In total, eight ponies stood in wait in the Canterlot Castle entry hall. There was the six elements of harmony, Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, and Prince Shining Armor. None knew why, but all had been summoned by Princess Celestia and been sent Pegasus chariot escorts all for some unknown urgency she wrote that she would explain when they got to the castle.
"I don't get it. If this were some new villain or baddie, why is Cadance and your brother here?" Rainbow dash asked.
Twilight Sparkle shook her head and said, "I don't know. Things have been calm for a while. But the princess sounded rushed in her letter."
Twilight's brother and sister-in-law walked up next to her and stood by her side.
"I'm sure... everything will be fine," Cadance said unconvincingly.
Just then, Celestia came into the room, a false calm expression on her face that even Pinkie Pie would see straight through.
"Hello... everypony," she said "I'm very glad you all came."
"Is something wrong princess?" Twilight asked her mentor.
"Yes! Yes there is! A pregnant changeling says one of us is the father... or mother of her fetus!" she thought inside of her head. But the regal princess attempted to keep her composure and stated calmly...
"Yes. Yes something is very, very, very wrong."
...maybe not that calmly.
The eight ponies stood in shocked silence. Celestia has never flat out stated that something was so terribly wrong, or taken such a disturbed tone.
"Auntie?" Cadance asked.
Celestia was silent.
"P-Princess?" Twilight grew concerned.
"I- I believe it would be easier to show you rather than tell you... Follow me please."
The solar princess walked away from them and down the hall, the confused ponies following her after exchanging concerned and confused glances at one another.
The group of nine, lead by Celestia, was silent. A very rare thing when they would be together. Especially with Pinkie Pie! But all of them understood just how serious this was. The princess had been speechless. No pony alive could recall a time when this has ever happened before.
Twilight Sparkle walked silently with her friends and family in concern. Concern for her mentor, for her friends, and for Equestria. What could be so unsettling and wrong that it would deeply upset the brave and fearless princess of the sun.
"We... are here."
Celestia's voice snapped everypony out of their thoughts of what could possibly be wrong to see they all had stopped. To be specific, they stopped in front of a door to a spare bedroom in the castle.
"Be prepared my little ponies," Celestia said "this news is rather... shocking."
Celestia's horn lit up and the door slowly opened up to show the room.
The room and its one occupant.
Its one changeling occupant.
Chrysalis picked up her head from the book she had been reading on Classic Orchestra, to see nine ponies she had a deep struggle of disliking yet liking at the same time.
"Celestia... back so soon. And you brought the rest of the party with you? How lovely."
"CHRYSALIS!" Twilight yelled.
Rainbow dash acted first by growling and shooting forwards at her in the air. Fluttershy yelled and ran behind Celestia to hide. Shining Armor pushed his wife behind him and lit up his horn with a spell powerful enough to send the queen flying away into the sky a second time. Pinkie (who knows how?!) pulled out her party cannon. Rarity lit up her own horn. Applejack pulled out her lasso. And Twilight fired up her own spell.
But all that was stopped in a second.
Celestia hastily used her own magic to stop Rainbow dash and pull her back by her tail, cancel out Twilight's, Rarity's, and Shining's spells, make Pinkie's cannon and Applejack's rope disappear, and push Fluttershy back out from behind her.
"Hay! What the- Princess what gives?!" Rainbow shouted.
"Why did you stop us from attacking her?!" Rarity questioned.
"She's evil! Look at her! Look in her eyes! It's evil!" Pinkie yelled.
"ENOUGH!" Celestia yelled in the Royal Canterlot Voice, something she hadn't used in decades.
The complaining ponies went silent in fear of the alicorn's outburst of rage.
Except one changeling on the bed...
"Honestly Celestia. Where do you find these- brutes? Attacking a lady while she is with her unborn foal still. Rather barbaric if I do say so myself."
"Princess! Why can't we get rid of her?!" Shining yelled.
"Are you that dead set on killing me that you would endanger an unborn life, Shining?"
Eight sets of eyes drifted to the queen's stomach to notice how it was expanded out the sides and resting softly on a fluffy pillow.
Shining gasped. "It's pregnant! Kill it! Kill her now!"
Rarity fainted dramatically... only to fall on the floor with a thud and a grunt of pain.
"SHINING ARMOR! YOU WILL BE SILENT!" Celestia shouted, affectively silencing the unicorn.
"Now," she continued "past or not, what Chrysalis claims is true. She is... pre- preg- preg-nant."
The words made her stomach turn. Mostly because she knew the possibilities of the other parent. But the princess took a swallow of her own disgust and continued.
"A-and she claims that *gulp* one of us is the child's..." Oh what was the right word for this? Father? Second mother? Um... "other parent."
The room filled with angry yells and claims of the queen being a 'Liar! Liar! Tail on fire!' and such.
"Lies! All of it!"
"Untrue!"
"What in tarnation do you take us for?!"
"Princess put an end to her lies!"
"Not true! Not true, not true, not true!"
Chrysalis just quietly laughed to herself. She found their bickering and outrage amusing.
"Auntie! You couldn't possibly believe this- this- MONSTER!" Cadance yelled and pointed an accusing hoof at the queen.
"It's not possible! The only male here is Shining Armor! And that foal is not his!" Twilight yelled.
"Hack!"
The room went silent and all attention went to Chrysalis on the bed.
"What? It kicked! It's not my fault. If this were a full blooded changeling it would have been born an egg already!"
Celestia took a deep breathe, then exhaled. "Chrysalis, explain."
The queen openly laughed that time, before cringing again and stirring on the bed.
"Ack! Which ever one of you is responsible for this, your kid kicks hard!"
She tried readjusting on the bed to fix her discomfort from the fetus inside her kicking her relentlessly. Finally settling with her front legs hanging off the side of the bed, she began her speech.
"Well, I suppose none of you know a single thing about changelings do you?"
"..."
"That's what I thought. All you know is we feed off of love correct?"
A collective nod was her response.
"Well there is much more to our race than just feeding off of other creatures' love. And my pregnancy is the result of our abnormal mating process-"
"La la la la! We shouldn't hear this! La la la!" Pinkie shouted and covered her ears with her hooves.
The room looked quizzically at the pink pony.
"Pinkie," Twilight said "what are you doing?"
The party pony uncovered her ears, "I asked Mrs. Cake about where foals came from once and she said to never talk about it in front of other ponies!"
"Shut up, would you?!" Chrysalis hissed "Changelings don't reproduce that way! We could, but we don't have to."
Pinkie dropped her hooves back to the floor.
"Good. Now, you all know very well changelings feed off of love. But love is more than food to us. When we are around strong sources of love it starts our reproductive process of our skin becoming a permeable membrane and genetic material is transferred from one body to another by touch."
"However, for a female changeling to get pregnant, we have to be in heat. A natural defense against over-population is a changeling only goes into heat for two weeks every three years, considering two changelings will have a clutch of around two to six eggs in the lowest and seven to twelve eggs in the highest."
"While I took Cadance's place, I was around Shining Armor almost twenty four-seven and the love alone from these pony subjects caused my reproductive process to start up."
She took a pause as she picked up a glass of water next to the bed and took a drink and then sighed.
"But... it wasn't until after you had defeated my invasion force that I noticed I had been in heat already for nearly five days. I had been so caught up in my plans that I hadn't noticed that two days before the wedding I had started my heat cycle. A day before you six mares arrived."
Eyes widened and the group grew panicked. Chrysalis took her time in taking another drink from her glass of water before continuing.
"In the time that I had been in heat while in Canterlot, I had direct contact with four of you ponies."
"W-who?" Twilight asked, rather hesitantly.
Chrysalis grinned darkly. She enjoyed how this made them nervous and uncomfortable. She dealt with this alone for nine months, why not make them feel the stress she had to go through for the last two?
"Funny that you are the one to ask Twilight Sparkle, because you're one of them."
The lavender unicorn's eyes were as wide as they could be.
"Remember when I put a hoof on your shoulder to 'comfort' you after you were kicked out of the wedding? That was the perfect amount of contact to pass DNA from you to me."
Twilight felt her throat start to fill with vomit and she gagged as she fought to hold it back.
"Then of course there's Shining Armor. I was leaning against him constantly to keep up appearances as Cadance."
Shining gagged silently.
"Cadance. Barely need to explain that one. I trapped you twice and the second time was when it could have happened when I stuck you to the alter by your hooves."
Cadance shivered at two things. One the memory of the gross and cold green goo that she had stuck to her. And secondly the idea of having a spawn with the very creature that tried to ruin her wedding.
"And Celestia. You were twice the fool to challenge me. Clashing our horns together counts as direct contact I'm afraid."
The regal princess once again swallowed vomit in her throat at the idea of her genes being combined with... that.
"But whoever the supplier of DNA was, you're all protected now."
The four suspected parents turned their heads to one another and shared looks of confusion. None of them knew what she meant.
"What do you mean?" Twilight managed the guts to ask.
"For changelings, like ponies, we make up families. Both maternal and paternal sides of a changeling family make up a clan. And a clan is protected by the hive. And whether you four are related by blood or marriage, you are all related. So which ever one of you is my foal's other parental, all four of you are a part of my clan and now defended by my hive. If anything or anyone threatens any of your lives, they threaten the hive. So despite whatever grievances or issues we still have with each other..." the queen bowed her head to the group "you have my word as a changeling and a queen that your family, friends, and race is now at peace with my hive."
Rarity fainted again (big surprise) and once again she hit the floor with a thud.
The others stood there. Unsure if this was real, if she was telling the truth, or if she could even be trusted.
"This... this is just a trick!" Shining shouted "You wouldn't just show up and declare peace with us! How do we even know you're pregnant?! This is all just a ruse to conquer Canterlot again!"
"Believe what you want, Shining. But in two more months I'll give birth and we'll see who the genetic parental is and I do so hope that whoever it is you'll want to be a part of my foal's life."
Twilight squinted her eyes, not buying a word she said. "Why?"
"Why?" Chrysalis echoed.
"Yes. Why?"
The queen just sighed and shook her head.
"Why? Why do I accept you? Why do I put the past behind me for the sake of my child? Why do I put an effort into being a mother?"
She sighed.
"Believe it or not ponies, but I am a mother. And a mother is supposed to love her children and want what is best for them. I'm a changeling, but I'm a mother first. And though this child is not an egg, and instead an eleven month fetus, it is mine and I want my foal to know both halves of its heritage."
"Th-that's sweet."
All heads turned to the timid Pegasus now shying in the back.
"O-oh sorry just-"
"Thank you."
All eyes shifted back to Chrysalis. Fluttershy nervously hid behind her mane.
"Oh um... y-your welcome."
Chrysalis just nodded her head before she yawned and closed her eyes heavily.
"Now if you all don't mind, I'd really love some sleep."
It took a minute for the ponies to register her request before fumbling out on their hooves. Each stuttering or grumbling out a goodbye for the expecting. All but Celestia, who was last to leave.
She silently watched the changeling readjust on the bed and snuggle into the soft cushions with a hoof draped over her stomach.
"Anything you need... just ask a guard," the princess said quietly before turning to leave.
But Celestia could have sworn she heard a mumbled "Thank you" as she stepped out.
"Princess can we even trust her?" Twilight asked her mentor.
Celestia silently closed her eyes and sighed. "I do not know. I want to say yes. I want to believe in peace between changelings and ponies... But we have no reason to trust her, and very strong reason to not trust her."
Celestia looked back at the door to the room containing the changeling queen. Then at the ponies she was walking with.
"But if we do not at least try for peace... then we will have truly failed Equestria."
Chrysalis lay silently in the bed while she slept. But the foal kept kicking her in her sleep and she woke up with in less than thirty minutes.
She lay on the bed thinking about what a mess she was now in. She told the truth, for the most part. She does put her foal first. That's just being a good mother. But she didn't tell them the whole truth.
'If they knew, what would they say?' she thought to herself.
'I refuse for them to see me as weak. I've lost enough as it is,' she dropped her face into her pillow and sighed 'This would never had happened if I had come here sooner instead of waiting so long.'
She closed her eyes and tried to sleep again.
Things could be worked out when she gotten some well needed rest.