//------------------------------// // 06. | You Can't Forgive, You Can't Forget // Story: Crystals & Chitin // by Nytus //------------------------------// “I love you.” I don’t think I slept at all that night. It made no sense to me, but for some reason, those whispered words on the edge of sleep bothered me. This one feels… off, was my only conclusion as I rolled out of my blankets, grabbed the burlap bag the young mare had been dragging in the day before—and promptly forgot about upon seeing the bathtub—and swung it up onto my back, holding it in place with my teeth as I walked outside. I left our schoolhouse sanctuary several hours before dawn and long before the affected’s morning roll-call at the palace. For whatever reason, I chose to remain ‘Headway’ as I made my way through empty streets. There really wasn’t what you’d call a morning chill, thanks to the Crystal Heart’s aura surrounding the city, but it was still noticeably brisker before the aura’s artificial sunrise made itself known. I convinced myself that the layers of fur and fat in my pony form was what made the choice logical. It’s not like she’s the first pony to fall for me, I am reasonably well practiced after all. This is what infiltrators are trained to do... I am just giving the situation more weight than it deserves because of how overfed I feel right now. That’s all. Alternatively, maybe it’s how similar this whole Crystalling thing is to our own process of recharging love crystals? The chance of extending my reserve supply may be making me act more lenient toward the pony. I mean, creating an infatuation to feed off of is perfectly routine. Yeah, there is nothing special about her. Buckholme Syndrome can affect both parties, given a long enough period of isolation. I just need to complete my mission and get out of here. It wasn’t until the buildings on either side of me began to grow into immensity that I cleared my mind and decided it would be prudent to be a little more inconspicuous. The affluent part of town was entirely too close to the palace to be lost in contemplation, even if most of the guards were still asleep elsewhere in the city. I mean, it wouldn’t hurt to put together one of these so-called Crystallings for her, or at least something vaguely resembling one. I could refill one of the love crystals and make her happy at the same time. Bah! She’s just a pony, a common prey animal who happens to possess speech. How significant an archaic ritual is to her is irrelevant. Except... Shaking my head viciously, I stepped inside a gated wall surrounding one of the mansions surrounding the crystalline spire that acted as the castle of the empire. Like all nobles and aristocrats the world over, the owners of this home overdid everything. They obviously had an inflated notion of their own importance. There was a massive garden full of overgrown rose bushes and orchids taking up the majority of the side and rear yards. An ornate fountain with a skillfully carved statue of an alicorn spouting clear water from her muzzle into the basin below dominated the path leading up to the front doors, which were large enough for a dragon to comfortably enter. Thankfully, my goal was not intended to be yet another useless expenditure of my resources and time. I had a limited window of opportunity before the hivemind of affected ponies became active for the day, so I fixed a new disguise into my mind and allowed the ecstasy of flame to wash over me, molding me into yet another pony. This one was modeled after one of the various guards I’d seen during my previous silent audience with the king. She was a creme colored mare with blue eyes. Because of the armor’s enchantment to make the pony within to look the same as every other guard, I had to guess what her mane color and style might have been. Thankfully, that wouldn’t matter for very long. Swinging the potato sack down off my back, I extracted the various pieces of armor that made up a guard uniform. The illusion weaved into the material didn’t snap into effect until the final piece was secured into place. I imagine ponies took some time getting used to the feeling of their manes still pressing against the back of their necks while appearing to actually be pulled up into a mohawk through a hole in the top of the helm. Pathetically inferior disguise magic compared to ours, but I suppose they don’t need to do more than provide anonymity by obscuring mane, tail, and cutiemark. Stage magic like this is more than enough for that. I made one more alteration before attempting to leave my hiding place—I forced my eyes to shed that same pale green glow that everypony else in town seemed to possess. The official guard helmet wasn’t going to be able to pass as the mind-controlling helms so many ponies were donning these days, but not everypony was required to wear one. I hoped that included a few ordinary soldiers as well, and my eyes would be adequate enough to avoid detection. Adopting the unusual walking gait of the affected was made easier once I purposefully selected a pony of the intended build to impersonate. I stepped back onto the road and walked directly toward the crystal spire, which straddled Mane Street. I risked a small upturn of my lip as I passed directly between two mindless guards and cantered inside. The unicorn lamps lining the main hall hadn’t been turned on—likely a deliberate choice by the current occupant of the royal apartments—causing the entire building to be cast in deep shadows. Not daring to slow my pace to allow my vision to adjust to the low-light conditions, I instead turned into the first side room I came across. Closing the door behind me, I scanned my surroundings for anything living. Satisfied that nopony would be asking questions about my presence, I removed a dusty tablecloth from the long meeting table that took up most of the room and packed it against the base of the door I had entered from. Everything is going according to plan. No sense in exposing myself by letting the light of my magic be seen under the door. I quickly bathed in an emerald fire for a third time that day just to adjust the internal structure of my eyes to be more forgiving of the darkness. It wasn’t strictly necessary, but this was the first opportunity I had to pursue the Heart, and I wasn’t going to cut corners while on-mission. I estimated that there was still a little over an hour before dawn, so I decided to begin my search in the throne room since it seemed unlikely that I’d be able to once Sombra left his bed-chambers for the day. The large room had been opulent once, but all that adorned the vaulted hall now were various lengths of black crystal jutting from the floor and walls at unnatural angles. I spent several minutes examining various features of the room before focusing on the throne itself. It was structurally recognizable, though what was almost surely once blue crystal had been tinted a deep purple-gray, and the backrest had smaller black crystals growing out through the top. These, I poked and prodded individually. It struck me that an artifact of such power would not be left to slaves to protect. Sombra would obviously be watching over it personally, so I was convinced the secret lay within the throne somehow. No matter how much I fiddled with it, however, I never found a secret compartment or hidden switch. It frustrated me nearly to the point of wanting to just blast the thing with emerald energy bolts until it presented me with what I sought. Fear. It was faint, but I was able to recognize the weak broadcasts for what they were. Several brief spikes of fear emanated from multiple affected ponies just before they thrust spears in my general direction, providing the briefest of moments to react before being skewered. I jumped away from the throne and crouched into a combat stance, my forelegs spread wide as I appraised my opponents. A team of three castle guards—two stallions and a mare—each in armor similar to my own. Their attack ended as quickly as it began once I turned to face them, each of them merely standing at attention, as though they had conflicting orders, the moment they locked eyes with me. Very interesting, it seems my imitation of their mindless eye color is good enough to fool them after all. Are the affected ordered not to harm each other? I wasn’t given the luxury of considering the question for very long because mere moments later, the larger of the two stallions blinked. When his eyes reopened, they were no longer glowing but were distinctly non-pony. The whites of his eyes were sickly green, and his irises, previously not even visible, were now blood red with draconic slits for pupils. I turned my eyes away from him the moment I realized who was staring at me. Luckily, King Sombra either couldn’t use his mind-control spell through a puppet, or he simply hadn’t realized right away that he needed to since my eyes looked like I was already under his control. “A crystal slave,” came an oily voice, echoing throughout the room and drawing out the ‘S’ sounds like a filly imitating certain reptiles. “Or are you something else, something darker? Perhaps I already know what you are.” I took a step back, watching the other two ponies for any sign of movement. Thankfully, they seemed to be content to stand there for the time being. Open combat with Sombra was not on my to-do list for the day, so I did what came naturally to my skillset: misdirection, evasion, and hiding. “Well, that’s a shame, I’ve always been fond of introductions. Unfortunately, Your Highness, I don’t have time for this,” I said in the voice of my guardpony disguise before hopping to my left, shifting my weight forward and bucking one of the larger black crystals jutting up from the floor. It shattered with a resounding crack that filled the room. The shards rained down on the three ponies confronting me like a storm of needles, and each individual piece that splashed against the ground echoed down the hallway like a frozen waterfall. Before the last of the shards added to the cacophony, I raced toward the balcony and leaped off. I could hear multiple sets of hooves in motion behind me as I did so. I released my disguise midair, watching as the crystalline armor pieces fell away from my body during the transformation. I then called forth another spell nearly every changeling is taught before they are trusted to leave the hive alone. Before the transformative flames had even flickered out, I cocooned myself in even more emerald energy, descending like a falling star to slam into the ground below. The magic did as it was designed to do; it absorbed the impact for me, leaving behind a crater twice the size of my natural body. Wasting no time, I got up, shook off what momentary disorientation the use of that spell always instilled, and immediately flew away at top speed. As I put distance between the palace and myself, I noticed that the door on nearly every home I passed by stood open. The affected had been roused by some magical summons and were milling about in the streets. Unlucky for me, they were also looking up. I made sure to remain as low to the ground as possible and weaved my way through side streets and formerly-manicured yards to confuse anypony who may have seen me. Once I was reasonably confident that I was safely out of sight, I put on my Headway disguise once again and made my way back to the schoolhouse. It took several hours to do so while ensuring that nopony saw me. When I arrived at the cul-de-sac, my breath caught in my throat. The school was under attack. A dozen or more ponies, likely the neighborhood residents, were systematically rearing and bucking the front door. Considering the level of activity throughout the rest of the city, I should have known our little corner of town wouldn’t be unique. Sombra’s alert to hunt me down must have gone out to every affected pony at once, regardless of distance. I was quickly putting together a plan to rescue my meal ticket when a flicker of light caught my eye. A thin shaft of light passed over my face two or three times in rapid succession, drawing my attention up to a second-floor window in the home where we found the cellar full of canned goods. Double was hiding up there. Apparently, she had the foresight to either grab a hoof mirror or break a shard off of a larger one that she could use to signal me with. Smart little mare. I ducked back behind the building, which had shielded my approach to the cul-de-sac and slowly made my way toward her hiding place, cutting through the various yards and gardens of our neighbors. Upon reaching her temporary refuge, it became apparent what her method of entry was. She must have been spooked when the locals started pounding on the school’s front door, because it looked like she dove into the house through the kitchen window, leaving shards of broken glass and droplets of sticky red blood contrasting against the black and white checkered floor. “Miss Time?” I called out softly as I brushed away a few pieces of glass still in the windowpane as I crawled in after her. “Headway, is that you?” came the reply from the top of a flight of stairs. “What’s happening?” I held a hoof to my lips as I acknowledged her, then beckoned her to come downstairs. Ten minutes later, I had bandaged the few shallow cuts she had acquired on her forehooves and face and returned my small medical kit to its usual place within my saddlebags. “There. Nothing too serious, you’ll be fine, Miss Time,” I said. She nodded, glancing toward the living room and the door leading outside on the far wall. I couldn’t ignore the fear radiating from the young mare as she did so, but her face at least made an effort to hide her anxiety. “Thank you. I didn’t know what else to do. When I woke up and you were gone, I got scared. Then when those ponies started beating on the door…” I stepped to the side and wrapped a hoof around her shoulders, squeezing her to me. She stiffened up at the contact, but melted into my barrel almost as quickly, sniffling and getting my coat wet. “None of that, now. You had your bath last night, I wasn’t planning on one of my own for quite a while. I’m several months behind you, after all. I am not sure I’ve earned one just yet,” I joked, eliciting a chuckle from her lips and a much more pleasant offering of gratitude and mirth from her emotions. “Hmm, you might be pretty close. Two or three more life-or-death rescues should be plenty to make up the difference,” she replied, her voice muffled in my fur before pulling away from the hug and wiping her eyes. “Thank you, Headway. You really are my hero.” For some reason, I felt a bit of sadness of my own at her words. If you only knew the truth… “Stay here,” I told her, “I am going to go make some noise a few blocks away. Don’t be afraid if you hear the commotion, I am gonna have to do something fairly big to draw them away from here. I should be back in an hour or so. Keep your head down until then, and no more jumping through windows! Leave the defenestration to the professionals, okay?” With that said, I crawled out of the broken window and made my way toward Mane street. By the time I returned, the schoolhouse had indeed been cleared of our overly-nosy neighbors. The doors held against the civilian assault, though there was clear evidence that it wouldn’t have for much longer. Had even one of the ponies trying to kick it in been a soldier, we’d have been forced to find someplace else to call home. I walked up to the house with the cellar and politely knocked on the front door. “It’s okay to come out now. I don’t think ‘Imperial Thoughts’ is going to be hosting another book signing any time soon, but I did at least learn exactly how flammable various kinds of rare inks are during my recent visit.” The door eased open after a moment, allowing Double Time to poke her head out at me. Watching her brow raise as she stared at the cloud of black smoke behind me was, admittedly, entertaining. “And in case you were curious, the answer to that is: very.” With a nervous chuckle, the door fully opened as she stepped outside to join me on the threshold. Her eyes remained on the darkened sky, but she didn’t hesitate to fall into step beside me as I turned toward the schoolhouse. She broke the silence of our short walk as we arrived at the front door. “What happened? Where did you go? Were you… um... were they looking for you?” Sharp kid. “Maybe. I ran into a couple of affected ponies while I was out near the nobles’ mansions. They might have raised an alarm of some sort.” As we entered, she stepped over the drainage trough and walked around the room divider as I shrugged out my saddlebag, dropping it on the pile of blankets I called my bed. “Okay,” she began. “I guess that makes sense, but why were you in the nobles quarter to be—ah!” The sound of metal striking against crystal rang out in the classroom, followed by the staccato clatter of panicked hooves. With all the speed I could muster, I spun toward her sudden scream and shouldered my way past the stacked desks to find a single guardpony advancing on her. He was older, not quite as grizzled as Warden, perhaps, but much more muscular. His coat was a dull blue that almost seemed to have a tint of purple in it, his mane was the same shade of pale blue that all guards in full armor shared thanks to the illusion of anonymity. He wielded a standard-issue spear identical to Wardens, held low after prying it up out of the floor where his previous thrust actually managed to chip away the crystal. The impact produced exactly the spiderweb design I had been waiting to see form every time Double Time jumped down from the teacher’s desk. I reared just out of his reach and stomped down hard, trying to catch the weapon with my hooves, hoping to snap the lethal metal tip off of it. He pulled the weapon away faster than I would have expected from an affected pony and brought it around to bludgeon the side of my head with the haft. I managed to duck the swing and charge forward, slamming my body into his armored peytral. He staggered back a single step before rearing up himself and delivering a massive hoof strike as he came down on my shoulder. It hurt more than I expected it to, prompting me to take my eyes off him for a split second, foolishly glancing at my shoulder. There was an unusual bruise pattern already forming where he landed his blow. Looking down at his hooves, I noticed the armored shoes he wore were of royal guard design and included small ridges along the edge of the hoof similar in form and function to the minotaur weapon known as brass knuckles. I can’t let him do that again. I’m going to have to get those shoes off him or take his legs out from under him. I could hear Double Time whimpering behind me, muttering a single word over and over again that I couldn’t quite catch in the heat of the moment. At least she’s safely out of the way for now. The guard lunged forward, swinging his spear up and thrusting toward my face. It was all I could do to jerk my head aside. He shifted his weight and converted the weapon’s forward momentum into horizontal movement with just a flick of his forehoof. The spear tip—which had missed me only a heartbeat ago—smashed into the side of my head as he pulled it back. My ears were ringing after that, and it became difficult to maintain my balance. I shook my head a few times, but that only served to heighten my vertigo. Again he thrust forward, forcing me to step back. Ugh, why did I ditch that guard armor when I jumped from the throne room? It’d be advantageous right about now. I always hated combat training against spears back in the hive. The slightest movement by the changeling holding the spear translated into a considerable amount of movement at the pointy end. It took so little effort to twist the shaft just slightly, and suddenly a miss becomes a whole new attack from a completely different angle, ending in a perfect guard position in the same motion, ready to do it again. If your opponent was strong enough to wield it properly and had the endurance to chain multiple attacks in quick succession, they could make it almost impossible for you to close with them without risking grievous bodily harm. And that was with a hard chitin exoskeleton… Again and again, he pressed the attack, forcing me to give ground with each thrust. At one point, I tried to improvise a weapon of my own by collapsing part of the room divider Double Time had built from student desks, but my opponent simply leaped to the side and continued to pursue me. I was losing stamina much faster than he was, and it started to show in my reaction time. I managed to avoid being skewered, if only just, but I had to come up with a solution to those secondary shaft strikes. I could sometimes deflect the weapon far enough to the side to deny the opportunity, but the grand movements required for that were what was taking its toll on me. Eventually, the fight brought us next to my bedding. I jumped away from a thrust, rolled once, then came up with one of my blankets in hoof. I spun it a few times like athlete ponies do in the locker room, and snapped it forward, hoping to wrap it around the spear. I succeeded, to an extent, but I couldn’t pull the weapon out of his highly-trained hooves. All I managed to do was tangle it up and force him to close with me, once again rearing and aiming those horrible horseshoes my way. Twice he launched those hooves at me, and twice I was forced to rear up with him to reduce the distance he had to build up momentum. The blows were still somewhat painful, but at least they didn’t break anything. A third time he rose to a great height, and again I stepped into him, only this time I ducked my head under his barrel and shoved, pulling on my blanket to force his spear to become tangled up between his rear legs. He staggered, as I had hoped, but my momentary victory was pyrrhic. As he crashed down, I watched in slow motion as those steel-encased hooves of his landed on my saddlebag. The sound of splintering wood and shattering crystal echoed in my ears. I froze, horrified as the reality of what just happened washed over me. I felt it, half a year’s worth of rationed energy blasted out of my belongings, dissipating into the ether wastefully. I was able to gasp in a brief taste as it exploded, not even a long enough draw to heal my bruised shoulder. The destruction of my queen’s love crystals was accidental on his part, but it was the most crippling blow he could have delivered to me. I was still dazed when he resumed his assault, successfully freeing his spear and thrusting it at my barrel. I don’t even remember the sequence of events over the next few seconds. However, I do remember Double Time slamming into me from the side and tumbling in a mass of flailing legs into the remaining blankets of my sleeping area. Her face was a mess of tears, and I was finally able to identify what she had been muttering throughout the battle as she stared up into his face from the floor beside me. “Daddy, stop! Please!” By the Queen, this is Stalwart? Her father destroyed my only hope of making it home? Stalwart, eyes still glowing an emotionless pale green, gave her pleas no attention. He lifted a hoof and brought it down across her face, sending her skidding across the floor. He then swung his spear around to point it at her crumpled form, tensing his muscles for the thrust. He’s going to kill her. He’s broken my love crystals, and now he’s going to kill my only living source of love. I can’t do anything to him like this. ‘Headway’ is useless in this scenario, but the girl… is it worth saving her if it means revealing myself? I’ll lose my food source either way. “Daddy?” came her choked voice. “Please.” I can’t expose the hive. I can’t. She isn’t worth it. She’s one pony. She’s food. “Daddy, no…” she sobbed again, scooting herself back across the floor until she came to a stop against the teacher’s desk. I’m going to lose my food source either way. His hoof drew back, poised to strike. “Headway!” There’s no going back from this, I thought as I released my disguise in a flash of brilliant green. I jumped into the air, hovering out of reach as the stallion turned his attention to the new threat in the room. I charged my horn and fired off three quick blasts of emerald magic, slamming into his helmet, hoof, and spear successively. His armor was apparently enchanted with more than just the standard anonymous guard illusion, as the crystal headpiece showed no discernable sign of damage, nor did the armored shoe on his hoof. The spear, however, snapped cleanly in half just above where he had been holding the shaft. Like the professional he was, he took aim and threw the broken shaft of wood at me as he stooped down to retrieve the half with the spear tip. The over-glorified stick bounced harmlessly off my chitin. I swooped low, firing off several more bolts of energy at the old guard. The battle had been entirely one-sided before resuming my natural form, but now I was finally landing a few blows of my own. He was agile, but not fast enough to dodge magic. Several bolts found their marks, peppering his flanks with darkened scorch marks and filling the air with the scent of burnt hair. Once he started staggering from the numerous blasts he took to the legs, I was shocked yet again when Double Time ran in front of him, directly in my firing line. “Leave him alone, you monster!” The wave of anger and defiance coming off of her was palpable. It nearly gagged me. Had I thought her love was filling, the depth of her hatred nearly robbed me of my breath. Unfortunately for her, the zombie that was Stalwart only saw an opportunity, rather than his daughter. I watched as he again raised the broken spear, aiming at her exposed back. I reacted instinctively and charged my horn with what I had available to me at the time. The blast of emerald energy flew past Double Time’s shocked face to slam into Stalwart’s neck, blackening a large portion of his fur. Double Time began openly crying as she turned her head toward her father. He blinked several times. A few times when he opened his eyes, they were azure blue rather than pale green, and a look of horror passed over his face in those brief moments of clarity. Fear. Shock. Desperation. Despair. Shame. His emotions were strong, but I felt them being suppressed. His breathing came in ragged gasps, which deliberately slowed as the pale green of mind control resumed its dominance over his eye color. He’s in there. Aware of what is happening to him... Again he raised the half-spear, and again I blasted him with all the force I could muster, this time striking his forehoof just above the shoe. The spear clattered to the floor. Then, a moment later, he followed suit. I watched as his eyes changed yet again, this time emitting a purple aura. His iris turning crimson while the whites remained green. King Sombra was once again puppeting a pony who was facing off against me in my natural form. If he had been bluffing about knowing what I was previously, there was little doubt remaining that he considered me a credible enough threat to directly oppose me. Double Time was crying. He lifted and turned his head in each direction, taking in the details of our schoolhouse refuge. The wound I’d given Stalwart must have swollen his throat shut because he tried to speak—likely an attempt to taunt me—but nothing came out except a low gurgling rattle. Sombra locked eyes with me, forcing Stalwart to smile creepily before blinking and abandoning his expired slave. He may not know which school this is, but there are only so many in the empire. It won’t be long before a dozen more guards come to finish the job. We’ve got to go. In the classroom, she was crying.