//------------------------------//
// Next Move 
// Story: Wanderings of a Chaos God 
// by BronyWriter 
//------------------------------//

The second TD left the room, I bolted out of the room and straight out of the compound. I could barely breathe as I flew back to the hotel as fast as I could. Seeing TD like that was... hard. The politician way that he talked, the callous view of things... was there anything left of my brother in there? Had the wars changed him that much?

I made it back to the hotel after a short while and flew straight through the window of the room. Skystar was reclining on the bed playing the Gameboy, and she yipped in surprise when I re-appeared in the room.

"Kristen! You scared me!" She picked up the Gamboy and frowned. "And made me vulnerable. One of those turtle things got me."

"Sorry," I muttered, trudging over to my bed. Skystar tilted her head and got off of her own bed.

"How did it go? Did you talk to your brother?"

I shook my head. "No, but I think that he suspected that I was there, if he didn't flat-out know. There was a moment when I feel like he was looking right at me and could tell where I was." 

Skystar grimaced. "Yeah, that probably wasn't very fun."

"No." I reclined back on the bed and stared at the ceiling. "Hearing him talk like that was hard. He didn't seem anything like my brother at all. He didn't seem like he had any sympathy for the locals. He talked like a politician who was annoyed that everyone was there questioning. The best I can hope is that a few things got through to him and he'll actually do something to help. Maybe it could snowball from there."

"Hope so," Skystar said. 

Before I could continue, a knock on the door brought me out of my thoughts. I sighed and walked over to the door. I really didn't want to deal with this kind of crap right now. I just wanted to rest and gather my thoughts. Maybe take a nap. I wasn't in the mood for visitors.

But that kind of changed when I opened the door and saw who had arrived. I grimaced and flattened my ears as I took a step back. I didn't mean to, but I was surprised. Skystar herself squeaked and glanced at the window like she wanted to fly out, but seemed to think better of it. She shot the newcomer an uneasy smile and waved.

"Uh... hi, Mom. What are you doing here?"

"I came to talk to you," Novo said, coming into the room while two of her guards took positions next to the door. Great. This wasn't who I wanted to talk to. "I received your note. It was very interesting."

"Oh, yeah, that." Skystar chuckled uneasily and rubbed the back of her neck. "Yeah, I thought that you could maybe help."

"I'm not sure I did, but if nothing else, it was enlightening to talk to Prince Antares about the situation." Novo looked over to me and let out an amused scoff. "And I think you can drop the disguise now, Princess Kristen."

I rolled my eyes but waved my hoof and turned back to normal. "Too much risk that somebody would recognize me," I said. "I didn't want anyone telling my brother that I was here."

"Understandable, but I think he knows anyway," Novo replied. "I mentioned that my daughter had left with you, and he probably put the pieces together from there with the meeting."

I grumbled and rubbed my temple. "Great. One of the reasons I left was so that he wouldn't know where I was. I know he knew where I was when I was helping you guys rebuild Mount Aris." 

"Indeed," Novo said. She glanced at the mostly eaten tray of snacks on Skystar's bed and took a cracker off of it. "I admit that I do have some concerns about everything happening here. I do not think that Antares will try to push past Klugetown to annex the forest between our nations, but the possibility is there that he begins trying to make some kind of deal with me. I'd refuse, of course, but he is immortal. He has all the time in the world to enact any plans that he might have."

"Makes me wonder why Celestia and Luna aren't stopping him," I growled. 

Novo shrugged. "I do not know. Maybe it's the idea of needing to get their hooves dirty a touch for the greater good. None of us are unhappy that he's trying to improve the Badlands, if he succeeds it'll help everycreature, but Klugetown is another matter. I think that on top of trying to help the locals, the reformation of the Badlands will go smoother if he has Klugetown. You can't encroach on somebody else's territory if it's already yours."

"So what do you think the odds are that he gives Klugetown back to the locals?" I asked. 

Novo gave an amused scoff. "Close to zero. Maybe he'll try some things to help the locals accept things more. He'll listen to their problems and give some concessions to make them feel better. He won't just let it go, though." She smirked at me. "But that's probably the vibe you got when you were at the meeting."

I rolled my eyes and sat down on my bed. "I'm not even going to ask how you knew I was there."

"It's not too hard to puzzle out. You're the chaos god, it's your brother, and the two of you are the ones who brought this to my attention. There was no way that you weren't going to turn invisible or put on a disguise to get into the meeting."

"Yeah, yeah," I replied with a wave of my hoof. "So what are you going to do now?"

Novo shrugged. "I'm not sure what I can do. I obviously won't go to war with him to liberate Klugetown, and he wouldn't appreciate it if I called a meeting with the griffins, minotaurs and zebras to put pressure on him. Klugetown is tiny, and Antares's plans in the region are going to benefit them as well. I don't think he'd do anything bad to us, but I'd rather not be on his bad side."

"So there's nothing anyone can do for them," Skystar muttered, deflating a little bit.

Novo shook her head. "Not at the moment, no. We'll see what happens later, but  for right now, he's not going to give them their town back."

I sighed and plopped down on the bed and draped my foreleg over my eyes. "Wonderful." I glanced over at Novo when another thought struck me. "So what about the Storm Kingdom? Do you have any idea of what's happening there?"

Novo shook her head. "Only what your brother told me at the meeting and a few small rumors. Given that it's a few weeks from Equestria by airship, any news coming from there would be sparse."

My eyes narrowed. "So he could be doing bad stuff there and nobody would know?"

"While I think that your brother has the best intentions for the Storm Kingdom, anything happening there would take a while to get back to him," Novo replied. 

Yeah, that could be an issue. Given that TD knew what the aftermaths of both World Wars back on Earth were, he'd make an effort to rebuild as much as he could. Make some allies if he could. But if something happened in the Storm Kingdom where, for example, the governor he'd placed there was abusive, that could do a lot of damage. Governor Overwatch seemed like he was trying his best, but I couldn't call him the most competent governor I'd ever seen. He wasn't cruel, as far as I could see. Given how close Klugetown was to Equestria, I'd have to imagine that it would be harder to hide any abuses here than the Storm Kingdom.

""Well, it was a pleasant surprise to hear from you, Skystar," Novo said. "I was not surprised in the slightest that Princess Kristen left, but I am surprised that you decided to go with her."

"Uh, yeah, I thought it would be a good idea. See the world. Some cool stuff," Skystar replied with a bit of a blush.

"I see."

Skystar gulped and scooted back a few inches. "I'm not gonna be, like, grounded when I come back to Mount Aris, am I?"

Novo let out a quiet chuckle and shook her head. "You are an adult, Skystar. If you want to spend a little time journeying with Princess Kristen, I cannot stop you." Novo turned her attention to me and narrowed her eyes. "I trust that you are keeping her safe."

"Uh, yeah," I insisted. "I'm not here to get either of us hurt."

"You cannot be hurt," Novo growled.

"Yeah, but I'm saying that I'm going to protect the two of us," I replied. "Just..." I held up my hoof. "We're going to be fine."

"Hm. Very well." Novo turned back to Skystar. "You are, of course, welcome to come home whenever you desire. We'd be happy to have you back." 

Ugh. I'd seen enough parenting to know that Novo was trying to guilt trip Skystar into coming back with her. I could understand that Novo wanted to make sure that Skystar was okay, but like she said: she was an adult. If she wanted to travel around the world with me, neither of us could stop her.

Well, being the lord of all chaos, I probably could, but... it was kind of nice having her around.


*  *  *  *


That night I was staring up at the ceiling. Skystar was still playing on the Gameboy, which was good, I guess. It was nice that I'd made something that she really enjoyed. It gave me some time to think. Skystar and I had already finished dinner, and a glance at the clock on my bedside table told me that it was just past midnight. 

I heard Skystar groan as Mario once again was killed by something, and she turned the Gameboy off. She put it on her bedside table and rolled over to face me. 

"You have that thinking look again."

"Yeah," I muttered. "I think I might be thinking of a dumb idea. Or a good one." 

"Yeah? What?"

I took a deep breath and glanced out the window. "I guess it's just all of the stuff I've been hearing about the Storm Kingdom. Yeah, they took over a bunch of countries including Equestria, but I can't shake the feeling that things aren't going so well over there. TD might not want to get revenge, but somebody else could be. Maybe I'm wrong and their lives have improved a lot, but I just don't get that feeling, especially seeing how the Klugetowners are feeling."

"I guess," Skystar said. "Which means that I think I can guess what your crazy idea is. You wanna go there."

I groaned and nodded. "Yeah. I don't feel like I'm gonna feel comfortable about it unless I see for myself. Maybe if things are going well there, I can do what I did for Mount Aris and help with the rebuilding. I know that they took Equestria over and killed some of TD's best friends. The women and children didn't. Plus it makes me feel weird that enough of the males were killed that the species might die out after a while."

"I hope not," Skystar said. "I don't think an entire species should be wiped out because of a war."

"Me neither," I said. 

"Sounds like you've made up your mind, then."

I squeezed my eyes shut and growled a few words to myself before responding. 

"Yeah, I guess I kind of have." I rolled over to face her. "You sure you want to come with? It'll take us a month to get there. I'm not good enough to just teleport us there."

"Pshh, I'm totally up for it!" Skystar said with a wave of her claws. "I want to make sure everything's good, too! Plus it'll be good experience for when I become queen of the hippogriffs. If I get some life experiences, that can only be good, right?"

"I guess so," I said with a shrug. "Well, nothing else for it, I suppose. We'll leave at dawn."

I hoped that I was doing the right thing.