Starlight Glimmer was the first to arrive in the throne room.
It was a room that held an aura demanding respect, which was how Starlight felt certain it was the throne room even before she had fully arrived at the room’s main entrance. That entrance was curiously unguarded, but it was also a wide and towering opening nearly three stories tall at its highest, decorated with the changeling equivalent of columns, so it wasn’t like it was easy to sneak unseen through it. Regardless, Starlight proceeded cautiously as she slowed to a walk when entering through this entrance, quickly seeing that the room beyond was even taller than its entryway, so much so Starlight couldn’t quite see all of the room at once from within that entrance.
In comparison to most other rooms she had seen in the hive, it was actually a fairly impressive sight, almost cathedral like and spacious, with a surprisingly level floor, making it clear that the changelings had put extra effort into the quality of the room so to be fit for their queen, no doubt. Nonetheless, the room still bore the same sort of traits seen everywhere else in the hive, with the walls being riddled with the hole-like entrances to intersecting tunnels at random. However, none of them were appearing or disappearing on their own like before and were instead constant.
The room also seemed conspicuously empty of any occupants except for Starlight herself as she didn’t immediately see anyone else within the room. This didn’t relieve her in the slightest and instead only made her all the more concerned, suspecting something was up while continuing to proceed cautiously, ever alert as she waited in dread for the other horseshoe to fall. Yet that didn’t stop her from getting a flare of excitement as her eyes locked onto the obvious centerpiece of the room, a jagged outcropping of black, almost obsidian-like stone, twisted and filled with plenty of holes, but was still quite clearly throne-shaped. An eerie beam of greenish light even fell directly upon it as if trying to point Starlight directly to it. Almost relieved to see it, Starlight started to step towards it, passing into the center of the room as she did so.
She stopped when she felt a glob of something wet and sticky plop onto her head. Wiping it off with her hoof, she saw it was the familiar green changeling gel, and feeling her stomach sink, she warily gazed upwards to see what it was hanging above her that she had completely missed on her way in.
The cluster of cocoons was arranged almost as if it was some bizarre, twisted, chandelier, and precisely as Thorax predicted, contained the very ponies she and the others had come to rescue: Twilight and her five friends, Princesses Celestia and Luna, Princess Cadance and her family, even Ember and Trixie hung upside down and unconscious in newly added cocoons of their own. The sight was dizzying and only served to fray Starlight’s already very strained nerves even further at the horrifying sight. But that was all nothing in comparison to the cackling laugh that echoed out shortly thereafter, chilling Starlight to her core as she realized who as making it.
“And after all that, it’s just one little pony who enters, all by herself,” the voice taunted before cackling again.
Starlight looked up at the cocoons hanging above her again in time to see Celestia and Luna’s cocoons be pushed aside enough for Queen Chrysalis to skitter in through the gap, twisting her body in entirely unnatural ways as she did so, before staring down at Starlight, frozen to the spot she stood, and grinned maliciously at the mare.
“Oh, how will I ever prevent this oh-so daring rescue?” the queen of the changelings taunted sarcastically.
Then the previously quiet and empty room exploded into activity as swarms of changelings that had been previously hiding out of Starlight’s view burst out of nearly every opening leading into the throne room. They were upon her before she could even think to do anything to fight back. Getting tackled from behind, one group of changelings pinned her to the floor, roughly keeping her still, while several more repeatedly spat gel at her forehooves, adhering them to the floor. They continued treating her roughly, to the point Starlight started to become terrified they planned to torture her with the abuse, but then Chrysalis shouted out a single word in the changeling language and the changelings all obediently stopped and backed off, forming a circle along the outer edge of the room.
Picking herself up quickly, Starlight saw the gel covering her forelegs up to her knees and desperately tried to pull herself free of it. Though the gel stretched and twisted with her pulling, it did not release its hold on her and kept her stuck to that spot. She couldn’t move.
Taking amusement in watching Starlight’s futile attempts to escape, Chrysalis chuckled again. “Well, well, well,” she began as she fluttered down to the floor, moving to stand directly before the caught mare. Starlight couldn’t help but cower a little before the slender and intimidating changeling queen, the first time she had ever seen her in person, let alone this close. “The princess of friendship’s sole pupil…went to all that trouble to escape my drones in Ponyville, only to turn around and waltz right into the lion’s den, as it were!” Chrysalis cackled again, tossing her head back in the process and making her long blue mane swing about her neck. “You know, you could’ve spared yourself all that trouble and just played along! Even if you hadn’t been out of town at the time I began my new plans to conquer, I honestly didn’t think you were worth the trouble of replacing with one of my drones.”
Starlight shot a glare at the queen as she renewed her attempts to try and free her hooves from the gel, again to little avail. “I hope I certainly have proven just how much of a lapse in judgment that was by now,” she quipped back darkly.
“You’ve definitely have proven yourself a mildly annoying pain in the rump, if that’s what you’re trying to get at,” Chrysalis growled, suddenly no longer amused. “But credit where credit’s due…you and your little squad have gotten far further than I would’ve expected on your own like this. You’ve navigated this hive startlingly well for a bunch of prey that has neither knowledge of the hive nor a guide to direct them.” She leaned closer to Starlight, close enough that Starlight could smell her surprisingly sweet breath. “Just how have you done that?”
Starlight locked eyes with the queen. “How do you think?” she challenged defiantly.
Chrysalis snorted, turning and starting to walk away. “Clearly, you’ve managed to pry information about where to go out of Julius somehow…I should’ve known that little grub would crack under the pressure.”
Starlight, however, looked up at her in surprise for a split second before remembering to quickly suppress her emotions or the changelings would sense them and be clued in to her thoughts. Why has she assumed we pried the information out of Julius when we have Thorax readily giving it up? she thought to herself.
Chrysalis noted Starlight’s surprise anyway, but she completely misinterpreted it, grinning again as she looked back at the caught mare. “Oh, don’t be so surprised,” she responded. “It wasn’t really that hard to guess that one or more of you somehow escaped from the cocoons Julius put you in on that airship he’d seized and you managed to overpower him without our finding out.” She turned and stepped back towards Starlight. “But just because Julius was shoddy with his work, made those cocoons incorrectly, and allowed even just one of you to wake up doesn’t mean you were guaranteed success at trying to thwart my plans. You really should’ve just used the chance to get as far from here as you could.”
Starlight didn’t respond though, in the middle of desperately trying to force herself calm and not react to Chrysalis’s words while she meanwhile realized in startlement what had happened. She hasn’t realized yet that we only fooled them into thinking Julius had caught us! This thought was quickly followed up by another. She hasn’t realized yet that Thorax is here too, still alive!
“Just what did you hope to accomplish by all of this, anyway?” Chrysalis continued, tilting her head at Starlight as the mare resumed trying to free her hooves from the gel they were caught in. “Surely you knew I’m not about to let any of you succeed in any way.”
“Like I’ll tell you,” Starlight replied, keeping up her defiant attitude as she sought to play along and buy time, in hopes it’ll give Thorax and Spike a chance to do something to carry out their plans while Chrysalis and these other changelings watching were distracted with her.
“Well, it doesn’t matter anyway,” Chrysalis concluded dismissively, straightening. “Once the scouts I sent out to find that airship of yours and figure out what happened to Julius report back in, I’ll have my answers then.”
Uh-oh, Starlight thought to herself, wondering if this meant their planned escape route had already been cut off and the Vergilius captured, but again, she worked to keep that thought to herself. “Look, it doesn’t have to be this way!” Starlight interjected, changing the subject and turning pleading. “There must be a way we can find peace between us where we can all be happy!”
“Now you’re just talking nonsense,” Chrysalis concluded, turning away as if the conversation bored her now. “We still need to feed somehow.”
“But changelings don’t have to steal love to survive!” Starlight bellowed after the queen as she started to walk off and the other changelings encircling her took a step closer, no doubt waiting for their queen to give the order to deal with her. “I’ve seen it for myself! Thorax—”
“Don’t you dare mention that traitor’s name here, in my hive!” Chrysalis snapped suddenly, whirling back upon Starlight angrily. “He had his chance to share in our victory, and he threw it away to pursue your pony lies like the idiot he is! So as far as I am concerned, he is unworthy of even being associated with it!” Chrysalis’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “Besides, don’t go changing the subject just yet, young Starlight Glimmer…we still have unfinished business to discuss. I have you and two of your friends captured, but there’s still one left to add to my collection.” Using her magic, she wrenched Starlight’s head upwards, forcing the mare to look her in the eye. “Where’s the little dragon whelp?”
Starlight merely glared defiantly back at Chrysalis and didn’t respond in any way.
“Fine, have it your way,” Chrysalis conceded with bored sigh, releasing Starlight from her magic and turning to an armored centurion changeling that happened to be hovering beside his queen. “Search the room,” she ordered. “If she’s here, then he’s absolutely going to be somewhere nearby.”
“Yes, your highness,” the centurion replied, dipping his head once respectfully, before turning off to begin his search, heading towards the throne.
But as he turned off, he made eye contact with Starlight for a second. Starlight caught his gaze, staring back for a second not understanding, before she suddenly did. As he walked off, Starlight turned her attention back onto Chrysalis. “So now what?” she asked curtly, working to keep Chrysalis and the other changelings’ attention on her while the centurion worked. “I suppose you’re going to monologue about your whole evil plan now, aren’t you?”
While Chrysalis and Starlight annoyed each other with their ridiculing banter, the centurion proceeded to scan the edges of the room, exiting the encirclement of the other changelings as his path took him around and behind the currently vacant throne. The moment he was securely behind it and out of the line of sight of the others, he broke the pattern and darted to a small gap in the back of the throne’s base, poking his head into it. Inside, Spike had wiggled himself into the gap so he could work without being immediately seen by anyone else in the room, blowing a jet of flame at the dark stone making up the rest of the throne hanging over him, brow narrowed in a combination of frustration and concentration.
“Spike!” the changeling called to him in a harsh whisper, then when this caused Spike to gasp in surprise, he hurriedly added almost as an afterthought, “Eaisht lesh dagh cleaysh!”
Spike stared at him wide-eyed for a split second then groaned quietly in relief. “Eisht jean briwnys,” he finished, shaking his head, exasperated. “Darn it, Thorax, you nearly gave me a heart attack! And at least take that stupid helmet off, it’s giving me the willies!”
“I can’t, it’s part of the disguise,” the disguised Thorax replied apologetically before getting right to the point. “How’s it going?”
“Frustratingly slow, this stuff’s way denser than it looks,” Spike admitted, glaring up at the stone of the throne he laid under, in which he had only made a very small hairline crack thus far, scarcely an inch long. “I’ve tried breathing fire on it, clawing it, even biting it! None of it seems to have made much of a difference.”
“It might be all the magic it’s absorbed over the years, giving it added strength,” Thorax reasoned, noting that despite the infinitely small size of the crack, he could still sense a spark of magic leaking out of it, and through it could feel the years of stolen magic trapped inside, under pressure and trying to get out again, the stress trying to force the unyielding crack bigger. It gave him renewed confidence that their plan could very much still work, but only if Spike could get enough time to critically damage the throne enough for that pent-up pressure to do the rest. “Keep at it,” he urged his dragon friend. “Starlight and I will keep trying to distract the others.”
Leaving the dragon to resume breathing fire on the throne then, Thorax withdrew his head and resumed posing like the centurion he was disguised as, making like he was continuing his search but hadn’t yet found anything to report.
Meanwhile, Starlight and Chrysalis were still arguing. “You won’t get away with this, you know,” the unicorn mare pointed out.
“I already have!” Chrysalis retorted brightly, and waved a hoof at the cocoons of captured prey hanging above them, Starlight’s gaze moving up to look at them once more. “I already have all of them, and now there’s no one else who’s going to be coming to save you that I won’t soon have captured too. Your little squad was it, and now there’s just you and the dragon, Spike.” Chrysalis shook her head teasingly. “However did you talk him into helping you, anyway? I’ve heard he’s had a very rough past few moons that has really soured his views on Equestria.”
“And how would you know anything about that?” Starlight challenged.
“The hive has eyes everywhere,” Chrysalis assured. “And what they witness, they pass on to me. I know more than you clearly give me credit for.”
“Still not enough,” Starlight mumbled under her breath smugly.
“Whatever the case,” Chrysalis pressed on, grabbing Starlight’s head with her magic so to force her to look her in the eye again, “The loyalty to Equestria you both have demonstrated is rather touching, but clearly it’s proven useless against my hive, has it not?”
Starlight merely glared back defiantly and again didn’t respond.
“I have completed my search, your highness,” the centurion reported as he dutifully returned beside Chrysalis. “But I regret I have found no sign of the missing intruder.”
“Oh, he’s here, I can feel it,” Chrysalis vowed, turning around and scanning her throne room eagerly for her prey. “Come out, come out, wherever you are, young Spike!” she called tauntingly. “You can run, but you can’t hide forever!”
“What makes you think he can even hear you?” Starlight demanded from behind the queen.
“He’s still within earshot, I can promise you that,” Chrysalis vowed as she continued scanning the throne room for any sign of Spike. “Everything he has come here to obtain is in this room…why would he be anywhere else?” She pivoted in place a couple of times looking for any sign of the missing dragon. “Come now, Spike, this is getting you nowhere! I promise you that we don’t want to have to hurt you…after all, you’re far more useful to us alive and healthy, and we like it when we can keep you feeling happy too.” This, of course, did nothing to lure Spike out of hiding and as a result Chrysalis started to get impatient. “Don’t think I won’t be willing to harm the others because of that though, Spike!” she warned darkly. “If you don’t reveal yourself soon, I just might have to take out my anger out on them instead, and I don’t think you want that!”
Apparently, neither did the other changelings, because even though the threat wasn’t directed at them, Starlight couldn’t help but notice they all took a cautious step back from their queen, clearly afraid of her anger, except for the one centurion who remained standing nearby Chrysalis and Starlight. “Clearly, Spike just might be more hidden than you’re giving him credit for, Chrysalis,” Starlight pointed out obtusely.
Chrysalis turned back to face her, lighting her twisted and jagged horn suddenly. “You know, you just might have a point there, Starlight Glimmer,” she admitted as she began to circle around behind the trapped mare. Starlight tried to twist around to keep the changeling queen in view, but her forehooves being still adhered to the floor made it difficult. “Sometimes things really can hide right under one’s eyes, if you don’t take the time to look closely enough at the details…like how there’s always telltale signs that a changeling is hiding in disguise. Isn’t that right…” Chrysalis then abruptly fired a spell from her horn, the sickly green energy shooting right over Starlight to strike the centurion that had been standing nearby, forcing the startled changeling to drop his disguise as such, “…Thorax?”
Surprised by this reveal but recovering quickly, the other changelings hissed loudly in anger at the changeling they saw as a traitor while Thorax, in a panic, sought an escape route, and turned to run. He didn’t even manage to make it a full step before other changelings were pouncing on him, hiding him from view in the resulting dogpile, before the attacking changelings backed away again, revealing they had adhered Thorax’s forehooves to the floor with gel like they had with Starlight’s, trapping him. Struggling fruitlessly against the sticky gel, Thorax looked at Starlight in dismay, a look Starlight could only return, unsure what they could do now.
“Oh, Thorax, Thorax, Thorax,” Chrysalis meanwhile was muttering while shaking her head, walking around from out behind Starlight and past the mare’s other side as she approached the caught changeling. “Clearly not as dead as I had been told…how unfortunate for you.” She narrowed her eyes as she lowered her head to stare Thorax down, Thorax bravely meeting her gaze and staring back. “You’re a fool to have left the hive and you’re even more of a fool to return, you know.”
“I couldn’t stand by and let you get away with this, your highness,” Thorax growled back, spitting out the honorific with unanticipated distaste.
This earned him a backhanded slap from Chrysalis for his insolence. “Thorax!” Starlight cried out in alarm. She glared at Chrysalis angrily. “Leave him alone!”
Chrysalis whirled onto her, hoof raised and causing Starlight to flinch. “Shall I strike you, then?” she asked, but then seeming to regain control of her temper, she lowered her hoof again. “I’m just surprised. I didn’t think all that time you’ve spent hanging around ponies would have given you such a spine, Thorax.” She glared critically at her wayward subject. “Whatever happened to the whimpering and fearful nymph I knew so well?”
“I learned better,” Thorax replied, rubbing his sore cheek against his shoulder since his forehooves being gelled to the floor prevented him raising one to tend it. He was speaking compulsively now, not having planned any of this, but he didn’t want to stop now that he had started. “I think you’ll find I’ve learned a lot living among the ponies, your highness, and I know I’ve done far better among them than you ever expected.” He leveled his gaze with his queen seriously. “Because I know now…I had always wondered why you had allowed me to run away from the hive in the first place and never tried to stop me sooner, but now I know…the only reason you let me go was because you thought I wouldn’t survive out there on my own, didn’t you?” He straightened himself proudly before her. “Well, here I am still, your highness. Not only did I survive for all this time, I have prospered. Even despite everything else, I have lived a better life than any changeling under your rule ever has, or ever will.”
“And it doesn’t have to be that way!” Starlight interjected, taking the chance to butt in. She looked around at the other changelings, who were all attentively listening but still didn’t seem swayed. “Every changeling here can live that same sort of life as Thorax has! You don’t have to live like this, no one does!”
“Spare me your lies!” Chrysalis snapped, circling the two captured intruders to her hive. “You aren’t telling the whole story and you both know it! I know all about what happened in the Crystal Empire, I know how Equestria responded to the chance to befriend a changeling, as you’d put it!” She shot a glare at Thorax. “You know, you aren’t wrong, when you first left the hive, I abandoned all thought of you. If you didn’t want to be part of your hive, then I decided there was no need to try and shield you from the dangers lying outside of it.”
“Shield me?” Thorax repeated, irate. “You didn’t even—”
“Hush!” Chrysalis shouted, interrupting him, before continuing more quietly. “Your queen is talking. But yes, I thought you really wouldn’t survive on your own out there, and if you were dead, then that would eliminate any danger you wandering around in Equestria might pose to your hive. So imagine my surprise when I get word that you had turned up in the Crystal Empire, seeking to make peace with the ponies only to get chased out and demonized by them, banished. So I followed what played out after that with interest through Equestria’s, namely Twilight Sparkle’s,” she nodded her head at the princess in question sealed in her cocoon above them, “attempts to find you after word got out that you had made off her dragon. You had made yourself a potential threat to my plans, after all.” She grinned wickedly at this. “But I was more than content to let Twilight Sparkle do all the dirty work for me, and if she had ever succeeded and caught you, I was more than prepared to jump in and ensure the job was finished properly.”
Thorax swallowed softly at the implied threat to his life, but nonetheless spoke his reply confidently. “So when that didn’t happen and it became time to carry out your plans, that was when you sent Julius to find me, so to…speed things along,” he deduced.
“And clearly he failed, more spectacularly than I had ever thought,” Chrysalis added, stopping her circling to give Thorax an annoyed glare. “Do tell me, is he even still alive?”
“Of course he is,” Thorax promised firmly, though he chose not to reveal how severely injured he had gotten in the process. “Unlike you, your highness, I don’t leave my fellow changelings for dead.”
Chrysalis shook her head at him and resumed pacing, tutting to herself. “You really are a fool,” she muttered.
“What he is, is a more benevolent changeling than you,” Starlight corrected firmly.
“No, what he is, is a more than adequate distraction for all of Equestria,” Chrysalis corrected as she stopped circling again so to stand beside Thorax. She smirked cruelly at him. “The ponies were so focused on finding you that they didn’t have any time left to look out for me.” She motioned Thorax’s gaze up at the captured ponies hanging above them. “And I’d say that worked out wonderfully, don’t you?”
Realizing she had used him to her advantage, Thorax only hissed angrily at her. Chrysalis chuckled in amusement but otherwise ignored it.
“As for you and your little pack of friends here and now,” she continued instead, resuming her circling, “I’m not surprised Thorax made the effort to come back here to resist my plans, but I am surprised you came here with so many supporters in tow. I did expect Spike at least, but certainly not all these others, nor for all of you to have gotten this far through the hive, although,” here she grinned a wicked grin, “despite all of that, I still have you all right where I want you, so despite your embarrassing little rescue attempt, everything has gone as I planned!”
“What is this plan, anyway?” Starlight demanded, trying to keep Chrysalis talking and distracted, hoping Spike, wherever he was, would be able to make headway on at least damaging the throne soon. “You still haven’t said! Why would you do all of this?”
“To feed, of course!” Chrysalis replied, facing her and moving to approach her. “By replacing all of the most beloved figures in Equestria, my drones will be able to store all the love meant for them and bring it back to me, and then everyone in here, in Equestria, and beyond, will do as I command, and my subjects and I will have love to feed upon for generations!” She laughed manically at this.
“This isn’t about love,” Thorax challenged defiantly, cutting Chrysalis’s laughter short, to her fury. “This is about power…and how you want all of it. For yourself.”
“And is there something wrong with your queen having power, Thorax?” Chrysalis asked dangerously, advancing on the changeling now.
Thorax didn’t cower as she approached and instead kept his gaze resolute. “What about us drones?” he asked. “Your subjects? Because after how callously you’ve treated me, I know you won’t trouble yourself much with our needs. I’ve survived for so long outside the hive because I found friends to support me and take me in, but had it been up left to you, you would’ve just abandoned me, or any troublesome changeling, at your first chance to die.” He stared determinedly up at Chrysalis, now standing before him, as she glared back down at him. “Is that right, or even the smart thing to do, your highness? Because I think it’s time for the changeling hive to live up to its reputation, and change.”
Chrysalis glowered at Thorax for a long moment, her face scrunching up into a look of fury. But before she could say or do anything, the noise of a solitary crack suddenly rang out from the direction of the throne. It wasn’t that especially loud, almost a mere pop, but in that moment of silence in the room, it had sounded like the crack of thunder and everyone’s heads immediately turned to look in its direction.
Chrysalis straightened and moved to face the throne, looking at it suspiciously. “Search the throne and the area around it,” she commanded her changelings, and those of guard status flew forward to examine the magical structure in depth. As they did so, Thorax and Starlight warily exchanged looks, worried for Spike that, last they both knew, was hiding there at the throne.
But quickly the changelings returned having found no sign of Spike. “We found no one, your highness,” the centurion leading the group reported in, indicating that Spike had managed to move to some other hiding spot. “But we did find signs of attempts to damage the throne, and found that a large crack has formed on a secluded spot in the base due to recent heat stress.”
Chrysalis shot a look back at Starlight and Thorax. “So that’s it,” she muttered, “Very clever. Clearly Thorax has revealed to you the secret of my throne, and we can’t have that.” She shot Thorax a nasty look. “What other secrets have you told them?” Thorax defiantly didn’t reply though, so she shook her head. “I’ll deal with you in a moment then,” she promised and turned her attention back on the matter at hoof, raising her voice. “I highly recommend that you reveal yourself, Spike!” she called to wherever Spike was hiding now. “There’s no point in delaying this any longer, the game is already over! You’re only making this more difficult for yourself and your allies!” Her eyes narrowed dangerously when she got no response. “Do not test me, dragon! I have two of your allies right here, at my disposal that I can, and will, do whatever I wish with if you do not reveal yourself soon!” When there was still no sign of Spike or any attempt from him to reveal himself, she lit her horn and bodily grabbed Starlight with her magic, pulling the unicorn free from the gel holding her in place then whipping the mare before her, aiming the point of her jagged horn at Starlight’s throat. “This is your last chance! Reveal yourself now, or the harm I bestow upon them will be on you, and you’re Equestrian enough that I don’t think you’re willing to let such harm befall your friends, now are you?”
Starlight stared in terror at the tip of Chrysalis’s horn pointing so dangerously at her. Unlike a unicorn’s horn, which rounded off with a nice, blunt, and mostly harmless tip, the changeling queen’s horn came to a very sharp point, more than sharp enough to cut, slice, and stab. And Starlight was fully aware that this was precisely what Chrysalis intended to use it for, unable to not fear the potentially fatal harm it would do to her. Nonetheless, Starlight pushed all this down and gave Chrysalis a confident grin. “He doesn’t care about me, Chrysalis,” she told the changeling queen with defiant assurance. “I’m one of the ponies who helped make him an outcast.”
Chrysalis nodded her head, as if considering this. “That is true,” she conceded, but she nonetheless jabbed her horn closer, forcing Starlight to tilt her head up so to try and keep herself away from its sharp point. She smirked at Starlight. “But I think you still underestimate just how much he does care.” She raised her voice yet again. “I do hope you’re watching, dear Spike!” she called out in a falsely sweet voice. She then turned her gaze back onto Starlight and gave her a malicious grin. “Because I am about to show you why friendship is your greatest weakness.”
Then, abruptly releasing Starlight, allowing the unicorn to fall to the floor completely unscathed, she whipped around and, using the jagged tip of her horn, stabbed the surprised Thorax in the chest.