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Chapter 16 - A bad day full of troubles.
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The queen was leaving the toy store, she had bought the latest `Petling`, which was a small stuffed changeling with the costume of an animal, a giraffe, in this case, they were extremely popular everywhere, very difficult to find and of course, Clear Spark had also started to collect them, Chrysalis had reserved one days ago and was able to get it in time for Clear Spark's birthday, of course getting it was helped a lot by the fact that the stuffed animals were made in one of the hives and she was the queen of the changelings, but she couldn't go home to wrap the gift yet, she had to buy other things.
She needed to buy some gardening supplies, AppleJack had recently finished helping her set up a greenhouse at her house and she needed some pots, and seeds of different plants, she also needed to talk to Fluttershy about how to keep bees and tips to avoid being attacked when collecting honey.
When she left the store she heard a commotion and the queen approached to see what was going on, it was a group of foals arguing agitatedly, among them were Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon on one side bothering one of the smallest of Cheerilee's class, on the other side were the CMC with other foals, Clear Spark was in the second group next to Scootaloo, who was bumping his head with Diamond Tiara's head trying to make her back off.
"Don't you have anything better to do than to bother others?"
"I could do better than that if there weren't any of you goofballs here."
"Then why don't you go somewhere with fewer goofballs and leave us alone."
"Because you guys flood the whole town with what goofballs you are."
"Just forget it Scoot, she's not going to understand." Said Clear Spark who was standing next to the little orange pegasus.
"You should listen to your friend Scootaloo, of the useless troop he seems to be the least useless."
"Hey." Apple Bloom said. "Don't call him useless."
"Does it bother you that I said something to your little boyfriend?, you should be thankful he's blind so he can't see what a loser you are."
Diamond Tiara took a step back and started laughing loudly along with Silver Spoon, the queen was coming over to stop it all when she saw Apple Bloom pounce on Diamond Tiara and both fillies started fighting.
"Hey knock it off!"
Shouted the queen as she used her hooves to separate the two fillies, but she used a little more force than she wanted to, and Diamond Tiara as she was pushed by Chrysalis, stumbled and fell to the ground on her haunches, whimpering from the blow.
"How dare you touch my little angel!" Shouted an offended mare from the group of spectators rushing up to the queen.
Chrysalis turned and saw a pink mare with a purple mane, a Cutie Mark of a diamond ring, a green blouse, and a rarely pointed nose approaching, she was none other than... a Karen.
"Well, if you taught your little angel how to treat others I wouldn't have intervened."
"Diamond Tiara knows perfectly well how to treat ponies of that sort, I taught her myself."
"Then her father should teach her how to behave with others, anyone can see you've done a lousy job."
"Filthy Rich is a good father and a good provider, and I'm lucky to have him around at night, unlike you, you old spinster mare, don't you get cold in the winter?."
Chrysalis was clearly offended and listened as the stallions and mares of the village began to murmur, slowly starting to gather more and more, the queen hadn't noticed but someone had pulled the little ones out of the scene, apparently, they all knew it was going to happen.
"I recognize that your husband is a good provider and works a lot of overtime in the office along with his secretary, apparently the paperwork is very exciting because he always comes home with a smile."
"Don't you dare insinuate things about my husband." Spoiled Rich approached the queen menacingly and stood in front of her nudging her chest with her hoof.
"Then don't talk about other ponie's personal lives and just tell your daughter to behave herself and not treat the rest of the world like dirt."
"Diamond Tiara has the right to express herself however she wants, and if Clear Spark is offended by how useless he is at not being able to do anything alone, my little girl is not to blame for that."
"Stop right there or I will stop you." Said the queen angrily nudging Spoiled Rich with her hoof.
"Don't you dare touch me, you worthless mare." Spoiled Rich replied in kind.
"I'm going to do more than touch you if you keep badmouthing Clear Spark." Shouted the queen.
"I can talk as I please about that useless rat who can't even see how stup-."
Chrysalis pounced on Spoiled Rich, and both mares started to fight in the middle of the village, hooves were flying in all directions, screams and insults of everything, magic lightning, and the things Chrysalis bought scattered everywhere, after a few minutes the queen being much bigger and stronger easily won the fight and was over a terrified Spoiled Rich who had her breathing very fast and was looking at the queen with wide eyes waiting for the final blow.
"Don't you dare ever say anything about my little boy again, do you understand?" Said the queen to her little prey as she bared her teeth at her.
All the ponies sighed in surprise as they saw in front of them a large black figure with insect features that had Spoiled Rich at its mercy, the queen took a step back and realized that at some point in the fight she had returned to her original form.
"IT'S CHRYSALIS, IT'S AN INVASION, RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!" Shouted a pony and chaos broke out.
Ponies and screams were going in all directions, Spoiled Rich took advantage of the moment to run off, Chrysalis amongst all the chaos was looking for Clear Spark, the little one was terrified listening to the screams and the ponies running in all directions, one of the ponies running in terror pushed the little one causing him to fall to the ground, the queen was frightened and ran in Clear Spark's direction.
"Get on my back and hold on tight, we must get out of here." Said the queen as she picked up her little one and settled him on her back before starting to run home.
"What's going on?, why is everyone screaming?" The foal asked in fright.
"We'll talk later, now we have to get out of here."
Chrysalis was running through town dodging ponies and jumping over obstacles when a light blue mare landed in front of her preventing her from moving forward.
"Chrysalis stop!" Rainbow Dash shouted landing hard in front of the queen. "Let Clear Spark go and I promise not to hit you so hard."
Chrysalis used a quick spell to blind the pegasus for a few seconds and give her enough time to turn around and run at full speed.
"Ms. Chrysalis, what's going on?" Asked the colt holding on as best he could to the queen's neck.
"Please give me a second, we must get out of here first." Replied the queen as she ran at full speed.
"But-but why did a mare say to stop?."
"Remember when I told you I was famous, well I am, but not in a good way."
"What do you mean?"
"I've done some very bad things in my life and many ponies would be happy to put me in a dungeon, that's why I asked you to keep it a secret."
Chrysalis entered an empty store and quickly closed the curtains giving her a few precious seconds to rest and recover.
"Is this my fault?" The foal asked somewhat chagrined.
The queen turned her head and saw the sadness on Clear Spark's face, she carefully lowered him off her back and gave him a tight hug.
"Hey, relax, this is not your fault, so don't worry, you didn't do anything wrong, what happened now is my fault, so don't be sad, ok?." The queen kissed the colt's forehead before hugging him once more and seeing that a smile had returned to his face.
"Good, now we should go back home, grab a couple of things, General Whiskers and run into the forest."
"Should we do that?"
"I'm afraid so, but it will only be for a few days, I know a place I know you'll love and no one will ever hurt you there."
"But what about all my friends, I don't want to leave them."
Chrysalis sighed softly and hugged Clear Spark again.
"Please I need you to trust me, this is our only option, can you do it?."
"Ok." Clear Spark replied hugging the queen back.
"Thank you." Said the queen before settling the colt back on her back and waiting for him to assert himself tightly. "Then let's go."
Chrysalis kicked the door open and ran out at full speed through the middle of town causing screams from the panicked ponies still running in all directions, she had no more places to hide, her only option was to run straight across the entire town until she reached her house and grabbed necessary things before escaping into the forest and later to one of her hives, but with each passing second her chances of escape were diminishing.
As she passed the market she saw AppleJack approaching her at full speed, spinning a rope over her head and throwing it to try to catch her, Chrysalis jumped to the side to avoid being caught, but the farm pony was known to be stubborn and continued to chase her with the rope in her muzzle.
From the sky, Rainbow Dash was approaching at full speed but the queen grabbed an apple from one of the fruit stands and threw it with all her might impacting directly into her face and causing her to lose her balance.
"Hey, that's cheating!" Shouted the pegasus wiping her face as she sped off at full speed crashing into AppleJack.
A little further ahead was Rarity with Pinkie Pie and a huge cannon with a cart full of cakes, Pinkie pointed the cannon at the queen and fired hundreds of cakes at the same time, the queen just ducked, and surprisingly none of the cakes hit her or Clear Spark.
"Wow, that was lucky." Said the queen in surprise.
"RECHARGE!." Shouted the pink mare as she reloaded the cannon at full speed next to Rarity.
The queen had already dodged most of the group and only had one barricade left in front of her, a fearful yellow pegasus that was the only thing standing between her and the escape, but the queen knew how to get rid of Fluttershy, running at full speed the queen stopped inches away from the frightened pegasus who ducked and hid behind her mane.
"Excuse me Fluttershy, could you move to the side?, I'm in a bit of a hurry." Said the queen calmly to the shy pegasus.
"Ummm... ok." Replied Fluttershy moving to the side and allowing the queen to continue on her way.
"Thank you, dear, have a nice day." Said the queen before continuing on her way at full speed.
The queen had almost left the town, Clear Spark was still held tightly to her neck and she could see in the distance her home when a bolt of purple magic hit in front of her forcing her to stop, in the air in front of her was Twilight Sparkle menacingly and with charged magic ready to attack, the queen knew she couldn't go out in the open to fight Twilight, that would give her enough time for her friends to regroup and she had to keep Clear Spark safe, she had to get back to town and lose her amongst the buildings.
"Don't let go!" Shouted the queen before turning around and heading back into town.
"Don't let her get away." Shouted the alicorn before starting the pursuit of the monarch again.
The queen could see as little by little Twilight's friends regrouped and closed off her escape paths, and turning a corner sealed her fate as she met a dead end.
"Chrysalis stop!" Twilight shouted, landing next to her group of friends who were slowly corralling the queen. "Give yourself up, you have nowhere to escape."
Chrysalis was cornered in that alley, flying was not an option because she would be quickly caught by Rainbow Dash or Twilight's magic, fighting head-on wouldn't work either because there were too many opponents to face at the same time, she also discarded the magic duel because Clear Spark would be in the middle of the crossfire, and her priority was the safety of the little one on her back, she was out of options and her enemies were getting closer and closer.
But she still had one thing left to do, a way out so that Clear Spark would not be hurt, the queen gently lowered the foal from her back and stepped forward causing the group of mares to step back and move into a fighting stance.
"I... surrender..."