The Last Changeling Queen

by Atuhor Name

CH. 07 Escape

Escape

Earlier that afternoon

Naudia paced around her cell, agitated and afraid.

It had been driving her up the wall that she couldn't find a way to escape. Indeed, driving her all the way up the wall, and around the ceiling, pulling at the stone to try to find a way out. She knew there wouldn't be one, but she needed to do something.

Her mother’s voice came back to her, unbidden.

"Never work without a backup plan or an escape route."

But that was Mother talking about small operations, operations where the risk was maybe having to replace a pony or change their memory. Never the fate of the entire changeling race resting firmly upon her hooves.

She was stuck to the ceiling, attempting to see if any of the tiles were loose or could be pressed for the third time that day, when she heard something from outside in the corridor.

It didn't sound like a guard, and it didn't sound like Celestia.

Naudia poked her head up to the bars and saw nothing. Then her face was met with a black hole-filled hoof and a key.

She stumbled back from the door and found a familiar face peering through the bars, with a nervous expression on his face and a key in his hooves.

"Mattar! What are you doing here?" Naudia shouted.

Mattar did not move. Mattar did not react in the slightest. The key was held unusually still in his hooves, hovering in mid dangle. The world began to take on a muted palette of colors.

Suddenly, the smell of burnt flesh permeated the room, pungent and fresh. Naudia turned away from the apparently frozen Changeling and found... something, sitting in the room with her. It was hard to describe from Naudia's point of view because there hadn't been anything on Equestria like it before. It looked like it stood on two legs, like a dragon or a diamond dog, but it wore heavy black clothes and a fedora. It had neither fur nor scales. Only its bare skin showed in what little space wasn't covered by a trench coat.

It was sitting at a table with a chessboard, neither of which had been in the room before.

"Sit down." It said, gesturing to a chair on the other side of the table. "We have a contract to discuss, and I've come up with a chess metaphor to tell you."

Naudia looked at the thing sitting in front of her--and she did think of it as a “thing.” Naudia would hate to think of It as a person. Everything about It oozed with malice. Its every word was a threat, every gesture it made was calculated just so as to be easy to turn into a blow at a moment’s notice. Even the look It gave her through those mirrored sunglasses told her that It was ready at the slightest provocation to abandon this facade and leap at her throat. But she would never call It a thing in front of It, because she didn't want to encourage It to gain any amount of self-satisfaction out of her. For that matter, she wouldn't put it past It to actually leap at her throat.

Naudia sat down in a guarded way, not taking her eyes off of It.

"I'm assuming you're the one that is responsible for this." She said, gesturing to the frozen changeling.

"Yes." It said, "All of that, especially the key he's holding."

Naudia glanced down at the chessboard.

"No, we're not going to play. I brought it for illustrative purposes. Also, I've found that it helps you look smarter when you appear to play chess and can talk about it."

Naudia was beginning to not like this creature. Not because It was clearly evil, but because It was so blatantly rude; even as It spoke, Its gaze wandered about the room--not in a nervous way, but in a way that suggested It was looking for something more interesting to look at than Naudia. While It was directly talking to her.

"I'm assuming you already know my name. What should I call you?" Naudia asked, feeling the need to at least appear polite.

"Continue to think of me as 'It.' But if you insist on a name to refer to me as, consider using something insulting." It said, in an infuriating tone. "And something... changeling-ish. I confess I don't know much about your culture, so I would find it interesting."

After a moment of conversational impasse, It clapped its hands together and spoke again, in a voice that woke up something primal in Naudia which demanded that hooves should meet with faces.

"Anyway, I think I should get to the nature of the contract before this drags on too long." It looked at the frozen key in Mattar's outstretched hoof. "That key is special. It is a key to your cell, Twilight's cell, and Twilight's magic suppressor."

"And why are you giving me a key to my cell and Twilight’s?"

"Well, consider it from the point of view of a chess board. If this was a chessboard, nobody would care if tomorrow you were turned into stone. However," It turned its silvered gaze over to her and continued almost angrily, "the world is not a chess board. You cannot sacrifice a queen and expect all the pieces to move on the board in the same way that they always have."

"The knights would have to conduct a search among the pawns as to how this grievous error of security took place. The rooks would be searched, top to bottom, for this regicidal assassin. The bishops would be called off to perform a ceremony for fallen royalty. The king would need time to mourn his lost love, and plot his vengeance against their assassins."

"It would be stupid to assume you could simply sacrifice the queen, and expect the rules of the board not to change."

Taking a moment to put two and two together, Naudia tried to see what point It was getting at.

"Twilight. You're doing this for the benefit of Twilight."

"Good." It said. "I'm doing this so I can ascertain the services of an intact Twilight, sometime in the future. Something that I have negotiated for with another entity in power."

"And what do you want Twilight for?"

"I'm afraid I don't need to tell you at this point in time."

"And if I decide not to help you?"

"Then I will allow you to decide how far back you want me to retroactively remove my help."

"Retroactively?"

"Yes." Its glasses didn't flash, they seemed to be reflecting a void quite unlike the room around them. "My... help. Little things. A nudge here, a push there... ever wondered why Twilight didn't cave in your skull when you popped up in the Badlands? Or why Celestia hasn't called you to court yet? Or indeed why Luna's guards were distracted at exactly the right time for you to capture her?"

There was a long pause, as Naudia considered her options.

"I don't have a choice in this, do I?"

"None whatsoever. But don't you want to rescue Twilight?" A note of acted concern entered Its voice.

"Don't pretend like she means anything to you."

"No, you're right about that, but she has a value to you. As such, she has served her purpose here."

Naudia thought for another minute trying to find something wrong with Its plan, something she could do. Something she could throw in Its face. Finally, a thought occurred to her.

"How do I know you're not working for Celestia?" Naudia asked.

It cast it's silvered gaze back from some part of the wall and onto Naudia. "Do you expect that Celestia would even suffer me to exist, if she knew about me?"

Naudia flinched back from the empty gaze, "No, no, I couldn't see that happening."

"Very well. If you have no further objections, we can consider your end of the contract a deal."

It offered Its hand to her for a hoofshake, and just for a moment, the sleeve of its jacket pulled back just enough to see the.. skin underneath. Now Naudia knew where the smell of burnt flesh was coming from. It was coming from... that thing.

Naudia considered for a long moment what to do.

"You're trying to think of another way out. None of them will work. Some I've seen that to be so, and others... others lead to paths you do not want to tread..." A tone of glee entered its voice. "Like corruption. You know what a corrupted changeling queen could do, don't you?"

Naudia shuddered, and stuck out her hoof to accept. She did have a choice here, but it wasn't a choice she was willing to make over this... thing.

Its hand was not slimy, not sticky, or skeletal. It gave as much of a hands-off handshake as it could, and with an expression of intense discomfort, as if touching her was somehow repugnant. And its hand was warm, but not in the way that Naudia associated with living things.

"Now. I expect you out of Canterlot as soon as possible. Twilight may have reason to stay if you wait long enough. But you both MUST be away from Canterlot." It let a pause drag on too long, and then spoke again. "Keep in mind that this is as far as my help goes. After this, I can get what I want regardless of your personal safety or mortal status."

"So watch your step, because I won't be watching it for you."

And just like that, the thing was gone, the chessboard and table were gone, and colors faded back into the world. A little chess piece of a queen remained on the stone floor of the cell.

----------------

Naudia crept along the corridor as silently as she could, specifically along the wall of the not very well lit corridor, somewhere up near the ceiling. She was alone right now. Mattar, having intercepted the ward on her cell, was ordered to leave. She decided that the guards shouldn't know he was involved with any of this.

Come to think of it, she didn't want to be involved in any of this herself. But whatever that thing was doing, It did give her a key to her cell, and had so far held up its side of the... extortion. Whatever the risk it presented, however, Naudia needed to get Twilight out of this predicament that she had placed her in.

Up ahead was a lone guard, standing in a pool of light in the otherwise unlighted dungeon corridor. He didn't look bored; he looked like the kind of guard who would need orders to be bored. Which was probably why he was stationed in this mostly unlighted, almost abandoned, palace dungeon.

Coming up behind him, Naudia made no more noise than a torn spiderweb and...

Just like that, the guard was helpless in her grip, unable to flex his wings or cry out. He made closed mouth noises and tried to move his head. Naudia leaned in close and whispered in his ear, with that odd many-voiced sounding tone her mother had used for intimidation.

"Where is Twilight Sparkle." The tone was not of a question, but of an order.

The guard shook his head and tried to put on a brave face.

"Now, Twilight would be angry at me if she heard that I had mistreated you, but I think she would be lenient if I got the impression that you have been mistreating her. Well, I don't quite know what she'd say about any mistreatment on my part."

The guard attempted to keep up his brave face.

"Very well." Naudia said, placing a hoof on either side of his head in a position for maximum torque.

"CELL 3B, TWO CORRIDORS DOWN, ON THE LEFT SIDE." The guard shouted.

"Thank you." said Naudia, using her normal voice again. "Now, this should wear off in a couple hours, but I'm sure if you shout enough, somebody will find you before then."

Naudia glued the guard to the floor with some hacked-up changeling goop and was gone.

Stakeout felt relieved. He felt like she had been about to...

But she wouldn't, would she? With what she said about Twilight.

Stakeout had only been to a chiropractor once, a big burly guy, and it had hurt a lot.
I doubt she even has a license for that.

Then a feeling of absolute dread came over Stakeout at that moment, and he furiously began to try and pull at his goopy bonds.

Maybe she’s going to get Twilight to reprimand me!

Meanwile, Naudia stalked her way along the remarkably guard-free corridor on her way to Twilight's cell, hoping against hope that this key would work... or maybe, that it wouldn’t work. She wasn’t quite sure if she wanted to be indebted to that… thing.

----------------

Mattar slipped back into the changeling prison camp to find it in complete disarray. Even he could tell some minutes before entering, or even coming into sight of, the camp, that there was something deeply wrong. Something unnoticed at the back of his mind had winked out.

Mattar couldn't think of what was gone, because it had felt so familiar to him.

It was dead simple to get back into the camp. Mattar had simply posed with other escaped changelings running around outside the camp. He didn't bother to check as to what they were looking under every rock for, but he fitted right in, such that the guards didn't notice when they came to corral them back into the camp.

Mattar's military instincts noticed a crowd of ponies gathered around the Canterlot side of the camp, with cameras and lines being drawn by guards to keep them out of throwing distance of the fence and prisoners within.

Something was wrong here. His instincts also told him that these guards were unsure and without any direct orders, which was quite unlike Luna. It was uncharacteristic of her to keep them in a holding pattern of simply rounding up prisoners, who had simply wandered outside the camp of their own accord.

Now that Mattar thought about it, he had never really wanted to leave the camp before. It had never occurred to him before that thing came with the key. So far as he knew, Luna didn't cast any spells on him, and none of the guards had either. He had just... never wanted to walk too far away from Luna.

Finally, Mattar decided to ask one of his fellow changelings what was so wrong here.

"Don't you know? Can't you feel it?" she said (it should be noted all changelings are, by tradition, referred to as female until they get their first disguise).

Mattar shook his head.

"Luna is gone! We can't find her anywhere!"

----------------

Naudia peered through the bars of a third dungeon cell, expecting this one to be as empty and dilapidated as the last three, and instead found herself gazing into what could easily be a princess's studio apartment and...

"Twilight!" Naudia shouted, unable to control herself.

Hastily, she fumbled the key into the lock and opened the door, as a bleary Twilight gradually became aware of her presence.

Before Naudia was halfway across the room, she was tackled by Twilight, who pulled her into a hug just this side of a tear-filled breakdown. They stayed that way for an endless minute.

"Twilight, we need to get going." Naudia said, reluctant to let go of Twilight. "I forgot to disable the alarm wards on your cell. Celestia will be here any moment!"

Twilight looked panicky. Ten days ago, she had never thought that Celestia could have punished her with something worse than magic kindergarten, even intentionally. Ten days ago, she wouldn't have been so scared to hear her mentor's name.

"But, but, neither of us has our magic! How are we going to get out of here?"

Naudia dangled the key from her hooves.

"Now stand still, and be ready to get us out of here, because this won't work on mine."

The magic suppressor clattered to the floor, and Twilight slumped over against Naudia out of horn shock. An ominous rumbling could be heard now, getting louder by the second.

The rumbling was just outside the door before Twilight began to cast her spell. Closing her eyes, and holding tight onto Naudia, Twilight felt like she was about to fail.

And then she heard Celestia shout. Opening her eyes, she saw Celestia herself at the door, running at them in a mad dash.

Fear and adrenaline lent Twilight new strength, and they vanished in a teleportation spell.

Author's Note:

No idea what to do about Fimfiction's converter messing up the tab spacing. It is not present in any other versions of this document. Thank you for reading and please don't comment, I've put in the description how you can contact me through Fimfictions PM's as well as a blog post about the subject.

Also I checked when I started working on this chapter and it turns out I've been working on it since March.