Ring by Europa
On the first day, Twilight had awoken to utter darkness. She was bound by heavy chains around her forehooves, hind legs, and even her neck, chained to the ground so that she was stuck laying down with her head on the stone floor, unable to move at all. Her wings were kept folded by what resembled a large metal hoofcup around her barrel, with pockets for the wings. To top it off, there'd been two magic dampening rings secured to her horn, preventing even the dimmest spark from escaping her.
Alone in the dark, totally immobilized with only her voice free, Twilight had screamed and screamed until she lost her voice, but no response came. She'd never been so afraid in her life, and with the darkness, she didn't even notice when she fell asleep.
When she'd woken up on the second day, she found that somepony with glowing blue eyes was in her cell. By the dim light, she was able to make out how small her location was, barely twice the size of Princess Celestia.
The figure - changeling, get away, get away! - held a stone bowl to her mouth despite her protests. Twilight felt water touch her lips, and was suddenly aware of how painfully dry her throat was after all her screaming. After drinking it all, the changeling said, "Agent in water. Keep blood from clotting." Then he left, leaving Twilight alone in the dark, with only her racing, terrified thoughts for comfort.
She figured it was the fourth - or maybe, probably the fifth - day when the queen arrived. She'd been given water regularly, but no food, so she was famished. She had never gone so long without food in her life, and it showed in her weakly trembling voice.
"Twilight Sparkle," Chrysalis said as she entered, showering her in weak, green light. "I've brought you something." The changeling's horn lit up, giving Twilight even more light. The long, flickering shadows peeling away from the queen gave her an otherworldly, ethereal look.
"Why are you doing this?" she asked, finding her nerve. "Where am I?"
Chrysalis hesitated. "You're in the Badlands, in my hive. As for why I'm doing this... I have no choice. We got a tremendous amount of love after the wedding, but even so we have been backed into a corner. This is my only available option."
"The Princesses will - "
" - never find you. They don't know where my hive is, they don't know it was me who took you since I framed that town drunk. Even if they did know it was me and even if they did find you, they don't know where you are in my hive, the tunnel here can be disguised as a thick wall, and I have you as collateral."
Twilight's breath caught in her throat. Collateral. If the Princesses or any of her friends tried to save her then Chrysalis would... "You'd... you'd..." she gasped, horror-stricken. She could feel what strength she had leaving her as well.
Chrysalis nodded. "I'd try to bluff, I truly don't want to hurt you, but if it comes down to it I must put the hive before my personal interests."
"Why me?" she tried to demand. "Why not anypony else?"
"You, and only you, foiled my plan for Canterlot," Chrysalis explained. "That grants me great respect for you, Twilight. But it also makes you a great threat. Furthermore the Rainbow Power attached to your soul amplifies the power of your love. Given a few weeks, I will be back to full power and your Princesses will not be able to challenge me, and even after, you are the only pony we'll need to feed us all." The changeling's ears flicked. "I'm sorry I need to cut this short, but I have royal duties of my own. I'll visit later, and rest assured that food will arrive more regularly now." She turned around and trotted out.
"Wait!" she shouted after her, but there was the sound of stone moving over stone, and her world was plunged into darkness. The climbing exhaustion stopped.
"... don't leave me alone," she whimpered.
***-_***_-***-_***_-***-_***_-***
Twilight very quickly lost all track of time, or of how many days it'd been since the changelings foalnapped her. Now and then a changeling drone came by with water or food, which she reluctantly - or gratefully, depending on how famished she was - took. The drone never spoke to her. She tried counting days with meals, but after around forty five meals she lost track.
There was a persistent tug at her soul, no doubt some technology the changelings had set up to drain her love even when they weren't around. It left her feeling chilled despite the warm air, an awful feeling that she couldn't shake. She wanted to stretch her limbs, crack her wings, and flare her magic, but none of that was afforded to her. And without her friends around her, she couldn't summon the Rainbow Power. At the very least her cell was somehow ventilated, so she had a steady supply of fresh air.
The worst was the darkness, the silence, and the loneliness. She only had any semblance of light when she had a visitor, and in the meantime she'd be amazed if there was a single photon of visible light with her. The only noises were usually her own breathing, the rushing of blood in her head, or the occasional trickle of her doing her business in a hole in the ground. She tried talking to herself to prevent sensory deprivation, and that usually worked, but she could only talk so long before her voice grew tired, and sleep was a fickle visitor, one that didn't bring any Princess Luna looking for her.
And the loneliness. The solitude. The only company she had was Chrysalis, who came by every now and then to vent to her, or to apologize for her capture, or simply to let Twilight herself vent. The times in between were horrible, and she found herself looking forward to the changeling queen's visits more and more. She knew she was slipping into Stockhoove Syndrome, but knowing that did nothing to lessen it.
Time passed, and Twilight soon realized that nopony was coming to save her. Her friends must have thought she was dead. She was going to live down here for the rest of her life. Despair grasped hold of her, and she broke down sobbing.
She hardly even noticed Chrysalis coming in, and only reacted when the queen laid down next to her and rested a hoof on her withers, rubbing it with the hardened limb while the changeling clicked and warbled at her in what must've been her native language.
"Twilight, thank you," she said at last in that amazing voice, the only voice beside her own Twilight had heard in so long. "I'm so so sorry, but thank you. You've done so much for us, thank you."
Her head was still chained to the ground, but she flicked her eyes over to where Chrysalis laid. She saw that, while she was still riddled with holes, the changeling queen wasn't nearly as gaunt and skeletal as Twilight remembered. She was full, curvy, and not at all unattractive. "What do you mean?" she asked quietly, forcing herself to stop crying around her mortal enemy.
"Your harmony-infused love, it's more than we could ever need. For the first time in centuries my kind's bellies are full. Thank you, so much, for your sacrifice. I can only convey how sorry I am for forcing this on you." A hoof reached out and tapped the two rings on her horn, but then retreated from them.
"I want to go home," she whimpered. "I want to go home."
"I know." The changeling came closer and wrapped her hooves around Twilight. The chitin was warm and surprisingly flexible. It helped push away the chill of the perpetual love drain. "I'm sorry."
She stopped trying to keep up appearances. With Chrysalis wrapped around her like a blanket, Twilight began openly crying.
***-_***_-***-_***_-***-_***_-***
After that session, Chrysalis visited more often than before, and spoke more freely with her. The quality of the food also improved, to Donut Joe's and Sugarcube Corner snacks, not just plain flowers and fruit. Twilight also spoke more freely with her. She'd accepted that she would never see her friends again and... and Chrysalis had never been deliberately cruel to her since the capture. The changeling was always so soft around her, always so regretful and always let Twilight rage at her however much she wanted, without a complaint. She even came by with some sort of cream to rub on her legs, her wings, that supposedly reversed atrophy.
She had Stockhoove Syndrome, bad. At any rate, that was what she kept telling herself.
Twilight Sparkle found herself looking forward to Chryssy's visits more and more, and dreading her departure less and less.
"Why didn't you just ask?" she asked one visit. According to Chrysalis it'd been a year since her foalnapping, and it felt like both a day and a trillion years to Twilight. "Why didn't you just come to Ponyville, explain your situation to me, and ask for help?"
"Think back to how you thought of me then, Twilight," Chrysalis said as she massaged her back, getting out the kinks and aches caused by months of immobility. "Can you honestly say that you would have willingly aided my people?"
She thought back. "No," she said sadly. "I'd have let you go extinct. Oh horseapples, I'd have committed genocide by negligence!" she squeaked. "Ah!" she cried as Chrysalis reached a particularly sore spot between her wings that made the free wings flap on their own.
"It's okay, Twily. That's in the past. How's this?" The changeling pushed against another area, sending waves of ecstasy through Twilight.
"Ungh, great. T-Thank you."
"It's the least I can do for you, given all you've done for us and all I've done to you." The massage ended, and Twilight saw Chrysalis walk around to in front of her. "I've heard that unicorns need to exercise their magic now and again, or their horns get damaged. I'm assuming alicorns also need to do so, if less often thanks to their earth pony resilience. I'm going to remove the rings now, Twilight, and shield myself. Blast me with as much power as you can, alright? Remember, you don't know where you are so you can't teleport."
The rings came off, and Twilight... didn't feel anything. Chryssy took a few steps away from her and a shimmering half-dome of green magic formed before her. It took a few tries for Twilight, still shackled prostate to the ground, to get her magic working, but when she did she unleashed a blast at the changeling, lighting up the cell.
Without the sun and moon for reference, Twilight had long ago lost her perspective of time. All she knew was that, eventually, her magic had run out. It felt like going to the restroom after holding it in all day, it felt like going for a gallop after being cooped up for a week, but so much better. Eventually the flow of magic stopped, and the two rings slipped back over her horn.
"Thank you," she said.
"You're welcome, Twi," Chryssy said as her shield faded. "I'll see you soon."
***-_***_-***-_***_-***-_***_-***
One day, on what Twilight was told was a year and a half after her foalnapping, her marefriend was acting unusually eager; a brilliant smile spread across her face, her fangs had been polished, and her tail flicked eagerly from side to side.
Her neck shackle had been undone, letting Twilight lift and move her head freely, so she looked up from the book she was reading by the light of a glowing crystal when she heard Chryssy's hooves clip-clopping across the ground. She smiled. "Hi, Chrysalis."
"Afternoon Twilight," she said in Hemipid as she took a seat next to her. "What're you reading?"
"Oh, just some Pluck Twain. What's up?" She turned the page with her snout and then devoted her whole attention to Chrysalis.
"Ugh, the noble court was giving me a lot of trouble again. They want funding for the dumbest things, I swear! If I hear another request to devote over ten thousand ambers for constructing skylights in our underground hive I am going to kill someling!"
"Hey, shh." She leaned over and gave Chryssy a lick across the thorax. "It's okay. You know they're mostly just windbags."
"I know, but they also control a lot of our wealth. Still, I want to just grab one of those horseflies and... grah!"
More licks. "Relax, Chryssy. You know you don't like feeling stressed," she said in Hemipid, having learned the language from one of the books her marefriend gave her.
The changeling cooed and leaned over to lightly bite her nape with her fangs, sending shivers up and down her spine. "I know. Your accent's still atrocious, by the way." Twilight blushed. "Anyway, speaking of stress, how are you?"
As little as she could given the shackles on all four legs, Twilight shifted. "I'm... coping. Much better than the last time." The effects weren't nearly as... intense as stallions thought they were, but they were still very noticeable. Like a persistent itch, or a buzzing in her ears that never went away. "Could be better." She didn't have any pills to suppress it, either. Not in Chryssy's hive, since changelings didn't undergo estrus cycles.
"Right. Well, I was thinking..." Her horn lit up with acidic green magic and Twilight heard four clicks, followed by the chains around her legs falling off. "I was thinking I could help you out with that?" Chrysalis moved closer and wrapped her hooves around Twilight, who was still in shock about A) the binds being removed and B) Chryssy's really, really tempting offer. The queen rolled over onto her back, resting Twilight against her abdomen.
For a moment Twilight Sparkle thought of what her old friends and family would say, up on The Surface, about what she was about to do, but…
Leaning down to kiss her marefriend's lips, the two soon became intertwined. After over a year and a half with no release, it felt amazing.
... but they were as dead to Twilight as Twilight was to them.
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I hate really dark stories, let's keep them down as much as possible, OK?
4986748 Fair warning was given before the story started. I like the fact that someone actually took a dark angle. We'd been fluffing Chryssy so much that her villainous side kinda got lost. Different strokes...
This Is Dark?
4986896 This is a collab between many different authors. We all pick a one word prompt from a list and write a short story inspired by that word. Most stories aren't related. Some, like most of mine are related. If they are related, the author's notes will let you know if it's part of a series.
As long as the writers don't lose sight of the romance and the warm fuzzies aren't drowned in a tide of negativity, I'm cool with some more stories like this one. I've actually been waiting for some Twilight and non-reformed villain shipping on this and the Nightmare prompts.
Yay, corruption!
This is my pride and joy for Twysalis. I don't feel I could ever write one better than this.
that was a fun read
4987473 Thank you! Anything in particular you liked about it?
This wasn't bad not my cup of tea but from a blank slate perspective not bad
4987482 all of it
4986943
stockholm syndrome is kinda dark itself ;p
4986817
4987047
I prefer stories that use the dark and sad moments to make the happy moments better by contrast. And I prefer the fluffier chapters.
4987851 And that's perfectly fine. Trust me, we've got enough prompts in the collab that there's a TON of fluff.
Wow, finally a dark Twisalis prompt. Like, okay, there's nothing wrong with Chryssi reforming because her circumstances are kind of vague and all (how do changelings feed??? Were her people really starving??? We just don't know.), but she is a villain and a sneaky one after all! A dark story is fitting for this couple.
4988279 For science. You monster.
This is fucked up.
Holy shit.
I seriously wish I thought of something like this first.
...
I double pinkie promise that I'll start going back on the thread by next monday. School's a bitch, and I've got a math test to revise for, though, so I probably won't participate until at least around then.
4987271
Wow, very mixed feelings about this one, Europa. As a dark fic, holy schmowzow did you hit the dark nail on the dark head with a very dark hammer.
I want to say I liked it, but… yeah, the actual concept. Hmmm, let's go with I appreciated the story for what it was, though I don't know if I could say I like it (due to the concept of the story)
But yeah, big kudos on writing something this, well, I can say brilliant, because it is brilliant, concept aside.
Though, I had kind of read the prompt "Ring" and expected some kind of Ringu situation, that Twilight had been pushed into a well by Chrysalis or something.
4989484 Thank you! Sorry for stealing your thunder, but I considered that after your stories having bad things happen to Chryssy, that it was Twilight's turn.
4990443 Yeah, dark's not everyone's cup of tea. At least Twilight and Chrysalis end up genuinely happy.
Finally! While the other stories were great I'm surprised at the lack of truly dark stories. Would love to see more like this.
4991008
Hahaha, I like the "genuinely" happy comment. I actually love dark, it's kind of the, well, I guess it could be perceived as a-certain-word-which-I-am-loathe-to-type-for-there-lies-drama by coercion.
Not sure if I would count that as working out for everyone
I usually love dark fics, especially psychological dark fics, like this one, but it's that particular interpretation of the fic that makes me feel a little squeamish.
Bit weird that Chrysalis won't let Twilight walk around even after their relationship is all but cemented, but, what the hell, magical ponies don't have to make sense! And it does suit the prompt better.
I'm not quite sure why people are so shocked that there's actually a dark fic where the relationship itself is the dark aspect. I mean, did no one read the description? Right in the first line-
As in, there's going to be stuff that falls into the dub-con territory(non-con wouldn't really fit the romance theme that's going) too.
I was just surprised it took this long for there to be one.
On a different note, I kinda wish the type/category of story was in the title though, or at the top of the story page. For example with this one-
Ring by Europa [Dark]
That way you can know what type you're getting into before reading it and can skip it if it's not a type you like. Or to find the kind you want. I've seen other collections of short stories on here do that sort of thing.
4987271 Europa please make a sequel to this even though I know that's probably not going to happen.
I don't think the Princesses would stop until they had found the hive, nor would Celestia, who was willing to send her own blood to the moon, be dissuaded from doing what had to be done.
In short, Chrysalis would be fried like an ant beneath a magnifying glass, where she gave Twilight up alive or not.
the only way the princesss and I mean all 3 of them plus shiny armor would stop searching is because something happen that kept it that way. ie discord, or a war happen, or something else,
also luna would be able to tell twilight was alive by going into her dreams, so they would knew she alive and being held some where in badland by the changelings.....