It was a good day for the changeling hive. And it was a good day for Chrysalis. After months and months worth of planning, scheming and preparing, she had finally succeeded in her quest for revenge.
The ponies that had defeated and utterly humiliated her all those years ago in Canterlot were now in her mercy. Hanging from the ceiling, trapped in her slime pods, and unable to escape. The heroes of Equestria, as well as their rulers were reduced to nothing more than glorified food dispensers!
And now that the country has been rid of their protectors, Canterlot will fall to the changelings, and Equestria will be hers for the taking! All those ponies, all that LOVE! It will all be hers to feed!!
And that's not all. Now that the sun and moon were under her control, no other nation would dare try and stop her. She would have the entire world in a choke hold. And there was no one left to stop them Her!
At that moment, while Chrysalis was sitting on her throne, enjoying her victory, the ground shook.
'RUMBLE'
It all happened so fast. First, the entire hive shook and cracked as earthquakes ran through it. They were strong enough to cause alarm, and knock some changelings off their hooves. But not enough to cause serious damage to the hive. And yet, screams of terror sounded throughout the hive all the same.
After a few moments, the rumbling quieted down while something new took its place. It felt as if the very hive was being lifted of the ground. At first, it was barely noticeable. And then it became very noticeable. Every changeling that was currently in the air was intercepted by the floor beneath them as the entire hive was lifted in the air.
And then, just as suddenly as it began, the hive stopped moving.
Chrysalis got to her hooves and looked at her surroundings. Most of the changeling guard were already on high alert while the weaker grunts were down on their side. She immediately went to barking orders to her subjects. 'Search the hive, help the injured, check the nursery'. Everything a leader should be doing during a crisis such as this.
She was the queen after all. She had been for centuries. The hive has been through worst crisis. She had to have some level of competence to be able to make it this far.
Though no amount of competence would prepare her for what happened next.
"You're Highness"!! called out a voice.
"Commander Pharynx, report!" answered Chrysalis.
Pharynx was Chrysalis head off patrol. He looked like a typical grunt but with red frills and purple irises. When the crisis happened, she had assign Pharynx to search the outside the hive to asses the damage. And now he was back. And he seems to be a bit hesitant in speaking.
"Well? On with it then! I don't have all day commander. Chrysalis said, a bit impatient.
"You're Highness, its... well... You might want to see this for yourself." Pharynx finally answered.
Chrysalis wasn't sure what she was seeing was real or not. She was currently flying outside of the hive, along with an army of changelings. A good chunk of them was made up of her guard, but most of them were just grunts that were curious and wanted to see what was going on.
They didn't quiet know what to make of this. All they knew was that right there, just outside the border to their kingdom, was a dome. A dome that seemingly encompasses the entire hive.
At first glance, it looked like it was some sort of magic barrier. But upon closer inspection, the barrier in question was actually made of glass. No, not glass. Glass was supposed to be hard yet fragile. This dome was more springy and stretchy.
Plastic maybe?
Who or what would have the power to trap an entire valley in an unbreakable plastic dome? Chrysalis didn't know, nor was she capable of even asking that question.
Just beyond the dome, where there were once grass and forest, was replaced by the unmistakable view of cloudy skies. The hive, I as well as the entire valley was currently floating high in the sky.
"H...How?" was the only response Chrysalis could muster. Who could have done this? Why had they done this? How did they do this!!?
"This doesn't make any sense!" Chrysalis yelled in confusion.
"Hahaha, makes sense? What fun is there in making sense?" asked and ominous voice.
There was a flash of light that blinded them for a moment. After it subsided, Chrysalis and her changelings were greeted by the sight of some sort of chimeric creature. It had the head of a goat, serpentine body and tail, and limbs from all sorts of different creatures. It was also sitting on some sort of red and black throne.
Chrysalis recognized the creature instantly. She had seen it back in Canterlot as a statue. Back when she was pretending to be Princess Cadance. "Discord! What is the meaning of this!?" she asked while motioning towards the dome.
"Well what ever do you mean?" asked Discord nonchalantly as he lounged about in his throne.
"This! This dome! The valley! All of it! Why!" Chrysalis asked angrily.
"Isn't it obvious? This... is a rescue mission." Discord answered as if it was obvious.
"A rescue mission?" Chrysalis asked in confusion.
"Of course! What? Did you really think you could pony nap my friends without having to deal with me?"
Chrysalis could only scowled at him. She knew he was friends with the ponies now, and that she would have to deal with him eventually. She just assumed he wouldn't be able to do anything to the due to the Dark stone. Unfortunately she was wrong.
"How?" It was a simple question. One that he didn't have to answer. But she had to know. "How are you still able to use magic? The Dark stone should have been able to stop you!"
"Oh I'll admit, while that pesky throne of yours is rather annoying, there are still plenty of loopholes I can exploit." Discord explains as grabs onto a piece of cloud. Using his chaos magic, he transforms the 'normal' piece of cloud into glass of chocolate milk. He then proceeded to drink the glass itself and then throw the now solid chocolate milk through the dome and past all the changelings, which then exploded when it made contact with the ground.
Chrysalis could only stare at the crater that the explosion left behind. Not only did Discords magic still work this close to the throne, but they also had nothing else that could counter the draqonequus.
Before she could come up with a plan, Discord continued while holding a microphone. "I'm only going to say this once so you all better listen carefully. Release my friends and whatever pony prisoners you have in there and I'll leave you all to your own devices. Fail to do so then I'll have to take matters into my own paws. So what it gonna be?" Discord said, his mismatched eyes glowing red.
It should have been an easy choice, between keeping the prisoners and face the Lord of Chaos themselves, or release the prisoners and he backs off, leaving them to only deal the ponies when they launch a counter attack. Still, she refuses to back down. She had invested a lot of effort into getting revenge, and she was not about to let this Thing take that away from her.
"I would rather die than surrender to the likes of you!" Chrysalis answered with venom in her voice.
"Oh please, I'm not going to kill any of you, I'm simply going to make it so that you can't fight back." Discord said in annoyance. If there was one thing about his past that he was proud off its the fact that he would never stoop so low as to kill someone who couldn't fight back. At least in a way that matters.
"I suppose the rest of you are with her on this?" He asked the rest of the changelings. Most if not all were more than a little afraid of what the draqonequus was capable of. But they were all loyal to their queen, so if she says she would rather fight, they would fight along side her.
"Well, suit yourselves." Discord said as he snapped the digits on his lion paw.
The changelings never stood a chance.
Starlight was at a lost for words.
Right in front of her, where there was once a changeling hive was now replaced by a gigantic hole in the ground. Not a crater, but a hole. It was about as wide as the entire valley. She couldn't tell how deep it was, mostly because she couldn't see the bottom.
Right above the hole, up high in the sky was some sort of sphere. The bottom half of the sphere was made entirely out of dirt, while upper half was made up what she could only guess was glass.
Right above the dome was an entire storms worth of pink clouds. They had originally been normal storm clouds from the surrounding area but Discord had used his chaos magic to round them all up and turn them into his signature cotton candy clouds. Which then proceeded to rain chocolate milk through the dome and all over the floating valley.
As if that wasn't pushing it, all around her, rocks, trees, dirt and basically anything within the surrounding area were lifted off the ground and turned into pastries (cupcakes, ice cream, cookies, you name it) which were then thrown right through the dome and at the hive.
Starlight knew what Discord was capable of, (Twilight and her friends have told her as much) but she wasn't expecting him to do any of this!
The trio looked on at the scene with horrified expressions. All of them for different reasons.
Starlight was acutely aware that her mentor, her friends and the princesses were still trapped in there. But all she could do was stand there and have faith that Discord knew how to be careful.
Thorax was starting to get worried. He may have been a traitor to the hive, but he was still born and raised here. He had at least some attachment to this place. There even times during his exile that he actually missed this place. And now here he was, standing around uselessly as the Lord of Chaos has a food fight with his childhood home.
Trixie wasn't fairing much better. When she had first met Discord, she found him rather annoying. First he shows up out of nowhere and inserts himself into the group. Proceeds to treat the entire situation like a game (until Fluttershy got involved). And then he had the bright idea to teleport them here without so much as a plan!
But now... now she was looking at the draqonequus in new light. All that confidence and arrogants was made whole lot more sense. Why would Discord ever need to worry about anything when he could just all do this.
She was also made aware of how she treated Discord before this and realizes that she should probably watch what she says around him from now on.
Discord was starting to get bored. After all this time holding back his chaos against the ponies, he finally gets a chance to let loose and spread chaos and disharmony all while still being one of the good guys. It was even a bit of a challenge this time around since he couldn't use his chaos magic directly, forcing him to use his surroundings as a means to spread chaos.
And yet here he was, slouching on his throne while throwing random food stuff at the changelings. Or at least the ones that were still outside.
After five minute of being constantly pelted by pastries and vegetables (he added those in just for the heck of it) and the that they couldn't attack him anyway due to the dome, Chrysalis order her changelings to retreat into the hive. Discord tried to stop them of course but without any way to cross over the AMF, all he could do was try and trap them in more sticky foods to try and detain them.
Alas, it was all for naught. Most of the changelings including Chrysalis had manage to escape to the hive. He could probably break through the wall if he threw something a bit harder, but decided against it in fear he might accidently hurt his friends.
Speaking of his friends, he should probably go and save them already. They were probably as bored as he was right about now.
And so he grabbed a piece of his cloud and started to use his chaos magic to mold it into a bag filled with very familiar seeds. Plunder seeds. A special kind of root with a mind of its own that not only do they not need magic to function, but would also heed the every command of their creator. Himself.
"Go forth my precious seeds, capture every changeling you can find. And while you're at it please do me a favor and destroy that pesky rock throne for me." he whispered to the seeds before throwing them at the foot of the hive.
The plunder seeds then proceeded to bury themselves underground as they start to enact their fathers orders. They didn't need to be controlled when he was turned to stone, and they certainly didn't need guidance now.