Book 1 - The Behemoth came to Canterlot

by Equimorto


Exile

Twilight wasn't sure if she should have felt annoyed by the stallion's attitude, or amused by it. Knowing what he was responsible for, indirectly and directly, her logical side said it should have been the former. Her guts disagreed at moments. "What do you want me to know about them, then?"
"A little wide for a question, don't you think?" the Charioteer asked, tilting his head to a side.
"Not when you implied the answers aren't that many," Twilight replied. "I may as well have you spit it all out rather than waste time playing guesses about what is and isn't worth asking."
"How efficient of you." The Charioteer gave a little tap with his hoof, and Twilight for a moment worried the Behemoth would start to move beneath her. "Exactly the opposite of how I like to do things. But I suppose the pretense of variance across different individuals is part of what makes life enjoyable, after all." He leaned slightly to a side, then to the other. "Right, then. Coils. What could the little pony princess want to know about them?" he wondered aloud, looking at the sky.
"Planning to make up for the time I'm not losing?" Twilight was tempted to sit, but she had no intention of putting any other portion of her body in contact with the Behemoth. Just because the spell had held that far it didn't mean she should try to push it further.
The Charioteer's eyes snapped back to her. "They are a consequence of the Behemoth's presence, obviously. And yes, there are still more you haven't found. No, they won't change with time, any perceived change is merely the result of better understanding and control. And as a warning, you've been lucky with the receivers so far. It won't last." The corners of his mouth drew back, giving an edge to his smile. "It already happened, actually." His expression then returned to a more normal one. "And yes. Newer ones will appear, in time. No particular correlation between their nature and the when of it. That's all about this, for now."
Twilight nodded, taking mental note of everything the stallion had told her and already beginning to analyse parts of it. A stray thought struck at her, and she decided she may as well give it a go before moving on with the rest. "You seem to know a lot about a lot of things." She waited just a moment, to see if the smugness oozing from the Charioteer's expression would crystallise in an affirmative reply as well. When it didn't, she continued, "Do you happen to know about what happened with Chrysalis? The parts I don't know of, of course."
"I do," the Charioteer replied. The part where he mentioned he wouldn't tell her wasn't needed, his tone carried that bit of information perfectly on its own. "Please, don't have me fill up the whole conversation with bits of knowledge about other creatures' lives. Unless you want me to talk about Silver Lace. Do I have some things to say about that mare's tastes in terms of paint colours."
Twilight looked at him silently for a moment. "Scales. Let's talk about scales."