After several hours pouring over the old records Twilight was satisfied that she had found a good number of the books they were searching for. She teleported them back to her library to study in detail later. Turning her head to see where Luna was she notices the night alicorn staring dreamily ahead. ‘She must be remembering her past based on what she is reading.’ Twilight thought to herself completely missing the fact that Luna had been lost in watching Twilight research. “Uhm.. Luna? I think I found enough stuff here. You ready to lead the way to your collection?”
Luna almost jumped out of her skin realizing that she had been lost in her own world of stars drifting in a sea of purple. “Eh? Yes, yes of course. Just follow me if you would.” Luna began to lead Twilight out of the library and toward one of the more ruined looking wings of the castle. “By the way, what do you think of the old castle?”
“How do you mean?”
“Do you think we could get it rebuilt? I’ve been thinking it would be a rather convenient place to set up here in the forest so we can keep an eye on the Tree of Harmony. I mean it is just right below more or less.”
“Interesting idea but I don’t know if it could be done easily. Admittedly while I would like to see this place restored to get an idea of what it once looked like,” here Twilight’s inner archeologist shone through for but a moment, “I’m unsure if it wouldn’t be better just to fortify and repair only the bulk of the castle that is still intact as a sort of watchtower over the Tree with some guards stationed here.”
“While I suppose that could be done we would have to pick out some of our best soldiers. At least if we commissioned the castle to be rebuilt one of us could stay here and keep an eye on it and we wouldn’t have to leave so many soldiers at the tender mercies of the Everfree, yes?” Luna asked as they continued to walk through the hallways toward her old suite of rooms.
While Twilight replied Luna listened with only half an ear to make sure she could respond properly. The rest of her mind was occupied with trying to figure out how to let Twilight know she was interested in her. This was her third attempt at such in a month with the last two failing spectacularly.
The first time had been taking out Twilight star gazing which she hoped would be romantic but it failed before it could even begin when Twilight showed up with an overstuffed notebook, two peer reviewed journals on the subject, and a list of questions about the night sky longer than Luna personally thought was warranted. While she had enjoyed the intellectual exchange, something she rarely got in this era for some strange reason, she had hoped for a simple night. The second attempt had been ruined by the usual disasters of the day as she had invited Twilight to a dinner only for the both of them to be pulled into a meeting resolving the differences between a minotaur ambassador and that insufferable twit Blueblood.
“Luna, are you alright? You kind of blanked out on me again.”
“Sorry Twilight. I got lost in thought about the cost in money and horsepower this place would have to get it back in line. I still think it might be worth the investment though if for no other reason than to keep an eye on the Tree and possibly a nice summer home to escape the nobility when things get too hectic.”
The two alicorns continued to discuss the viability of the castle and its potential use as changelings followed the pair walking across the roof above. So far they had not had to act but they were already setting things up in case they did. The rather modest swarm that had been detached to this duty was prepared to pull out all the stops needed. They had already decided that if nothing else they would kidnap one of their targets to keep the other distracted trying to find them. Admittedly their commander had a plan that he hoped would do the job before it came down to that.
In Canterlot Celestia had summoned her commanders to an emergency meeting concerning a threat to their citizens. Once they had all gathered in the meeting room she began the show. “I have it on good authority that the changelings are preparing another assault on Equestria. I recently found a changeling posing as one of my personal staff and got it to talk before… well before it gave out shall we say.”
The commanders were suitably shocked though more about the fact that changelings were that close to the princess than about anything else. They kept their poise as best they could to hear what their diarch wanted to tell them.
“As such I’m going to need to assign you all to new patrols. I want the Wonderbolts and a detachment of battle mages to set up in Cloudsdale to make sure it remains safe.” Celestia began to give off her orders. “Spitfire, make sure you have one of your fastest ready to report to me if anything happens up there, alright?”
“Of course Princess.” Spitfire answers back ready to do her job.
“I’m going to need a good deal of the guard to set off for Ponyville, Manehatten, and Fillydelphia commander.” Celestia didn’t want to reveal that she had yet to remember the name of Shining Armor’s replacement so she didn’t bother naming him directly.
“Are you sure that is wise, ma’am?” The commander, a unicorn with a dingy yellow coat and oddly two toned brown hair answered.
“Perhaps not the wisest choice but we don’t know where they will assault us. The changeling wasn’t exactly informative about where they were going to raid. I would suspect it didn’t know if our theory about them possessing a hive mind is accurate as a spy wouldn’t need to know where the assault was happening.” came Celestia’s response.
“As you wish, ma’am.” The commander nods already plotting to keep some of his better troops here in Canterlot just in case. Admittedly better troops from the guard means they were merely useless rather than given to panicking flights of terror in the event of something going wrong but he would not confess to that.
The meeting continued in this vein of Celestia ordering various members of her military to move their troops around to protect various cities but in such a way as to make sure they had a fighting chance. Only the guard captain noted that it left Canterlot itself pretty exposed but he could not countermand orders. In the shadows of the rafters above one of Luna’s commanders heard the conversation and found the positioning of troops suspicious enough to warrant reporting to his mistress. Waiting until the meeting was over and the participants had time to disperse he took wing and set out to where he had heard she would be. The Everfree posed little threat to a member of Luna’s own after all.