Taking in the scene around, Princess Celestia slowly dropped her shocked expression and walked over to the bed. The Mane Six and Spike quickly let go of Starlight. With a sudden tug of powerful magic, Starlight was ripped from the changeling’s grasp and floated gently to the ground. Her friends quickly surrounded her.
“Are you okay?”
“Did Chrysalis hurt you?”
“Did you like the cuddles?”
“Pinkie!”
“Sorry!”
“Girls, look!” Rarity interrupted, pointing past Starlight to the bed. Chrysalis was tossing and turning, her face screwed up, and fumbling as far she could reach with her tied hooves: trying to get back her ‘plushie’. The white unicorn then had an idea. She levitated a spare pillow over to the changeling, dangling it just in front of her. Chrysalis immediately grabbed the pillow and then snuggled it, her face becoming relaxed. She sighed blissfully into the pillow. Everyone else in the room was trying very hard not to laugh at the changeling’s antics, even the Princesses and Thorax.
Pinkie Pie again failed to keep silent, letting out a loud snort of laughter … that quickly ended when Chrysalis frowned again, her eyes flickering open sleepily. The ponies, dragon and changeling all froze … in anticipation … for what? Nopony knew. The changeling still looked feverish. She looked dizzily down at her changed body, and then up at the ponies and other creatures in the room. Chrysalis unexpectantly giggled, and gave a dreamy smile at the ponies.
“Woah. I’m dreaming … but it’s a good *yawn* dream.” The changeling’s eyes closed and her expression became relaxed again. Princess Luna coughed quietly, but pointedly. Everypony turned around to look at her.
“This is unexpected”, the blue alicorn said. Rainbow Dash again rolled her eyes at the second understatement of the day.
“You’re telling me”, Starlight said. She was presently occupied with flicking through the book. Starlight stopped on one particular page, nodded, and then levitated the book towards her friends. “See something familiar?” she said. Applejack’s jaw metaphorically dropped.
“What in tarnation?” Rainbow just stared.
“Whaa…” RainbowDash.exe has stopped working. Need reboot immediately.
Pinkie Pie took a glass of water and then threw it in her face.
“This can’t be … she can’t …” Twilight said, in complete shock. Starlight nodded emphatically.
“The picture is a perfect match”, the pink unicorn said. “Chrysalis, at the moment, looks exactly like Queen –”
“Rosedust”, Celestia whispered. Luna frowned.
“Celly, that’s just wishful thinking. She just happens to look like her. That’s …” The lunar alicorn’s horn glowed, as she cast a detection spell on Chrysalis.
Luna’s jaw dropped. “Celly …”
“I know, Luna.”
Twilight blinked. She turned to look at the other Princesses.
“You know her?!” the purple pony said.
“Yes”, said Princess Celestia.
“Not exactly”, said Princess Luna, at exactly the same time. The royal pony sisters glanced at each other. Celestia decided to explain.
“It all happened a long time ago, Twilight. More than a thousand years ago, Luna and I found a place called ‘Flutter Valley’. It was inhabited by a race of ponies with beautiful, sparkly butterfly-like wings, who called themselves the Flutterponies. Flutter Valley was a paradise: spring and summer seemed to be intermingled together in a valley of beautiful nature. The Flutterponies used their magic to maintain the peace and harmony of their home and protect it from anyone who wished to harm it. We made friends with the Flutterponies, and their Queen: Queen Rosedust.”
Luna then took over the commentary.
“Every other month for 5 years, we went to Flutter Valley to visit our friends and have fun …”
“Fun!” Pinkie Pie started to bounce up and down extremely fast. “Like parties? Did you go to parties there? What were they like? Sarsaparillas? Balloons? Did they have a party cannon?!”
The blue alicorn just blinked.
Twilight magically grasped and lowered the party pony to the ground. She gave her a meaningful stare. Luna’s telling us something important. Ssshh.
Princess Luna decided to resume talking, albeit hesitantly.
“Err, right … well, we did have parties there on special occasions. Sometimes, Queen Rosedust visited Equestria. The foals and fillies adored her, especially her wings. Then…” the lunar alicorn said, and then fell silent. Her expression and that of her sister had suddenly become grim, very grim. The silence in the room seemed to be deafening.
“What happened?” asked Starlight, her ears flat against her head.
“It was the day of Queen Rosedust’s 107th birthday. We’d been invited to Flutter Valley by special flower invitations. We came as quickly as we could to Flutter Valley, only to find total devastation.” Luna paused again, to shocked gasps, eeps, and looks of shock from the rest of the ponies (not counting Celestia), Spike, and Thorax.
“All of the buildings and trees were shredded, the animals had gone, and the valley itself looked it had been washed clean of flowers and plants. But those things were not the worst of it. The worst thing was that the Flutterponies had … disappeared!” The lunar princess’s voice grew a bit wobbly. Celestia patted her sister comfortingly on the shoulder.
“Luna and I searched for ages, and talked to the leaders of the other nations nearby,” the white alicorn said. “Tragically, we never found out what exactly happened to the Flutterponies … but we always wondered. Now, however, we may have found a clue.” Celestia took a step forward and pointed directly at Chrysalis on the bed.
The rainbow pegasus’s jaw metaphorically dropped again. She started to splutter.
“You can’t be serious? The Changelings are the Flutterponies?!”
Thorax was completely gobsmacked.
Starlight broke the communal state of shock. “Maybe Chrysalis knows what happened?” she suggested.
“It’s a good idea, Starlight. Perhaps we could ask her the next time she wakes up?” The other ponies, dragon, and multicoloured changeling all nodded.
A sudden thought came to the purple alicorn’s mind.
“Celestia, do you know if Shining Armour and Cadence are going to come here or not?” Twilight asked.
“Well I did tell them about a very ill Chrysalis being found in a clearing, but they might not be here for some time.”
“How come?”
“Poor Flurry Heart has had a very bad temperature for the last couple of days, and so her parents had been giving her 20-hour care.” The thought of a sick Flurry Heart made Fluttershy’s expression droop and become fearful.
“Oh dear, I hope Flurry Heart will be better soon”, the yellow pegasus murmured. “She will be better, won’t she?” Fluttershy asked the sun princess. Celestia nodded, and smiled.
“Yes, she will”, the white alicorn said.
While this conversation had been going on, Thorax slowly walked over to the bed. Looking at the former queen’s sick state, he sighed.
“Oh mother, what have you done to yourself?” the multicoloured changeling said quietly. Starlight blinked in surprise. Had she heard right?
“Why do you call her ‘mother’?” the pink unicorn asked Thorax.
“Even though she was evil, she’d cared for the Changelings; each and every one of us”, Thorax explained. “She is the mother to all of us, after all.” The purple alicorn smiled at him.
“You’ve certainly learnt to forgive others, Thorax … even some who did bad things to you”, she said. Twilight’s smile slipped slightly as she thought about Trixie. “Yeah, it’s hard sometimes to do it to people who’ve meant you harm in the past.” The changeling leader nodded.
“Oh, I wish she was awake”, Thorax murmured, “so I could apologise …” The orange mare frowned.
“What for?” she said warily.
“For running away like that. I guess I should have told her about my feelings … the need for friendship. If I had, maybe she might not have kidnapped you.” Thorax’s ears flattened. “No wonder, she was upset.” Starlight frowned deeply.
“That doesn’t excuse Chrysalis trying to drain you, though.” Rarity’s stomach suddenly rumbled. It reminded the Mane Six, Spike and Starlight that they’d left breakfast half-finished.
“Girls, I just remembered that we’d left most of our breakfast behind when we rushed over here”, Starlight said. The pink unicorn winked at her friends. “I vote we go back and finish it.” Her friends all whooped and cheered.
“I second that vote!”
“Woohoo!”
“Eeyup!”
“Me first, me first!” Pinkie Pie grinned widely.
“We were only onto the pancakes”, she said. “There’re still cakes, biscuits and ooh … caramel!” Celestia and Luna’s eyes lit up.
“Er, can we join you?” the white alicorn said, trying not to lick her lips at the thought of ‘delicious cakes’. Luna’s ears only had to process one word: caramel, for her mind to instantly agree with her sister’s query. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes! The blue princess tried a charming smile.
“Yes, we only had a very light breakfast … yes … light breakfast, heh…” Applejack rolled her eyes. Luna was even worse than she was at lying! Starlight turned to Thorax.
“Thorax, do you want to come to breakfast with us?” she asked. The multi-coloured changeling smiled, but shook his head.
“I’m sorry but I have to go back to the rest of the Changelings”, he said. “After what I’ve discovered this morning, I think that they need to know about it.” The pink unicorn acknowledged this with a nod of her head.
The Mane Six, Starlight, Thorax and the Princesses all turned and walked out of Chrysalis’s room. Spike shut the door quietly behind him, before following his friends.