• Published 22nd Sep 2020
  • 170 Views, 1 Comments

Cara's Collection of Curious Curios - Esalen



Collection of speedwrites from Quills and Sofa Speedwrites

  • ...
 1
 170

Climb Higher on These Broken Wings (Contest)

Author's Note:

Prompt was 'Broken Wings'.

How she kept ending up back at the bottom was a mystery. It wasn’t for lack of trying, of course. She was never one to give up, no matter the obstacles.

“Eris’s teeth and the hungry swarms!”

By the sixteenth time, she was ready to call it quits.

“May all the charms of Acanthus light on you, Equestria!” she snarled into the air. “May you choke on the stale air of the forerunners, cursed land!”

Ex-queen Chrysalis sat on a small, muddy stump, trying to avoid the murky water of the swamp lapping at her hooves. Her legs were caked with mud, her mane was waterlogged and bedraggled, and she was seething. She shifted ever so slightly, attempting to regain feeling in her left hind leg, which sent her reeling into the muck below.

“You stinking swamp! I didn’t ask to be out here! I didn’t want to be in this swarm-barren wasteland!” Her shrieks echoed through the dead trees as she pulled herself back onto the stump, only to find herself face to face with a frog, which croaked once before hopping into the dirty water.

“Hello?” Chrysalis lifted her head higher, and lapped at the air. Somecreature was nearby, close enough that their worry could be tasted. Chrysalis straightened herself-even if she no longer had her hive, it wouldn’t do to be seen as weak.

“Hello? I could’ve sworn I heard someone.” The voice was closer now, discernable as a female voice.

“You heard correctly.” The ex-queen licked her lips, tail flicking excitedly. Finally a filling meal on the horizon, better than eating the large rodents that appeared now and then.

“Keep talking!” the voice replied.

“Follow my voice,” Chrysalis called. “You’re not too far off.”

“Where?” The pony pushed her way through a thicket of dying briars a couple of meters away from the changeling. “Ouch. There you are! What brings you around these parts?” Chrysalis paused, wondering why the pony hadn’t bolted at the sight of her.

“Do you know who I am?”

“No?” The auburn earth pony cocked an ear. “Should I?”

“You mean you have never heard of Chrysalis of the Western Hive, Queen of the Scolus changelings?”

The pony stared blankly.“Nope.”

Chrysalis shivered in delight. Here was a place that the cursed sun-goddess would never think to look for her nemesis, a place for the changeling to recover and plan for the future. Here was a perfectly good food source, and hopefully many more from wherever this pony appeared.

“Think nothing of it, then. Who are you?”

“Amber Oak.”

“I’m sorry, could you come a little closer? I couldn’t hear you, on account of my ears being filled with water.” Chrysalis shook her head, flinging mud from her mane and horn. The pony took a step closer and opened her mouth to repeat herself.

“Amber O-augh!” Chrysalis had opened her mouth, unhinging her jaw and drawing upon Amber’s emotive energy. How I’ve missed this, she thought, before a blunt object hit her across the face, breaking her concentration and nearly fracturing her jaw.

“What in Setula’s name was that?” She snarled, whipping her head around to look for the intruder. Her gaze settled on the pony in front of her, vigorously shaking her hoof.

“Damn, you’ve got a strong skull there. Any other creature would have a broken jaw by now.” Chrysalis growled, leaning forward into the pony, then stopped when Amber brought up her hoof. “You try that again and I’ll break it for sure.” The pony stated.

“Fine, fine, you win.” The changeling settled back on her stump, wincing as her forehooves slipped into the chilly water.

“It appears we got off on the wrong hoof, so I’m going to ask again, and you’re going to stay over there,” Amber backed away from the ex-queen. “And you’re going to tell me what you’re doing here.”

“I was once the queen of the Scolus, the changeling hive out west,” Chrysalis begrudgingly stated. “I brought empires to their knees, I ended the reigns of usurpers and tyrants alike. We were the greatest hive that ever existed.”

“So then why are you out here?”

“I’m getting to that!” Chrysalis growled. “We used to be the greatest, until that upstart decided that befriending those around us would make us stronger. Instead, it tore us APART!” she roared. “I was usurped, banished from the hive. I would have kept us strong, but they chose the traitor over me, their queen. They have broken my wings, stranded me here.” Chrysalis flung a hoof out at their surroundings.

“And how is the hive functioning now?”

“How would I know? I was banished. They promised me that I would be imprisoned on sight. Bah,” she spat. “As if those imposters could ever defeat me.”

The changeling looked at the pony, noticing the look in her eyes.

“Don’t give me pity. Pity does nothing for me. It is as worthless as my hive is.” She could see the gears turning in Amber’s head. Ponies were all so predictable, willing to give anything to strangers. “Love, on the other hoof, will sustain me, and keep me from dying out here, amongst the dead and dying trees.”

“Alright. How?” Chrysalis blinked. She hadn’t expected this stranger to so readily agree to having her emotions sucked dry.

“It’s simple really. You stand there, and I absorb your love.”

“Alright, but if you take too much, I’m hitting you again.” Amber warned as she shifted her weight into a more comfortable stance. Chrysalis unhinged her jaw again, and drew upon the pony’s emotive well, siphoning it into her stomach. She braced for the impact of Amber’s hoof, but it never came. Amber stood there, stoically, as her emotions were drained, one by one.

“How are you giving this much love?” Chrysalis asked through the siphon.

“It looked like you needed a friend to talk to. Fortunately for you, I’m not good at standing by and letting others fend for themselves.” Chrysalis blinked in shock. Nobody had ever called her friend, and certainly not a pony she had just tried to steal from.

“Well then, friend.” Chrysalis’s body shook, then was engulfed in a brilliant green flame. When it subsided, a completely different creature stood in the muck. Soft yellow gave way to greens and blues, and the ex-queen no longer had holes riddling her limbs.

“Well then,” Chrysalis commented.

“Looks like your wings are healed now, Chrys. Time to fly home.”