Princess Celestia's flowing mane cast pastel shadows on the young filly. It was impressive just standing before the regent of the sun as she was twice any pony's height, but Rarity had brought her sister first to Twilight, friend and expert in magic. During that conversation the princess herself sent word to bring young Sweetie Belle as soon as possible to this meeting place.
She tried to be as succinct as she could with the royal presence towering over her now. "She started screaming, your majesty." Rarity watched Princess Celestia eagerly examine Rarity's sister from a respectful distance but could not tell what the regent was looking for, only that since the destruction of Applejack's farm two days ago the young filly had gotten no sleep. "She was talking all funny which I just, you know, put to some bizarre form of post traumatic stress disorder. She was so calm though. Then she had no sooner fallen asleep than she jumped up and started screaming about monsters and seeing Applejack's granny ... Well, you know your majesty about the incursion from that army. We're all glad my sister is alive but why. I mean." Sweat was making Rarity feel very warm.
Twilight, also present but politely waiting for Sweetie Belle who was strangely silent after all the fuss earlier in the evening now felt the need to step up to explain to her teacher. "She sounded for a time like the old Sweetie Belle. Scared beyond her wits' end but Sweetie Belle."
The young lavender colored filly betrayed no emotion though fatigue blurred her eyes. "I'm sorry. I don't know what they're talking about and I just woke up. I remember laying down in this lady's bed" At this Rarity pinned her ears in frustration. The disorder had left her sister with amnesia and replaced it with pony that talked ... like she was from another planet altogether. "and then I was walking here."
Sweetie Belle, dear sweet young filly she was, tried to shake the shadows out of her eyes. Rarity had met the princess a number of times through her association with Twilight but her baby sister had, she believed, never seen the princess this close. Rarity watched as Sweetie Belle looked again, straining her eyes in the pale moonlight to see Celestia. Now the filly was twisting her ears in consternation, gears obviously grinding in her little head. "You're one of the god-kings, aren't you?"
Just like that. Blurted out as much accusation as question. God king? How could a mare, millenia old or not, be a king? Goddess maybe, Rarity thought but she felt warm again, worried her sister had offended the still silent princess who-was-not-a-king.
With the kindness of millenia of practice, the regent of the sun (not so out of her element this night, only a few short years since she gratefully relinquished dual regency of the moon) spoke to rarity's sister. "I'm sorry. The person you're speaking to is no longer available."
Rarity scrunched her brows; her own ears now dancing as she searched for meaning in Celestia's words. Her sister started to respond as though that was a perfectly normal greeting from royalty in the middle of the night during a war. "Oh! Then who is ..." Then stopped.
Her baby sister was obviously going into some trauma thing again. She had completely left this plane emotionally, and was staring blankly at about the Princess' knees. Presently the strange Sweetie Belle was back. "What? Why did you say that?" The enunciation, Rarity noted, was subtly shifted. Her accent had changed; lack of memory of her friends was also a change she had seen recently. The other two CMCs thankfully had been spared all sight or smells of the bloodshed between giant two legged monsters and the royal guard. But Sweetie Belle...
For her own part, Rarity felt much confusion for being forgotten, which was not aided when Celestia said "I was quoting you. You confronted an officer among the enemy, and he ... she, you explained, hailed you as a comrade and you said the one she was talking to wasn't there."
"A dead general" Sweetie Belle intoned. After a pause she nodded and continued. "That sergal was able to use magic but his body was eventually destroyed. I was about to be banished for lack of a body to sit in but." Rarity saw her baby sister stare at her small hooves but did not see Twilight step up beside her.
Aiming her words at Rarity's sister she explained "I think this happened before. When Stack" Twilight paused, gulped, then started again. "A sergal who was friendly to us stayed in the palace. He fell asleep then started screaming in their foreign language."
The princess added "And did horrible things to my guards. Lost two good ones to that alter ego. Do you know anything about that, small pony?"
Feeling left out and helpless Rarity could only stare up at her majesty's questions. What would her sister know of the invaders or of the palace and its guests? But Sweetie Belle was nodding as if this was all perfectly normal. "Yes that was because he wasn't really dead. When I fell asleep he woke up and no one got any sleep. Except your guards who won't wake up but I thought he was dead and I'm sorry."
Quickly, Twilight who obviously knew where this was going, spoke again. "We all thought Sweetie Belle was dead, too."
And as Sweetie Belle, fatigue making her eyes look so old, turned her head to to purple unicorn, the white alicorn finished the thought. "That's what the screaming was about. Sweetie Belle woke up."
Realization slowly dawned on Rarity. Could it be this was actually not her sister at all? Sweetie Belle nodded at what to her should be a giant, intimidating alicorn and boldly asked "Well then do you have any dead bodies I could use instead? Long dead but mostly uninjured sergal perhaps?" Whatever else this thing was, it still had the frail, weak body of her sister. She wiped her weary eyes again and sighed. "I can tell you're a god-king but I don't remember hardly squat about me. I don't know if I can cause the magic....thing." Another sigh "To move. And no insult to this one's sister but I don't think a very small unicorn has the power to do this with local magic. I'll have to recover."
Rarity wanted to hug her sister tight and promise to find whatever thing would help her get better, but was also repulsed by the thought that something had eaten her sister like some sort of talking intestinal worm.
While she was frozen in inaction the princess turned her full attention, ears erect, at her prized student. "Twilight I hate to impose on you during such hard times, but he was an incredible fighter and I felt his heart was in the right place even if Fluttershy would never forgive him for raising rabbits to eat. I need to get back soon but can you make arrangements somehow? I'll send a guard with money and supplies in the morning."
Rarity wondered why she had even come, having not contributed squat to this meeting and surely experiencing aural hallucinations as evidenced by her baby sister blurting out to the ruler of Equestria, "Whiskey, perhaps a gallon, if you please. Other components this town will have but as small as it is I hate to impose on those few wanting to escape in that way. But I think I can use a more nearly dead-for-good body if I convert the oxygen out of such a catalyst as whiskey."
But apparently she wasn't really hallucinating, as her sister now wore the biggest grin as she continued with a promise not to let any pony drink the alchemical reagents thus brought. "One last thing, dear God King. Do you know my name? I still don't."
The princess sighed deeply, closing her eyes and drooping her head ever so slightly. A stray breeze shifted her unearthly mane to Celestia's left side as she spoke to the small mauve filly. "You warned me that the mouth you were using, was mangling it horribly. I tried to learn your name but the look in your eyes said I wasn't getting it right. I don't know if that is my mistake or yours, Nadsippley."
Rarity saw the princess' ears shift forward. Slowly, inexorably. Quickly Rarity shifted her eyes to what should have been Sweetie Belle. Nothing. No smile, no frown, no tipped head. All her baby sister said was "I'm sorry, that isn't it. But thank you for your help."
The princess nodded, bid them all good night. Then turned and launched herself into the air, giant wings unfurled and glowing as she slowly flapped them. Her speed so disproportionate to her effort compared to the pegasi she was used to watching.
Twilight, now her purple coat barely identifiable without the princess' ambient glow to add to the moonlight, invited everyone back to her library. "We'll try again to get some sleep. Rarity will you please bring Sweetie Belle who might wake up, to bed with you? She'll be very confused I think but Stack is right. If the symbiont and host don't either of them sleep, then the pair is horribly sleep deprived and nonfunctional." Twilight yawned. "I feel awfully nonfunctional already."
After a touching scene in which Sweetie Belle, the real one, woke up and clung tightly to her sister's neck, Twilight heard Rarity try to explain why she couldn't remember what happened, and eventually Sweetie Belle calmed down enough to fall asleep wrapped up in Rarity's hooves. She stayed asleep this time, and eventually Rarity's deep breathing could be heard.
Twilight had a harder time getting to sleep and eventually whispered to Owlicious to bring her some mint tea. Something had tried to eat her junior assistant but he could still fly albeit noisily for an owl. The flapping, three trips in all to bring tea leaves, a cup, and boiling water in a very small bucket seemed not to wake Rarity or Stack. Nad. Whatever the thing in Sweetie Belle was named.
The tea was good; it let her organize her thoughts. But it didn't help her sleep. Fatigue won out anyway and she awoke after the sun was well up to the sound of pegasus wings.
Twilight leapt out of bed and ran to the window, hoping to see the still missing Rainbow Dash. She saw instead, down on the path and well away from the library, a bright yellow pegasus, and two gleaming white, armored pegasi. Fluttershy looked up at the squeaking window and called a greeting that could barely be heard at this distance.
A quick glance showed the fashion pair still asleep, so Twilight opted not to call in return though she knew she could muster the volume to be heard. She waved instead and pulled the window closed in a measured fashion so as not to squeak again, and then cantered as quietly as she could to the front door.
Spike had already let them in at the first knock from the royal guard. "Ordinarily I'm the careful type but Twilight says the monsters don't bother knocking. So if I could keep you out I don't need to try." Dragon logic aside Twilight offered a quick hug to her yellow friend. In these dark times you never knew if your parting with a friend was your last, until you saw them again.
Her voice barely above a whisper fluttershy gave Twilight a report on Rainbow Dash. Namely, there was nothing to report. "I've covered ground as quick as I could but I'm not like Dash. Anyway Big Mac has made arrangements for Granny Smith's funeral and asked if I thought it was too soon to call Applejack gone but it is, isn't it? She's still in hiding or fighting her way back or... Oh Twilight do you think they're OK?"
Twilight momentarily ignored her honored guests who seemed to accept they were second fiddle to close friendships. "I don't know but I want to warn you of something you won't like. There's a problem with Sweetie Belle, but it's not as big as you might think. That's why these gentlecolts are here in fact."
Fluttershy blushed suddenly, glancing askance at the guards to either side of her, then stopped her hover-flight and dropped her head to look up at Twilight silently.
The guard on Twilight's left, who had a jingle in his saddlebags, took this opportunity to speak up. "Is Sweetie Belle the name of the filly we're to assist, then? We received rather cryptic instructions but there's. Well. Whiskey, and a hundred and fifty bits, and sidewalk chalk."
Twilight tried to smile. Friendliness started with the mare in the mirror, she reminded herself. "Yes but they're both asleep, as is Rarity who's had sort of a hard two days. I'm sure they'll be down soon but have you three had breakfast yet I can start some oatmeal cooking. Spike? Water for oatmeal please."
As the baby dragon ran off to the kitchen Fluttershy, having not yet raised her head, looked pleadingly to Twilight. One big breath, but no words. Another try, and she spoke. "Who? Who is with Rarity, Twilight?"
That made Twilight drop her head as low as Fluttershy's. "You remember that ... uh, friendly monster thing? That used claws instead of a horn to cast spells?"
Fluttershy squinted her eyes tightly shut as she responded. "Jack something. The one that ate rabbits and said he couldn't eat anything else." Now her eyes were open, and she raised her head and shook the pink forelock away from her eyes. Steel lined her face as she spoke, now. "I used to feel mad about the rabbits. Really mad but I heard that the other monsters, sergal Jack called them, were eating ponies. Not even killing them just eating ponies and I thought maybe Jack was doing us a kindness. A small kindness to be sure but he would never eat any of us and I don't even think he would eat a pony he never met but I'm not as sure of that."
Twilight saw her friend's normal, worried face come back. "Is Jack up there then? With Sweetie Belle?"
But Twilight couldn't explain because neurons had fired in order and it all made sense now. Not Stack, not Nad, but "Jack! Jack Something! Yes he's" and now her volume came back down as she realized the rest of the story made no sense. "Jack died, fighting on Apple Acres. Only instead of dying he grabbed on to Sweetie Belle who Celestia only knows why she was there. So Sweetie Belle is Jack and that means she won't need rabbits, just oatmeal today."
At that, there was a clop-clopping of hooves, small and large as Sweetie Belle and Rarity came down. Rarity called a greeting to the guards first, and Twilight saw the distress on her face as they said their good mornings to each other.
Sweetie Belle said, before she had finished descending the stairs, "Jack. Chipple. Thank you very, very much Twilight for another important memory. I'm Jack Chipple." Sweetie Belle approached the guards then, though she stole several quick glances at the yellow pony, no look of recognition but more perhaps of frustration. The guard she approached had the whiskey in his packs, and hesitantly asked if the little miss needed it now.
"No, thank you. We need a body first. To which I should add." Here she turned smartly to Twilight and spoke with that accent that unnerved the three mares, Fluttershy most of all because she had never heard this before. Jack's voice had been a bed of gravel shaken by rock tumbler; never easy to understand. But Sweetie Belle would surely grow up to be a singer, or some destiny that would be made better by that clear voice. "Twilight, if we find nothing and you grow impatient of a form, I should say there is a way out. I can take you. You're a strong unicorn, and I could move on far more easily than if I, say, took one of these guards." Here she, Jack, whatever it was, finally noticed the guards' wings and stared briefly before returning to Twilight. "Just as Sweetie Belle will awake, you would fall into a coma and wake when I had a proper body. Keep this in mind and now." She turned to Fluttershy.
"What are you?" No malice, no accusation. Just the confusion of an amnesiac foreigner.
Twilight watched the yellow ears go round and around as Fluttershy searched for a response. "Don't you remember me? I was the one that called you a monster over the rabbits. I'm Fluttershy."
And now it was Sweetie Belle whose ears rotated. "I'm sorry I don't remember and that name doesn't help. But what is right on the tip of my brain's tongue is what you are. Do they call you a pony, miss Fluttershy?"
She muttered an affirmative but it was Rarity now, who spoke up. "Little ... well, maybe Jack isn't little anything but you know the word unicorn -- you just used it. Unicorns are ponies; and pegasi, a pegasus being what each of these three ponies are, are flying ponies."
Twilight pointed a question at the back of the still-staring filly's head. "Is it Jack that has amnesia, or Sweetie Belle?"
At that the filly turned her head, frustration momentarily forgotten. "I don't know, Twilight Sparkle. If I remembered it all I might know, but I've forgotten, so I don't." but the little filly turned resolutely, the steps measured like rolling of a wagon wheel being pulled by a working pony. Facing the guards now, she spoke to both of them, with a gentle if unlilting voice. "I needs must eat, and I suspect you're invited though it's not my house to say. Then we can be off; I have a notion of an idea but no more. Where I battled last, there should be dead of the enemy, and perhaps not all of them were consumed by hungry living enemies. There is the body most easily found that will need the use of your ingredients." Turning to trudge into the kitchen she spoke over her shoulder with hardly a turn to her head. "A small body will need many small meals, and that is how I would like to use the money directed to my use."
Sweetie Belle disappeared behind the swinging double doors, having pushed them with her nose and not even trying to levitate them. Twilight tried to be as gracious as possible, offering breakfast to the guards, who instead dropped their packs and begged for pardon to shop for lunches, in case the trip to Sweet Apple acres was only the start of the trek, and not their true destination. "Wouldn't want the little miss to grow overtired. When she's just herself again she'll need the strength I'd wager."
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Author's note. Yes, those appear to be sergals. I got nothin'. Nothing but Sergals on the brain. So it's a crossover fanfic, eh?
Still plan on writing this with a minimum of body parts. Bits of blood, though. Short scenes, those.
'K. Moving on.