//------------------------------// // S3 CH 5: Chrysalis // Story: The Story of Twilight Glow // by Jeweled Pen //------------------------------// “Now then. Shall we start from the beginning?” Twilight asked. “The invasion plans?” Chrysalis asked, sighing. “No, before that. Namely, who ARE the changelings?” “… I’m sorry?” “Where do you come from? I mean, do you know? Not all--” “I was the first,” Chrysalis said with a sigh. “Long, long ago. I was the first changeling.” The earth pony froze, her mouth falling open slightly. “You… were? How long ago was...” “Older even than many of you ponies could believe. Back, in ages past, when your princesses were young,” Chrysalis whispered. “I was the first. The queen, who ruled. We were born of a corrupted, foul tree in a magical spring.” Twilight froze, her eyes narrowing. “You’re… bucking with me. Aren’t you? That’d make you… well over a thousand years old.” “Your princesses are of that age, are they not?” “Well, yes, but--” “As am I. I have led my creatures for over a thousand years, surviving. Fighting. Reveling. We have--” “Wait wait wait. Your birth. This spring, what happened to it? What do you mean you were born from it? Can you please go into more detail?” Chrysalis rolled her eyes. “Very well, if you so insist. Far to the east, there was a magical spring. From it, sprang a great, carnivorous plant. It devoured all it could. Insect. Animals. Other plants. However, one day it was damaged, cut by something. I… do believe it was a pony, but that was so, so long ago that I cannot be certain. I believe it may have even been the… Starswirl the Bearded, but I cannot say for certain that it was him. It may just be that that was one of the few ponies of the time who’s life coincided with my birth, and now I just believe it is him. Of no matter. When the tree was damaged, I was born, as were many of the first of my hive.” “Wow… are any of them still around?” The queen sighed and shook her head. “No. I, like your princesses, do not seem to age or die of such things. My subjects, however, can and often do fade. It’s quite...” “Saddening?” Twilight offered. “Bothersome,” Chrysalis corrected. “I’d only just get to know a changeling and then bam, they’d die off. After a point, I just stopped caring. Individually, my hive is pathetic and weak.” She made a gesture towards the cell. “I mean, look at this situation. I was imprisoned and captured. They should have hidden, found or made a new queen. Or at least tried. There are three off the top of my head who would have been possibly able. Instead, they came barreling forth, to be imprisoned. They told of our one weapon to defeat you ponies and allowed it to be destroyed. They are disposable foals.” The earth pony blinked, eyeing the creature. Slowly, she nodded. “… I see. If your hive died off, could you survive?” The ruler snorted. “Of course. I am the strongest of us. I have survived a thousand years, I have--” “Has your hive died off before?” Twilight interrupted her. The queen froze, her eyes wide. “E-ex… excuse me?” “Your hive. The entirety of your hive. Has it died off before?” “… I do not wish to answer that question.” “I can get Moondancer back down here to start the next slide--” “YES!” the ruler yelled, standing up fully on her cot. “Yes, you vile pony! It has! The entirety of my hive has died three times! THREE TIMES! Are you HAPPY?! But I have risen again, my hive has risen again, born anew! You believe you have won? This is only a delay. One day, I will be free and my hive will begin again. This time, I won’t allow any of you ponies to… I will escape. Mark my words. I will escape and I will have my vengeance. My fifth hive will be stronger than you ever imagined!” she yelled. Twilight stared at the ruler. Finally, she gave a small nod. “I think I’m beginning to understand...” Chrysalis snorted. “Understand what?” “You’ve lost your hive three times. You’re on the verge of losing it a fourth time. To be blunt… everypony you’ve ever known, ever cared for, has died. You care about your hive though, don’t you? It hurts knowing they’re all going to die if you don’t do anything, but you’re helpless right now, aren’t you?” The changeling snorted. “I care not if they die.” “Yes you do. If you didn’t, you wouldn’t think they should just abandon you. You’d be more mad that they failed. But you call them your changelings, your subjects. Your hive as a whole means a lot to you. You call them bothersome and that you stopped caring. But the hive is important to you, isn’t it?” the earth pony mumbled, slowly writing in her notes. “I’m sorry. I’m not surprised you feel this way.” The ruler snorted. “Oh? And how--” “Easy. You’re over a thousand years old, correct? You’ve lived a very, very long time. Individual changelings, even if they live a hundred years, would only live a fraction of that time. While to them, you’d be an unmoving beacon, something that is eternal. To you? They probably felt almost like… pets, I guess might be a close word. Not quite right, but close. But the hive? The hive is something else entirely. You seem far more protective of that. Which I suppose makes sense. How many hundreds of years would a hive live? How long had your first?” Chrysalis was silent for a long, long moment. “… I can get--” “I do not know. It was… not long, however. The first died off, as I was inexperienced. I did not know how to properly feed us. I could feed myself but… the hive? No. The second… I made a mistake. The third, I… I just... However, this hive...” Twilight glanced up, her breath stopping. She didn’t know if the queen truly was sad, or faking. For all she knew, all of this was just made up. Pretend. But she had to keep pushing. She knew she was being a bit harsher than she liked. Perhaps even a bit too rough. But an entire species hung in the balance. “This hive has… existed… for centuries. Most of my life. It was… I learned. I learned so much from my first mistakes. The first starved to death. The second was destroyed due to my arrogance. The third from my weakness. But the fourth? We took love. We managed to grow strong. For centuries, we thrived.” She lightly tapped the ground. “Do you know how many creatures have fallen beneath my hoof? How many of you ponies? We were careful, of course. I learned. We tricked ponies, betrayed them. Made them believe we were something other than we were. Then, once we were in control? We drained all of their love. Drop by drop. We fed on them.” “Then what happened?” Twilight asked. “I’m sorry?” “Your hive was starving and desperate, correct? So what happened to bring them to this point?” “We… ran out of food, we--” “No, there’s more to it than that. You were invading and taking ponies, weren’t you? But you couldn’t any more, could you? Something changed.” Chrysalis sighed. “Your ruler. Not this one, your past one. Celestia. We… fought, in ages past. A century? Two? When we were trying to take from you ponies again. She...” The changeling lifted her hooves. “These holes? She did them. She nearly killed me. From then, well… all changelings have been born with them. The wounds she created in me have not healed. Will not heal. Were we to face her wrath again, we would be eliminated.” “… But you were planning to, weren’t you?” Twilight asked softly. The changeling queen glanced away, once again annoyance flashing on her features. “Because you were desperate. Equestria stood out as a beacon of love, food. And your hive was dying around you. You were going to risk it, in order to stop this hive from dying.” “It was an all you could eat buffet. What else--” “And then what?” “… What?” “Your methods were not sustainable,” Twilight said firmly. “Your hive, it was once big. Correct? But whenever you devoured areas, cities… anything else. What happened?” “We moved on, what else?” Chrysalis offered with a roll of her eyes. “And it wasn’t sustainable, was it? You basically burned the land as you traveled, devouring and destroying everything you could. Eventually, you were bound to hit this point.” The changeling snorted. “Oh? And what point was that?” “Either there was nothing left for you to eat, or the things you could eat were going to be too strong for you to eat. What about after Equestria? Assuming you succeeded. Assuming you managed to eat ALL of the love in Equestria. What then?” The ruler sighed. “Equestria would have fed us for a hundred, perhaps hundreds, of years. When we required sustenance again, something new would have come up.” Twilight sighed. “Do you know how Equestria’s population has increased over the last thousand years? How rapidly?” The changeling shrugged. “Why would I know, or care?” “Re-usable resources, basically. Agriculture, for one. We’ve managed to create more and more food out of the same spot, allowing more ponies to be fed. Equestria, itself, hasn’t grown in… well, ages. But the population has, incredibly. We depend on these resources to survive. It’s why we’re careful with the ground we use. Why we manage the weather the way we do. Why everything we do is so careful with the limited space we have. The same land and resources are used repeatedly, again and again. And--” “Yes, yes. This is basic. What does this have to do with ANYTHING?” Chrysalis asked, rolling her eyes. “I didn’t know you were going to BORE me to death.” “My point is, love isn’t finite. You don’t HAVE to drain all of us. You don’t have to drain any of us! You’re gorging, destroying everything in your path. But when you do that, there’s nothing for later. Rather than plucking a dozen apples out of a tree, you destroy the tree entirely for the same dozen apples! How many changelings are there now? A few dozen? You could live here. Thrive here. You could--” The changeling gave a soft, mirth filled laugh. “Ah, I see, now. This is what you meant by ‘save us’, isn’t it? Helping us? Oh, yes. Let’s take the hand out from the ponies. Pathetic,” the queen said with a light snicker. “Let me guess. YOU are willing to share your love to feed my subjects?” “Oh, buck no.” That startled the queen, her eyes narrowing suspiciously. “Then… why would you...” “But I know a pony who can. I know the absolute BEST pony for the job. I just require Nightmare Moon to sign off on this little test. More importantly… well… I need details.” “Details.” “And your help.” “Why would I help?” “Because the hive is your responsibility. If you don’t want it to die off, you have to help.” Twilight sighed and closed her eyes. “The fact is… they’re dying. Your subjects? All of them are dying. They’re starving again. Just like your first hive. You can pretend you don’t care, but I can see you do. Maybe you’re right. Maybe you will escape. Maybe you’ll be able to run off and form a fifth hive. But it won’t be like them, will it? It won’t be the fourth. The one you held for… who knows how long. Every memory, every thought. Every good and bad memory will be in the past. Because they’ll all be gone. This is your only chance. I am your only chance. But I need your help. I cannot do this on my own.” Chrysalis stared at her for a long while. Then, finally, she burst into laughter. “Oh, you silly, silly pony.” “Huh?” “You really have woven this entire narrative into your mind, haven’t you? ‘Oh, poor Queen Chrysalis, lost her hive and now she’s going to lose another. Boo hoo hoo. If I reach out and talk to her, surely she’ll be super nice and helpful and we’ll all eat cupcakes and be bestest best friends!’ Blech,” the ruler said with a shake of her head. “I do not care. If they die? It’s hardly my problem. The only thing I care about is the loss of my power.” “But--” “That’s it. That’s all. Nothing more, nothing less.” “But--” “I’ll eventually escape and I’ll make the fifth hive. I don’t care about your little plans to, what, save us? You don’t actually believe that dribble, do you? As if I could care about them? My hive was dying when we first came here, so--” “Then why did you come here?” Twilight asked softly. “Equestria is a bastion of love and--” “No. It was. But it’s not now, is it?” the earth pony asked. Chrysalis stared at her. Finally, she shook her head. “Of course it is. Why else would--” “When Nightmare Moon came here, that love? It died. So much of it just… disappeared. It stopped all of your plans, didn’t it?” The changeling shook her head. “N-no. I don’t know--” “Don’t lie to me, Chrysalis. You came here. You didn’t have to. You put yourself, personally, at risk. You tried to trick Nightmare Moon. You had to know how dangerous this was. If all you cared about was yourself, you could have let the hive die off. You could have done this all, personally. Fed yourself. Found a new way to gain love. Eventually started again. This? This was a move of desperation. You were trying to save what little you had left. Because you care.” Twilight glanced down at her notes. “And you’re scared if we know that, that we’ll use it against you, aren’t you? That we’ll hurt your changelings, we’ll hurt you, even more than we already have. Right?” The ruler didn’t respond, her eyes turned to the side. “… I want to help you. Please. Chrysalis. Let me help you. Let me help your changelings. It… it can be done.” “… Who told you?” “Told me?” “About the love. About… all of that. Did your ruler tear it out from my subjects?” Twilight sighed, glancing around. Finally she spoke up. “I can promise you. Changelings CAN live with ponies. They can survive, without destroying or attacking us. We can live in peace, as friends. But I need your help. I need you to get them to help me. Ponies need to know who and what you are. What you need, what you want. You can keep trying to be nasty, cruel, pretend you don’t care. Pretend you’ll just wait all this out. But your hive will die. And you might, as well.” “I don’t--” “Don’t tell me you don’t care,” Twilight snapped, her eyes narrowing. “Your hive. Your changelings. Your responsibility. I’m not stupid. I’m not easily fooled.” She heard Tirek snort, but she ignored it. “If you won’t help them, then they will die. And it won’t be my fault, or Nightmare Moon’s. It’ll be yours. Because you were too stubborn to risk accepting help from a pony. Because you were scared of what Nightmare Moon would do to you. Because you let the only chance slip between your hooves.” Chrysalis glowered at the mare, her body quivering with anger. Finally she rolled her eyes. “Very well, little pony. I do not care. BUT! If it will make you cease your endless prattling, I will continue on with your experiment. I will tell my subjects to assist you in this endeavor. Will that be enough?” Twilight nodded. “That’s all I ask. Past that, leave it to me.” She then paused, before sighing. “… Could you really feed your hive on the amount of love here, for centuries? How much could you feed after the moon came?” “...” “I’ll try my best, your highness. I promise. I’ll do everything I can to help your people. You may have attacked us… but you were desperate. I still have a lot to learn about how you operate, but--” “You had seven slides based on our mathematical love intake. How did you even calculate that? What more could you need to learn?” Twilight was silent for a moment before shaking her head. “… Good guess? Was it accurate?” “I don’t know. Well, listen here… earth pony. I have agreed to help you. I will hold you to your word. You want friendship? You want us to live in peace? I do not believe it is possible. But perhaps I am wrong. Perhaps you, little pony, will succeed.” Her eyes narrowed. “Now, leave me. I wish to rest.” The earth pony nodded and turned, starting to make her way up the stairs. However, she paused a few steps up when she heard them talking behind her. “Is she always so… that?” Chrysalis asked. “… Yes. You get used to it,” Tirek said in resignation. “I thought Twilight of the Ten Thousand Speeches was a joke when I first heard it.” “I’ve heard her speeches to Nightmare Moon are legendary. One was even written down and now hangs in their library, or so they say.” Twilight rolled her eyes and continued her walking. Really? The library? Why would anypony record any of her rants? Most of the time she was just yelling at Nightmare Moon in a mixture of anger, frustration and fear. They weren’t anything worth remembering. Speaking of speeches, she wondered if she should try and prep one before she spoke with the ruler about gathering a few of the changelings for this experiment. ------ “Err, your highness?” Twilight gulped and lightly tapped on the door to Nightmare Moon’s room. It had taken her hours to prepare and fill everything out, but she was ready. For something like this, she suspected delivering it to the ruler’s room, rather than in front of others, was the safest bet. However, at the sound of her hooves on the door she heard a light shriek from inside, followed by clattering. After a moment, there was a light cough. “C-come in, bard.” The earth pony paused, but slowly opened the door. Inside she found Nightmare Moon standing in front of her bed. She couldn’t be certain, but she was sure she could hear something rummaging about under the bed. Did she smell a hint of chocolate in the air as well? “Err, your highness… is this a bad time?” “Of course not,” the ruler said defensively, rising to her full height. “Whatever it is that has summoned you to us at such an hour must be of grave importance. Make it quick.” Twilight eyed the alicorn suspiciously. She wasn’t sure, but she swore that the mare seemed embarrassed. She glanced around the room and caught sight of some wrapping paper on the desk. Nightmare Moon followed her gaze and, with a cough, her magic gripped the paper and threw it into a dresser drawer. “If there is nothing you wish to speak of, bard, we would like to return to our work. We are quite busy, you see. We are in the midst of dealing with a situation in Ponyville.” The earth pony paused, her mouth falling open. “Wait, Ponyville?” she asked softly. “Yes. Ponyville.” “Is there anything I can do to help?” the earth pony asked, her heart beating faster. What if her friends were in danger? “It is nothing of great import. There is nothing you can--” There was a light clatter from under the bed and Nightmare Moon froze, her cheeks almost turning red. “As a matter of fact, we believe you would be perfect in assisting them for this! Join with Moondancer immediately, she will be heading to aid the ponies within the hour!” the ruler said quickly. Twilight’s eyed the ruler. Something definitely had the ruler embarrassed. What in Equestria would make the mare so nervous? There was another clatter and now she was certain she saw the ruler’s cheeks turn red. “Of… course. I will depart immediately. But, before I go, I do need to speak with you about the changelings.” Her eyes narrowed slightly when she saw the ruler push her back left hoof back, pushing something deeper under the bed. There was that clatter again. “What? Changelings? Yes. Do whatever you wish of them,” the ruler said quickly. “Is that all?” “Err, I’d need you to permit me to take some of them from Tartarus, but--” “Of course, of course, do as you wish! Deal with them as you will,” Nightmare Moon said quicker. “… I think… ten would do...” “Yes. Have the request delivered to me and I will--” “I actually have it right here!” Twilight said proudly, sliding out a small piece of paper from her saddlebag. “I only need your signature and--” A pen flew across the room, signing the paper in a moment. “Is that all, bard?” “… Yes, your highness… thank you. I’ll get Spike and we’ll join with Moondancer immediately,” Twilight said, bowing her head and quickly backing away, before walking out the door. She shook her head and glanced back. She didn’t want to imagine what dark and horrifying things Nightmare Moon was doing in her room. Probably summoning monsters or preparing for some great apocalypse. ------ Nightmare Moon sighed with relief once her bard had left. She quickly locked the door before lifting up the covers of the bed, revealing the small, chocolate moose that was trying, and failing, to walk while laying on its side, bumping around the place. She gripped it in her magic before pulling it out, letting it rest on the bed. The spells that protected it from dirt and gave it life would have long since faded, if she hadn’t renewed them. But, as it was, the gift she had received from Spike had become just a simple amusing toy. She was too old for toys. Rulers of Equestria didn’t have such things. She was a mature, responsible pony who had to maintain the dignity of her office at all times. Who had to maintain her rule without the slightest hint of weakness. She should have destroyed or eaten the moose, it was the logical thing to do. She stared down at the chocolate treat, watching it bumble around her bed. She should show her sister, Tia would love-- She froze in place. How could she allow such a thought in her mind? She focused and snuffed the desire out a moment later. She then picked up the moose, eyeing it while considering its fate. After a few seconds, the wrapping paper flew out from the drawer, enveloping the moose once again and making it go still. She was ruler of Equestria. She didn’t require gifts or toys. Still, it didn’t mean she couldn’t, sometimes, allow herself to appreciate them. A ruler had to show proper respect at all times to the treasures given by her subjects. The neatly wrapped toy was slid back into the dresser drawers, hidden under her regalia.