//------------------------------//
// Extra Chapter 1: Under the Cover of an Illusion 
// Story: For The Swarm 
// by VanishingAct 
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At last in familiar surroundings, I thought that I would finally be able to move around the castle by myself. The thing I didn't realise, however was that the show's scope of Canterlot Castle was far smaller than the actual thing, and so we found ourselves in strange places we had never seen before.

The Cadenza brothers had given us leave to explore the entirety of the castle as we waited for the ceremony to begin. Storgia wanted to visit the main city and see what had changed whereas Filio had some business in the city as well. Agape and Clair both opted to stay in the castle and visit Princess Celestia and Cadance, but wished for our prescence to not be revealed at that point, so we were on our own and had to hide.

"This sucks!" Jesus exclaimed loudly from the vase, "There's nothing to do and were cramped in here like old Christmas decorations!".

"Shhh!" We all cried out mentally at Jesus, "We can't let ourselves be heard!"

"But who says there's nothing to do?" I replied, "He said don't be seen, not don't move. This place is practically crawling with Chess Pieces, least we can do is investigate them further."

"Sounds like a plan!" Jesus said, "Let's go!".

At once we all tried to fly out of the vase, but came across a little problem.

"Simon, you're on the top, can you get out?"

"I'm trying!"

It was at this point that we all came to realisation, and our thoughts coalesced and became the same idea.

"We're stuck, aren't we?"



The sky, limitless and blue, stretched far over the city of Canterlot, and Celestia's orb shone down its might and glory onto the city below. The guilded alabaster buildings stood tall and proud much like their owners, and the white cobble roads accented each step of the very important ponies, heralding their prescence and making them feel larger than life.

The crowds were thick and slow moving today due to the knighting ceremony that was happening, which so many ponies has heard was happening, and everypony wanted a piece of the action. However, amidst all the hustle and bustle, there were two ponies standing among the crowds, reluctant to move and conversing with each other.

"You know, this would be so much easier if I wasn't royal.", the tall white unicorn stated with an air of frustration.

"But you must remember, your Highness, that if you weren't you wouldn't be able to.", the blue pegasus next to him replied.

The unicorn, significantly taller, turned to his cohort. "Hm. If I wasn't royal, I wouldn't need to either. I envy you, Crosswind, do you know that?"

With a chuckle, Crosswind replied. "What possibly could you envy me for, Prince Filio?"

"You're a pony." Filio said simply, with the utmost sincerity. "You're all these ponies' equal. Sure, there may be some status with being a Guard, but even so, you can relate with eachother. I, on the other hand, am elevated to a status where no-one could even dream of being, royalty. They see an alicorn in the street and suddenly they bow down, suddenly you're so much better than them when in all honesty you're not! I tell you if I didn't have these stupid wings they wouldn't look twice at me!" Filio turned to Crosswind as the issue started to come out. "It's not as if I even asked to be there, it was just determined when I was born, 'This colt is royalty, all hail.', and sometimes I almost wish I..."

He couldn't bring himself to say it. As this conversation was happening, a commotion was building up in the street, the flow of ponies sped up and the noise increased. Amid the clamour, a few voices could be made out.

"There's an alicorn at the market stalls!"

"What, an alicorn?!"

"Prince Storgia Cadenza!"

"Come on mares, one of us is gonna get a royal wedding!"

At this last comment Filio couldn't help but laugh.

"Storgia better step carefully, otherwise he may end this morning unwillingly engaged!"

But within his chuckles at the situation, a point had still been made. Filio turned back to Crosswind, always one with open ears, and continued.

"Storgia, he loves attention, it's in his nature to. As the Sovereign of Affection, there's nothing more he enjoys than the general joy that ponies get from being with eachother, and when you're able to bring them together just by being yourself, that's perfect. He's just one big bundle of happiness, and it rubs off on everyone he meets. I, on the other hand am completely different. I deal with friendships, intimate bonds between people who've been with eachother, seen eachother at their best and worst, know eachother and care for eachother. How am I able to form bonds like that when I'm shut off by my title? I try to with yourself and the rest of the squad but sometimes it just feels so fruitless. I mean, I'm the Sovereign of Fellowship, but sometimes I just feel so detached from that." Filio turned to Crosswind, who had been listening and nodding the entire time. "Pathetic, isn't it?"

Crosswind took a moment to articulate his thoughts inside his head before responding. "No, not at all, Filio. It's perfectly natural. I honestly can't think of a better friend than you, and I'm pretty sure the entire squad agrees. Sometimes, we're just put into situations we can't do much about, we just have to make the most of them. You can't be friends with everyone, but you can at least stay loyal to the rest of us, and loyal to yourself too. There are several ponies out their who'd be brothers in legs if only they realised it. You can help them at least."

Filio took a while to ponder this before smiling. "You know, you're right. I shouldn't be drowning myself in woe when there are other people I can help." He, in his white unicorn's guise, smiled at Crosswind. "I'm glad you're my friend Crosswind.".

Crosswind simply smiled back.

Filio suddenly took note of the amount of time they had been standing in the pathway. "Storgia gave me 2 hours with this illusion, enough time to go there, get the negotiation over with and to get back to the castle before it breaks. I reckon that if we tread carefully, we could get back to the castle without the illusion without being noticed. Let's have fun with this. Know a good pub around here?"



Crosswind did indeed know a good pub, owing to a cousin who had recommended it to him should he ever visit Canterlot. The Split Hoof was an old, rickety establishment, eaten away by time and rot, in the outer areas of Canterlot where there wasn't much in the way of grandeur or high society. Exactly what Filio was thinking of.

The place didn't have much in the way of customers owing to the early hour at which they had arrived. The only beings inside were a black bat-winged pegasus, with luminous yellow eyes with his head held lamely on the chipped wooden table, his hoof tracing the top of his empty glass with no purpose, a green Earth pony with a short blue mane, reading a notebook with intent and the bartender, a crusty grey unicorn with stubble and a permanent wide grin. Filio looked between the two customers and grinned to Crosswind before charging up a spell. Two hearts, similar to his interlocked hooves and swords mark appeared in front of him. Filio then willed these to move towards his two targets before making them burst in front of them. Of course, this was completely invisible to all but Filio, but its effect, subtle as it was, was easy to see.

The Earth pony looked up from his notebook and looked around the entire bar, from the cheap furnishings to the new ponies who had walked in to the bar counter, before his eyes settled on the bat-winged pony on the opposite side of the bar. He looked at him staring at his glass morosely, and wondered what had happened to him to put him in such a bad mood, but quickly shook his head to put this thought out of him, and returned to his book. But he still wasn't able to throw the thought of the pony away, and eventually his curiousity peaked, and with that his closed his book and trotted over to the bat winged pony.

"Hey you two! You gonna stand there all day or come over here some time soon?!"

The call of the bartender had broken the prince and his guard's observation of the two ponies. They looked at eachother before trotting over to the counter, all the while listening in to the conversation that had started.

"So, what happened?"

"Nothing I really want to talk about."

"Go on, you can tell me. I'm all ears."

"Really?"

"Yeah. Not like I've anything better to do."

The bartender trotted over to Filio and Crosswind, while cleaning a greasy mug and said to them, "So, what'll it be?"

"Just a regular pint, thanks." said Crosswind.

"The same here, mate." went Filio after, masking any hint of royalty in his voice.

The bartender nodded and started to fill their drinks, and the duo carried on listening to the conversation.

"So the house might be seized?"

"Mate, this isn't a 'maybe', it's gonna happen unless I can get a 'trusted' pony to say that I can pay back the darn loan."

"Hmm... tell you what, I think I might be able to do that?"

"R-Really?"

"Yeah. I'm an accountant, trusted enough?"

"Y-Yeah! That'll work! Oh my..."

"What?"

"I, I just don't- wow, thanks, bro."

"Heh, glad to help. Can I get your address down?"

"Yeah, sure. Take down the address of my lender too."

By this time the bartender had finished filling Crosswind and Filio's glasses and had handed them to the ponies. Filio, in light of the solving of the batwing's problem, sought to celebrate and realised the perfect way to do so.

"And a drink for these two gentlecolts, on me!"

Both the Earth pony and the batwing turned to Filio and Crosswind in surprise.

"Oh, I just heard how your problem was solved, so I thought 'why not?'"

"Heh, wow, this day just gets better and better!"

All the colts eventually received their drinks and entered conversation of a more light humoured sort, with each telling stories about each of their lives. The batwing, who's name was Moonlight, complained about his sister's new coltfriend (it was always somepony new), how he always stank of BO and piss and was about as structurally sound as a piece of paper. Seabreeze, the Earth pony went on about his boss, to which Crosswind cheekily agreed that his boss was also an arsewipe, before giving anecdotes about training and the guard life. Filio started talking about his siblings, one with no grasp of the real world, a second who was far too serious for his own good and a third who thought she was better than everyone else since she got married (all lies of course, purely for banter). And they each cried with laughter and drank their drinks and knew the feels that they all felt, so much so that they were all loath to have Crosswind and Filio leave after an hour's stay.