Chrysalis marched out of the Hive, glaring up at the sky as a gust of wind buffeted against her. The dragon’s shadow loomed over her as he descended. Snorting out jets of smoke, Korg landed with an earth-shaking rumble.
“Leave my Hive alone if you know what’s good for you,” Chrysalis commanded, standing resolute against the much taller dragon.
Korg let out a rumbling laugh. “You don’t frighten me, bug,” he groused. "I want my treasure back, my jeweled beetle that you stole from me.”
Chrysalis narrowed her eyes. “You won’t get it.”
“I’ll tear this nest apart if I have to!” Korg slammed both fists on the ground, getting down eye-to-eye with Chrysalis as flames leaked from his mouth. “Where is it?!”
“I’m afraid your precious little treasure and I have gotten rather… attached.” Chrysalis smirked and gestured to her chest where the scarab was on display. “It’s not going anywhere.”
Korg growled, the reverberations rattling Chrysalis’s carapace. “Then I’ll take it from your charred body!”
He raised up with a big inhale, and let loose a torrent of bright orange fire where Chrysalis stood.
Chrysalis had meant to move, to shapeshift into something to either get out of the way or take the heat, but the scarab moved first. The strange armor returned in an instant, and the two insectoid legs formed a dome of glowing blue membrane around her body. She stared wide-eyed as Korg’s fire swept past it like water.
“Initiating self-defense protocols.”
As Korg abated, satisfied he’d reduced the bug to ashes, he stared wide-eyed as Chrysalis’s shield lowered, revealing the queen in black and blue.
“Is that the best you can do?” Chrysalis sneered.
“Alright, whatever you are,” Chrysalis hissed internally. “Give me something to hit him with!”
“Understood.”
Korg raised a fist to smash Chrysalis, but the changeling queen rolled away from the blow as it cracked the earth. She briefly glanced at her foreleg as a cylindrical device formed from blue pixels, much like the membrane shield. Figuring the scarab had taken her suggestion literally, she charged forward.
The thrusters of her new suit of armor flared to life as she slammed her new weapon into Korg’s jaw. The dragon let out a roar of pain as he stumbled back, clutching his bruised jaw. Chrysalis smirked, until she saw the first eddies of flame.
She said to the scarab the first thing that came to mind: “Webbing.”
The cylindrical gauntlet shifted, the end of it expanding into a wide opening and a pair of pinchers adorned the rim. Before Korg had a chance to open his maw, Chrysalis aimed the new weapon at him. Somehow, most likely through the scarab’s will, a thick globule of glowing blue webbing splattered across his muzzle.
Wide-eyed, the dragon tried to open his mouth, before resorting to clawing at the webbing. Smoke bled from his nostrils as he dimmed his fire. Chrysalis grinned, charging in again low while he was distracted. “Punch!” she commanded, and the scarab’s weapon reverted back to the gauntlet.
She delivered a blow to Korg’s gut that sent him skidding back, a muffled grunt of pain sounding through his glued maw. Experimenting, Chrysalis commanded: “Mantis blades!”
The gauntlet on her foreleg shifted again—into a long, scythe-like blade that was joined by another on her opposite foreleg. She experimentally slashed with them and nodded in approval.
The joy didn’t last for long as Korg charged forward, slashing at her with his claws. Chrysalis’s forelegs moved on their own, parrying the blow with the back of the blades. She watched, fascinated, as the scarab continued against Korg’s onslaught again and again, her strength somehow matching the dragon’s.
No, the scarab’s strength.
“Alright, let’s finish this,” Chrysalis snarled.
Instead of parrying the next blow, she rolled out of the way. In the air, she was much more nimble and evasive. Using a combination of her wings and the suit’s thrusters, she ducked under one of his blows and slashed upwards.
Korg let out a muffled cry of pain as she slashed through one of his great leathery wings, reducing its tautness to uselessly flap in the breeze. With fire practically in his eyes, he finally tore the webbing from his mouth. Before he could find the Queen to torch her, another slash tore through his other wing.
Crying out in pain, the fire died in his throat as he glared around for his target wildly—only for a shadow to race towards him from above.
And Chrysalis, with the weight of a dozen anvils, delivered a gauntlet punch to the square of his back.
The dragon sprawled to the ground, his breathing raspy. As the dust settled, Chrysalis stood before him with a wicked grin. The gauntlet faded away, now replaced by a long thin blade.
“Eliminating threat.”
The suit stepped up to Korg, leveling the blade at his neck. Just before it could touch his scales, Chrysalis spoke up: “Halt!”
The suit froze, locked in place. “No. As much as he deserves it for daring to assault my Hive, I don’t need a war with the dragons on my hooves,” Chrysalis explained, frowning down at Korg. “He may live.”
“As you wish.”
The dragon opened one eye, staring up at the victorious queen as her blade faded away and she stomped the hoof into the dirt.
“Go back to the Dragon Lands,” she growled. “Walk back and tell them, if you dare, that Queen Chrysalis of the Changeling Hive bested you, and will best any dragon who dares to stand against her Hive. Now GO!”
The dragon staggered to his feet, bruised and battered. He glared daggers down at the changeling, only for her to stand her ground.
“Go,” she growled quietly.
Without a second glance at the changeling or her Hive, Korg trundled away, his wings drooping uselessly against his back.
Chrysalis snorted, and the suit faded away once more. Despite the adrenaline rush, she was still standing proud this time.
She turned to her Hive as a swarm of her changelings pile out, buzzing excitedly. Thorax and Pharynx led the group.
“Your Majesty, that was incredible!” Thorax exclaimed, wings buzzing excitedly.
“That beetle thing, it actually worked! It’s incredible!” Pharynx remarked.
“Yes.” A cruel smile curled across her muzzle as she looked down at the scarab still embedded in her chest. She reached up and lightly touched it with one forehoof. “It makes for a most useful tool, doesn’t it?”
“You don’t think that dragon will come back… do you?” Thorax asked.
Chrysalis gave a hearty laugh. “Dragons are too prideful. He won’t tell a soul that a little changeling beat him,” she replied, smirking out across the barren wastes of her kingdom. “But there are more pressing matters to attend to now. Pharynx, ready the troops for march.”
“Your Majesty?” Pharynx asked, glancing out across the kingdom himself. “What’s our target? Are we attacking the Dragon Lands in response?”
“No, dear Pharynx.” Chrysalis gave a dark snicker, eyes sliding towards a tall mountain far off in the distance. “It’s time we pay Canterlot another visit.”
To Be Continued…