Twilight Sparkle
My jaw drops. It couldn’t be. They’re extinct. Those that remained after Canterlot destroyed themselves in a civil war to claim the dead queen’s mantle. I’ve been through the weathered ruins of their hives. I’ve personally seen Queen Chrysalis’ sun-bleached body, recovered from where it fell in a crater in the badlands.
But it is.
The eight figures around me are enveloped in a sudden green fire. When it vanishes, I recognize in place of four ponies and four gryphons seven changeling drones and the larger, more obviously feminine silhouette of a changeling queen. The latter has the black chitin coat, long legs riddled with holes, ragged insect wings, semitransparent blue mane, green eyes, and long, pointed horn that mark her out as a royal amongst her kind.
I take a step backwards and swallow. “Chrysalis?” I ask, too stunned to think of anything else.
The queen narrows her eyes, as if the name angers her. “Not quite,” she lifts a hoof to her own chest. “Though I’m surprised you could mistake me for my mother, considering that you all murdered her!” The queen bares a mouth full of pointed teeth.
It’s the tone of apparently sincere outrage that motivates my next words. After all that Chrysalis did, from brainwashing and feeding on my brother to leaving Cadence to starve to death in the Canterlot Caves to invading Equestria unprovoked, her daughter has the nerve to be angry with us that she died of the fall?! She died because her own actions, we only ever defended ourselves.
“Queen Chrysalis died because she attacked us without provocation,” I respond, my voice hard. “We would have made peace had she been willing. As princess of Equestria, I now extend the same offer to you. Stand down and cease whatever scheme you have created, and I am sure we can find a way to live in harmony. Refuse, and I will have no choice but to defend myself.” I don’t expect her to accept, but as Princess of Friendship I would be remiss if I didn’t try to at least give her a chance.
“Make peace? With prey?! Hah!” She laughs, sounding remarkably like her mother. “When we are so close to our greatest triumph? I think not. Soon we will have our revenge and more love than we could ever need, and we’ll have no need to treat with my mother’s murderers.”
I narrow my eyes. “Very well.” I activate a spell to take me out of this place. If they’ve revealed themselves, logic says they must have at least some plan to defeat me, and in any case I’d much rather warn Princess Celestia than fight. With a flash of lavender, I vanish.
Or, at least I should have.
The spell fizzles on my horn, and I stay right where I am.
The changelings, led by the queen, snicker at my surprised expression. “What’s the matter, princess? Your little tricks not working today? Tsk tsk. Such a shame.”
“What did you do?” I demand, already trying to determine what just happened. I didn’t see any of the chitinous pseudo-equines cast a spell. So this place must have already been warded against teleportation.
The changeling queen laughs again, as the drones begin to spread out to encircle me. I back up a few steps, until my tail hits the wall. I’m already outnumbered and on enemy territory, I don’t need anypony stabbing me in the back. The queen advances directly towards me, grinning broadly. She’s now between me and the way out.
“Answer me!” I shout, though not yet in the Royal Canterlot Voice.
She shakes her head and smirks. “Now now, Twilight, didn’t Celestia teach you manners? That’s no way for a mere princess to address a queen.” Her horn, straight and full of holes, begins to glow with a light green.
In response, I activate my own magic and call a spherical, purple barrier into existence between myself and the surrounding bugs. “You’re no queen,” I answer. “A queen must earn the loyalty of her subjects and seek their good above her own. You’re just another tyrannical pretender leading whatever’s left of your people to their doom.” I address the drones. “Please, you all must see that your queen is mad! She is taking you down the same road to war that saw your society crumble and your last ruler perish! Abandon her, and I swear to you that I will personally find a place for you in Equestria and ensure that you are granted amnesty for whatever she’s had you do, no matter how long it takes!”
The drones look to each other, then to their queen, and then back at me again. They bare their fangs menacingly at me, as one.
“Please! Think about what you’re doing!” If they attack me, they’re likely to die in the effort, and I don’t want any bloodshed that can be avoided. “Do any of you truly believe that this will end any better for your people than last time? Leave her, and I promise you refuge. But if you attack me,” I set my face in a determined look. “I will defend myself.”
The queen laughs again. “Do you really think that will work? My children are far too clever to side with a relic of an age that is about to end against their own flesh and blood! No,” she shakes her head. “The changeling people know their ruler, and that ruler is Queen Ecdysis! Not some pitiful pony princess!”
Ecdysis: the act of molting or shedding an outer cuticular layer in many species of invertebrate. Apparently bug-themed names run in the family.
I shake my head sadly, but put on a firm expression. “Even if you best me here, you will not prevail, any more than did your mother.” I’ll admit that I’m a little afraid, but I’ve faced more frightening monsters than this one. “But you won’t win here, so the point is moot.”
“Enough talk!” Queen Ecdysis shouts, lowering her horn and unleashing a blast of green magic directly at me.
I return fire with a beam of my own magic. Green and lavender collide in between the two of us, and for just a moment are at perfect equilibrium. Then, slowly but surely, the purple magic begins to beat back the green, and the point of contact creeps closer and closer to the queen’s head. I grin.
“What are you all waiting for?!” the straining queen shrieks. “Attack her!”
The remaining seven changelings fire up their horns, and seven smaller blasts of green magic come hurling my way. I break off the contest with Ecdysis to reinforce my shield, as eight beams strike it as one. There’s an explosion upon contact, and through sheer kinetic force I’m hurled backwards into the rock wall, hard, and I feel one of the crystals shattering against my back. But my shield doesn’t break. There’s a bit of pain, and I think my skin might be broken at one point, but the actual damage is minimal. I can already feel the tiny wound in my flesh knitting itself.
I get back to my hooves in an instant, shaking off the dust covering my coat. While the smoke in front of me clears, I stand at my full height, flare my wings wide, and my eyes glow a solid white.
“CHANGELINGS!” my Royal Canterlot Voice booms out, echoing painfully in the confined cavern space. “YOU CANNOT WIN HERE! THIS IS YOUR LAST OPPORTUNITY TO SURRENDER, OR ELSE I WILL HAVE NO CHOICE BUT TO DEFEAT YOU!”
Some ponies would think that offering the enemy one more chance to give up after they’ve already attacked me is stupid, but I disagree. Friendship is a powerful force, such that even Discord could not resist its lure in the end. And these insects are hardly on his scale – Chrysalis could only defeat Celestia because the latter held back to spare her subjects, and because of the strength of my brother’s love for Cadence. Her daughter doesn’t have that, and I’ve grown very strong. After experiencing the limits of Queen Ecdysis and her minions’ combined strength, I’m confident in victory. But I would still prefer to avoid bloodshed, if at all possible.
“NEVER!” screeches the queen, pointing a hoof at me. “Get her!”
With far more loyalty than sense, the seven launch themselves at me, wings buzzing and a magical green shield appearing around their heads.
Very well then.
I concentrate, building energy and weaving my spell over the scant seconds it takes the queen’s minions to get near me. When they’re almost upon my barrier, it suddenly expands. Each and every changeling is hurled away from me with great force as my lavender sphere swells to envelope dozens of feet of ground. I’ve never been as proficient at shielding spells as my brother, but I’m no slouch.
Seven changelings are smashed against my magic like bugs on a window shield, and are carried backwards until they impact against the opposite bedrock wall of this cave. I can hear the sickening crunch of chitin cracking against stone. I hope that I didn’t just kill anypony, even if they did attack me first.
Alone among my opponents, Queen Ecdysis is able to stand firm in the face of my spell. Her eyes screwed tight and her teeth gritted, she holds her position and forces her way through my attack when the barrier sweeps over her. She is, however, pushed back several feet by the forces involved, and looks somewhat strained.
I don’t waste any more time calling for her surrender, opting instead to follow up by conjuring numerous tendrils of violet magic from the floor and sending them straight at the changeling queen. They spread out to wrap themselves around her and bind her for me, but Queen Ecdysis conjures another beam of green energy that severs the tendrils near their roots, disrupting the spell and causing the attack to fizzle out harmlessly before touching her. No matter. She’s starting to breathe hard, and I’m not.
I fire another blast of energy at the queen, which she dodges by flittering her ragged wings and taking to the air. The room for aerial maneuver in these tight quarters is limited, but I don’t intend to allow her even a chance to do so. I flap my own wings in broad, powerful strokes, calling on the pegasus magic within me to stir up the stagnant cavern air into a powerful wind capable of blowing Ecdysis away like a leaf in a storm. A localized air current with all the force of a light hurricane hurdles at the changeling.
Queen Ecdysis hurriedly wraps herself in a bubble of deep green energy, meeting my attack head on. The force of it is enough to push her back some way, but her magic does its job and my wind does little damage. But when it’s gone, the queen is openly panting, while I’m just barely starting to sweat. She’s weaker than I thought – she must not have been feeding well recently. No surprise, if she’s been keeping to the shadows and impersonating staff at a hostile international conference. Somehow, I can’t find too much sympathy for her plight. She’s brought it down on herself.
Like mother, like daughter, I suppose.
“Care to give up?” I ask, extending a hoof of mercy yet again, as Princess Celestia taught. “I’m still willing to accept your surrender.”
Ecdysis sets herself down on the cave floor, still looking winded, but her gritted teeth and hateful expression answer my question for me.
“As you wish then,” I fire another violet beam of magic at her. The queen dodges gracelessly, throwing herself to the side and stumbling over a crystal outgrowth on the floor. Before she can recover, I seize her in telekinesis and pin her against the nearest wall. Ecdysis struggles furiously, but can’t break my hold on her body.
I approach her cautiously. “You lose,” I declare authoritatively. “Whatever plan you had is finished. Come quietly and I will still promise you greater leniency than you will otherwise receive-”
I’m interrupted by the changeling. “Enough of this!” Queen Ecdysis roars, lighting her horn up with magic again, even in my magical grip. I raise my shield again, but she fires upwards, at… the ceiling?
No, her magic hit one of the crystals, and it’s… glowing?
But not green, like the queen’s magic. The crystal on the ceiling is glowing red. In fact… I catch something in the periphery of my vision. Some of the other crystals are starting to glow red as well. No, not some of them. All of them.
Uh oh.
Before I can reinforce my magical barrier, each and every one of the crystals that surrounds us discharges a thin stream of red magic directly at me. That wouldn’t be so bad, except that there hundreds of them. My defenses are overwhelmed in less than a heartbeat, and I’m hit directly.
Agony wracks my body as the magic courses through it. All my appendages stand on edge as my nerves go haywire, ignoring my mental commands to do something. My mouth opens to scream, but no sound comes out. I feel like my insides are fire. My coat and mane are actually on fire. Inside me, bones snap, tendons break, muscles strain themselves to bursting. Blood literally boils inside my arteries under the assault of dark magic. The rest of the world vanishes, irrelevant next to the white-hot agony engulfing the totality of my mind.
I don’t know how long it lasts. Time ceases to have meaning, my brain fully occupied with the task of trying to perceive just how much pain that I am in. And then the magic reaches all the way in there as well, killing off the pain receptors and leaving me curiously numb as just about every component in my anatomy that is capable of being damaged is so afflicted.
With no warning, the storm is over, and I collapse limply to the ground like a puppet with her strings cut. I can’t feel much of anything, but my vision gradually returns. I can see that my legs are twisted underneath me at unnatural angles, which would have broken them on their own if they weren’t already shattered by the surge of dark magic. My lavender coat has been burnt off, and much of my skin is black or red with burns. My carefully preened feathers, naturally, are also gone.
A hoof reaches under my chin and pulls my head upwards. I look where directed, to see… myself, as I was not long ago, grinning down at me with a triumphant smirk on her face. Gods, I hope I don’t really look that malicious when I smile.
“Now, what was that about accepting my surrender?” Queen Ecdysis – or so I presume, my rational mind tells me that it could just as easily be any of her minions that survive – says mockingly.
I won’t rise to the bait. My lungs and throat are incredibly damaged, but already the magic that’s kept me alive despite these fatal injuries has done a bit of repair work. With effort, I can force out a few words.
“Had to cheat… beat me… I am… youngest alicorn… Celestia….” Talking isn’t easy, but I manage.
“Oh, don’t you worry about your pretty little sun princess. We have plans to deal with her.”
Of course they do. How successful these will be remains to be-
Wait.
“We?” I ask, my insatiable curiosity urging me on even now.
Ecdysis’ smile grows wider. “Yes, we. Another old friend of yours, you might say. In fact,” her eyes shift momentarily, looking at something that’s behind my limp form. “It would seem that he’s eager to see you again.”
Huh? Who’s eager to see me? Old friend? Don’t tell me Discord has gone bad again.
My question is answered and a thousand others are raised when a second figure steps into my field of vision. His body is smoky and the outline is inconsistent, but I still recognize the one before me instantaneously. But that can’t be right. Can it?
Why not? The changelings were supposed to be gone as well.
“Sombra…”