"Pears."
"What did you say?"
"Pears," Chrysalis repeated, walking towards Twilight, "it tasted like pears."
Twilight quizzically lifted her eyebrows, then turned back with a shrug and went back to cleaning the room. Pinkie's decoration had unfortunately not vanished in the same way they'd appeared, but all the others seemingly had when the party had been over and the time to clean had come. She was focused in her sweeping when she heard someone knock on the door to the castle.
"Can I go see who it is?" Chrysalis asked.
"Well, I think it would be better if you stayed here and I checked instead," Twilight replied while placing her broom to rest near a table, "after all I haven't officially announced your reformation yet and you might scare some..." Twilight stopped as she realised that the changeling had already left the room. She teleported herself in the corridor and began to run towards the front doors.
She was about midway through when a bright flash of light went off in front of her and a unicorn materialised in front of her. "Twilight!" the unicorn screamed as she saw her.
Twilight stopped and looked at the other. "Starlight?" she asked.
Starlight's breath was ragged, her mane dishevelled, her eyes nervously darting back and forth as she fidgeted in place with her hooves, her body shacking. "Twilight!" she screamed again, grabbing the alicorn's head. "There's a thing in the castle! I wasn't able to see much other than a colourful blur. It attacked us and tried to suffocate me! Now it's focused on Spike, but I don't know how long he'll last. We need to stop it."
Twilight shook herself off of her friend's hold. "Don't worry, Starlight, she doesn't mean any harm. She just has a bit of trouble when it comes to meeting others for the first time. But don't worry, she's good."
Starlight looked at Twilight with an uncertain gaze, still panting. "Are you sure? Because she didn't seem that friendly to me. And who is she, anyway."
"Chrysalis," Twilight replied, smiling.
Starlight jerked backwards, startled by the name. She grabbed Twilight's head and began to shake it, staring in her friend's eyes. "Twilight! I think Chrysalis has been hypnotising you! Please, if you're in there, please wake up!"
Twilight tore her head away from Starlight's grip. "Starlight, I'm not being hypnotised. There's nothing evil about Chrysalis, she-"
"No! It's too late!" Starlight began to speak to herself as she panicked. "She's already fully under her control! Chrysalis must have come here to finally take her revenge upon me!" Starlight lay with her back against a wall, putting a hoof over her forehead. "It's too late, I arrived too late. I need to get out of here, run away before she catches me, or who knows what she'll do to me. I need to get help! Maybe Trixie can-Oh, who am I kidding, I need competent help. Princess Celestia will-Oh, who am I kidding." Starlight rubbed her temple. "I need competent help. Princess Luna will probably be okay with helping me if I tell her that Twilight is in danger. She might even make me a princess if I defeat Chrysalis again."
"Starlight, I-"
Starlight got back to her hooves and began to rub one of them beneath her chin, thinking. "Yeah, this might be a good chance to finally get those wings. And if poor, poor Twilight were to lose her powers during the battle, then my victory against Chrysalis would be even more important. I just need to make it look like her magic was drained by a changeling and then-"
She was interrupted by a new flash of magic, from which Chrysalis emerged, holding the unconscious body of a young purple dragon.
"Ah! Don't eat me please!" Starlight screamed as she saw the Changeling Queen.
Chrysalis dropped Spike's body and jumped at Starlight, constricting her into a hug.
"Chrysalis, this is Starlight," Twilight said.
Chrysalis distanced her head a bit to get a better look at the unicorn she was depriving of air. "Starlight?" she curiously asked. She then went back to hugging her even tighter. "Starlight! Celestia said that I had a thing for you! I don't remember anything about it, but if she said it it must be true, so we'll probably be best friends now."
Starlight gasped for air. "Help me," she silently muttered out to Twilight, desperately stretching a hoof towards the alicorn.
Twilight considered the idea of freeing her, then thought about what the unicorn had been saying. She decided to remain silent for a few moments, but eventually spoke when she noticed that Starlight was about to pass out. "Chrysalis, I know you're excited to meet somepony new, but could you avoid suffocating Starlight?"
Chrysalis looked at Twilight, then at Starlight's barely moving body. "Sorry," she sheepishly said, letting go of the unicorn and rubbing the back of her head with a hoof.
Twilight offered a hoof to Starlight to help her get up. "Starlight, this is Chrysalis. The new one. I would have organised a proper meeting, but you and Spike came back earlier than expected."
Starlight, still trying to catch her breath, turned to the changeling and finally noticed how her appearance had changed, being now much more rainbow-coloured and moose like. Or not, she'd never actually seen a moose, but for some reason she felt reformed changelings looked like moose. Almost as if some otherworldly being of great power and wisdom had once referred to them as rainbow moose things. Obnoxious rainbow moose things.
As Starlight had been making those considerations, Chrysalis had slowly moved closer to the unicorn, and was now practically staring at her mane at such a short distance that she could have easily bitten into it. Which, weirdly enough for the unicorn, looked just like what she wanted to do.
Starlight gently pushed the changeling away with her magic. "So, she's good now. That's... awesome, really. Can I talk to you in private, Twilight?" she asked, turning to the alicorn as her eyes nervously looked back at the changeling, who was still moving closer despite the fact that she was sitting and that she wasn't visibly moving any part of her body. It was almost like she willed herself forward.
"Well, I don't really want to leave her alone, but if you think it's important..."
Starlight vigorously nodded.
Twilight craned her neck to get a better look at the changeling. "Chrysalis, if I tell you to stay here will you do it?"
"Sure!" Chrysalis passionately replied. She then grabbed Spike's still unconscious body. "Can I play with him while you're gone?"
"Sure." Twilight walked away and inside the nearest room, followed by Starlight.
As soon as they entered the unicorn shut the door behind her and turned to the alicorn. "Twilight, you can't tell me you really trust her! She's Chrysalis!"
Twilight smiled. "Oh, Starlight, trust me, if you'd been there in Canterlot to see how things happened you wouldn't doubt her. Besides, everyone deserves a second chance, right?"
"I gave her one, and she refused it. Now she's out for revenge!"
"Starlight, I think you're overreacting." Twilight placed a hoof over the unicorn's shoulder. "After all, you changed after refusing my first offer, too."
"Yeah, and you remember what I did in between those two things, right?" Starlight looked at Twilight, still unconvinced.
"Oh, come on, Starlight. Do you need me to get Princess Celestia to write a letter stating that she believes Chrysalis to no longer be of any danger? Because-"
"No danger? She almost made me pass out! And look at what she did to Spike." Starlight opened the door and peeked into the corridor, Twilight's head doing the same just above her.
Chrysalis was using her magic to repeatedly throw Spike's body forward with his wings outstretched, watching him glide into the air. The process ended with the dragon's body smashing against the floor or a wall, Chrysalis then picking him back up and starting over.
Starlight closed the door once more. "No danger?" she asked as she turned back towards Twilight.
Twilight rubbed the back of her neck. "Okay. No intentional danger is what I meant to say. But it's not like you didn't do this sort of things when you were my student."
"That's exactly the problem, Twilight, she's even worse than I was at pret-I mean..." Starlight began to awkwardly cough, nervously scanning Twilight's features. "What I meant to say is that she's far worse than I was. She's clearly pretending to be reformed, while in reality she plans to gain your trust and use you to surge to a position of power that will allow her to drain away your magic, thus gaining the ability to take over all of Equestria."
"Starlight, please, trust me with this one." Twilight shook her head. "Besides, what would she do, anyway?"
"Lure you in the middle of a giant power conversion rune designed around Starswirl's principles and reinforced with magic crystals?" Starlight blurted out. She then lifted her hooves up to cover her mouth and began to shift her wide-eyed gaze between herself and Twilight.
"I don't think that would work, really." Twilight replied, too distracted by thinking about what she'd just heard to notice the unicorn's distress.
"If I can ask, why?" Starlight said after a few moments of hesitation.
"The principles were designed with unicorns in mind, and the crystals would likely start to resonate and then interfere with each other. Shards taken from Chrysalis's old throne, however..." Twilight trailed off, losing herself in her own mental calculations and begging to pace around the room while looking at the ceiling and muttering to herself.
"Twilight?" Starlight called, but she received no answer. She tried again. She was about to try once more when Twilight startled her.
"I got it!" the purple alicorn proudly proclaimed, "I know the perfect combination of runes and artefacts to drain away my powers."
"Could you write that down for me later?" Starlight asked. She then turned to open the door, staring out again.
Chrysalis was using Spike's body like a small bouncing ball. She supplied for the reptile's natural lack of bounciness by bouncing him off of the ceiling rather than off of the ground.
Starlight looked back at Twilight. "Fine, I'll give her a chance."
Twilight smiled.
They both walked out in the corridor and Starlight walked up to Chrysalis. "I'm sorry for how I reacted before. I would like to be your friend."
Chrysalis threw Spike's body away and jumped onto Starlight, once more constricting the poor unicorn with her hug. "Of course! We'll be the best-est of friends!"
Twilight gave a worried look to the changeling, slightly nudging her head forward.
Chrysalis followed Twilight's look to see her own hooves pressing against Starlight's back, as well as the unicorn's failed attempts at formulating a sentence. She guiltily eased her grip.
Starlight drew back, catching her breath, but after a stern look from Twilight she move forward to hug Chrysalis back. Once her head was to the side of the changeling's she moved her mouth to the other's ear. "You better watch out, Chrysalis, this castle has only room enough for one villain pretending to be Twilight's friend."
Chrysalis withdrew from the embrace, a worried look on her face. "Oh dear," she said, bringing a hoof to her mouth, "that's a terrible policy. What if someone came in and pretended to be her friend? Does Twilight know about this? We should warn her, I mean, how can she not even be able to trust someone claiming to be her friend in her own castle?"
Starlight gave her a perplexed look, tilting her head to the side. "Twilight, did she hit her head somewhere?"
"Well, she smashed through a window, and she's been a little clumsy since then." Twilight walked up to Starlight's side. "But she's got nothing but the best of intentions. Isn't that right, Chrysalis?"
The changeling did not answer. She was intent on studying Spike's wings. She accidentally dropped one of them over her eyes. She began to turn her head around, confused, and suddenly got up, beginning to move around. She then dashed off and hit a wall, which caused her to fall on her back, her legs curled up on top of her and jerkily twitching like those of a bug that had been turned upside down.
Starlight looked on with a puzzled expression. "So, Twilight, what exactly happened in Canterlot?"