//------------------------------// // Chapter 23: Where, Why, and a Baby // Story: Changeling Fate // by Nightmare Rift //------------------------------// Unknown POV: I see that my ponies weren’t completely useless; at least they captured an Alicorn. Not Celestia, Luna, Twilight, or Cadence, but at least it’s an Alicorn. This means that this is the long lost one, Night Crystal. We must convince her to join our cause and help us bring balance back to the world. Although a little bribery never hurt anypony either. “Scarlet Arrow, Chrome Shield, make sure our prisoner is tied tight. If she escapes I will hunt you down and kill you. Nowhere will be safe for you, not even this Crystal Empire, not the Dragon Lands, not Klugetown, not anywhere,” I bark to the two ponies that I hired from Cloudsdale. “Yes my liege,” they say in unison, scurrying quickly to the prisoner. The plan is coming together. Now it just depends on our most important piece. Night Crystal’s POV: I wake up to see nothing but darkness. I know that whoever decided to capture me clearly doesn’t know that I possess dark magic. They put a magic inhibitor on me, but it doesn’t do anything to stop my dark magic, only light magic. I am bound tightly to a chair, but I try to wiggle anyway just to see if I could loosen it. Nope, nothing. I probe with my dark green magic to notice that the ropes have been tied by pegasi, which is odd, but I won’t question it, yet. “Ah, you finally decide to join us. Good, let’s get started.” “Yes, let us start by you telling me who you are and what you want with me,” I say as bright lights suddenly come on, revealing a severely disfigured pony. This pony is half shadow and half a midnight blue unicorn. The two halves blur together so there is no clear line as to where one starts and the other ends. “Yes, I suppose so. My name is Midnight Star, but most ponies know me as Traveling Storm. I am a bounty hunter. I have my own cause that I am trying to get moving, which is where you come in. I need an Alicorn to support my cause. My cause is to overthrow Celestia, Luna, Cadence, and Twilight, and bring balance of good and bad back to Equestria. None of this ‘Celestia kills or banishes all of her enemies’. Judging by how you have been treating Celestia recently you don’t particularly enjoy her rule either. However, we do need to release Sombra from Limbo. I have been guided by his teachings throughout my life to get this cause up and running. I need him to seal the plan in place, which means I need an Alicorn to bring him back from Limbo. Will you help me?” I pretend to think on this, whereas I technically know that I will definitely not help her/him/them, I don’t know. Since I knew Sombra, and all of these supposed teachings that this pony has been reading are all falsified stories written by other ponies. “No. Now untie me and go find an actual job to contribute to society.” “I won’t take no for an answer, so I have no choice but to remove your cutie mark to make sure you can’t do magic unless I say so.” She starts conjuring up a spell and I writhe in agony pretending my cutie mark is being removed. However, seeing as I am a Changeling, I don’t actually have a cutie mark. “Why isn’t this working? Scarlet Arrow, Chrome Shield, why isn’t my magic working?” “We don’t know, my liege,” a red pegasus mare says, coming into view along with a dark blue pegasus stallion. “I know,” I say smiling and changing into my Changeling form. “I am a Changeling and therefore possess no cutie mark. Also this magic inhibitor is really useless on somepony like me,” I continue, taking off the magic inhibitor with my dark magic. “Now along with all of that, Sombra has no such teachings. I would know, since after all, I was practically his daughter. Secondly, do you want to contribute to society, or would you rather die? Since you tend to frighten others I would think. Judging by how much you have tried to turn yourself into an Umbrum, but only partially succeeding due to it being impossible. So, what’s you answer?” “I would rather die than see this world continue to be ruled by Celestia, or any other Alicorn! So just kill me and get it over with you traitor!” She screams, and I end her life quickly for her sake, and not just for the sake of the two ponies watching this happen. “Now,” I start to say as I teleport out of my restraint, looking at the two pegasi. “What brings you two to be helping out this lunatic?” “Well that’s easy ya see. She offered us a large sum of bits each if we helped her pull this plan off. We got here only to find that she was broke and couldn’t pay us, but when we tried to leave she threatened to kill us. Needless to say, all either of us want to do is go back to Cloudsdale to live a semi normal life, and put this all behind us.” the dark blue stallion says. “Then go. I will not stop you because you were forced to do this, but you must not tell anypony of what transpired here today. Are we clear?” “Yes!” They say in unison and burst out the door. I canter outside to see that I was in an old abandoned house on the outskirts of the Crystal Empire. I switch back to Night Crystal and fly towards the castle in hopes that Candence doesn’t have an important meeting of any kind. I land in front of the entrance to the castle and ask the guards to let me in to see Cadence. They nod, open the doors, and gesture towards the meeting room. I nod my head in thanks and strut off towards the meeting room. So much for not being in a meeting. I reach the room and knock lightly on the door. I hear somepony say come in, and I enter to see Cadence and Shining Armor sitting at the table alone. Cadence and Shining both look exhausted, as I enter they both look up at me and smile. “You are not who we expected to come in. Please join us Night Crystal,” says Cadence, seeming to perk up at the thought. “So who were you two expecting? Secondly, what is going on here that makes both of you look extremely tired?” “We were expecting my advisor that was going to tell me I have another meeting with the leader of some far away land.” “Sitting through all of those meetings, 23 to be exact, has left Cadence and I exhausted and barely able to function. It doesn’t help when Cadence is expecting a baby.” “Goodness Cadence, why didn’t you say something sooner? I know just the thing to make you feel better,” I say pulling two vials out of my saddlebags. “What are those?” asks Cadence with a little more eagerness. “These are your new best friends. This pink vile contains a mixture of poison joke and red tulips. Combining these two together makes a concoction that eases pregnancy cravings and cramps. Just drinking it by itself is fine, I have read that it tastes like bubblegum. This blue vial contains a mixture of blue lilies, black crystal roses, and purple dragon snaps. That, once put into a drink of your choosing, makes fatigue be lessened greatly that comes from dealing with nurturing the baby. Take them, drink up, and then tell me how you feel. As for the fatigue of the meetings, the only thing that will help that is a good night sleep.” Cadence takes the vials, drinks the pink one, procures a glass of tea, dumps the blue vial into that, and then drinks that. Once she is finished with both, her mood improves greatly. “Thank you so much Night Crystal, but where did you learn all of this?” “Old book that I found in an antique store early yesterday. I made two of every recipe in it before setting off here. You can have the other vials of those two. According to the book they last for three months each. So depending on how far along you are I would use these two carefully. Could I possibly stay the night here? I think it is too late to be taking the train back tonight.” “Of course you can. We would be honored to have you stay the night. I’ll take these back to my room and Shining can show you to a guest bedroom up on the second floor. Have a good night,” Cadence says walking off the opposite direction of the meeting room. “Shall we go?” “Of course Shining, lead the way.” As we walk upstairs and down the hallway, I start to think about talking to Shining. Just as I decide to, Shining speaks up. “So, how is Twily doing?” “Pretty good. You know her, off solving friendship problems with her friends almost every other week. But other than that not much for news. How are you holding up Shining? You look as beat up as Cadence and your not even the one carrying the baby.” “Honestly pretty tired. I’ve been running around trying to help Cadence with her cravings and her fatigue, so I am using up all my energy doing that. But even with all of that, I don’t know if I am ready to be a father. The day that Cadence told me that she was pregnant, I almost passed out from fear of what that was going to mean.” “Shining, look at me,” we stop and he looks straight at me. “You are an amazing pony, you are making it through running a whole empire at the same time trying to take care of Cadence. You will be an amazing father, and I can only hope that I can see him or her one day.” “Thank you Night Crystal. Your room is one more room down on your right. It should have the number 258 on it. Good night, and thank you again for your help.” “No worries Shining. Good night.” I enter my room and see that it is lavishly furnished and just right for an Alicorn. I put my saddlebags down on the bedside table and crawl into the bed. I close my eyes and fall into a deep sleep.