//------------------------------// // Stolen statue // Story: Chrysalis trial. // by Kingless knight //------------------------------// A cloaked pony walked through Canterlot. After getting past the guards and, he smiled at the statue in front of him. "Oh my little filly, you had such talent in magic, so much ambition, yet sadly you didn't inherent your mother's intelligence." His horn lit up and a black aura surrounded the statue, shrinking it down. He placed it into his saddlebag; the next thing he knew two guards pointed their spears at him. "Pedestrians at best." He breathed out a cloud of black ash, covering the two guards. Once it cleared the two guards had disappeared. Then he jumped out of a blast of magic. "You're under arrest for theft of public property and assisting criminals!" a purple alicorn told him, which he answered with a shrug before he started running toward the edge to jump off. Twilight flew after the falling pony and so did two pegasi guards, trying to save the insane unicorn, but once close enough the unicorn breathed out the same black ash, making them disappear before said unicorn unfolded dragonfly-like wings. Twilight then realized he was dive-bombing as it he changed directions mid-air upward using the speed he had built up to out-Speed Twilight, and she stopped. "I need to call the girls," she said before, dodging a black aura of magic. The cloaked pony landed, following the track to Appleloosa, and then to the Badlands. He stopped and jumped out of the way of a rainbow blur, a Magic blast and finally a Party Canon. He look at the five mares all of them with determined expressions, except pinky. He then dramatically gasped. "Oh goodness, how did you find me? You truly are the mage of mages! Princess of magic and savior of the world!" He spoke in an authentic, yet dramatic tone that made Twilight blush a little. "A member of the apples! The best farmers this side of Equestria, and, Rarity, the world's greatest couturier!" He then looked toward the little Fluttershy. "Oh, how does an innocent thing like you have that much chaos around you unless—oh, so you're Discord's friend! You're prettier than any description." He grinned showing his fangs. Fluttershy "eep!" She hid behind Rarity. "U-um, thank you mister?" He lifted his cloak, revealing a stallion with a tanned coat, a gray beard, and a light blue mane. He smiled. "My name is Maxilla Scythe! The first in a line of emperors and—" He caught rainbow Dash with his magic and placed her next to her friends, after taking his saddlebag back. "I'm a millennium and 203 years old, and I'm taking my daughter to her trial." They all gasped, shocked. "You're Cozy Glows dad?!" Pinkie asked. He shook his head slowly as his right eye cracked open and revealed a dark brown compound eye, just like the one the changelings had. "You're Chrysalis's dad? Do you have baby pictures of her?" He looked at the pink pony, confused for a brief moment at the fearless smile, while all the other ponies there were in shock and trying to calm down. Twilight was going through her knowledge of changelings and she had never read, heard, or seen a changeling shape shift physically. "H-how and WHAT?! Chrysalis has a father?!" Pinkie placed her hoof around Twilight's neck. "Pinkie, I know where foals come from." She then took her hoof away. "You're planning on freeing Chrysalis and—" His horn lit, making Twilight and friends perceive their mouth's disappear. He smiled as they panicked. "No, I mean I will free her, then put her and her hive on trial for breaking our laws. If they're found innocent, they and Chrysalis will be freed, if they're not, they will be restored, or as I like to call it, reborn." They gasped, and Twilight's horn lit as she figured out it was an illusion spell. "You will stand as witnesses, and witnesses must be protected." He breathed out a dust cloud of multiple colors. Once it cleared, Twilight found herself in a room full of books held in golden shelves. "Is this paradise?" she asked, trying to take one out, but sadly, there was a protective charm on it, and then she noticed her friends weren't there. "GIRLS?! Fluttershy? Applejack?" She heard hoof steeps, and then saw a changeling queen the same height as Chrysalis, and whose mane was a golden color shining in the torch lights around them. She took on a fighting stance, "Who are you? What did you do to my friends?!" The changeling queen stared at Twilight before Holding up Spike. "Spike?!" He chuckled awkwardly. The changeling queen with the golden mane spoke. "That vermin was sent to the Treasury; lucky I was hungry enough to devour the greed from him before he turned into a giant pain in my flank!" She said, annoyed, throwing him to Twilight's hooves. Twilight remembered the last time Spike went on a greed-fueled rampage, but then looked at the queen. "WAIT!" The queen's pupils narrowed. "U-um where are my friends?" She summoned a mirror, showing each of Twilight's friends with each of them in a changeling hive, except Fluttershy, who was combing the white mane of a small puffy looking changeling queen with moth-like antenna ears; she still had the black carapace and the holes on her hooves. "Rainbow Dash! Applejack! Pinkie Pie!" None of them reacted as the mirror turned black. "Who are you!" She demanded from the changeling queen. She smiled. "Golden Spindle. Any other questions?" She spoke calmly, waiting for the next question. Twilight gulped. "You said you feed off greed, just like Chrysalis with love?" Spindle ate the greed from Twilight. She looked at Spike. "Question: why do you think there are few dragons who mindlessly raid and steal?" Twilight's eyes widened with understanding. "We also own every casino in Equestria, but you can't feed off a sleeping dragon forever." Twilight tried to teleport, but it didn't work. "Sorry, magic doesn't work in the hive, and I know you would love to know more about my kind." Spindle smiled, knowing she was right. Twilight stayed silent then spoke up. "Are you related to Chrysalis?" Spindle frowned and nodded. "Where is Maxilla going?" She sighed, floating the mirror again, and showed the jungles near the badlands, showing a gigantic black dead tree. Spindle had a smile of nostalgia. "The grand hive, where I and my sisters were raised. Where my mother will punish Chrysalis and her hive for showing our existence!" She growled and then one of the changelings threw a bucket of water on her. "Thank you, brood." She used her magic to pull out a book that had a picture of a carved crystal blade on it. Twilight tried to use her magic to take a book again, but the runes stopped her from touching them. "Sorry, could I read one of these books?" Spindle opened her mouth and a wave of orange escaped from Twilight. "WHAT DID YOU DO?!" Spindle rolled her eyes as she blocked Twilight's magic attack with her own shield. "Simple, I ate your greed for Knowledge. It's more of an obsession, isn't it?" She asked Spike and he chuckled and Twilight glared at him. "My father was hoping to fight you, sadly you're a witness. Pity, he has been so bored since mother went into hibernation." Twilight looked at Spike, and sadly he didn't have a quill or paper. Twilight then looked inside her saddlebag and pulled out a note pad. "Why did she hibernate?" Spindle looked at Twilight, amused that Scythe wanted to fight her. Spindle tapped her chin. "Well, my mother is ancient, and she needs to rest or else she will overwork herself. My father, on the other hoof, has one duty, which is to be her muscle when needed, and when she sleeps, he travels the world for knowledge, and my non-queen siblings guard her. If anyone dared to place a hoof in her chambers he would teleport and destroy them." One of the changelings came and gave her a glass of sparkling cider. "So, he decided to give me his scroll collection for safe keeping. Some are ancient, some are recent, and a few he said he stole from the future, but I don't trust that. We have dark magic, normal magic, music magic, Kirin magic, Deer magic, changeling magic, first issues of lost or known spell books, and a few first issue Comics, because my changeling found out they cost a lot after a few decades." The princess and Spike stood frozen; changeling queen took in the greed from the two before they got out of their trance. Twilight tried again to take one of the books but she activated a trap causing her to float, hit the ceiling and come back down. "I just want to read one! Is that so bad?" Spindle shrugged and took a sip from her glass. "Wait if, there are more hives? Why didn't you help Chrysalis during the attack on Canterlot?" Golden Spindle sighed. "You see, my sister has the ego of a dragon with a hoard the size of a mountain! I'm not interested in conquest, who is?! It's just having to tell ponies what to do, and stopping rebellions isn't fun after ponies get angry about having to be ruled by am insect pony." She drank from her glass. "Better than the old times when changeling queens would go to have never-ending wars with each other." Twilight wrote it down. A scarred male changeling entered the library, his carapace a dark crimson and his eyes a dark copper color. "That was when we were predators, instead of the mutualism we practice today." Spike had a bored Expression. "You are?" He asked, and Twilight held the dragon's shut. "Mandible saber, first hatchling of emperor Maxilla Scythe and Empress Vehemence, slaughterer of the northern hives, and best cook in Equestria,"he said with pride. Golden Spindle nodded. "Yeah, that's true, his strawberry pie is to die for! You're making your special today, right?" He nodded. "Good, Hopefully father won't be too full after eating that Thorax—" Twilight jumped at Spindle, panicking. Twilight and Spike yelled at the same time. "What?!" As Mandible raised his stinger-like tail, hissing at Twilight who slowly stepped off the queen. "What do you mean, him eating Thorax?" The changeling soldier calmed down. Golden Spindle sighed. "Eating his emotions. Though my father might actually destroy Thorax." Mandible nodded. Twilight then tried to use her magic to teleport again and was met with two portals opening under and over her which led to her falling endlessly for a few minutes. "Um, when does this stop?" Spike asked, seeing Twilight scream. Spindle sighed. "When she figures out she can fly." Twilight then did so and looked at Spindle. She took on an attack stance. "You will let me out or I will..." She didn't have any threats. "Ok, I have nothing! But you can't restore the changelings or free Chrysalis or kill thorax!" Spindle rolled her eyes, then had an idea. She gave Twilight the book on changeling laws. "Then you figure out how to save your friends and keep Chrysalis imprisoned! Because my father's laws are annoying! Mandible will help you with the stuff you can't understand." She teleported away. Twilight started reading to find a loop-hole. She wrote eight letters and gave it to Spike to see if she could send a message to the outside. Mandible ignored the dragon, because his job was to explain anything Twilight didn't understand, not act as a guard; even if his sister was a queen he didn't have to listen to her every word. In the bad lands The changeling emperor caught the burned message and reformed it partially as he wasn't the intended recipient. One word, however, made him grin like a foal on Hearth's Warming Eve. "Pillars." He then set the letter on black fire and headed to the reformed changeling hive with one intent: have some bucking fun!