looking at them menacingly.

“You think I’m truly magicless, don’t you? Don’t you realize I have been absorbing love again for a while now? You have proved yourself to warrant my full power!”

She lit her horn and quickly shot forth a gigantic, blazing energy beam.

“Holy!” Discord yelled and winced, as he barely managed to dodge the powerful beam, but his outstretched wing was still somewhat burnt.

The energy beam, however, kept going and hit the boundary of the mental sanctum. It created a gigantic tremor on the ground they were standing on.

Discord gritted his teeth, he quickly rushed near the imprisoned Rosencross, and snapped his finger hastily. The bars dissolved in a blink of an eye. He then hurriedly picked the stunned red mare up like a ragdoll.

“E-eek!”

“Stop it, you crazy bug!” Discord barely dodged another blast as he leapt aside swiftly. “You’re gonna wreck the place at this rate! This is why I don’t cast energy blast in here! I don’t want to get a vegetable when we got her back!”

Rosencross’s eyes shrunk to pins as she realized the severity of Discord’s statement.

Discord grunted and snapped his fingers again. Immediately, thorny vines emerged from all directions and restrained the changeling. But like ropes made out of paper towels, it disintegrated promptly with a greenish-purple flash, as Chrysalis continued to chase them with great speed.

“Oh for the love of pandemonium!” Discord loudly grumbled, as he barely dodged another powerful attack. The entire dimension shook, and cracks began to appear on the inner walls.

Discord gritted his teeth. He couldn’t be as reckless as Chrysalis and shoot back, as the raw magic power would likely cause further damage to Twilight’s delicate psyche.

‘Speaking of Twilight…” Discord thought. ‘Whelp, I may as well try waking her up for help.’

He lowly muttered to Rosencross who laid on his shoulder. “Hey, Soul Dust expert, what did Chryssy do to ‘put Twilight to sleep’? Is there any way we can do to wake her up? I figure that if the owner’s back in her house, she might be able to help lift us out of the hot water.”

The red mare inhaled sharply as she pondered the possibility. “… Soul Dust is an item which can amplify the grasp of a soul or a ‘vital impetus’ on one’s body. It’s usually used by masters or gurus to heighten their senses. Chrysalis had twisted its use to take control of Tw-”

A flying white beam grazed her purple mane, causing her to yelp in fright.

Discord again jumped as well as snapped his finger, teleporting the two behind a bend.

“You should cut it short a bit, dear. We’ll have plenty of time to talk after this.”

“F- Fine!” Rosencross gasped for air and then woefully touched her mane. “I don’t know for sure…”

“What the-” Discord stopped himself from the half-uttered dirty oath.

“But!” The red mare glared at Discord. “If we managed to invoke something emotionally intense for her, then it might boost her consciousness enough for her to manifest again in the mental realm.”

“That’s it? It’s no different than most other hypnosis then.” Discord grinned.

“You have some idea?”

“I’ve got this. Just watch.”

Discord produced a giant megaphone and shouted into it with all his volume.

“Twilight! I’m sorry to have betrayed your trust! Please forgive me!”

Rosencross slightly widened her eyes, but a thin smile crept up on her face.

“… You are my bestest friend for—e—ver and ever! Don’t ever give up!”

“So you two are there!” Chrysalis growled from afar, and swiftly closed in. 

“Dang, it’s too tame!” Discord cursed and muttered. “Well, here goes nothing…!”

He threw a bouquet up and yelled at the top of his lungs. “You saucy bookworm, I love you loooong time! Get your plump purple plot up already and lift your beloved darling dear Discord out of this ditch!”

Rosencross did a spit-take and looked at Discord incredulously. But something did happen at that very instant.

The entire mental scene suddenly shifted and crumbled. However, between falling pieces and debris, the pursuing changeling queen suddenly flailed and fell onto the ground haplessly.

“Eh?” The red mare gasped in surprise.

Discord shook his head, his expression a mix of amusement and frown. “At the end, it was shamelessness that saved the day. It’s a bit anti-climactic, though.”

He jumped towards the changeling queen, who looked up with pained and resentful eyes. The chaos spirit wasted no time in tying her up tightly with a bunch of ropes.

“I don’t know what exactly happened, but it seemed that the true master of this realm has intervened.” Discord shrugged. “Now what do you have to say for yourself?”

Chrysalis, however, stayed absolutely silent, while maintaining an intense glare towards Discord.

“Oh yah? I think you’ll have a thousand choice spiteful words to say t-”

The red mare, however, elected to simply brutally smack Chrysalis’s face with her front hoof.

“Gah!” The changeling queen flailed backwards, and laid on the ground helplessly. She only managed to raise herself up partially with her shaky legs.

“Rosy, I don’t prefer going physical on our captive.” Discord frowned.

“Don’t you stop me, Discord.” Rosencross said with dripping hatred. “I waited for so long for this very moment. I even tolerate seeing my one and only benefactor being mentally tormented and her identity stolen by this foul being. Now she laid prostrate before me, I shall cut her open to see if her heart is also as black as her shell.”

“I’m not usually one to claim to be chivalrous, but I do think that torturing a defeated enemy is beneath us, not to mention pluck out someone’s heart like we’re knock-off Ahuizotls.”

“A-who?”

“Never mind.” Discord rolled his eyes.

“… Do it.”

A raspy sound came from the ground, and the two turned to look at the defeated changeling queen. To their shock, the famously ruthless changeling queen was crying.

Rosencross felt her anger flaring up. “You aren’t fooling anyone, Chrysalis! Don’t you think staying in Twilight’s guise can elicit even the smallest degree of sympathy from me! For your crime, you deserve death by a thousand cuts!”

“None of these is not my choosing!” Chrysalis yelled.

“Huh?” Discord asked aloud.

“I didn’t want to tell you, or anyone, but now, I have no choice.”

Discord blocked the imminent insult from the red mare, and said to the sniffling changeling queen. “All this crying is not only unbecoming, but also uncharacteristic of you, Chrysalis.”

Chrysalis grunted and gritted her teeth, tears wetting her cheek.

“What? Speak up!”

Chrysalis inhaled sharply, and turned to look at Discord with a barely maintained defiant look. “Yes, you’re right. It was not me. It was that accursed purple unicorn. She made me a freak of nature and not myself!”

Suppressing his natural urge to mock Chrysalis, Discord sighed and said in uncharacteristic curtness. “Explain.”

“You want explanation? You want answers?” Chrysalis raised her voice. “I’ll tell you answers! That Twilight Sparkle made me do this! She did not only steal my symbol of power, she imposed her petty emotions on me! I originally don’t care for any of those, or any of you! But now, when I see each of you, her feelings well up in my mind!”

The changeling queen was already hysterical. “I had a hive to lead, and nations to conquer… But here I am, defeated! Alone! And I can’t believe it, wanting to have friends! What the hay have I become?”

Rosencross coldly glared at the changeling queen, while Discord closed his eyes and asked. “So you do this…”

“Not just to steal her magic, but to steal all her friends! I deserve them as much as she does!” Chrysalis screeched, and then broke down into tears again.

“You-”

“No, Rosy, don’t. Whatever judgment to be passed, we must ask the egghead first.”

Rosencross and even Chrysalis looked in surprise at the unusually soft-spoken chaos spirit.

Discord turned to the red mare. “Why are you looking at me like that? It’s obvious, innit? Twilight and Chrysalis shared some sort of mental linkage even before the whole Soul Dust thing. If we so callously kill Chrysalis off here, we don’t know if Twilight herself would be affected. At the very least, she would be quite mad at us.”

“Grr…” Rosencross could not argue against Discord’s reasoning.

“So you keep me alive just because you don’t want your little Twilight to be hurt?” Chrysalis sneered.

“Can you be less irascible for once? I’m trying to persuade the missus next to me not to murder you right now.” Discord huffed with annoyance. “And besides, I myself am too morally implicated to not let you have a fair hearing first.”

“Oh right, you betrayed Twilight and her friends. How did it all go for you?” Chrysalis coldly smirked.

“You- You betrayed Twilight?” Rosencross gazed at Discord with wide eyes, her mind a confused mess.

“Oh yes, when I led my hive to attack Canterlot, I almost fell for the feint they used to distract me from paying attention to their real choice of weapon. Fortunately, this draconequus here snitched on his friends and informed me of their plan. If not for Twilight Sparkle’s subsequent interruption, Equestria would long be mine!”

Discord rolled his eyes. “Yes, I did go a bit neurotic for a split second and decide to play some tricks in order to get Twilight to tell me something she didn’t tell me. But now I know about it regardless. More importantly…”

Discord took in a breath and sighed. “I’ve been regretting that ever since. From the very moment I know things went seriously wrong, I’ve been trying to patch things up to my best of ability.”

“Hmph, your ‘some tricks’ ended up almost killing her.” Chrysalis mocked.

Discord ignored the changeling queen and turned to Rosencross. “If you don’t want to trust me, that’s fine.”

Rosencross stayed quiet for a long time, and then she shook her head. “No, I still trust you.”

“Huh.”

“Twilight trusted you, her friends still do. Who am I to withhold my trust?”

She then jeered. “It’s not if I can trust this wretched creature before me more.”

“Okay, that’s dealt with. Let’s not entangle ourselves with words anymore in here. It couldn’t be healthy to have three foreign presences in her mind yelling at each other all the time.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
After a snap of finger by Discord, the three reentered the physical space together.

Chrysalis, now back in her changeling form, muttered. “My hivelings will soon notice.”

“We’ll worry about that later.” 

Chrysalis opened her mouth, but she merely winced and stayed silent.

Discord knelt down to check on the unconscious form of Twilight. He casted a spell and examined the purple mare’s conditions.

“Her magical core is abnormally weak. There’s no immediate danger, but she’s unlikely to gather enough stamina to wake up at this rate.”

“Do you find out why?” Rosencross asked worriedly.

“Dang it girl, I’m not a medic. Almost every time I casted magic, I did it to mess ponies up, not to set them right.”

Discord then stretched his arms and legs. “One thing I’m sure, is that she’s been like that definitely for longer than we thought. We’ve just given her a wee bit too much stress by messing around in her head. She would need a long recuperation before she can wake up and talk to us again.”

He laid a claw on Rosencross as he looked at the rising morning sun. “In the meantime, I trust you not to suffocate or poison each other in my absence, toodles!”

“Wait!” Rosencross yelled out as Discord quickly made for the exit. “Where are you going?”

“I have something really important to talk with Twilight’s friends. Keep an eye on both of them, I’ll come back later.”

Rosencross opened her mouth, but Discord already teleported himself away from the room.

‘Pfft, what does she have to worry anyway?’ 

Discord thought to himself, as he teleported onto the bow of Esperança. ‘That changeling imp will spend the next few days almost as magic-less as her.’

He casually waded inside Rainbow Dash’s office without even bothering to knock. 

The cyan mare gasped at the sudden appearance of the chaos spirit by her side, and she immediately berated. “Discord! This is a military ship! I don’t expect you to salute or anything, but can you please keep to at least the most basic of ship codes? Knock for goodness’ sake!”

“Yeah, yeah.” Discord waved his claws. “Got some important things to tell. Can you also call for Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy?”

Rainbow Dash looked at Discord strangely. “… And Spike?”

“Nope, not him.” Discord waved again. “You’ll know why.”

Rainbow Dash narrowed her eyes, but she still called in a lieutenant from the outside and whispered something into his ears.

After some time, Fluttershy and a groggy-looking Pinkie Pie arrived one after another.

“What’s up, Dashie?” Pinkie Pie rubbed her eyes. “It’s too early for breakfast… But if it’s a party, I’m game, because it’s never too early for a party!”

Discord drew in a deep breath, then he snapped his finger to lock the door and soundproof the entire room. The mares looked at him strangely, but they kept their silence.

“Wow, I mean, wow.” Discord shook his head with amusement and began. “You all owed me a chocolate cotton candy buffet or something for keeping me in the dark for so long about Twilight’s big secret.”

The three all gasped in shock. Fluttershy asked with slight tremor in her voice. “W—What are you talking about?”

“What else could I be talking about?” Discord scoffed. “Whatever left of that ancient tome told me all when I was going to save Twilight from Chrysalis!”

“What?!” Rainbow Dash yelled. “What in the ever loving hay happened?”

Discord then gave them a summary of what transpired last night. The mares looked at him with dazed gazes after listening to the incredible encounter.

“Where is Chrysalis?” Rainbow Dash asked hurriedly after regaining her composure.

“Under control from Rosy. She ain’t going anywhere now that she’s expended all her power fighting us.”

After a protracted silence, Fluttershy quietly said. “You made the right call, Discord.”

Rainbow Dash added. “I suppose I should thank you. If I have shown any doubt in you before, I apologize.”

Pinkie Pie simply gave a hug to Discord, which he accepted with candor this time.

“If anything, Twilight and you girls taught me that you’ve got to give chance to ‘villains’ that show potential of reform.” Discord casually shrugged. “I’m not that great a judge of character myself, but since Twilight did kind of show mercy to her, I suppose she counts.”

Discord then knitted his brows. “Wait, was she even reformable? Did the alternate Twilight reform her?”

“Uh… We don’t know.” Rainbow Dash said hesitantly.

“Ugh. Might have to keep an extra eye on her.” Discord groaned.

The chaos spirit then looked at the incredibly squeamish and uncomfortable-looking mares, and let out a chortle. “Come on, she trusted me enough to let me know, it isn’t too bad is it?”

“No, it’s not that. Of course we trust you too.” Rainbow Dash looked around with an unsettled expression. “It’s just that we didn’t expect this and this is the first time we talk to someone about our one big secret. We don’t know what to do or say.”

“Relax.” Discord whistled. “I’m not going to tell any other soul. I made a promise and I will keep it.”

Pinkie Pie widened her eyes and asked somewhat over-eagerly. “Can you Pinkie-promise me too?”

“Pfft. Seriously, you really don’t have to worry. Do you think I will, for example, tell the princesses about it and ruin my potential loads and loads of fun?”

“Puh-lease?” Pinkie Pie begged regardless.

Discord let out a defeated sigh, and said with dead-fish eyes. “Fine… How do you do it?”

“Cross My Heart, Hope to Fly.”

“… Cross My Heart, Hope to Fly.”

“Stick a Cupcake in my Eye!”

“Stick a Cupcake in my Eye… Done?” 

Discord groaned aloud. “Geez, I just want you all to tell me all you know too, so that I can understand what’s going on and why on Earth you all fared so badly.”

The mares winced in embarrassment, but Discord just continued bluntly. 

“For example, why in the name of Entropy did you girls still manage to screw anything up given the knowledge of some ageless entity and something equivalent to seeing the future?”

“I must clarify.” Rainbow Dash retorted. “What Twilight saw were a series of imageries from the most important life moments of the alternate Twilight. A lot of details were still lost. And it only went to the point some time after the alternate Twilight’s ascension to princesshood.”

“What’s more…” Pinkie Pie added. “We’re not really sure that their world is really completely the same as ours. Although as time went on, we’re more and more certain about that… everything was in place until the changeling invasion.”

Fluttershy then said. “Even so, we still have some confines of our own. We didn’t want to appear suspicious or overstepping our marks. We also don’t want to change our lives too drastically just because of the new information. And above all, we preferred to lean on the side of caution.”

Rainbow Dash drew in a breath and concluded. “We would rethink about our general plan again once we return to Equestria, optimally with Twilight’s input. Back then, this line of thought actually brought us to another concern. Suppose our assumption about the similarity of the worlds was true, we would not want to change things too much because it would make us lose our edge of foreknowledge. However, if we did nothing, then having foreknowledge was useless. We were simply trying to walk the fine balance between two.”

The cyan mare chuckled wryly. “All are moot now though. The causal train of events was totally derailed after the changeling invasion.”

“… Although I have a vague idea what you mean, I’d still want a clear explanation of what happened significantly differently between our world and the alternate one.” Discord said.

“Besides the tome, what we did differently were just trying to smooth out silly misunderstandings, and increase our influence carefully, so that we can change society positively some time in the future. That’s why some of us opened up enterprises, while Twilight and Fluttershy established a newspaper, because to do that you gotta have both the bits and the talk.”

“What a boring way to do things.” Discord yawned. “If I were you, I would straight up start planning rebellion using my future knowledge, and then establish a nation of my own to do whatever the Tartarus I want.”

“Of course you will.” Rainbow Dash facehoofed.

Fluttershy said with a strained tone. “Twilight was adamant. She saw too many world-shattering events dictated by just a few individuals. She wanted to create a society not revolving around princesses, heroes and outstanding ponies, but the collective will of ordinary citizens.”

“In other words, rule of the mass instead of the few.” 

Pinkie Pie finished matter-of-factly with a serious face. “This is why we didn’t just go and set up shop of our own, not just because we respect the princesses and think that they are excellent rulers, but also because without a democratic tradition, we will just end up replacing one despot with another.”

Discord narrowed his eyes and muttered. “I don’t really like the idea of letting everypony and their moms interfere with a rightful monarch’s rule, such as mine… But come to think of it, a mob rule would also lead to a delightfully chaotic situation of everybody trying to shout everyone else down to get their ideas through.”

Discord cupped his mouth and chuckled. “How delightfully discordant! I don’t know you girls have it in you, haha! If only you told me so earlier, I would raise all my arms, legs and wings to support you!”

“No! We are not trying to introduce mob rule!” Rainbow Dash protested. “We do this not to create arguments and chaos, but to give voice to the citizens!”

“Yeah, as if what I said wouldn’t happen. And you’re one to talk, Rainbow Dash.” Discord smirked, then he imitated the voice of the cyan mare. “’Power to the masses!’ says somepony who took a title after being offered one. And ‘down with the heroes!’ says somepony who saved some distant nation and earned a bunch of loyal followers. A mare of principle.”

Rainbow Dash’s cheek reddened like it was on fire. “I—It was a desperate situation!”

“So desperate, that you use your influence as a Cruzesian hero liberally to order your army around just to find your friend.”

“Discord, please stop teasing Dashie…” Pinkie Pie pleaded. “Yes, it might look hypocritical, but turning down the offer was to cut off ties with the Cruzesians. Having more allies by our side is always good in this world.”

Fluttershy sighed. “… Sorry, this is the first time we actually use words to convey our plan to someone else, so forgive us if we sound inarticulate. Popular rule was rare in this world, and practically forgotten since the fall of Roam. However, we think that letting citizens have a say in their government is a good way to protect the world from catastrophic happenings. Or as Twilight would say, to disaster-proof the world.”

“How so?” Discord frowned.

Rainbow Dash inhaled deeply and said. “The ancient tome is a probe sent out from a civilization not of this world, but that civilization had a society and social structure remarkably similar to ours. They too had kings and chiefs, but as time went on, elected leaders slowly began to take the helm of their respective nations. Some say it evolved this way because democracy was the best and functional system of governance. But if we simply want to adopt rule of the masses just because it sort of worked among a bunch of aliens, we would be quite stupid and mad, to be honest.”

Rainbow Dash narrowed her eyes. “No, we think that democracy can solve a problem specific to our nation and our world.”

Rainbow Dash stood up and took out a decorated headwear from her drawer. It was her coronet bestowed by the Cruzesians. She then sighed as she stroked the feather on the crown. 

“The outlook of our world has been forged by epic heroes and diabolical villains. And a lot of times, a catalyst for great ambition is the promise of power through crowns, autocratic rule and kingship. Some, like Chrysalis, struck out to fulfill her desire to conquer and dominate, some, no offense, like you…”

“Do go on.”

“Well, they want power for their own purposes, grand or petty, good or bad. Now, a king or queen is a united force, and it produces a greater effect than when the power is divided. If a rule is just, then rule by princesses is better than rule by nobles, which in turn is better than rule by magistrates. But if a rule is unjust, then rule by mobs is less bad than rule by barons, which in turn is less bad than rule by tyrants.”

Rainbow Dash then smirked. “Surely you’ve been called that a lot in the past, haven’t you?”

Discord blew a raspberry. “I don’t blame them for not understanding the tastefulness of perfect chaos.”

Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. “Anyway, that was the universal part of the rule. What made Equestria especially special is that it is magic-rich. Great magic wielders concentrate in this part of the world like bees are attracted to honey flowers. Equestria’s history inevitably intertwined with those who are not only larger-than-life, but inherently more powerful than their compatriots. It made for great writing materials for chroniclers, but it was a ticking time-bomb that never stop exploding. When will we see the next Chrysalis? The next Discord?”

“There can only be one Discord!” Discord huffed.

Rainbow Dash drily chuckled. “No doubt. But we’re setting out to break this wheel, by making our society not about powerful persons, but its collective citizenry. We hope to create a society where the ordinary folks hold the deciding power. That they do not have to raise their head and fear that the sun will not rise because Celestia was kidnapped, or that the world will end because Luna got jealous, or their livelihood ruined because some self-styled conquerors came rolling in and planted their flags on the Canterlot Castle.”

Discord immediately pointed out. “This is some prime double-thinking there. How are you going to achieve all those? Meh, you will still have to rise and become the thing you hate in order to get rid of those accursed ‘great persons’ from the world.”

“True, we are hypocritical. But we’re honest about it. That’s also why we want to make it the end of History and make us the last Great Ponies within our lifetime.”

Discord widened his eyes in stunned expression. Then he shook his head and said. “You mares are a bit crazy. To be honest, I couldn’t care less about your lofty intentions and inadvertent contradictions, as long as the results are fun to watch.” 

Discord chuckled to the disapproving glares from the mares. “So, regarding our world and Twilight’s visions, the major divergence is Chrysalis, right?”

“Yes.” Fluttershy said with sadness. “In the alternate timeline, Chrysalis also impersonated Princess Cadance at the wedding, but none of us knew in advance. Since Cadance was Twilight’s foalsitter, Twilight was able to notice a lot of irregularities. After getting stonewalled by others, Twilight confronted the fake Cadance herself, but got thrown in the caves, where she met the imprisoned real Cadance. Afterwards they broke out and confronted Chrysalis again. Making use of Chrysalis’s hubristic underestimation of their abilities, Twilight was able to reunite Shining Armor and Cadance and let them cast the love spell, which expelled all the changelings from Canterlot.”

“Sounds like a relatively effortless victory.” Discord commented. “Though it relied on the stupidity of Chrysalis, which might or might not work. By the way, where was me at that moment in that timeline?”

“Still in stone.” Rainbow Dash said. “It was only moons after the changeling invasion that you got out of it with us releasing you using the Elements. Believe it or not, it was Princess Celestia’s initiative.”

“What?! That sun butt—” Discord widened his eyes, and then coughed. “Well, that’s nice of her.”

He again smirked. “You could have done much better with your information. Why not straight up tell Celestia and Luna? Or track Cadance down before she got assaulted by the bug?”

“You think we didn’t consider that?” Rainbow Dash said irritably. 

Fluttershy then added. “We decided that it was too much of a risk to show off our foreknowledge to the princesses without solid excuses. And while standing for guard for Princess Cadance might work, she was away on a diplomatic mission up until right before the wedding, not to mention we’d still look very suspicious to suddenly swarm her up. Twilight was also worried her intervention might mess up the relationship between her brother and her foalsitter. Bottom-line, by the time the wedding took place, Chrysalis already gathered her changeling army around Canterlot, any misstep will lead to them spreading out and terrorizing the countryside.” 

Pinkie Pie nodded. “We wanted to exploit our foreknowledge to catch a clean sweep of both Chrysalis and her underlings, by copying the plan of the alternate Twilight but streamlining it, which was to reunite Cadance with Shining Armor as soon as she was caught, and then let them expel the changelings in a similar way.”

“Well, your foreknowledge bit you all in the plots then.”

Rainbow Dash glared at the chaos spirit. “… Our foreknowledge did not exactly foretell the betrayal of a certain someone. Besides, our hooves are forced by our promise with you to return the Elements.”

Discord’s grin drooped a bit, and he said. “You girls did not expect my betrayal? I’m the spirit of chaos, master of change and subterfuge! Besides, you knew clearly that I had it in me, because the alternate me was turned by Tirek once! You all need to learn to be less blindly trustful.”

The mares were stung by Discord’s words, but they then merely looked at him with strange looks.

Discord sighed. “I’m sorry, alright? Now that we found Twilight and she kind of told me her secret. All is forgiven, innit?”

“No, we’re not thinking about forgiveness and such.” Pinkie Pie’s ears drooped, but she sadly smiled. “It’s not like we can stay mad at you when you’re being so thoughtful of us.”

“… Then what?”

“You mentioned Tirek.” Rainbow Dash knitted her brows. “Presumably you were told about the exploits of you and he in the alternate world?”

“Yes, so what about it?”

Fluttershy bit her lips hard, but she gathered up her courage to ask. “… Do you think that our friendship is merely another form of imprisonment? One that kept you from being the chaos spirit that you truly are?”

Discord widened his eyes, and he briefly pondered, holding his jaw in his palm.

But merely seconds later, he asked. “Was that what Tirek said to convince the alternate me?”

Fluttershy winced, but she nodded forcefully.

“I must say, this is something that I never considered…”

Discord blinked and grinned at the increasingly fearful mares. “But I’m willing to bet that I’m wiser than that other Discord with what we’ve been through and also what I now know.”

After a sigh of relief, Rainbow Dash asked. “How so?”

Discord scratched his head. “Can’t say I have it very detailedly thought out. Let’s just say staying with you girls is much more amusing than just messing around using chaos magic like before.”

He looked to the mares, who did not look satisfied or reassured with his answer, and sighed. “Okay, let me improve my phrasing. What I meant was having you all by my side are important to me… more important than my personal pursuit for shenanigans, not to mention it’s fulfilling in more than one sense. Of course I like having you around, but you all also have a very high potential at turning the world upside down with your abilities, knowledge and goals. I ain’t gonna miss this wild ride.”

Rainbow Dash wanted to retort, but after a moment of deliberation, she merely shook her head and smiled. “At least you’re honest with your last point. Although we’re definitely not out there to deliberately mess things up, you have to get it right.”

“Fine.” Discord chuckled with wry amusement and tapped his fingers. “By the way, I must ask you what kind of major villains would turn up, so that I can give you some pointers on how not to screw up again.”

“Might turn up, mind you.” Rainbow Dash clarified. “Our future is going to diverge quite a dang lot because of all the events post Chrysalis’s invasion. For one, Chrysalis and her mooks were merely banished to the Badlands without further disturbances. Twilight wasn’t declared a national hero due to her heroic sacrifice. I didn’t go out and get myself a title and an army of followers somehow, and so on and so on.”

“Still might be helpful. Or at the very least interesting to hear.” Discord shrugged.

“There are three most immediate menaces...” Pinkie Pie said with a spooky voice, “First, Sombra.”

“Oh, that unicorn bloke who got boiled by Celestia’s magic into shadowy mist. He finally comes back from the frozen tundra? Meh.” 

Discord said with an uninterested look. “He was so monotonically evil, he was boring as watching paint that has already dried. Oh dear, I can already hear his droning… ‘Slaves… Crystals…’”

Discord shuddered a bit. “Yikes. But that guy was so consumed by his singular desire to conquer and enslave, he was full of exploitable holes. I bet you can totally find some way to get the Crystal Heart and get rid of him easily by activating it right in front of him.”

The mares slowly nodded in slight amazement at Discord’s accurate deduction. Discord was indeed a formidable ally when he was truly on their side.

Fluttershy then realized that they were supposed to respond, and said hurriedly. “Um yes, that’s also how they got rid of him in the alternate timeline.”

Pinkie Pie frowned and added. “Although… the Crystal Empire was ‘supposed’ to return by last moon, but it hasn’t. We totally thought the princesses summoned us for a trip to the Crystal Empire, but it turned out to be Dashie in Las Pegasus.”

“Yeah, sorry ‘bout that.” Rainbow Dash scratched her cheek awkwardly.

Fluttershy knitted her brows in worry. “What if it does return when we’re out here at sea?”

“Ack, I guess AJ and Rarity can manage… They know what to do.” Rainbow Dash made a grimace.

Pinkie Pie, though, smiled. “Don’t worry, silly! Spike will definitely get a letter if that happens.”

“Okay.” Discord said. “What is that second threat?”

The mares rolled their eyes left and right in hesitation. Pinkie Pie hesitantly said. “Um… Tirek.”

“Yeah. As I said, I now know that he’s one unreliable bastard. Don’t worry, I’m not going to do a heel-face turn when he turns up. I have already learnt a lot from Twilight and all of you.”

“Discord…” Fluttershy warmly smiled.

“… that if I have to pick a partner-in-crime, I better pick one that I can defeat on a one-on-one fight.”

Before Fluttershy made a disappointed look, Discord laughed aloud. “Just kidding! As long as we stop him early from stealing any magic, he would not be a threat. Geez, they should post some more guards down there in Tartarus.”

“If only they can.” 

Rainbow Dash made a ‘pfft’ sound. “Cerberus might bite their heads off though.”

“That dog ain’t doing a spectacular job if it keeps letting dudes escape.” Discord shook his head. “What about the third one?”

Pinkie Pie scratched her cheeks. “Uh, originally it would have been your overgrowing plunderseeds, but since now we have returned the Elements to the Tree, they should not cause any more troubles.”

“But please.” Rainbow Dash said plainly. “Weed your garden once we got back.”

“Yeah, yeah, alright…” Discord said in slight annoyance. “Your foreknowledge is going to make it much harder for me to prank you.”

“With all due respect.” Rainbow Dash said. “Making the Everfree Forest take over Ponyville is way past the level of acceptable prank between friends, and goes into the territories of ‘we’ll have to punch you in the nose if you continue’.”

“Dashie!” Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy frowned at the same time. “Violence is a nuh-uh!”

“Ain’t it right, my loyal friends.” Discord grinned smugly.

“Violence does solve Cruzesia’s problem with the Black Snake though.” Rainbow Dash smirked. “But I kid. It’s just not very nice to do that just to teach Twilight ‘princessly responsibilities’.”

“Oh, I did that? Hey, then I was just acting like the kind and wise mentor that I am.” Discord laughed. “So what is the real third threat?”

“She’s not some evil powerful entity, she’s just a pony with an unsettling agenda. Her name is Starlight Glimmer.” Pinkie Pie narrowed her eyes.

“Never heard of her.”

“Of course.” Rainbow Dash said, “When Twilight got to her in the alternate timeline, she lived in a hamlet in the northeast with a bunch of loyal followers. We tried to search for her from the very beginning, but apparently that village hasn’t even been founded yet.”

“So what’s so bad about her?”

“She was a powerful unicorn on par with Twilight, and the founder of an ‘Equalist’ village. Or at least pretended to be one.” Rainbow Dash pouted. “Her stated goal was to a certain extent noble. Equalism proposed that ‘true friendship’ comes from being equal—no more or less talented than another—and that having special talents of any kind only leads to disharmony.”

“What the Tartarus!” Discord made a disgusted face. “As a spirit of disharmony, I’m seriously offended by the idea that just being somewhat unique is the same as contributing to chaos! You have to actively make an effort to be disruptive and unharmonious!”

“Uh… sure.” Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. “She achieved a state of ‘perfect equality’ by taking away all resident ponies’ cutie marks and replaced them with equal signs. But as cutie marks are one of the manifestations of the vital impetus and the soul, the residents ended up acting like blank slates and empty smilers… She also made them more mindless by subjecting any dissident with a brainwashing program, which involved imprisonment and forced re-education.”

“Heck.” Discord grimaced. “So she’s all pretending to be equal and stuff?”

“She was acting hypocritical by not taking away her own cutie mark. And she was kind of a jerk. Although there are some nuggets of wisdom in pointing out the issue with a brand of talent, her solution was so terribly over-simplistic that it would only lead to ruins anyway. The alternate Twilight and her friends eventually chase her away and regained their cutie marks, but that girl came back and challenged Twilight in her own castle. She tried to conjure spells with the power from the Tree of Harmony, and successfully messed with the time stream temporarily. She was eventually persuaded to stop, but we didn’t see how it turned out, because the ripples of her magic destabilized the meta-dimension so much, that the visions stopped at that particular moment.” 

After seeing the bemused face on Discord, Rainbow Dash added. “… Ah yeah, that’s after her princesshood. The Tree of Harmony conveniently gifted her a castle after Tirek wrecked the Golden Oaks Library.”

“Wow, he dared touch her books. Did he get evaporated after being defeated?”

“Heh. Nah, he was just sent back to Tartarus.”

Discord made a face of disbelief. “I have no words about the lack of sense of security among you ponies.”

“If not Tartarus then where, my genius draconequus?”

“I have a whole catalogue of alternate dimensions for you to choose, dear. Some of them would surely shake his resolve so completely that he would lose the ability to even think of escape.”

“No! We don’t brainwash or torture, even if he’s a villain!” Fluttershy insisted.

“But I didn’t hear about you reforming Sombra. That guy is dead meat if he’s really hit by the power of Crystal Heart. Are you saying that being dead is better?”

Facing shocked faces, Discord said with a bored tone. “… Fine, we shan’t talk about your confused and self-contradicting morals for a second, because I’m more interested in what this Starlight gal did to earn the title of ‘major threat’.”

Rainbow Dash sighed. “She made use of an ancient magic to alter the past. She channeled the power with the Cutie Map in Twilight’s new castle, and tried to change it that we six did not get our respective Cutie Mark on the fateful day…”

Discord raised a brow, and then broke into a hearty laugh.

“W- What’s wrong?” Pinkie Pie asked.

“This you call a threat? It’s just foal’s play!” Discord said as he wiped his tears with his claw.

Rainbow Dash snapped. “She doomed Equestria in multiple different ways just because she stopped me from doing my Rainboom! If not for Twi’s intervention…”

“There is no need for that purple egghead to do anything.”

“Huh? Why?”

“You all are getting played by that jackass of a Harmony Spirit.” Discord shrugged. “It’s clear that that Starlight gal wasn’t using the Cutie Map, but the Cutie Map was using her.”

“W- What?!” The mares all gasped.

“I bet it showed the purple egghead everything she feared, like all those villains winning, and I bet there’s one depicting yours truly being his awesome self as the ruler of Equestria.”

The mares merely nodded blandly. Discord continued. “It was certainly just a lame attempt by the Spirits of Harmony at teaching how Cutie Marks are everything and you all should be grateful at Mother Harmony and such. All pitiful illusion, or simulation if you will.”

Discord then casually grabbed a chalk out of thin air and drew on a wooden board he conjured up right then. “The world that we live in is one single thread. There is only one true past, even though it sounds dreadfully boring. Even though I can manipulate dimensions, I still can’t bend time to make it branch. Time always forms stable loops no matter what you do.”

“But how do you explain the visions of the future that Twilight saw? Isn’t that an alternate timeline?”

“That’s most certainly not our world, however similar.” Discord scratched his head. “How should I put it… Well, let’s say our world is a balloon.”

“Really?!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed. “I like balloons! They’re so bubbly and colorful and-”

“Stop! I want to get this over with as soon as possible so that I can go back to check on Rosy and Chryssy. If I go back too late, I’m afraid their catfight will become a death match. You girls also want to check on Twilight too, right?”

“O- Okay, do continue.” Pinkie Pie bashfully said.

He snapped his finger and produced a blue balloon. “Our world is like a balloon, and we live on its surface as two-dimensional creatures. The ‘alternate dimensions’ that I usually wade through are actually folds and creases that form on the balloon when powerful beings, like me, pluck the surface enough. The alternate timeline Twilight viewed given her description, however, was not happening on our balloon.”

He snapped again. Various different objects floated next to the original blue balloon like a slide show. 

“It might be from another balloon. It might be from some other weird sources entirely. It can even be a higher power yet to be observed on our world. But for us 2-D creatures on the balloon, it does not matter anyway because there are no way to distinguish these possibilities. Any ‘intervention’ from the external void never occurs in a physical way, kinda like if you tear out one balloon’s rubber to ‘transfer’ it to another balloon, it would only burst the balloon. Only information, like tremor on a balloon, can be transferred between one to another. But even that is so rare that I don’t even know it’s truly possible until I heard about Twilight’s little experiences.”

“Whoa…” The mares blinked almost in sync.

“Still following?” Discord groaned. “I hate explaining things in such details.”

Rainbow Dash asked cautiously. “So what you’re saying is, Twilight’s ‘foreknowledge’ was from an almost similar but separate sister world that might or might not actually exist?” 

“Probably, maybe, I guess. The similarity, though, from what I heard from you, is eerie. There might be more to it than what I just said.” 

“M- More?” Fluttershy spluttered.

“I… I’m gonna need some pills because my head hurts.” Rainbow Dash added.

“Good to see someone’s getting royally confused. Remember who I am again?” 

“Wait, what?” Rainbow Dash was miffed. “You’re just making all those up?!”

“Just reminding you not to blindly trust me. I’m not always reliable.” 

Discord snorted and shrugged. “I’ve been serious though. The more important point I’m making is, there is no way to truly alter the present by changing the past. Don’t you think that a spirit of change and constant flux like me wouldn’t do something like that already to exploit my full chaotic potential, or at the very least, not get caught by the darn Alicorn sisters?”

“Probably…” Rainbow Dash frowned but nodded, somewhat suspicious after the chaos spirit’s semi-joke.

“If we’re still using the balloon analogy, the linearity of time in our world is like a line drawn on a balloon. The deeds we’ve done add to that line, but however you squeeze the balloon, or even un-blow the balloon itself, it’s not going to make the line change its relative position on the balloon or branch. Even though its visual appearance may look different for a moment, but when you revert the action – like letting go of your squeeze and letting the balloon bounce back to its normal shape – the present will eventually be corrected to the ‘true’ shape by the regulating force of the world, maybe by the magic of Harmony, maybe by individual agency, maybe both like in that case. The ripple effect is real, just like how a balloon changes shape when you press it, but it is also always transient, just like real ripples. Their timeline, if their world operates on the same rule as ours, is never in any sort of real danger itself.”

The other two mares were still processing the information slowly, but Pinkie Pie quickly burst out with intrigue. “Wow, Discord! How do you know so much about the basics of our world?” 

“I spent millennia trying to bend the rules of the world for fun, but these are the dang rules that are unyielding no matter how I bend them. Of course I’m way too familiar with them, to the point of nausea even.” 

Rainbow Dash added with a sigh. “We never got to know what happen afterwards, though. The distortions this alternate Starlight made must be so disrupting to the space-time, they began to tear it up. Twilight’s mind would be engulfed by the encroaching nothingness if not for the intervention from the ancient tome.

Fluttershy then said. “We wish we get to see what’s at the end. Maybe she would’ve changed her mind? We’ll never know… But we tried our best to look for her in this world to prevent something like that from happening in the first place. Maybe she’ll feel better if we offer ourselves as her friends…?”

Discord silently nodded. After a pause, he smirked and mockingly yawned. “What a boring as Tartarus rationale to wreck things up! I’ve seen better sob story written by foals.”

“Don’t be mean!” Fluttershy chided. “Out of all, you should be the one who understand the joy of making friend and the sadness of losing one.”

“Meh, it’s just that it sounded incredibly petty compared to the other dudes who wants to conquer the world.”

Discord waved his claws. “So Sombra’s still in ice, Tirek’s still in Tartarus, what’s stopping you from looking for that lonely gal?”

“We can’t find her despite all our attempts…” Pinkie Pie slinked in defeat.

“Maybe there’s no Starlight Glimmer in our world?” Discord shrugged and offered.

“No!” Rainbow Dash immediately said. “There is an entry for her in Trottingham’s citizen registry, but she herself was nowhere to be found. Some said she went into the mountains, others said she went to the East.”

“Huh.” Discord said. “Okay, this sated my curiosity. I now have a question-slash-advice for you.” 

Discord knocked on the blackboard with his claw. “When are you going to tell the little guy about all these?”

“You mean Spike?” Pinkie Pie widened her eyes, and then lowered her head uncertainly.

Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash also fidgeted around uncomfortably. “Depends on Twilight. She’s his adopted mom after all.”

“I don’t think it is healthy to keep this a secret to someone you deem so close to.” Discord said in a rare moment of sincerity. “He has a right to know this, just like me.”

“But he is too young and not mature enough to handle this…” Fluttershy said worriedly. “He might think of us as liars and react badly.”

“I’m not going to put a foot between you and the dragon, it’s not my business.” Discord shrugged. “But your hesitation to just be honest to him is also stopping him from growing up. When will he ever be ready? If it was left to you to decide, I think he will never know the truth because he will always be a baby in your eyes.”

The mares gazed at Discord with shock. They never expected such wise and genuine words to come out of his mouth. Moreover, his words made them both think and feel slightly ashamed.

“… Thank you, Discord. We’ll discuss and think about it.” Fluttershy quietly said.

“Marvelous.” Discord nodded. “I must go. Rosencross could not manage her guard duty for long, she would be driven mad quickly by being forced to stay close to her bitter enemy and not being able to punch her in the soft part of her carapace.”

Discord let out a sigh. “But before I go, I still want to know one last thing about you six yourselves.”

The mares sharply inhaled. Rainbow Dash slowly nodded. “Ask away.”

“As a spirit that deals with minds a lot, I’m curious about what the nature of your mind melds with Twilight exactly was. The tome said she had to do this because of some shenanigans with the Elements, so what did it entail? Did it interfere with your senses of selves?”

The mares winced at the difficult question. After some deliberation, Fluttershy slowly began. “It was complicated. Mind melding was much less intense than the outright mixing of minds between Twilight and the ancient tome, but much more intimate than mental links such as those between changelings and their queen. Twilight ‘colored’ our vital impetuses with her own. We could see her and ancient tome’s memories almost as clearly as herself, but we are still us, and we know that those memories are not ours.”

Rainbow Dash then sighed. “… We would be lying if we said it was not a violation of our individuality. We should be rightfully indignant because she more or less dictated her ways to think and feel about certain things for us. Among all, perhaps the most obvious example is Spike. He is a cute little rascal, but I’m never sure how much of my like towards him is inherited from Twi, and how much is really mine.”

Pinkie Pie smiled sadly. “To the end though, does it really matter? We are the collection of our experiences, and Twilight’s forceful intervention is part of it, whether we like it or not. And we have decided long ago that we don’t… mind it at least.”

Discord slowly nodded. He then snapped his finger and cancelled his magic on the room. He walked towards the door, leaving three thoughtful-looking mares behind.

Before he exited the room though, he turned his head and smirked. “Thanks, I appreciate your honesty. Friends.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“… So Chrysalis is now being secured by Discord, and Twilight was recuperating in her room. My soldiers were rounding up the changeling infiltrators.” 

Rainbow Dash finished explaining the situation to Twilight’s astonished Zebrican companions as well as Spike.

The assembled group stood in shock in Rainbow Dash’s deck office. After a while, Geuse turned to Rosencross and asked quizzically. 

“Rosy, you’re a changeling?” 

“B- But of a good kind, right?” Verna added with a somewhat fretful one.

“What, that’s your first question?” Kanipha raised a brow.

“She’s been with us for so long, this is a legit question!” Geuse huffed. 

“I…” 

Rosencross was a bit tongue-tied. “I… um… I’m sorry to have withheld this information for so long. But I promise you, I’m definitely no Chrysalis. Ever since I lose my hive to the wretched queen, I have lived as a pony for… for goodness know how long.”

“You said Twilight knew about this, right?” Geuse asked with suspicion.

“… Yes.”

“So why didn’t she tell us before?”

“She wanted to protect me.” The red mare gritted her teeth. “Changelings are hated in the land, and I know only it too well. It was only a bizarre coincidence that she uncovered my identity… I happened to wade in front of her when she was practicing changeling detection spells in the inn I worked in. After we cleared the misunderstanding, she volunteered to sustain me by directly hooking me up to her magical conduit. Since unlike Chrysalis, I only absorb the energy required to maintain my life, the influence on her was almost negligible.”

She shook her head, her purple mane wavering for a bit. “Still, it was an immensely generous gesture on her part, and I’m forever thankful to her for rescuing me from having to do… degrading things to earn cheap love in the city.”

The listeners in the group either gulped or winced. Kanipha decided to shift the topic away to avoid the awkwardness. 

“Rainbow Dash, what you’ve said makes sense to me.” The zebra colt nodded with an inscrutable face, which was promptly corroborated by the others. 

“I’m glad you all are so understanding.” Pinkie Pie nodded.

“So what’s stopping us from chucking the darn queen and her bugs into the sea?” Kanipha gritted his teeth, his anger barely hidden.

“Revenge is not the solution.” Fluttershy winced.

Rainbow Dash bit her lips. “If they stay put for the moment, I don’t think we have to do anything extraordinary yet. So far, neither Chrysalis nor her hive have given us any disturbance yet. To the end, we want to await Twilight’s input on this matter.”

“Plus you know, they can fly!” Pinkie Pie japed.

“… Point.” 

Spike’s mind was a confused mess. He was glad that the distant and strange Twilight he saw these days was just an impostor, but he was also devastated that she was again unconscious. “So when’s Twi gonna wake up?”

Rainbow Dash sighed. “Discord and my unicorn army medics all checked up on her. The short answer is we don’t know. Her magic was abnormally weak, not even improving when we started pumping raw magic inside her. And the fight in Twilight’s mind probably caused some unspecified damage as well. Until she finally wakes up, we can’t do any more in-depth diagnosis.”

Spike lowered his head and sulked, that’s when someone banged on the door hurriedly.

Rainbow Dash opened the door to a severe-looking Mistral Trail and a grey earth pony mare with a restraining collar. The grey mare was reticent, but she swept the room quickly with her gaze. She stopped briefly at Rosencross, and then moved on.

“Your Grace, I brought along with me-”

The mint-green unicorn looked uncertainly at the assembled group in the room.

Rainbow Dash waved the unicorn inside and closed the door. She whispered. “If this is about the changelings on Chitona, then all of them know. They are all our trusted associates.”

“As you wish, Your Grace. This grey mare claims to be the leader of the changeling squadron on the ship.”

After a moment of murmurs, Rainbow Dash asked with a frown. “I thought Chrysalis is the queen of your hive?”

“She was.” The grey mare said curtly.

“What does that mean? Are you betraying your queen?” Rosencross frowned.

The grey mare’s gaze flickered. “Chrysalis is not our queen anymore.”

“What?!” Rainbow Dash asked in shock.

“This is the natural consequence of her incompetent leadership.”

The grey mare narrowed her eyes. “The Siege of Timbucktu was a failed maneuver that had wounded many hivelings of ours. I decided to hold her to her promise and expedited her removal from our queenship. And seeing how Twilight Sparkle is the one who holds the Green Stigmata of the hive, she’s our presumptive leader pending her own assent.”

“Wait a bucking second. Are you saying that Twilie is now your queen?!” Geuse exclaimed.

The grey mare nodded slowly. “That’s why we did not offer up any resistance when the underlings of the rainbow one came, because I understand that she’s on our new queen’s side.”

“Rosy, is what she’s speaking the truth?” Geuse turned to Rosencross and asked.

“… It’s true that whoever holds the Green Stigmata is the queen of a hive. But it’s always passed willingly from one queen to another, or ritualistically conjured in case of sudden demise of the previous monarch. When Chrysalis conquered my hive, my own Stigmata was simply extinguished. Never was there a case of ‘accidental’ transfer like this.”

Rosencross then looked at the grey mare suspiciously. “What is your kodikas?”

The grey mare looked evasive when prompted by the red mare. She gulped and said with a bit of difficulty. “… Allela.”

“Allela, this is an unprecedented happening. You could have ignored this and continued to stick with Chrysalis. Why are you so eager to turn from your queen?”

Allela stayed quiet for a long while. Finally, Rainbow Dash impatiently said. “Speak up, Allela. Your silence is only adding to our doubts of your sincerity.”

“Can you promise to not lay harm on me or my hivelings first?” 

Allela bit her lips. “I’ve heard a lot of talk about feeding us to the fishes.”

Despite the seriousness of the atmosphere, Pinkie Pie let out a suppressed giggle, while some others, like Fluttershy and Mkondo, winced uncomfortably. 

Kanipha spat. “Why would we make such a promise to a bunch of degenerate raiders and thieves like yours?”

Rainbow Dash, however, frowned but nodded. “My soldiers aren’t out there to harm your changelings, but merely to put them in place. Some of us want justice to be served, but it would better be done on land than the high seas. More so, Twilight is the leader of the Zebrica expedition, she should have the final say on your fate, doubly so if she’s now your… queen somehow.”

“So there’s a promise, right?”

Rainbow Dash nodded. “You might say so. But you should know that this depends on whether the changeling hive is up to no good again.”

Allela eyed Rainbow Dash, and Rosencross, then slowly said. “We chose Twilight Sparkle to be queen also because of… other reasons, among them is that we’ve found out she’s now sustaining us.”

“… Go on.” Rainbow Dash narrowed her eyes, but it didn’t mask her surprise.

“I’m among the small amount of changelings who were blasted across the seas to West Zebrica with Chrysalis, leading the largest squadron under her command. Ever since the two fought in the pony capital, they have been intertwined in a strange way that can only be described as magical in nature. She became strangely fixated on Twilight Sparkle and her exploits. That’s why we were ordered to attack the city time after time even against such an organized defense.”

“Quit trying to blame Twilight for your own gluttonous desire to feed.” Kanipha sneered.

“Well, it’s up to you whether to believe me. I’m only ordered to tell what I know. I never understood her fixation anyway.” 

The grey mare shrugged. “She was shaken by the defeats, but she was even more shaken by the leniency shown by Twilight Sparkle. After the release, she first wandered the desert aimlessly for some time, and then she decided to track down Twilight Sparkle’s entourage to the East. On the way, we met a tiny caravan. She then made a very strange decision that made us doubtful of her capacity to keep on leading.”

“She decided to pound on them even though they’re so few?” Geuse asked in doubt.

“No, I found it strange that she didn’t. We changelings aren’t nitpickers, even a small amount of love that can be squeezed out, we will squeeze it so… especially since we were emaciated. But the she was too hesitant to attack because she saw their fearful looks.”

Rosencross made a face of utter disbelief. “Chrysalis, compassion? Are you kidding me?”

Rainbow Dash was also unconvinced, but she said. “I’ll question you about that later, but what happened exactly and then?”

“I told you, she didn’t attack, so we didn’t. The caravan escaped quickly.”

“Isn’t that… a good thing though? No one was hurt.” Mkondo asked.

“Unless you don’t count us changelings. We still have to feed and keep ourselves alive.” 

Allela frowned. “The caravan, in its hurried escape, did leave on the ground something for us to pick up.”

“It’s the Soul Dust isn’t it?” Rainbow Dash shook her head.

“Correct. The hivelings were close to losing the will to march forth anymore. After discerning the use of the magic item, she proposed to us the plan to… well, use the Soul Dust to infiltrate your group and take back the Green Stigmata both at the same time. It’s only because of this daring promise that the hive moved so fast across the inhospitable desert.”

Rainbow Dash sensed some discordance in Allela’s words. “Hmm, are you implying that you would have abandoned ship if not for her promise?”

Allela turned even more expressionless. She then said slowly and blankly. “I only do what’s best for my squadron hivelings.”

“… Hmph.”

“When we finally finished our trek northeast, we were malnourished and close to dying. That’s when we chanced upon Twilight Sparkle in the vicinity of Bannerdeer. We had thought that was an incredible stroke of luck. But the true stroke of luck for her was how she showed compassion to us.”

“You scoundrels exploited her kindness to the fullest, didn’t you?” Geuse hissed.

Allela ignored the taunt and continued. “Twilight Sparkle hooked the remainder of hivelings to her magical source, and spared us the immediate risk of dying from malnourishment. Chrysalis decided that the extant magical link was the best chance to launch her plan, and it succeeded. It was even aided by Twilight Sparkle’s literal selflessness.”

“Um, this one I just heard from Rainbow Dash. She helped Chrysalis out from the inside, didn’t she?” Verna sighed.

“She never expected it either. By my observation, she seemed grateful for her help even. I’d have never expected our highfaluting queen to act this way before all these.”

“Grateful? It’s probably more like snickering inside at her naiveté.” Kanipha harrumphed.

“No. As you may have noticed, I have some strong reservation for Chrysalis, but, I’ll say this: her gratefulness was real. Even though with the loss of magic and the Green Stigmata, our mental link to her has gradually weakened, we could still detect her affection for the purple pony.”

“Are you kidding me? What kind of affection would drive anyone to almost murder the one they love?!” Rainbow Dash almost shouted.

To her surprise, it was Rosencross was who shook her head and interjected. 

“… Changelings saw love and possession as one. There is no complicated courtship ritual in changeling society, for example, because there is no difference between a queen showing love to a male hiveling and a queen having the male hiveling for herself. If a queen saw one suitable mate, she would just proceed to dominate and take possession of him. In warlike hive like Chrysalis’s, where relationships were rigidly hierarchical, I bet this kind of tendency was only more magnified and reinforced.”

The red mare seemed to have thought of some long-ago memories, and paused for a while. 

“… I myself was clueless to the concept of pony companionship until I lived among them for years, I would bet that Chrysalis saw taking possession as the only way to show her twisted affection. Perhaps in her perverse mind, she think... well, what’s that pony proverb…”

“Imitation is the highest form of flattery?” Pinkie Pie offered.

“Yes, that’s the one. If she did really grow to become madly jealous and affectionate, that’s the kind of insanity I could picture her to do.”

Allela’s gaze was complicated, but she then said. “She was indeed becoming more and more unstable afterwards. But now that her plan has fell through and her promise broken, the queenship has been duly vacated. And with Twilight Sparkle being the one who possesses the Green Stigmata and sustains us directly through her magical core, she’s our queen pending her own assent... Even though it is extraordinary to have a non-chan-”

Geuse suddenly exclaimed. “Hey! So you’re telling us that Twilight’s unconsciousness and loss of magic are all due to you greedy wisselkinds overdrawing from her?”

Kanipha also added. “Yeah, now what’s stopping us from tying you up and throwing you all into the sea to save Twilight?”

Rainbow Dash called them down. “Wait! We made a promise! Unless-”

“So much for loyalty!” Geuse taunted and interrupted Rainbow Dash. “Your friend is slowly being killed by those villainous bugs, and not only you choose to sit there and do nothing, but to stop us who actually want to do something?!”

Before Rainbow Dash could react, Mistral Trail already angrily protested. “Are you doubting the dedication and sincerity of Her Grace?! She sailed across half the world to look for her friend, in the process almost got her wing torn clean-off!”

Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy and Spike all gasped aloud. Even Geuse instinctively retracted her wings.

Rainbow Dash shifted awkwardly. “Yeah, don’t mention it. My wing is still in place, isn’t it? Thank goodness for that. But Geuse, what I’m trying to say is simply to let… Allela explain her case first. Not that we have to take her words for it, but she might have information about Twilight that we don’t yet fully know or understand.”

The grey mare who was coolly watching the whole scene suddenly smirked. “Rainbow Dash, isn’t it? You’re indeed wise and fair in your dealings. I’m gonna be honest with you, and I’m not just saying this to save my chitinous shell, but I’m pretty sure Twilight Sparkle’s current unfortunate status has little to do with our paltry feeding, and more to do with the magical imbalance due to her crossing hooves with Chrysalis before, which was then complicated by the battle during which you tried to extract her from Twilight Sparkle’s mind.”

“What ‘magical imbalance’ are you talking about?”

“This is just conjecture on my part based on what I heard, so take that as you will.” 

The grey mare waved her hoof. “Changeling magic is by nature different to pony magic. So when they interact so closely, they might cause unpredictable change to each other. I mentioned that Chrysalis’s magic was failing to manifest more and more frequently, and it was plain to us that it was not just due to the lack of food. I bet something similar was happening to Twilight Sparkle.”

The group, especially the Zebrican companions, thought of Twilight’s recent decline in magic, and reluctantly agreed that what the grey mare described matched with what happened. 

Geuse had calmed down somewhat, but she still couldn’t help but ask. “So wouldn’t removing Chrysalis and breaking the link solve everything?”

Allela smirked. She then said with a thoughtful look. “If only this is so simple.” 

She narrowed an eye. “Why, we changelings are no stranger to mind magic and mental connections, but seldom does it cause such intimate intertwining like this. Her use of Soul Dust only strengthened this bond to an unnatural degree. I don’t know how you achieved the removal, but with such a short time span, I doubt it was a gentle and benign process. Damage from the battle aside, it was like yanking a grass of weed from the ground. The grass might be removed, but the roots remained, festering inside and causing unpredictable effects.”

Rainbow Dash inhaled with unease. “So what should we do to revive Twilight now?”

“No idea.” Allela shrugged. “If we had any way to do it, I would have proposed it earlier. A queenless hive is a dangerous thing.”

“If so, why don’t you keep Chrysalis as your queen at the moment?” 

Surprisingly, it was Pinkie Pie who asked somewhat suspiciously. “I still don’t see what made you so eager to foist the queenship of your hive onto Twilight.”

After a sigh, Allela suddenly grinned, revealing her sharpish teeth. “You are a difficult bunch, aren’t you? Fine, fine, I’d admit it, I have a selfish reason of my own. I want a change in leadership.”

Facing a wave of shocked and stunned looks, Allela raised a brow. “I’m a reasonably good tactician, and I had been gradually promoted to become the leader of the largest squadron in the hive. But my squadron usually operated with relative independence, which often got on her nerves... and my own nerves as well. Speaking of which, Chrysalis has lost us three major engagements by now, isn’t it natural that I should seek some intervention to better our fortune? Even without Twilight Sparkle, I would definitely hold Chrysalis to her promise and made her abdicate.” 

She drew in a breath and continued. “Twilight Sparkle is our willing benefactor, has a vast magical potential, won battles, and showed little reluctance at helping us or offering advice to us, and till this very moment is giving us the energy to operate even in coma, I would say she is a promising leader even without the royal trappings of Green Stigmata. And with the Green Stigmata on her, she has the rightful claim as well. Maybe it’s destiny’s will.”

“You also think she would be softer and easier to manipulate, don’t ya?” Kanipha pointed out acutely.

Allela blinked and said cryptically. “No, no. My gift to Twilight Sparkle is purely out of good will. I have no aspiration to power of my own, other than protesting against a leader that I dislike.”

Rainbow Dash bared her teeth and slowly said. “I still can’t quite trust someone who would turn on their queen so quickly at the sound of defeat. If we’re to accommodate you, who knows when will you turn on us or Twilight like you turned on Chrysalis?”

Allela merely smirked. “You overestimate us, Rainbow Dash. What can we possibly do to you at this stage, being a few dozen hungry changelings? The reason I stood up and come to you is, frankly, begging for mercy for me and my underlings and explaining the situation. Changelings thrive on secrecy and deception; you should realize that my gesture of telling you everything represents a total capitulation on my part.”

“If being a queen so alluring, then why don’t you take on the crown yourself?” Geuse pressed on.

“Oh dear, the Green Stigmata isn’t on me, right? It’s also too much burden and danger to be a queen.” 

After some deliberation, Rainbow Dash asked cautiously with narrowed eyes. “So what do you want from us?”

“Nothing big really, just halt your soldiers and let us live among the other passengers disguised as ponies at the moment. We certainly appreciate it if you don’t add to the others’ suspicion by trying to round us up so blatantly. We’re still beings of flesh and blood, and if thousands of ponies, cows, antelopes, and so on surround and attempt to lynch us, we’d all be dead bugs before sundown.”

“But you’d all be sucking love and energy from Twilight! How can we allow that to continue?” Spike, who was till then quiet, burst out in a mix of anger and worry.

Seeing the emphatic nods from the others, Allela sighed and said with a wistful tone. “I saw this one coming. Well, if this makes you all feel easier, we’d stop feeding from Twilight Sparkle until she gets better, alright?”

“You’ll do that?” Rosencross raised a brow and said, feeling somewhat embarrassed.

Allela’s gaze swept across Rosencross. For some reason, the expression of the grey mare somewhat softened. Still, she said. “Yeah. That seems to make you all feel better.”

Rosencross turned aside and pouted. “… Then I will not be the selfish one and continue my feeding.”

Allela raised a brow. “You… don’t have to.”

“No, if that would help Twilight recover faster, then going hungry for a while will be worth it.”

“Hmph.” Allela deliberated. “So is this fine with you all?”

Rainbow Dash looked left and right, and nodded after seeing no dissent. “Very well, I’m going to let the changeling hive stay in place for now, but if you’re to plot anything against Twilight or us, I’d rescind my offer of protection.”

“Deal.”

The group looked at her with different emotions as the changeling prepared to exit the room. The cyan mare’s loyal lieutenant quickly followed.

“Wait!”

Fluttershy asked aloud, to her own surprise. “… Where are you going?”

The grey mare smirked. “I’m not going anywhere out of your sight with Miss Collar-yanker here.”

“No, I mean, where do you plan to go?”

“Oh, I’m just going to drop by Chrysalis, if that’s permitted.”

“What for?” Rainbow Dash frowned. “Discord is guarding her, and my soldiers would not permit your entry.”

“Bummer, I just want to try to communicate the situation here to her and make sure she doesn’t act up or anything.”

“Huh.” Rainbow Dash grinned. “You act like you’re the one in charge of the changeling hive.”

“Heh, I just wanna make sure things go smoothly from one queen to another, hmm?”

“Well, you can meet her, but our soldiers and Discord will be watching.”

“… Fine by me. Thanks.”

With a loud bang of the door, the grey mare and mint-green unicorn left the room for real this time.

After hearing the steps grow distant, Geuse immediately protested. “Rainbow Dash, we shouldn’t be so trusting of that darn changeling! For all I know, she could be lying about everything and plotting against us once more!” 

“To be honest, I don’t trust her either.”

“Hm?”

“For reasons I already mentioned. Besides, it’s plain as day that this Allela is quite a plotter.”

“So why-“

“I trust in Twilight’s judgment if she deemed the changeling hive as something that is salvageable. I don’t think the way she acted towards Chrysalis and the changelings was merely out of naiveté. If there’s no immediate danger to Twilight’s life, I see no reason not to withhold our ire for the moment and place some trust in Twilight.”

Geuse, as well as the other outspoken members of the group like Kanipha looked a bit stung at the implied lack of faith, but they did not offer a retort.

“Having said that, we should be on our full guard. Although from our interactions just now, that Allela probably meant us no harm, but I suspect there’s something she’s not yet told us, and she might, as you said, be planning something as well.”

“… Fair enough.”

Rainbow Dash then knocked on the table. “Okay then, I’ve kept you all long enough, and I myself have some new duties to conduct. I suppose the meeting’s adjourned for now. You can go back to your quarters, but please consider not going around the ships for too long, now that we’re on heightened alert.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It had been a few days since Discord volunteered to keep a watch on Chrysalis, and it was grueling to say the least. 

A few days ago, a self-proclaimed lieutenant of Chrysalis came by and talked to Chrysalis about the current situation, and in particular, holding her to her promise of giving up the queenship. 

He briefly wondered what could have prompted the power-hungry changeling queen to make this kind of promise. Was it the desperate situation, disloyal underlings, or more?

Counter to Discord’s expectation, Chrysalis did not explode in anger at all. She just weakly argue about the wordings of the promise, that she only said to release them of their vows, but not giving up the crown herself. 

However, the changeling named Allela only said with vagueness and a hint of mockery.

“The seed of your demise had been planted long before the day we sieged Timbucktu. You should just stay here and wallowed in your baseness and ineptitude.”

Stunned quiet, the now changeling ex-queen simply looked at her former lieutenant left without a word.

Afterwards, Chrysalis did throw some hysterics in the cabin she was kept. But they all quickly gave way to silent, somewhat unsettling staring at the wooden wall.

This silence, the chaos spirit could not bear with. Having to stand guard already robbed him of the time to chitchat with others. In this room he did not only get bored with inactivity as if he was also being imprisoned, he also got increasingly unnerved by the eerie silence of the changeling ex-queen. It was almost like being forced to stand next to a corpse.

Discord finally could not bear it anymore. He jumped out of his makeshift hammock and went next to Chrysalis. Seeing the changeling sitting in her bed motionless, he coughed to get her attention, and then asked.

“Feeling hungry yet?”

Getting no response, he said again with a louder voice.

“Are you okay? You should’ve got no love to eat for a few days now.”

The changeling’s head turned, but she did not say anything. It was as if she’s not even looking at Discord, but something behind him.

Discord sighed, and produced a loudspeaker with his magic. Then he yelled with all his might.

“DO YOU HEAR ME?! ARE YOU OKAY?!”

“What's going on here?”

An alarmed Cruzesian guard ran in and asked loudly.

“Nothing. I'm just checking if she's okay. You may go back to your post.”

Discord told the guard calmly with a grin. The guard blinked, and then bowed out quietly as told. 

Discord turned to see an irritated-looking Chrysalis staring at him.

“Oh good, at least you aren’t dead inside, or outside. I don’t know about changeling biology that much.”

She coughed and cleared her throat, which was dry as a desert after a few days of silence.

“… I may not be dead, but I’m almost deaf courtesy of your stupid action.”

“It isn’t stupid if it got your attention, which is my goal.” Discord crossed his arms. “I’m concerned that you might also suffer from some damage after getting forcefully extracted from Twilight.”

“Oh? What’s that? You are concerned about me?” Chrysalis drily laughed. “Don’t make me-”

“I’m serious. There’s no need to get cynical about this.”

Chrysalis was surprised by how forthright Discord was. She flustered a bit and said. “Pfft, I’m fine. Just a bit… unused to having no one to lead, that’s all.”

“Meh, you’ll get over it. That’s speaking from my experience.”

“Huh, right. You were the king of Equestria back then, weren’t you?”

“Chaos King of Equestria.” Discord corrected. “My reign brought much needed discord to this boringly bubbly land of ponies, although the no-fun Celestia once said it was ‘an eternal state of unrest and unhappiness’. Bah, to Tartarus with her propaganda.”

“Celestia…” Chrysalis gritted her teeth angrily.

“I heard from the girls that she fought with you and your changelings once a long time ago. That’s how you all now look like you’re made of fermented cheese.”

“Grr…” Chrysalis angrily hissed, but she then held her head with her hooves and deflated quickly.

“What’s wrong?”

“I…”

Suddenly, the former monarch of the hive began to tear up.

Discord internally groaned again. Ever since he had been broken out of stone, the number of times he saw some mare crying right in front of him already far exceeded that during his supposed reign of terror. Also, Chrysalis crying was a sight that he did not think he would ever get used to.

He tried his best to calm the changeling, and gently cooed, emulating the tone of his long-time roommate Fluttershy. “… I’m here, ready to listen to your woes… If you’re also ready, that is.” 

‘It’s not like I’ve got anything better to do here.’ 

He japed in his mind. But he actually was also wondering what made her act so weird as well. 

Being a spirit of mind, he was curious, somewhat morbidly, about how the formerly proud and vile-tongued changeling queen could be reduced to such an unstable whimpering wreck. It could be a combination of humiliating defeats and getting practically abandoned by her only remaining changelings, but he suspected the mysterious cross-linkage with Twilight also affected her mind to a healthy, or unhealthy, degree. 

Bottom-line, if changelings were sensitive to mind and emotions as legends told, she herself should also be aware of her own change. What she told him and Rosencross back in Twilight’s mind was not quite clear enough to sate his curiosity, which was quite intensely stoke by the reveal of Twilight’s secret a few days ago.

He’s of course also concerned with the status of Twilight herself. He was somewhat regretful that their battle probably wrecked the place, and he hoped fervently that his ‘vegetable’ jape wouldn’t come true. 

But with Twilight surrounded by Cruzesian medics, there’s little he could do, especially since healing magic was never his forte. He could, however, try to examine what’s going on with Chrysalis, in order to get a rough idea about what happened to Twilight, who was on the other end of their curious connection.

As he thought about the two mares awaiting Chrysalis’s response, the ex-queen wiped her eyes, raised her head and said. “You’ll hear me out?”

“Why, of course. I’m always a good listener.”

“… I doubt that.” Chrysalis continued regardless. “It’s been, what, six months since we last met?”

“Seven months actually.”

“So much has changed, and so many regretful deeds I wish to go back in time to undo.”

“Hey, I regret my action back then a lot too. So much so that I’ve gone a bit loco and got willingly burnt by the Tree of Harmony. That purple egghead’s self-destructive tendency was probably rubbing off me. That’s why afterwards I took a three-day vacation to wash myself in the Prismatic Spring to wash it off me, lest I turn suicidal for no reason all of a sudden.” 

“If that’s an attempt to joke, I’m not amused.”

“No joke, I did go to the Prismatic Spring. I have the souvenir to prove it!” Discord snapped and produced a rainbow-colored stone. “Purple egghead’s influence is positively infectious.”

Chrysalis huffed, but her voice turned unsure. “I don’t know what to think of her.”

“How about ‘I can tear her guts out’?”

Chrysalis let off an inadvertent giggle, but she then immediately widened her eyes. She eyed the chaos spirit suspiciously. “Hmph, aren’t you on her side, now that you regret turning from her?”

Discord ignored the unsettling chuckle and simply grinned. “It was not a betrayal, so much as a moment of miscalculated trickery set to get back at her. Let’s say Twilight and I had some… romantic dispute, which has since completely dissipated… I hope.”

Discord carefully chose his words to shift the focus to imply that it was all about romance instead of the secret that he already knew. 

Chrysalis raised a brow and looked somewhat amused. “A scorned lover, eh? Good enough reason to turn on her as any.”

“My heart is warmed.” Discord drily chuckled. “But seriously, do you still hate her?”

“… I know I should be. She is the one who caused my downfall. My grand army of changelings were reduced to nothing all due to her meddling…”

She tapped her perforated hoof on the wooden wall of her cabin. “But whenever I saw her, I felt irrationally… I don’t quite know how to describe that feeling. I guess you can say it was a mix of… yearning and envy. When we crossed hooves in Canterlot, I already noticed her vast magical potential, on her own no less, and her strangely proficient mind magic. For someone like me who could only cast strong magic by absorbing a large amount of love, it is very alluring if I could get my hoof on that.”

“You plot your plan this far back?”

“No, of course not! It was just at first a stray thought, something like ‘It would be so sweet if I could get my hoof on that’. But that feeling soon ballooned into something else entirely.”

“I never notice that you have an unrequited love on her.”

“What the Tartarus are you talking about? No!” Chrysalis’s face reddened. “I’m regretting my foolish decision to talk to you right now!”

“Oh, come on, I just want to ease the tension. You just seem so high-strung all the time.”

The chaos spirit narrowed one of his eyes and deliberately probed. “You kinda remind me of Twilight whenever she was, but actually wasn’t mad at me.”

Chrysalis opened her mouth quickly as if to spout an angry diatribe, but no words came out. After a while, she said through her gritted teeth. “You’re teasing me, knowing that she’s the culprit of making me not see things like it was.”

“Can you tell me what exactly happen from your perspective?” Discord straightened his back. “I’m an expert of mind after all. Maybe I can help or at least give some advice.”

“More like an expert of screwing someone’s head up, according to what I’ve heard.”

Despite Chrysalis’s riposte, she continued with a quieter voice. “Ever since we emerged from the earth in Zebrica, changelings had been scattered in small squabbling hives. Ours were the most numerous, well-positioned to unite the changelings as one. So after I ascended to the throne, I immediately marshaled across the land to turn the changeling race into an unbreakable black spear, capable of breaking open the best defended minds to obtain the love we set our eyes on. Deceit and brute force are both fair games.”

“Hm, it matches with what I heard.”

“I don’t aim for less.” Chrysalis let off a small prideful smirk. “We’ve sacked big cities and small villages, we even crossed the seas to raid settlements far from Zebrica, like the great city of Trot to the East. It was a feat unthinkable for changelings of the past who were content with small-time feeding on nearby villages.”

“So what’s the problem? You sound like you’re still quite fond of your conquests.” Discord shrugged. “If it were the girls who are talking to you right now, they might rail against, or at least show disapproval to your deeds, but I know better not to demean someone’s pride and achievement, whichever direction my moral compass points to.”

“You, spirit of utter disharmony, have a moral compass? This is complete news to me.”

“Hey, isn’t inverting someone else’s expectation most fun? Who would expect a chaos spirit has a moral rulebook?”

“… This sounds like what a chaos spirit would say.”

Discord lightly grinned. “Granted, it’s more of a list of suggestions than hard rules. But I see nothing wrong with following them for now.” 

He then chuckled and shook his head. “I love fun, and I positively hate the static environment the crowned heads of the old Equestria, and now the royal sisters so like to propagate. Of course I could go solo and create havoc alone now that I’m freed. But sometimes, there can only be so much fun alone. Twilight and her friends’ kindness and their active reaching out to me taught me a new way to have fun without raising Tartarus. And now I know they have a lot of fun plans for the future in their saddlebag. Why won’t I try to align myself a bit towards their views in order to keep in their good grace?”

Discord eyed Chrysalis, who seemed to want to ask what those ‘fun plans’ he mentioned were. Before she opened her mouth to ask, he made a flourish to distract her and sighed dramatically. “Alas, I didn’t have a voice of moderation to tell me when I went overboard. What a lame state of affairs when I look back to it!”

“At least your change is out of your own volition.”

“Oh? Tell me more.”

“There was no kindness or charity in my book of operation, or indeed, changeling society as a whole. The strong shall devour the weak, lest she is devoured herself.”

She smirked again, but this time with some hint of uncertainty. “You think ponies are bubbly, try bunnies. When I was traversing in the East, I once encountered a tribe of extremely friendly bunnies. Even though we’re not disguised at all, they were hospitable to the point that it bewildered me how they survived in the wild.”

“Needless to say, you gave them the shaft, am I correct?”

“Definitely.” Chrysalis closed her eyes. “I tell you about them just to show that I’m no stranger to kindness with no strings attached before. I knew what it exactly meant – a show of weakness and submission, a surefire sign of exploitability. I also knew what to do – putting them down with clinical coldness and extracting the love for the hive.”

“What has changed then?”

“She is definitely to blame, because I started reacting to acts of kindness with… a desire to reciprocate.”

Instead of probing further, Discord asked rhetorically. “Why is reciprocation a bad thing?”

“I- It shows you’re weak!”

“You’re smarter than that, Chryssy.”

Chrysalis narrowed her eyes at his unpermitted use of nickname, but he simply continued. “You’re shutting yourself out from a perfectly valid strategy if you decide to eschew reciprocation in any situation.”

“Who need that if we’re strong and deceitful enough?”

“Judging by your current situation, I think they’re clearly not enough.”

“Are you mocking me, Discord?”

“Not at all.” 

Discord shrugged. “If everything can be dominated through force and suppression, the world should be completely filled with aggressive predators and their chafing slaves now. Magical forces like the Elements of Harmony notwithstanding, there are plenty of herbivore herds that roam the land. How do you think they manage to survive in the wild, wild nature?”

“They cowardly band together, in a foolish attempt to stem the inevitable.” She huffed.

Discord manually adjusted his eyes which were rolling up at high speed. “… But the point is, they survive, and sometimes even triumph over smart and very calculating individuals like Yours Truly. Why’s that the case if ruthlessness is the superior strategy?”

Chrysalis spluttered, and Discord simply said. “Because they are not necessarily the best strategy. Showing rapport ties individuals with different interests up as a cohesive group. Unless you’re so powerful that you can wipe the world clean, there are cases in which we need support from friends and allies to patch up where we’re lacking, and at least an exchange of favor to keep the peace, which prevents everyone from ganging up on you at once. If I knew that earlier, I wouldn’t lose my kingdom to some Alicorn upstarts. Altruism isn’t just some foolish nonsense, it’s an important social ritual that helps countless species survive over the years.”

“So are you trying to convince me that kindness has its use?”

“Yes. And oh, it makes your heart tingly sometimes, but it depends on whether you think it’s a good thing.”

Discord gave some time for the changeling queen to think, and then continued. “Back in her mental realm, you mentioned something about Twilight’s feelings and your own as well.”

Chrysalis lightly gasped, her gaze shot away from the draconequus.

“So what’s up with this friendship thing? New to it, aren’t you?” He said.

She bit her lips, her fangs impressed on the dark chitin shell. “Those feelings are just like those intruding thoughts about kindness!”

“T- They aren’t mine!” She added, somewhat uncertainly.

Discord silently sighed. He thought of the last question he asked the three mares when he was about to leave Rainbow Dash’s office.

He asked that question because what happened to Chrysalis might be something similar to what happened to them. An inadvertent transfer of foreign feelings and emotions. Ultimately morally wrong, he must admit.

Or maybe Chrysalis was just undergoing change on her own with what she saw in Twilight. Who could tell, and did the distinction really matter?

He’s there to untie this mental knot regardless. He felt no obligation to turn Chrysalis to the ponies’ side. Turning this former changeling invader to Twilight’s side, however, would likely make her very happy, and he wouldn’t mind getting on her good side after all that had happened.

Discord collected himself and asked. “But does it matter? Say, try to be honest here, do you feel a tinge of warmth seeing her friends? Do you long for having friends to shower care and affection towards you without an expectation of return?”

Chrysalis again opened her mouth, but she only mumbled. After a moment of deliberation, though, she said with somewhat contained strain. “Do you know why I’m telling you all these instead of giving you the buck to the face?”

“No one has the heart to buck my witty charming self and my handsome face, I’m sure.”

Chrysalis gulped as if she was suppressing something. Then she said uneasily. “I feel… comfort. It’s oddly liberating talking to you. Not even towards my most loyal hivelings I could explicitly tell about my innermost thoughts, even though they might sense my overflowing emotions from time to time.”

“And that, is what having friends is for, my friend.”

Chrysalis turned breathless at being called a friend of the chaos spirit. When she came to her senses, she started to protest, but she was immediately interrupted by Discord.

“Give me a sec, Chryssy.” Discord grinned. “’Friendship is magic’, they say. Always sounds too cheesy to me. But there’s something about friendship that is true whenever you go. With true friends, not only it makes happiness more than a transient personal moment, it also let you afford to be things that you can’t be, lest you’re overly exposed.”

Chrysalis blinked in half-understanding, so Discord continued. “With friends, you can afford to appear weak, because we don’t need to pose for fear of being dominated; to appear wrong, because we don’t have to be perfect; to appear directionless, because we don’t always have to lead; and to appear stupid, because we don’t have to prepare for their appraisal. We all need a moment of respite from constantly having to guard ourselves from others and run towards success on a lonely trail. Constant vigilance and unending personal craving will only drive us crazy eventually.”

Chrysalis went silent. What she next told Discord surprised him.

“I guess you’re not wrong.”

“Oh?” Discord suppressed his natural urge to be sarcastic.

“… Can we have a deal?” She said suddenly.

“It depends on what it’s about.” Discord smirked.

“I want to hear more about your past and how you come to be, and in turn, I will tell you mine.”

“Gladly. Why, they should’ve written multiple books about my glorious exploits by now.” 

Discord chortled, and then told Chrysalis a distilled version of his past as the chaos king, his defeat at the Sisters’ hooves, and his uneven road to reformation afterwards.

Chrysalis was slightly mesmerized by Discord’s intriguing storytelling. A gentle poke from Discord brought her back to reality, and she realized it was her turn to speak.

“Well, we have a deal, haven’t we?”

She sighed and began. “I don’t suppose you know how a queen of changelings came to be.”

“You mentioned the Green Stigmata. I presume that the throne itself was somewhat hereditary?”

“Actually, it’s more complicated than that. From a special batch of hatchlings, many potential future queens are born after the previous queen passes away. Hive rules dictate that all of them will fight each other until only one is left. But not before they display their first bout of changeling magic are they permitted to launch any attack. Basically, it was both a way to select the most powerful changeling queen, and also a way to see if the new queen has the gall to mercilessly eliminate defenseless opponents before they pose a threat to her.”

Discord couldn’t help but ask. “Even Rosy underwent something like that?”

Chrysalis raised a brow and harrumphed. “… I don’t know about her specific hive, but if they select changelings according to the common ancient tradition of all changelings, then I suppose she also did.”

Discord coughed. “Did you?”

“I did. Albeit accidentally. It was the only time I have hiveling blood on my hooves.”

She drew in a breath. “I was a curious specimen of changeling. I was the shiest of the bunch. I walked and fed alone. Basically, I was the bottom feeder among the candidates. So it came to me as a surprise when I had my upsurge of magic at a very young age. But back then, I was still reluctant to attack.”

“Why? They are your rivals.”

“But they’re also my hatchling sisters.”

Discord tried to maintain his inscrutable look, but his facial expression betrayed his surprise at the explicit expression of a yearning for intimacy.

“Outside of the queenship selection, we talk and feed together. It was something akin to companionship to me, so I didn’t take action against them. That was until I was violently accosted by them one day, and I was pushed to the breaking point. So I decided to shock them with my magic to show them I was no pushover. However, I overcharged my power, and I incinerated all of them.”

Discord nodded minutely.

“But my display of power immediately had the hive fully submitted to me. I never felt so good, for it was the first time I had power over any other beings. So my desire for power grew, and I learnt and adapted to use whatever means necessary. It had been so long that complete ruthlessness has been my cardinal rule.”

Discord slightly nodded. It seemed that Chrysalis wasn’t exactly born evil after all. Maybe the changes she had now were seeded long ago.

Chrysalis looked at the reticent Discord, shook her head wryly and shifted the topic. “Come to think of it, I did have something akin to a friend when I was very young.”

Discord was truly surprised. “Really?”

“… Imago. His name was Imago.”

“A male changeling?”

“Yes, this was what made him very special. Ever since we were birthed from the fertile earth, changelings only had queens but not kings. But for some freakish reason, he was born among us the candidates. Imago was one of the more talkative changelings. Strange, since changeling society was never one of kindness and compassion. But we’re both outcasts, so we naturally gravitated towards each other. He’s the only one in the hive who would listen to my muttering. But one day, he died.”

“What?” Discord almost thought Chrysalis was telling an anti-joke. 

“Yep, just keeled in front of me, completely out of the blue. It was definitely foul play, I am sure of it. Probably poison, done by someone who thought his existence as unnatural and sacrilegious, though I never managed to get a hold of the perpetrator even after I started a purge after becoming queen.”

The changeling then merely smirked, albeit sadly. “Absorbing as much love as possible is supposed to be the solitary duty of a changeling queen. But as you can see from Phalena, I probably didn’t have to do it by brute force. However, Imago’s death convinced me that kindness is weakness, and weakness kills.”

“Doesn’t it still?” Discord toothily grinned.

“You’re trying to make me argue against the me of the past, aren’t you, you scamp.” 

Chrysalis shook her head. “What you’ve said just made me rethink what led me to become what I am today. I haven’t thought of Imago for years, but I did just now. You are probably right, even though Twilight Sparkle’s friend-loving tendency might rub off me when we’re locking horn back then, but the thing that matters more is my own change.”

“Eh, are you going to join me in ‘reforming’?” Discord mischievously grinned.

“’Reforming’? To reform means I must admit what I did was wrong. But to this day I still think that all I did were for the best of the hive. Now I merely think there might be other… perhaps better ways in achieving what I desire.”

Discord smirked. “Meh, just wording anyway. If you are truly willing to act in a more palatable way to them girls, I’ll certainly speak on your behalf in front of Twilight’s friends.”

Annoyance briefly flashed across Chrysalis’s face, but she gave his words more thoughts, sighed and nodded almost imperceptibly. 

“Give it time.”

She looked back to the chaos spirit with a reserved gratitude, and the thorns in her gaze seemed to have gone.

Discord then turned and walked back to his hammock, intending to leave the former changeling queen some time to think on her own.

However, she suddenly said. “How’s Twilight?”

Discord raised a brow at the more intimate form of address. He turned again. “Still unconscious in bed.”

He then narrowed an eye and asked. “You sure you aren’t mad at her for taking away your throne or anything?”

“If anyone’s to blame, it would be myself for my foolishness and incompetence. Twilight Sparkle herself never expressed a desire to take away my queenship, even offering to give back the Green Stigmata back then. Even Allela… She was probably just doing what she thought was best for her band of hivelings.”

She looked up with apparent tiredness. “I guess she’s right. Time to take a break and rethink.”

Seeing the sulking Chrysalis, Discord shifted the topic. “You got any idea about her condition?”

She shook her head and looked somewhat fretful. “No, not at all. I’m just a bit… concerned.”

“If not even you know what’s going on, then bugger-all helps us.”

“I’m thinking, though.”

“Hmm?”

“You keep mentioning the Elements of Harmony. They’re really powerful magical artefacts, and the six mares that I fought were their wielders, am I correct?”

“Yes…?”

“So maybe if her friends use them, they can fix her up quickly.”

“Not a bad idea, but there’re some difficulties.” Discord sighed. “First, they aren’t the wielders anymore, because they put the Elements back to the Tree of Harmony in a bid to reassure me that they wouldn’t use them against me.”

“… No wonder you look surprisingly loyal to them despite being a chaos spirit. They’ve really gone the extra mile, even placing themselves in danger, to try to befriend you.”

“Are you trying to make me feel guilty?” Discord raised a brow. “It’s useless. I’m long past that stage.”

“Not really, I’m just even more curious what makes you turn back then.”

“You can’t feel deeply scorned unless you first grow close with someone.” Discord said vaguely, and then quickly reverted. “Anyway, the second reason is that Twilight herself wouldn’t be available to activate her own Element.”

Chrysalis exhaled in disappointment. “I… hope it wasn’t my magical blast that caused the damage in the first place. She might have foiled my plans many time, but as things now come to this, I can’t really be mad with her.”

“The good will is noted, though some of her friends, I fear, aren’t exactly that forgiving.”

She huffed. “They can keep their pitiful hatred. It’s far from my first time having to face someone’s hateful gazes.”

“You sound like you would appreciate it if they don’t, though. You look so obviously lonely.”

“What? I-” Chrysalis gritted her teeth and heavily sighed. “Must you be this difficult?”

“Oh, I’m so sorry for getting someone to be more honest with herself.”

Chrysalis harrumphed, and turned to the wall-side of her bed and seemingly refused to talk anymore. Discord simply loudly chuckled, and went back to his hammock content with his little discussion with the changeling ex-queen.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“Hey Rosy.”

“Discord?” Rosencross eyed the chaos spirit, who came near the bow to her side. “Shouldn’t you be watching over Chrysalis?”

“Don’t you worry, she shouldn’t be up to anything now. I’ve more or less talked her into staying put for a change, and perhaps even less cold. Turns out she has a story to tell.”

Rosencross looked at Discord with a mix of disbelief and shock.

“You still hating on her, right? Alright, we shouldn’t talk about her if-”

“… Tell me about her.”

Discord blinked, and the corner of his mouth slightly raised. He then began to retell Chrysalis’s tale to her.

“… This is perhaps why Twilight thought that she could be turned to her side.”

Rosencross bit her lips and stayed quiescent. Discord waited for a while, and decided to let the red mare process the information herself. He was not so delusional to think that a mere understanding of Chrysalis’s motives would make Rosencross forget all the past transgressions, but it might be a start regardless. If the changeling duo were to stay close to Twilight afterwards, he certainly could appreciate less of an auditory carpet bombardment whenever the two met each other.

Rosencross turned from the bow and entered the cabin of Esperança, and Discord followed without a word. Streaming through patrolling soldiers, they arrived at the mess hall of the ship. There they found everyone having lunch around a big table.

“Oh? Discord, Rosencross?” Rainbow Dash turned and waved at the incoming duo. “Hey, come sit by us. It’s so rare to see you two appearing in the mess.”

“Just want to find somewhere to sit and think.” Rosencross shrugged expressionlessly.

“A weird choice, I must say.” Kanipha smirked. “You can’t find a noisier place on this ship.”

Discord, however, looked at Rainbow Dash and said. “It’s also rare to see the bucking commander to sit among the ensigns in the mess hall.”

“You need to show up from time to time to forge a sense of togetherness. The brothers and sisters who fight together eat together.” Rainbow Dash said with a grin.

“Uh, no offense, Mister Discord…” Verna asked uncertainly. “Aren’t you supposed to be -” 

“- watching over Chryssy?” Discord finished her query. “Good news to you all, I have successfully preached the gospel of Friendship to her, and she has since accepted the goodness of Kindness in her heart.”

Facing absolute stunned silence, he crossed his arms and huffed. “What, I just used what I was taught during those moons of reeducation with these lovely mares.”

“Reeducation? This term you use made us sound like we forced you to be like that.” Rainbow Dash muttered.

“You have to admit though, you all were a tad bit forceful when you tried to make a friend out of Yours Truly when you broke me out of the stone.” 

Seeing three unhappy faces, Discord then swiftly added. “I didn’t say I don’t like it, geez.”

Pinkie Pie blinked, and playfully jabbed the chaos spirit. “Good that you know to say that!”

Geuse frowned. “I know I’ve been naysaying a lot recently, but I’m still finding hard to trust that changeling lieutenant. Now you’re telling me you’ve turned Queen Chrysalis to our side? Next time you’ll be saying you’ve parted the ocean.”

Spike gulped quietly, and raised his little arms. 

“There’s something I want to talk to you all since a long time ago. I know you girls, Twilight included, are a forgiving lot.”

The mares looked at the purple dragon with a hint of surprise on their face. Despite Twilight’s explicit wish to involve Spike in their big planning in general, the fact remained that he usually stayed silent on most matters and seemed content with the six of them in charge of the grander scheme. It was somewhat astonishing to see Spike comment on them so frankly.

Not knowing what the mares were privately thinking, he turned to Discord. “I know I gave you Tartarus in the past for what happened in Canterlot, but you’ve since been reliable, and most importantly, regretful. Now that Twilight’s confirmed to be… well, at least not dead, I don’t find it in my heart to hate you anymore.”

Discord put up an inscrutable face, while the dragon sighed. “But the point remained that we’re being incredibly trustful to the point of naiveté to any bad guys who come by and say they aren’t evil anymore. We’re playing fire with not only our lives here. Twilight’s trusty and undoubtedly talented companions from the land of the setting sun notwithstanding, you girls have risen above the fray to become important ponies in the community. Magnate, entrepreneur, top reporter, star performer… And you Rainbow Dash… You wield enormous influence basically as a warband leader.”

Spike’s tone then turned grave. “This is why I feel it strange… no, absurd that you all seem to throw care to the wind when you deal with a band of invaders who almost brought doom to Equestria. While you girls are right that Discord’s heart is ultimately in the right place…”

Discord rolled his eyes. “Thanks for vouching for me, bud.”

Spike eyed the draconequus with a thoughtful gaze. “… He still indirectly caused a lot of pain and grief during all these months.”

Spike, to the mares’ surprise, managed to preempt and surprise the protesting draconequus and the mares by continuing. “I’ve come to know it has something to do with some arguments over kept secret, so while I regret to say that, there is probably some blame to lie with Twilight as well.”

The mares’ faces turned a rather strange shade of blue, while Discord barely managed to keep himself from smirking in schadenfreude. The mares searched their heads fervently to see when and how Spike came so close to knowing their secrets, to no avail.

Spike gazed at the mares and sighed again. “I have no interest in knowing what exactly those secret or secrets were. You mares are, I’m sad to say, a rather secretive bunch, and I know very well there’re many things that you’re keeping from me using various ex... well, reasons.”

“S- S- Spike…” Pinkie Pie began to stutter. Fluttershy lowered her head in apparent shame, and Rainbow Dash’s face was grimmer than a lump of coal.

He then smirked, but it was clear that it was mirthless. “It doesn’t matter. I’ve come to accept that long ago. I’m just here to plead that you all use more tact from your cabal meetings or secret dealings or mega scheming… whatever, just don’t ever, ever repeat the shambolic mess that was the changeling invasion again by blindly spreading your trust around.”

Spike then stood up, picked up his meal tray, put it aside and walked out of the mess hall without a word.

The first one to react was Geuse. “Woah, little guy got guts. He totally said what I wanted to say.”

Kanipha narrowed his eyes. “I thought he was just a tagalong baby dragon. Hm.”

The other Zebrican companions just looked at each other with uncertain looks. 

Discord, however, simply gave the mares an ‘I told you so’ look. The meal was then continued in an incredibly uncomfortable manner.