As the flickering lighter fell, I learned many things. First and foremost, that I was just as soaked as Chrysalis, we would both go up in flames in a second. I also noticed that the broodmother made no attempts to catch the incendiary device, actually, she seemed to accept her death without a fuss of fight. Perhaps it was adrenaline, or some miracle, but I was able to run much faster than my norm, and only felt the heat off the fireball from the exploding barrels. My clothing, however, was no so lucky, and the combustible fabric soon burned my skin. A heavy but somewhat pliant object slammed into my back and sent me to the ground.
A trail of fire connected with another grouping of barrels, bathing the only exit in flames. Not that I was in any condition to move, with my skin screaming in pain and whatever the fuck was on my back. I didn't expect the debris to move, or the inferno to warp around me instead of engulfing me like any fire should. A green spark caught my attention, and it turned to it as best I could, and actually wasn't that surprised with what I say. Chrysalis hadn't attempted to stop the initial explosion's shock-wave, but she hadn't been killed by it, the blast just stunned her. Her eyes were still open, but they were unfocused, and her magic was still actively deflecting the flames. I realized that was an autonomous survival response, and a certain bubble around her was protected from burning.
I had a wonderful idea.
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“You two alright?” Jay had just finished cutting Celestia from the cocoon he'd found her in, while the guards were taking care of Cadence and Shining Armor. The princess spit out some green gunk, some kind of bug juice from the inside the pod that had gotten into her lungs. At least it didn't seemed harmful, not yet, anyway.
“Chrysalis took Taylor to the caverns!” The outburst was punctuated by a low rumble permeating the castle, it came from deep below, most like the Marehouse. The human would know that feeling anywhere, and he was positive that was an explosion being muffled by the mountain's stone.
“Somehow, I think he has the situation under control.” Much to the uniformed teen's dismay, the alicorn pulled on his shoulders to hoist herself up. Celestia was capable of being very loud when she wanted, and if it helped get her point across, then she would resort to shouting. However, her calmer voice would do much more in this situation.
“You don't know how scared of her he is.” The alicorn was deathly serious, for the first time since Jay met her, the princess' eyes were narrowed in anger. The teen realized that he may have made a mistake in his estimates, but he couldn’t be certain if he had overestimated Taylor, or underestimated the changeling queen. Another rumble permeated the mountain, this one was more powerful than the previous one, likely munitions detonating inside the Marehouse. Jay briefly wondered how much damage had been done, before he remembered that his friend was likely in the epicenter of the blast. Taylor was a tough guy in his own right, but a large bomb would put him under like anybody else. “She had him shaking, she even used his own knife on him.”
“What kind of psycho is this bug bitch?” The teenaged pyromaniac did not like what he heard, nothing about the changeling queen sounded good. If Taylor was able to hold her off, it wouldn't last long, and the explosions erupting below the castle only proved the young man's desperation.
“We've got to get him out of there!” Shining Armor had returned to the waking world, thanks to his fiance's help, but there were more pressing matters than celebration at hoof. The captain was more than ready to mount an assault on the classified facility, the black project's location was well-known to the higher-ups in the royal guard. That didn't mean he knew what was held within, it just meant he knew the door code and how to clean the keyboard.
“Maybe we should keep you up here while more able soldiers take care of it.” There had never been a moment when Shining Armor looked at Cadence like she was insane, but there was a first time for everything. With Princess Celestia's stare, the slightly-shaken stallion had no option but to agree.
With the monarch's consent, Jay and Vinyl took four noise troopers to the lift.
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A suicide mission, that what it had been, simple as that. Chrysalis realized that Taylor had viewed their little game the same way as she did, and for a moment, almost felt guilty about attacking the city. The human was slumped against the lift's wall, most of his exposed skin was a mass of mottled red and pink, only his face and parts of his legs were untouched by the flames. The teen was still lucid enough to know that the broodmother was awake, possibly enough to know that she had faked being unconscious the entire time. Chrysalis briefly wondered what was going to become of her and her few children that still lived, freedom was unlikely, and Taylor was almost certainly set on execution. How long would she suffer at his hands before Celestia ordered him to end her, if the Solar Princess would even allow the human to perform the deed himself.
“I hope you'll kill me quickly, I hear torture is an awful experience.” The queen was joking, she highly doubted her burned carapace would be capable of sensation for some time, changelings took several weeks to regrow lost nerve endings, and her chitinous exoskeleton was sufficiently charred to warrant a shedding or two.
“Torture is the coward's method of information extraction.” Taylor was proving to be an odd one, he had set fire to an entire storage complex full of powerful artifacts in order to kill the hivemother, and now he was saying he wasn't going to torture her. Chrysalis was accustomed to using deception to get what she wanted, and she knew the human was after something, she just wasn't sure what. A single spark came from her horn before the human hurled an amorphous, soft object at her head, and she found herself unable to complete her digging.
“What did you hit me with?” The green thing rolled on the floor, its odd bumps and clefts made its movement as unusual as its form. Whatever it was, the strange item did a spectacular job at negating the queen's magic. The revelation brought a genuine smile to the teen's face, like a foal with a huge haul from Nightmare Night. Chrysalis realized that Taylor had just found a powerful weapon against any magic-wielder he could ever come across, and she was his test subject.
“It's called a Bubble, it neutralizes radiation.” The final terms was unfamiliar to the broodmother, though the way the human said it, it sounded like something awful. Chrysalis had seen into the teen's analytical mind, but hadn't found a reason to venture into his stored knowledge, she was actually regretting that decision. “Magic, it seems, is a harmless form of high-powered energy, like gamma without the gene damaging effects.”
Before the queen could ask what any of those words meant, the lift's door opened to reveal the other human and some ponies armed with oddly-shaped speakers. Taylor gave them a mocking salute as they saw him, burned and blistered, but still very much alive. Two of the noise troopers bound Chysalis in chains before anything could be said, and the changeling gave no resistance. Taylor was helped to his feet as a white unicorn attempted to pick up the Bubble with her magic, only to have the masked human grab it instead. The burned man looked to his uniformed comrade, and in the kindest voice h could muster, made an innocent request.
“Get me to a goddamned medic.”
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I was rushed to a hospital, one of the few buildings that had gone undamaged in the battle, and been immediately treated for my injuries. The ponies had a salve they put on my burns that sped cellular regeneration, but itched like hell under the bandages. Thankfully, the balm would prevent most of the scarring, but that didn't mean infection wasn't possible, so they weren't allowing visitors just yet. I was relieved that everything had gone relatively well, with only a dozen deaths on our side, mostly just aged hearts giving out, but the losses would be easy to recover from. Shit, was that really how I was looking at this? Death and destruction, hundreds of ponies were homeless, and I was focusing on numbers?
Numbers and whatever secret Chrysalis had up her metaphorical sleeve. Deceiver, that's what she called me, and it implied religious or cultural significance, further study would be required. My nurse had dropped off a message from Celestia that I would have all the time in the world to interrogate the queen, she would be receiving a life sentence, as would the dozen or so of her brood that still lived. The princess had also taken the liberty of letting Trixie and Lyra know that I was okay, and they would likely be the very first two ponies I saw that weren't medical staff after I'm allowed visitors.
I had a busy week ahead of me, and things would only get worse from there.