Queen Chrysalis stood alone in her royal bedchambers, or what was left of them at any rate. Any semblance of royal extravagance had been long stripped away in an effort to help her little changelings. What remained was a nearly empty, cold stone room carved from the rocks of their mountainous home, with a rickety, wooden bed and a worn full length mirror tucked away in the corner. Chrysalis stood staring at herself in the mirror, contemplating the ways in which the past had gone wrong. The sharp, green eyes of the changeling queen reflected in that mirror, filled with weariness.
The last few years had been hard on her changeling empire, ever since she and her ilk had been ousted from Canterlot during that disastrous failed invasion. Security measures the land over had been increased dramatically to prevent another attack. The ponies had even set up a guarded perimeter around the entirety of the badlands. They were lucky that their city hadn’t yet been discovered thanks to being mostly hidden beneath the mountains.
It was growing harder with each passing month for her people to get into pony cities, and it showed in the possessions owned by the changelings. Many objects were difficult to come by or create with the resources available in the badlands. Wood in particular was exceptionally rare and was a tremendous luxury in their homes of stone and dirt. Her bed, though horribly worn and on the verge of collapsing, was worth a fortune. Oh how the mighty had fallen! She, a Queen, driven to sleeping on a bed not suitable for even the dungeons!
The material possessions, however, were of little concern compared to the ever dwindling reserves of love that their kind required as surely as a normal pony required food. Her little changelings weren’t quite starving yet, but they were swiftly approaching that fate. Soon they would run out of love reserves and be left with only what meagre amounts the collectors were able to gather.
The changelings were descended from predators, so to an extent they could supplement love with meat hunted from the desert’s scarce animal population. Unfortunately, even if there was enough to feed all changelings, meat alone was insufficient for a changeling to survive and would merely delay their starvation. Their kind had lost the ability to survive solely on meat long before even the solar and lunar princesses were born, and some changelings today couldn’t digest it at all.
Sometimes she wondered if it would be best to dissolve their entire civilization and try to integrate all changelings into pony society. They wouldn’t be forced to live in the squalor of their dying city and if they could find somepony that cared for them they could eat to their hearts’ content. She didn’t think she’d be able to stomach living among the ponies, but her little ones may be able to adapt.
A messenger from earlier that evening flashed in her memory, reporting on two more love collection teams being discovered and wiped out just last week. She wished she could say that it was an unusual event, but she was receiving news of her infiltrators being exterminated by the ponies every day. If the expertly trained infiltrators were being so consistently caught, then what chance did the average changeling have? They would be crushed beneath the hooves of the ponies as if they were little more than insects! The flames of fury momentarily flashed in Chrysalis’ reflection, but soon burned out and gave way to her inexorable weariness.
Had she failed her subjects? Was this all her fault? She had taken a gamble with invading Canterlot, and she had lost. But what was she to have done? Her people had lived in the shadows of those happy and prosperous ponies for far too long with only just enough to crawl through existence like the animals that survive in their harsh wasteland home. Did the changelings not deserve to experience the same prosperity as they? Did they not deserve a chance at the glory, splendour and excess that the ponies took for granted?
She could never forgive the ponies for what they had done, were doing, to her kind. If she had the strength, and changelings didn’t need them for sustenance, Chrysalis would have gladly eliminated every one of those damned ponies and ensured the safety of her children.
But it was too late. She couldn’t do it anymore. She was too tired and nearly starved for love. While her powers were far from pitiable, she was as far from the power she wielded during the invasion all those years ago as Celestia was from a newborn foal. Even if she somehow managed to regain her strength, Princess Twilight Sparkle had grown far more powerful than she could even have dreamed was possible, and Discord was now acting as a defender of Equestria as well. There was no way she could have been more than a mild nuisance to them anymore. If only she could go back in time and fix her mistakes at that wedding.
She dragged herself away from the mirror and towards her shabby, old bed. The clopping of her hooves eerily echoed off the stone floor and through the dim, empty room. She collapsed onto the mattress, not even bothering to cover herself with the blankets made from what had once been regal tapestries hanging upon her walls.
Yes. Yes, she had failed her little changelings. They hadn’t said anything about it, at least not to her face, but she had failed them in a way that they may not be able to recover from. Surely they resented her by now. Perhaps they would be better off if she stepped down as Queen. Perhaps a new leader would be able to set their nation back on its hooves. Tears seeped through her lidded eyes and trailed their way to the tattered bedding beneath her.
Despite her incredible exhaustion, Chrysalis could not fall asleep. The roiling ball of rage, sorrow and guilt deep within her chest saw to that. She tossed and turned restlessly, desperate to find release from the thoughts plaguing her. Eventually, as is wont to happen to even the most troubled minds, the Queen finally drifted off.
Unfortunately for her, she was not to remain in blissful slumber.
CRASH!
Chrysalis vaulted herself out of her bed and readied her horn for an assault, fearing that the ponies had actually found their home. She had never been the type of Queen to rely on personal guards since she had always had more power than any contingent of guards ever could in the past, but given her weakened state she probably should have reconsidered that position. What she saw reflected in the eerie, green glow of her horn shocked her. It was a large, metal...thing, and it seemed impossibly smooth too. It looked kind of like a giant box with some kind of glass covering much of the upper half of it, though she noted the glass wasn’t transparent as she couldn’t see through it. Chrysalis stood in slack jawed wonder. What in the world had found its way into her bedchambers?
Kshhh! Vrrrrrrr!
Chrysalis flinched back at the sudden sounds made by the thing and dropped back into a combat ready pose. Whatever it was, it was opening up. A rectangular segment swung up and away from the main body and blinding, white light poured forth from within. She squinted through the pain, not daring to look away from this thing lest she risk being attacked by whatever was inside.
Prepared for an abomination of a creature to charge from the container, Chrysalis was shocked when she merely saw a grey pegasus stallion with golden eyes, and a messy blue mane step through the opening and look around. She couldn’t see his cutie mark from here, but such details didn’t much matter to her. A pegasus pony had infiltrated her domain deep within the mountain.
“Well, this certainly isn’t what I was expecting from a Queen’s—Urk!” The stallion was interrupted by said Queen leaping at him, bowling him over onto his back and pinning him to the floor with her comparatively large forehooves.
“You have ten seconds to convince me not to kill you, pony!” She hissed at him, fangs bared mere centimetres from his face.
Panic spread across the stallion’s face. “I...I...uh...I’m from the future!”
Chrysalis was not impressed with this obvious lie. Even if somepony did have time travel at their disposal, they’d be insane to barge into her chambers. She let her opinion of his attempt at deception known by placing her powerful jaws around the stallion’s throat, applying just the slightest amount of pressure with her fangs.
The pony, pathetic creature that it was, began to hyperventilate and attempted to string some words together, but only managed to get out gibberish. He had better hurry up, Chrysalis thought, or she would be supplementing her diet with pony flesh. Five, four, three, two, one. Time’s up.
“I killed Princess Twilight Sparkle!” He shouted at the top of his lungs just as Chrysalis was about to bite down. That was certainly enough to catch her attention, if it were true. It was almost as unbelievable as him travelling through time, but it was worth giving him a reprieve at least. She moved her head so that she could tower over the terrified stallion and fixed him with a glare.
“Prove it.”
He swallowed loudly before he continued. “She’s in there.” He pointed to the thing he had come out of, refusing to look at it as tears streamed down his face. Chrysalis looked at the box skeptically, and then bent down to whisper in his ear.
“If you so much as move from this spot, I will tear you to pieces with my bare teeth and feed you to the desert coyotes.” Trembling, the stallion nodded his understanding.
Chrysalis stepped off of him and cautiously approached the box. After one final look back at the stallion to ensure he wasn’t trying anything funny, she stuck her head inside the opening. Inside was a room filled with a plethora of panels, levers, buttons and several other things that Chrysalis wouldn’t have been able to recognize, but those were unimportant next to the main event lying in the middle of the floor. Though it was disfigured from some great impact, the unmistakable violet body of Twilight Sparkle was right before her eyes.
After the initial shock wore off, Chrysalis was beside herself with excitement. She could hardly stand still, she wanted to dance with joy, and a smile that hadn’t graced her features in ages threatened to split her face in two while she laughed as only she was able. She hadn’t felt this way in years, she was positively giddy.
She practically pranced her way back to her hero. The adorable thing was still lying precisely where she had left him. That wouldn’t do, not at all, so she lifted him up with her forehooves and wrapped him in a crushing hug! He seemed so frail! How could such a pathetic seeming pegasus defeat a pony as powerful as Twilight Sparkle? Oh, it didn’t matter! Twilight was dead and her people would have a chance to prosper without that monstrosity aiding the ponies! She needed to reward him for this heroic deed!
“I don’t know how you did it, but you have my word as Queen that anything within my power to give you in return is yours!” She half lidded her eyes and seductively licked at the stallion’s neck before continuing breathily. “Anything.” She felt him twitch beneath her ministrations and giggled as he blushed profusely. He stammered a bit and through countless apologies and assurances that she was beautiful turned her offer down. A pity, she could have used the release and the resulting love energy, but she would not force herself onto the saviour of her people.
“What’s your name?” She asked him.
“Time Keeper.” He swiftly replied. He was still scared of her. It was cute. There was no way she would hurt him now.
“Time Keeper...” She rolled the name across her tongue. As far as pony names went, it wasn’t anything special, but circumstances led her to find it the most pleasing name she had ever heard. “Well, Time Keeper, your name shall go down in the history of the changelings as one of the greatest heroes of all time. Thanks to you, my changelings stand a chance of finding a better life. I’d offer to prepare a feast for you, but I’m not much of a cook. Different dietary needs and all.” She gave a flirtatious wink at him and squeezed his rump for emphasis. Hey, just because she wouldn’t force herself on him doesn’t mean she couldn’t have some fun.
“I’m not a hero!” Time Keeper blurted out. Chrysalis set him down and put a gentle hoof to his cheek.
“Don’t be modest, of course you are. You have saved my people.”
“I haven’t saved your people, I’ve doomed them! Them and everypony else in the universe!”
Chrysalis furrowed her brow in confusion.”What do you mean you’ve doomed us?”
“Oh, nothing much, just that the entire universe is going to implode because I caused a huge paradox by killing Twilight Sparkle before she did anything of importance!” Chrysalis stared at him skeptically. “Look for yourself, that Twilight doesn’t have any wings!”
Chrysalis humoured him and stepped back into the box to inspect Twilight’s corpse. There were no wings, just as he had said. She searched for any enchantments that could hide them, or for any indication that they had been removed by force, but it was precisely as Time Keeper said: this Twilight never had wings. Additionally, she was visibly younger than she should have been. Could he really be telling the truth about being a time traveller?
“Okay, let’s say that you’re telling the truth and you did kill Twilight from the past. Obviously nothing bad has happened, we’re all still here and nothing has changed.”
“Time travel isn’t a new thing! We’ve done studies! Changes made don’t have an immediate effect on the time lines. We have approximately twelve hours from my perspective to make things right before the space time continuum collapses on itself and destroys everything!”
“You expect me to believe that you’ve done studies on the destruction of all life?”
“Well...no, we haven’t, obviously, it’s just theoretical, but we do know that changes will ripple through time after twelve hours from my perspective, and we’ve never had this big of a change made before! Plus, I went back in time because of Princess Twilight! If she never became famous then I never had a reason to go back in time and that means she would be alive, which would mean I would have gone back in time and killed her! It’s a huge paradox and it might tear the universe apart at the seams!”
Chrysalis was beginning to get a headache from all this paradox talk. It was getting to be very hard to believe anything he said.
“So you killed Twilight Sparkle, panicked over potentially ending all existence and instead of trying to find somepony who could fix the problem, you visit me. Why?”
Time Keeper shuffled a hoof nervously. “If I told anypony in my own time I’d likely be banished to the sun,” he gulped, “or worse.”
“So you’re merely avoiding facing the responsibility for your actions?” Bile began to rise in Chrysalis’ throat. What a pathetic creature her hero turned out to be. “That still doesn’t answer why you came to me.”
“I needed to find somepony that could help me.” He hesitantly said.
“Why. Did. You. Come. To. Me?” Her booming voice echoed through her chambers.
“I need you to take her place.” He squeaked out in terror.
Chrysalis stared at the stallion with her mouth agape. What kind of crazy foal would come up with such an insane plan?
“I tried to just go a little further back in time to save Twilight from myself, but for very complicated timey wimey reasons that are way beyond my ability to understand I couldn’t! I couldn’t go back to my time and tell the guy who made the time machine or I’d be a dead stallion, so I tried to think of other ways to fix the problem. I figured that I had to replace her, but I not only needed somepony who would be able to fool others into thinking they were Twilight, but also somepony who was powerful enough to face all the trials she went through. I didn’t know anypony from my time period like that that wouldn’t kill me for what I’ve done, but I did remember that there was a being that was able to replace a princess before without getting caught in the past.”
“You want me to spend several years of my life masquerading as my most hated enemy just to get you out of trouble? Why shouldn’t I just force you back to your time to confess? You make it seem like they would be able to fix the problem.”
Tears streamed down Time Keeper’s face and he attempted to give the most adorable puppy dog eyes he could muster. Chrysalis merely snorted in response. She was a changeling, such basic manipulations would not work on her. Realizing it wasn’t having the desired effect, Time Keeper halted his attempt and chose to stare into Chrysalis’ green eyes with an air of seriousness.
“Because you gave me your word that you would grant me anything within your power. This is within your power. Please, help me.”
Silence reigned for several seconds. Chrysalis had given her word, and she had always been a mare of her word, even in spite of the lies she spewed while disguised. In fact, it was in part because of all the lies while infiltrating that she held promises made while undisguised in such high regard. Of course, she had promised under the belief that he had eliminated her greatest foe. Having her take that foe’s place defeated the entire purpose behind her offering him the boon in the first place. On the other hoof, maybe she could get away with shaping history a little more to her favour if she did agree to help.
“How accurate to the history would I have to be to avoid destroying everything? I doubt that even I could be a perfect replacement.”
“That’s okay, I understand completely! There’s no way I could expect you to get everything exactly the same, just so long as the major events end more or less the same way the space time continuum will be fine! I think.”
The little fool didn’t seem to have any idea of what Chrysalis intended to do. It was almost adorable how oblivious he was. She put on a sweet smile.
“Very well. I’ll help you.”