“No, seriously, what are the Yaks doing?” Flurry asked Yona as she took them down the airship tower to Yakyakistan proper.
“Yona not spoil surprise!” Yona bounced slightly in excitement, rocking the rickety rope elevator considerably. She rediscovered her childhood fear of heights upon making the platform take a thirty-degree angle with the ground. “Yona just… stand still. Excited, but still.”
“Don’t take the elevator up much?” Spike asked.
“...Yona not trust rope.”
Luster lit her horn, examining the ropes holding them. “Pretty sure these are enchanted with steel mesh. Not going to break from one yak.”
“That is what ponies said. Prince Rutherford took it as a challenge. Not go well for anyone involved.”
“I can imagine,” Flurry said, using her wings to hover just outside the rickety construction. “But seriously what are you doing?”
“Yona finds your impatience… fun.”
Flurry twitched. “Spike. Can I—”
“No,” Spike deadpanned.
“You didn’t even hear what it was!” Flurry huffed. “I swear…”
“Sometimes, your tone is enough to tell me it’s a bad idea.”
“How is that not all the time?” Luster asked.
“Yona finds this dynamic confusing.” The yak examined the three of them, eyebrow raised.
“It’s called ribbing, I thought you’d be an expert!” Flurry nudged Yona in the side. “You know, being a yak and all. Best at everything, right?”
“Yes! Everything!”
“Except gift-giving,” Luster whispered under her breath.
“Hm?”
“Nothing!” Luster grinned. I still can’t believe that was the deepest secret I could pry out of Pinkie Pie.
They reached the ground—which was basically just “however high the snow happened to be at any given time”—and hopped out, entering the streets of Yakyakistan. The capital of Yakyakistan. Yes, it was confusing, but the yaks were all about “name is perfect!” and didn’t care much for disambiguation, even after all these years.
“So… Yona, where are we going, then?” Flurry asked.
“Where do ponies and Spike need to go?”
Flurry twitched. “Wherever you want to take us to see your new yak thing! Come on!”
Spike took out a checklist. “Well, actually, we need to stop by Prince Ruprecht to give him an update from the Crystal Empire’s affairs, and we’ve got to procure further supplies for our journey to Subquestria and beyond. After that we should be out of your coats.”
“Spike…” Flurry twitched.
“Learn patience. Maybe if you don’t use your magic to hurry this along, I’ll give Twilight a good report on your behavior.”
“Not fair…” Flurry pointed. “This was supposed to be a vacation…”
“I thought it was supposed to be a learning experience for me,” Luster added.
“That’s for you. I, on the other hoof…”
“VISITORS!”
Flurry folded her ears back instinctively. “Oh no…”
A massive male yak burst out of a pile of snow, his horns decorated in all manner of golden trinkets and shiny baubles. “YOU ARE WELCOME IN YAKYAKISTAN! AS ALWAYS!”
“Prince Ruprecht,” Spike said, extending a hand as if the yak weren't shouting at a volume high enough to rupture eardrums. “I see you’re in good health!”
“HAH! THE DRAGON LISTENS WELL! AMBASSADOR SPIKE, DO YOU WISH… TO… SMASH!?”
“I’d rather not break my scales on any logs today, thank you.”
“YOUR LOSS. WHAT DO YOU HAVE FOR ME?”
“A report on…”
Ruprecht swiped the scroll out of Spike’s grasp and placed it on his back. “WILL GIVE TO PAPER PONY LATER.”
“Sandbar,” Yona corrected.
“HM? OH, SANDBAR. WHY PONIES NEED TO BE CALLED BY NAME, I WILL NEVER KNOW.” He seemed almost proud that he was using the word “I.”
Spike set his jaw. “It is rather important to them. A pony’s name is who they are.”
“PONY IS PONY, YAK IS YAK, DRAGON IS DRAGON.” Ruprecht waved a hoof dismissively. His mind switched tracks without giving Spike a chance to respond. “DRAGON, WE SHALL THROW A FEAST!”
“Actually, we aren’t planning to be here long, just to pick up supplies on our way to the south, as part of a tour.”
“Yeah!” Flurry said. “Luster here’s never even left the Empire before!”
Ruprecht laughed loud enough to make Luster take a step back. “HOW PONY ENJOYING OUTSIDE WORLD?”
Luster blinked. “Well, so far, it’s just been… colder and louder.”
“BETTER AND BETTER! PONY LEARNING!”
“If that’s what you want to take away from that…” Luster laughed nervously.
“WHILE YOU ARE HERE, AT LEAST SEE THE ICE FARMS.”
“Ice… farms?” Luster asked, cocking her head.
“YES, ICE FARMS! NEW YAK INVENTION! YAKS BEST INVENTORS.”
Flurry blinked. “It’s a FARM!?” She looked at Yona like she was a traitor. “You can’t be serious.”
“Yona perfectly serious,” Yona huffed. “You will see, and you will understand.”
“Growing ice. How interesting could it possibly be? I can grow ice with my magic!” To demonstrate, she created a life-sized statue of prince Ruprecht right then and there.
“I AM KEEPING THIS!” Ruprecht declared.
“Will you smash it later?” Flurry asked.
“MAYBE. MAYBE ASK ART YAKS TO MAKE MORE FIRST. THEN SMASH. UNSURE.”
Flurry shrugged. “Whatever floats your boat.”
“The ice farms are this way,” Yona said, waving with a hoof.
With a roll of her eyes, Flurry followed Yona to a large, open area near the edge of town. It was completely white and surrounded by a stone wall.
Inside were four-legged creatures of pure ice. Flurry could vaguely make out heads and short, stubby tails in the creatures, though the heads were far too triangular to be natural. Sparks floated around in the head’s point, almost like meandering eyes.
Flurry knew instantly what it was: one of the smaller ice beasts. Unlike Luster, she had gone outside before, and knew exactly what these things meant: death.
She likely would have blown it up were a young yak not riding it like the family pet.
Her jaw dropped. “Bwuh… wha… huh!?”
“YAKS BEST ICE TRAINERS!” Ruprecht laughed.
“They’re feral beasts of ice endowed with the magic of hatred!” Flurry blurted. “They just want to kill you! How in… what in…” She shook her head, trying to understand. “What did you do!?”
Yona grinned. “Yveltal went out into the snow and smacked one in the head until it listened to her.”
“That… shouldn’t… work.”
“I don’t know, maybe the yaks have some kind of inherent magic we unicorns don’t,” Luster suggested. “A way to bend other entities to their will. Something has to keep the wendigos away, right?”
Yona blinked. “What Luster talking about?”
“Eh… crazy theories.”
“CRAZY THEORIES ARE WORTHY OF SMASHING!” Ruprecht declared.
“What do you use the ice-beasts for?” Spike asked.
“UH…” Ruprecht blanked, staring at the beasts. “NO IDEA. JUST HAVE.”
“You can probably use them to carry heavy things, or defend against other ice beasts, or… smash things better.”
“YAKS ALREADY PERFECT AT SMASHING.”
“Better than perfect.”
“THE LEGENDS WERE TRUE…” Ruprecht said, eyes wide.
Flurry facehooved, her fascination with the ice-beasts over.
“Anyway, friends see ice farms,” Yona said. “Now friends get supplies. Tell Cozy Yona said hi!”
“I will,” Spike said.
Luster opened her mouth to say something, but thought better of it, clamping her jaw shut.
~~~
Starlight looked at her team. “Our mission, should you choose to accept it, is to raid the Canterlot Archives.”
“I’m in,” Sweetie said, without hesitation.
“Something hurt Scootaloo,” Rainbow Dash growled. “I’m going to make her pay. If this helps, I’m in.”
Discord looked up from his magazine. “I question why you’re even asking.”
The four of them were in Discord and Fluttershy’s house. Fluttershy was currently in the kitchen, making them another batch of tea.
Starlight huffed. “I was being… okay fine, I was just being dramatic. I know you’d all come regardless. If I just went out to ask for volunteers I’d probably have to turn people away just because…”
“Canterlot will eat you up and spit you out, yeah, we know,” Rainbow said. “We’ve all been out there. Lived out there for a while.”
“Look, I chose you three for a reason. Sweetie, you’re my student. Rainbow, you’re the best fighter we have. And Discord, even if you’re limited, you still pack more punch than any of us. Together, we should be able to storm the archives, get what we want, and get out.”
“Before it notices us?” Sweetie asked.
“Yeah, that would be preferable,” Starlight admitted.
“What are we even risking our lives for?” Discord asked. Catching Rainbow’s glance, he held up a hand. “Scootaloo, I get it, I’m asking what could possibly be in there that we need?”
“Starswirl’s records of his study of the Tree of Harmony, for one,” Starlight said. “He told us there wasn’t anything useful in there, but we’re a little desperate now that it seems to be related to Scootaloo. And…” Starlight glanced towards the kitchen. “Fluttershy, make sure nopony else is listening in!”
“You’re good!” Fluttershy called back.
Starlight nodded. “There are lots of powerful and dangerous books in the restricted section.”
“Do we need the Alicorn Amulet for some reason?” Rainbow asked.
“It… might not be a bad idea to pick it up, but no. We’re bringing back the remnants of the Map.”
Sweetie did a spit-take with her tea. “We have those!?”
“Yeah. And Cozy doesn't know we know where they are which is why this has to be kept quiet. We figured it was a safe place to keep them, and when it moved in it just made it more secure. But…”
“Now we need them and everything is just a million times more difficult,” Discord observed.
“Eeeexactly.”
“If we’re using this to find the Tree…” Sweetie began.
“Twilight doesn’t think that’ll work,” Starlight interrupted. “The Treehouse wasn’t found before, it’s not going to be found now using old tricks. No, she wants to use the destiny spell inherent within the Map to figure out… well, she said ‘find whoever did this to Scootaloo and how to fix it’ but she’s probably just banking on it knowing what to do next, somehow. And…” She pointed at Sweetie. “She’s able to do it because you three are all here again. Your cutie marks shine with the power of destiny.”
Sweetie beamed. “Thanks!”
“Then we need to get those shards.” Rainbow smirked. “I got a lot of tips from A. K., we’ll be in and out lickety-split.”
“That’s the hope…” Starlight said.
“I do hate to break it to you, but I did recently use my magic on some apples,” Discord commented. “I rarely have enough to be of much use.”
“That’s why I asked for a candygram.”
“You didn—”
Pinkie Pie flew through the window and slammed a pie right into Discord’s face. She did a triple pirouette off his face and landed on the windowsill she’d just jumped over a while ago.
Her family was outside—Cheese and all four of the kids—clapping and shouting happily.
“...Pinks, I have nightmares about your kids,” Rainbow admitted.
“I know, Dashie!” Pinkie giggled. “Anyway, Dissy-wissy, you’ve got a candygram!”
Discord laughed. “I can’t talk you out of it, so hit me with it!”
Pinkie pulled a pink gemstone out of her mane and set it upon her nose. It flashed a bright red, drawing magic directly out of her face, shooting it in a beam of concentrated energy into Discord’s necklace.
Starlight winced as Pinkie gave far more of her magic than was probably healthy. Her smile never wavered, but her legs started to wobble and the poof in her sprinkle-covered mane went down slightly.
“There… ya… go…” Pinkie breathed, panting.
Discord sighed. “You really do give it your all.”
“Yeah… I’m… I’m gonna go sleep for a week now, heh…” She wiped her brow, stepping back outside. “Don’t fail. I won’t have more to give you for… geez, I don’t know…” She stumbled into the grasp of Cheese Sandwich and the kids, who all but carried her away. “And if I’m not awake to give you the party when you get back, Cheese will! Got it!”
Discord fingered the necklace containing Pinkie’s chaotic power. “Got it…”
“Use that sparingly,” Starlight said. “It’s our last resort if we come across… it. Or something just as bad.”
Discord glanced at the gem. “I wonder if I could…”
“No, do not try to destroy it, I don’t want to risk that backfiring horribly.”
“Oh, all right, fine, you don’t know how to have fun.”
Fluttershy walked into the room with a new set of tea, but all of it was in thermoses. There were also four packs large enough to hold several meals.
Starlight’s eyes widened. “We… we get your homecooked meals on the road?”
“I figured you would tell me no if I offered to cook for you,” Fluttershy smirked. “So I just made them before you left.” She kissed Discord on the cheek. “Now go be the heroes. I’m too old f—”
“Hey!” Rainbow shouted.
“I’m a year older than you.”
“Wel, uh.” Rainbow blinked. “A single year doesn’t matter!”
“Mathematically speaking, there has to be a line,” Sweetie said. “Where one gets ‘too old’ for something.”
“Actually it might depend on the mood and biology of the person in question,” Discord added.
“Perhaps, but have you conside—”
“Okay, goodbye Fluttershy, we’re leaving before this neurosis gets worse,” Starlight laughed nervously. “...I’ll bring him back safe.”
“I know you will.”
~~~
Chrysalis and Tirek watched as Starlight, Discord, Sweetie, and Rainbow left the Crystal Empire in a magically levitating carriage.
“Two of their biggest powerhouses, gone,” Tirek observed.
“I was looking forward to tormenting Starlight again,” Chrysalis whined.
“You may still get your chance. If we complete this early… we may track her down.”
Chrysalis licked her lips. “Good… now, stay here.”
“I know the drill,” Tirek muttered, leaning back into a snowbank. “Find him and bring him back here.”
“With pleasure…” Chrysalis transformed into a unicorn with a blue coat and purple mane. She’d learned long ago to stop using the same pony for her disguise unless there was a particular reason. She teleported across the walls.
One thing that was nice about being a changeling; the Crystal Heart and other protective magics didn’t actually recognize the species as evil. Tirek would probably have tripped some alarms had he attempted to enter, but Chrysalis? If anyone was looking closely, they’d just see a changeling, and that wasn’t that unheard of. And if they were testy, she could always pretend to be a reformed changeling. It wasn’t difficult at all to pull it off.
She did hate the Crystal Empire, though. A memory of her defeats and a bastion of hope for her enemies. Were she less aware of the apocalyptic threat of the windigos, she would probably have started looking for ways to tear this little Empire to the ground. Unfortunately, even she could admit—these ponies and their Crystal Heart were the most effective resistance against the Cold in the world, aside from maybe Cozy’s little experiment, but Chrysalis didn’t like thinking about that place either.
Basically Chrysalis didn’t like thinking about any place at this point, which was more than a little annoying for her.
“Maybe I should leave the planet,” she muttered to herself. “Then maybe I could get away from all this.”
Shaking her head, she refocused her efforts on her goal: find the pony Shadow Lock, last of the line of Stygian. Shouldn’t be too difficult, ponies kept meticulous records of who lived where. They liked paperwork.
She walked right up to the castle, a confident smile on her face.
She barely managed to keep it when Twilight walked out, talking with Rarity.
“Scootaloo’s condition is stable,” Rarity was reporting. “And Starlight’s left.”
“Good.”
“What else can we do?”
“I…” Twilight furrowed her brow. “Stay close to her and watch her. Something dark is brewing, I can feel it.”
“Yes…”
They got out of earshot and Chrysalis didn’t want to make her snooping particularly obvious. She was curious, yes, but these ponies’ problems were not her own. She had a goal.
She walked down to the archives. She’d been in the castle before, many years ago, she knew where to find them. Unfortunately, there was a guard now: a blue griffon. Gallus, if she remembered properly.
Chrysalis considered transforming into Rarity, but she couldn’t chance that the guards were trained in changeling recognition. Instead, she walked up as her random reformed changeling. “U-um, hi… Gallus.”
Gallus blinked. “Do I… know you?”
“N-no, but… Ocellus talked about you a lot, and about how… well, uh, never mind that…” She scratched the back of her head. “I’m Vibratum, and I’m trying to find the archives?”
“They’re in here.”
“Oh, good.”
“I can’t just let anyone go in there, though. Lots of important documents.”
“I’m just trying to trace a few family t-trees… I-I mean I guess I could try to come back with…”
“No, no, it’s fine, I can watch you. There’s nothing classified in the census and genealogy sections, far as I know.”
“T-thanks…”
And so Chrysalis walked right into the archives, looking for the pony Shadow Lock. She made a show of trying to trace down family lineages and the like, but, really, she didn’t have to try very hard. Gallus may have been a student in the past, but he had no idea what real academic research looked like. He just guarded while she poked around, digging through files…
After forty minutes she found Shadow Lock. She made sure to keep reading past the name, so Gallus wouldn’t have anything to report back to Twilight. Once she had his name and census data, she was able to move to some employment records. She found a picture of the gray unicorn and an employment manifest. It was very brief, but it told her he worked in the castle itself as a researcher of some kind.
She spent a few more minutes digging around and writing notes for show. “Thank you, Gallus!”
“I stand around and guard things all day,” Gallus said with a shrug. “Wasn’t a problem.”
With a wink, she trotted out. As soon as she was out of sight she shifted to the appearance of a different reformed changeling.
She had a few options now. She didn’t know exactly where in the castle he researched, so she needed to narrow that down. Asking around was on the table, as was transforming into Shadow Lock and trying to garner reactions. But she didn’t like how easy those were to see.
No, she had a better idea. She trotted up to the pony who managed the employee payouts of the castle: a very nervous looking unicorn.
“Um, excuse me, I didn’t get my check this week?”
“Oh no oh no oh NO!” the pony whined. “Not again… not again!”
This was not the reaction Chrysalis had been expecting, but she went with it. “Really? You lose checks that often?”
“I don’t know, but last time it happened, I…” He suddenly gained control of himself, forcing a smile. “Let’s see. What is your name.”
Chrysalis chose a name that definitely wouldn’t be on any name list anywhere. “Xyjaxia-loru,” she said. “...It’s old Buffalo. Should be easy to find.”
The unicorn paled when he couldn’t find it in any of the files in his cabinet.
“...You might have me under a misspelling. Some people hear it as ‘Sha-jaxia’. Here, let me help.” She walked over to the filing cabinet and used her magic to slowly sort through all the files. Sha… Sha… Sha… ah, yes, Shadow Lock. He didn’t have an address listed, just a really high payout and instructions to deliver it to the red door in the fifth basement.
Satisfied, she kept looking through files. “I… guess I’m not in there…” Chrysalis frowned. “Don’t worry, you tried. I’ll go talk to Rarity about this.”
“O-okay…” The unicorn looked about ready to pass out.
Chrysalis left him like that, making her way to the fifth basement. The red door was pathetically easy to find, though she had needed to sneak past a few guards—easy to do by causing commotions to send them running away.
The door itself was enchanted. Only a specific spell could open it, one Chrysalis didn’t know. However, there was a slot in the door to get paper-thin items in and out. And Chrysalis was a master of changing her shape. She transformed into a butterfly, a trick of size distortion most changelings couldn’t accomplish and flew right through. She couldn’t keep it long, though—on the other side she was forced to pop back to a pony-sized changeling.
On the other side was a decently sized room filled with books, scrolls, and notes. On the far end of the room was a much more sinister, darker door, wafting with dangerous magic. Chrysalis recognized the signature—the Umbrum were behind that door.
And asleep on a desk in front of the door, surrounded by sketches and magical drawings, was one Shadow Lock.
So that’s how they knew he existed. He was studying their door.
Oh how Crysalis wished Tirek were here so he could drain the arrogant Umbrum door of all magic, relieving them of another portal to this realm. Alas, that was not to be. What was to be was her capture of Shadow Lock.
She dropped her disguise and spat green goo onto his horn, waking him up.
“Ah, Shadow Lock… I am Queen Chrysalis, hopefully you’ve heard of me. Don’t scream or I eat you.”
He stared at her in terrified shock.
“Now, I am going to take you through that red door, and you are to say nothing. We are going to leave this empire, you and I. Understood?”
He nodded slowly.
“Good.”
The door was locked from this side as well, unfortunately, no doubt to try and keep the Umbrum under control if they should ever be released.
“Open it,” Chrysalis said. “I’d rather not blow it to smithereens, but I no longer require stealth.”
Shadow Lock pointed at his horn.
“Explosions it is…”
“W-wait!” He stammered. “I don’t have to use any magic, it just needs to read my magic signature.”
Chrysalis rammed his face into the door. The moment it touched his horn, the lock disengaged. The moment they left, Chrysalis made sure to slam the door.
She didn’t want the Umbrum getting out either.
Now that she was outside the magically protected room… she could teleport out. With a flash, she and Shadow Lock were gone.
Nopony would notice for quite some time.