The Portals

A phoenix. There was a blue and navy phoenix.

Twilight had been working on placing some new books Celestia had allowed her to get from the Everfree Castle in the library of her new castle. While working, a portal had suddenly opened for a few seconds, letting out the strange phoenix.

“Huh? What just happened? Spike!”

When Spike didn’t come, Twilight called again. By the time Spike finally did arrive, the bird had started to fly around looking for something.

“What do you need Twilight?” Spike said upon entering the room. “Woah! Cool bird! It kind of looks like a phoenix. Where’d you find it?”

“That’s why I called you.” Twilight told him. “It just kind of appeared while I was organising our new books. It came through some sort of portal that appeared and disappeared.”

“Did anything else show up?” Spike asked, looking around.

“Not that I know of. Unless there were other portals that appeared, this phoenix is the only thing that appeared.”

The blue phoenix seemed to be calming down and was no longer flying all over the room. It had perched itself nearby, but was still ruffling its wings and looking around.

“Can you help me look to see if there are any books that might tell us what this bird is exactly?”

“I’m on it Twilight!”

“I’ll stop you right after I’ve written this letter to Celestia to tell her what happened. The portal might have been caused by a dangerous spell, and if she knows about it, she might be able to help.”

The two of them didn’t have much time to work before the bird started to fly again, this time trying to leave the room. Both of them tried to ignore the animal at first, but soon, it became hard to.

Twilight gave a frustrated sigh. “Fine, I’ll take over looking for a book about this thing, you see if you can calm it down.” She told Spike.

At first, when Spike tried to get close to the blue phoenix, it tried attacking him with its talons, but after a while, the bird calmed down enough that it perched itself on Spike’s arm when he held it out.

“Good job Spike!”

“Well, it seems to be enough like a phoenix that I just did the same thing I would whenever Peewee needed to be calmed down.”

“That’s nice. Now can you help me find a book that could tell us about this thing?”

Spike sighed. “Fine. Don’t suppose you know where to look?” He asked the bird.

Surprisingly enough, the blue phoenix flew off of his arm and started to circle around looking at the various books. It eventually grasped one of the books from the Everfree Castle and brought it to him.

“Hey! Twilight! Maybe this book will tell us something.” Spike called to the magenta alicorn. “It’s called ‘Beyond Our Stars: a Guide to Rare Animals and Plants’”

Twilight immediately turned her attention to the dragon. She grabbed the book in her magic and pulled it over to her before she started ruffling through the pages. “Aha! Here we go!”

Twilight had turned to a page with a picture of the bird. “It says here that this is a nightshade phoenix. It’s ‘A rare breed of phoenix that is born when a phoenix egg hatches when there is a moonbow nearby.’”

“A moonbow?” Spike asked.

“It’s supposed to be this odd occurrence that can only happen in certain places and only under the full moon. It’s something pegasi can’t control which is why it’s so rare. In fact, it’s so rare that many ponies believe it’s just a myth, but if this really is a nightshade phoenix, then they maybe actually do exist! Now, I have to finish that letter to Celestia about this!”

That being said, Twilight finished her letter while reading a bit more about the nightshade phoenix. She gave it to Spike to send, which made the phoenix tense up for a second before calming back down.

“While we wait for her reply, I want to get a look at this phoenix.” Twilight told Spike. “Do you think you’ll be able to keep it calm while I do that?”

“I think so.” Spike replied.

But when Twilight tried to get near the bird, it got defensive and tried to attack her. “That’s odd. You would think that it’d be more nervous around dragons than ponies seeing as how phoenixes are mainly the prey of dragons. Though it could be that wherever it came from, ponies try to capture it due to its rarity.”

Before Twilight could try to examine the bird again, Spike let out a burp as Celestia’s reply appeared.

“Oh good! Let’s see what she has to say.” Twilight said, opening the scroll.

Dear Twilight,

While your message of this portal does concern me, I would first like to tell you what I can about nightshade phoenixes. Luna is able to tell when a moonbow forms, and she has told me that there has not been one in at least the past hundred years. Luna has told me that she shows an interest in seeing this phoenix since she has not seen one since before her banishment.

Now my thoughts on this portal you saw. From how you described it, it seems much like a normal dimensional portal if it were not for the fact that it was not tethered to an object. I would like if you might be able to find out how such a phenomenon could occur. I will try to find what I can from the research I have from when Star Swirl was studying portals himself. I will send another letter if I find anything that may help you, but for now, do not let that phoenix go unwatched.
~Celestia

“So, we better try and figure out where this guy’s going to live for now, aren’t we?” Spike asked.

“It seems that way. Since it seems to be fine staying around you, maybe you can take care of it. You’ll also have plenty of space in your new room.”

“Alright, but if he messes anything up, I’m not letting him stay.”

The phoenix screeched at Spike, making him flinch back. “Okay, okay! I was just joking.” It quieted down, but still looked offended.

As Spike started to leave to take the nightshade phoenix to his room, he was stopped as something else happened. In the center of the room appeared a second portal. It was open longer than the first was before out shot a figure who crashed into a wall before it closed back up. The phoenix flew over to the new pony and landed next to her.

“Wha- Oh good, you made it over Lila. I was worried you might end up somewhere else when we split up there.”

The pony got up and fluttered her gossamer wings, letting the phoenix perch on her back. As she brushed herself off, she didn’t notice either Twilight or Spike until the alicorn spoke.

“How did you find your way here?” Twilight asked as she powered up a spell.

The pony, or rather, changeling looked up to see Twilight and was shocked for a second before her look turned to anger and she powered a spell as well. “What are you doing here?! I thought that spell would take me away from you.”

“What do you mean?” Twilight asked.

“I’m not telling you anything Empress!”

“Empress?!” Twilight and Spike said simultaneously. “Wha–”

Before either of them could say anything more, the changeling fired her spell at Twilight, cutting her off from what she was going to say, and ran out of the room.

A Confused Newcomer

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The changeling ran through the halls of the castle, looking for a way out. Unfortunately, the castle was enough like a maze to those who were not familiar with it that she soon got lost.

“How am I going to get out of here? I need to find something to stop Empress Twilight.”

The changeling’s pet cawed her reply. “I know Lila, But if she ended up on the other side of the first portal, then she might be able to do it again.”

“There you are!” Twilight said as she spotted the changeling.

The changeling looked around for a way out, but Twilight used her magic to block any escape route the she might have used.

“Fine… I guess we’ll have to fight.” The changeling said to Twilight. “Strange not to see you in your armor, Twilight, but I guess that will just make it easier.”

“What are you talking about?” Twilight asked. “I never wear armor.”

“And I suppose you never speak with the ambassadors either.”

“No! What ambassadors?”

“Hi Twilight! Whatcha doing?!” Pinkie exclaimed.

“Pinkie what are you doing here?” Twilight asked.

Before Pinkie Pie could answer, she was hit by a bolt of magic from the changeling. “Do you really take me for a fool empress? When will the rest of the ambassadors arrive?”

“I still have no idea what you’re talking about.” Twilight responded. “But if you’re going to hurt my friends, I have no choice than to fight you.”

“I thought that’s what you wanted in the first place!” The changeling yelled before a rainbow blur came in and collided with her, knocking her out.

“Rainbow! Thank goodness you’re here. How did you and Pinkie know to come?”

“Spike came outside and we happened to be hanging out nearby. All he told us was that you needed help with a changeling that appeared. Can you fill in the rest?”

Twilight explained to Rainbow Dash what had happened, and told Pinkie the same story when she woke up and asked the same question.

“So let me get this straight. A changeling suddenly appears and starts calling you an empress? Is that what they all think?”

“Well I’m not sure.” Twilight replied to Rainbow. “She hasn’t been calm enough for us to talk and find out what exactly is going on.”

“When we do figure out, do you think I can throw her a party?” Pinkie asked.

“Well, I guess if she isn’t a danger to Equestria we could, but for now, don’t plan on it.”

“Aww!”

“Rainbow, did Spike go to find the rest of the girls after he told you two what was going on?”

“Yeah, but Rarity might be a while. Her parents were out of town and Cheerilee wanted to do parent teacher conferences today since Scootaloo’s dad is back in town for the next few days.”

“Well, can you two set up a place for us to let this changeling rest in the throne room. I’ll bring her in once you two are ready. Hopefully everypony else will get here before she wakes up.”

“So what you’re saying is that she tried to attack you upon seeing you without any provocation?” Rarity asked Twilight after everypony had settled down.”

“Well, I may have gotten a bit defensive when she first showed up and gotten a spell ready if she tried to attack.”

“Well, I can hardly blame her.” Fluttershy responded. “If I was greeted by a strange pony that looked like she might possibly attack me, I would get scared too.”

“But that’s just it!” Twilight exclaimed. “She knew my name and I had never met her before.”

“Well ah think we’ll just hafta wait ‘til she wakes up tah find out what she thinks in goin’ on.”

The group didn’t have to wait long. In a matter of minutes, the changeling started to turn on a mattress that had been brought into the room for her. A matter of seconds after that, she was drowsily getting up before she realized where she was.

“Oh no.” She whispered.

“Yay! You’re awake!”Pinkie exclaimed. “Now we can talk to you and see if you’re bad or not and then I can throw you a party where we can make cupcakes together!”

The changeling screamed and tried to get away from Pinkie. Lila swooped down from above where she had been hiding to try and scare Pinkie off.

“Pinkie, I don’t think you’re helping that much. Let me try.” Twilight told her. “Well, you’ve already show that you know that I’m Twilight Sparkle. I’d like to know what else you know.”

“I’m not giving you any information on where the refugees are hiding if that’s what you want. I’ll take that knowledge to my grave, if I’m fortunate to get one from you.”

“Listen darling, we all seem to be a little lost by what you’re saying.” Rarity tried to reason. “While you seem to have at least met Twilight before, none of us have ever met you before. In fact, I believe the last time any of us saw a changeling was at the wedding of Twilight’s brother and Princess Cadence.”

The changeling gave a cautionary and quizzical look. “Y-you mean you aren’t going to torture me.”

“Wh-why would we want to do that?” Fluttershy asked. “You seem like a nice enough pony. You’re just a little bit scared.”

“Well it’s hard not to be scared in a room full of ponies that are always trying to hunt you down.”

“Okay, as Rarity just said, we don’t know who you are! And the longer you wait to tell us, the more lost we’re going to be.” Rainbow told the changeling.

“Alright, I’ll tell you. First off, my name is Queen Cicada, Ruler of the Changeling Empire and fighting to gain back Equestria from the Empress Twilight Sparkle since her enslavement of the country seven years ago.”

Twilight and her friends looked between themselves as they took in what Cicada had just said before letting her continue.

“She gained power with the help of the ambassadors Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Rarity, and Pinkamena, each of which helps control different sections of the empire, making sure no changeling can try and stand up to the empress or try and contact me.”

The group of friends exchanged looks one more time before Twilight spoke to Cicada. “I’m not sure what Equestria you’re talking about, But it sure isn’t the one you’re in right now.”

The other Equestria

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The sky was set in an everlasting twilight as the sun and moon sat on opposite sides of the horizon. Neither ever set, and neither ever rose fully. they just sat at the two ends of the sky, waiting to move again.

Equestria was one of the worst places to live for the changelings since it had been taken over by the pony empress soon after the fall of the alicorn sisters. The previous ruler had barely been the leader when she was battled for the throne and lost to the magic of Empress Twilight.

To make sure the changeling citizens would not fight back against her rule, the empress divided the country of Equestria into six sections, letting five of them be overseen by her chosen ambassadors.

The first sector was ruled solely by the empress, and was almost devoid of any changeling inhabitants. The few that did live there were in the positions of slaves, or kept in the dungeons in the castle.

The second sector was watched over by Ambassador Pinkamena. The changelings who still lived there were terrified and even the pony inhabitants were nervous living there. Each day mainly consisted of changelings trying to guys who would make it through the day.

The third sector was mainly watched by Ambassador Applejack. Here, all ponies and changeling were told they would be treated equally, but this was a lie. Everypony was given an equal amount of work and was told they would be punished if it was not done, but if a pony were to not do their share of work, it was a changeling punished for their actions. The only compensation was that this was the farming sector, and the changelings here were better fed than others.

The fourth sector was watched by the ambassador Rarity. It was most likely the best sector to be in and had the most changelingings living there. It was also the smallest sector for the changelings since half of it was given only to ponies. The worst part was that there were more than twice the number of changelings as there were ponies in that sector.

The fifth sector was overseen by ambassador Fluttershy. Most changelings had to be cautious from all the monsters that were kept in this sector. In the center of the entire area was an area, and weekly a group of changelings were told to go against a group of ponies. The changeling were always weak, and it didn’t help that the ponies chosen were always stronger than an average pony.

The sixth sector was governed by Ambassador Rainbow Dash. This sector was the main producer of weather, but only changeling ran those jobs. It was more dangerous for them compared to their pegasus counterparts seeing as the magic that allowed them to do the same feats as pegasi was weaker. Any lightningbolt that would only stun a pegasus would damage a changeling.

Then there was the unofficial seventh sector. It was ruled by the previous ruler of Equestria, who had been the owner of the throne for not even a year before it was taken from her. This sector was the only one where changelings were treated as they should be. They were stronger than most changelings nowadays and had even been able to capture a few ponies to get the extra emotions to consume.

It had been almost seven years since the fall of the changeling rule, but the changelings felt it was finally time to take back their empire. They made their way through tunnels that only changelings could fit through due to them being able to shapeshift at least their size. After a few hours or so, they found themselves inside the castle, ready to take on the empress. Or so they thought.

“Nymph, Grub, Morpho. You three take that end of the hall. Thrip, Aphid, Midge. You take the other end. Pupa, you and Milkweed check this room and clear it of any ponies. Nymph, are you sure you want to help?”

“Yes! I told you I wouldn’t leave your side no matter what.”

“Alright, but remember, the second I tell you to go home. You. Go. Home. Got that?”

“Yes Cicada, I got it.”

The changelings Cicada had sent into the room came back out with four ponies, all of them knocked out. “Where should we put them?”

“Here, give me a few seconds and I’ll open a portal to where we’ll keep them.”

In about a minute, the changeling opened a lavender portal on the ground. The ponies were placed right above the portal, and a lavender shield bubble lowered them into it.

“Nymph! Is your side secure.”

“Yes. We have the shields up so only changelings will be able to get in and out. We also didn’t see any ponies in the halls.”

“Hmm… Thrip, what about your side.”

“Same deal over here. The halls are empty of any ponies.”

“Anyling else think it’s a little too quiet here?” Aphid asked around.

“We’re probably just in a quiet area of the castle, right ‘Cades?” Grub said.

“No, Aphid’s right. This isn’t right. I made sure the tunnel would connect to the one that leads to an area of the castle near the middle, but not too close. There should be more ponies around.”

“Uh guys,” Morpho spoke up. “I think I know where they all went.”

Morpho picked up a card one of the ponies they had just captured had had with them. It gave a notice that on this date, there was going to be a large gathering in the main hall.

“Do you think the empress was going to try and do the same thing we’re doing?” Nymph asked her sister.

“I hope not. The worst case scenario is that she knows we’ve been planning to try and reconquer the capital.”

“Heads up! A few ponies are starting to come this way.” Midge called.

At first, the changelings were able to pick off each pony as they came down the halls, but slowly, the number of ponies started to increase making it tough. Eventually, one pony called back to warn a few other ponies who were about to reach the hall, letting them run back to warn others.

“Thrip, you’re fastest. Go back in the tunnel and tell Metalmark, Gypsy, and their teams to come up.” Cicada ordered. “After that, I want you to take a peak using the tunnel leading toward the main hall and tell me what you see.”

Before long, seven new changelings were above ground to help take down ponies. Cicada herself was concentrating on keeping a portal open at each end of the hall for ponies to be placed in, but the longer she kept them open, the more exhausted she felt.

After a while of keeping the ponies at bay, they finally seemed to stop coming. Cicada closer the portals before giving orders to expand their territory in the castle.

“Where’s Thrip?” Nymph asked. “He still hasn’t come back.”

“You’re right.” Cicada said surprised, looking around. “He should have been back by now. Maybe we should-”

Cicada was cut off by a loud shattering noise. “Dragonfly’s shield is down, and he and Mantis are unconscious.”

A second and third shatter could be heard. “Both Morpho and Spittle lost theirs now, and I’m not sure how long I can keep mi- Ah!”

All of the shields were down and more than half the changelings were unconscious.

“Nymph! Go back home, now!”

“But Cicada, what about you?”

“I said go back. You promised you would when I told you to.”

Nymph looked at her sister. “How will you get out?”

“Don’t worry, I’ve still got one trick in my bag that hasn’t been used yet. Just go home. If I don’t come back…”

“Don’t say that! You’re going to come home!”

“I hope so. Now leave!”

A few seconds after Nymph was out of view. Cicada could hear someone coming down the hall behind her. She quickly turned to see…

“Thrip! You made it back! what took you so long?!”

“He had a run in with me.” A sickly sweet voice spoke. Thrip’s body fell slumped to the floor when the voice’s owner released it from her magic.

“Empress Sparkle!” Cicada almost growled at the armored alicorn.

“Oh you should know by now that I prefer to be called Empress Twilight. Really thoughtless of you to try and attack the capital. You know I’m stronger than you.”

“Only because you took Celestia’s magic after she battled Selena.”

“And only because you refused to take the magic of that traitorous pony you call a friend.”

“Not anymore. You and I are equals once more Twilight!” Cicada told the empress, firing a powerful spell at her, which his the alicorn.

“Ugh! So you finally took up Luna’s magic, did you?”

“That’s not her name anymore!” Cicada yelled, firing two more large bolts of magic.

The changelings that had still been in the room and conscious had dragged their friends into the empty room they had taken over. The only ones left in the hall were three dead changelings, and the two battling rulers.

“Give up! You and I both know that Celestia’s magic was stronger than her sister’s.” Twilight fired a large beam at Cicada.

“That was only because she was older. And while you may have forgotten, I still remember that I… am older… than you!” Cicada’s own horn fired a beam, and the two collided in the middle, leaving both of the battlers to try and power it as much as they could.

“AAHHH!” Cicada cried, as Twilight won the battle, Cicada’s magic still depleted from having her portals open earlier.

“Looks like it’s over for you now.” Twilight said to the collapsed queen.

“Not… if she has… anything to say about it.” Cicada pointed behind Twilight.

“Wha-” The Alicorn started before a blue blur collided with her face.

She fell to the ground as Cicada got up and opened a portal. The changelings from the room raced out and through the portal which led back to their base in the tunnels underground.

“Lila! Come!” Cicada called to the nightshade phoenix. “This isn’t the last you’ve seen of me Sparkle!”

“NO!” Twilight yelled as she fired two dark magic spells from her horn. The first hit the lavender portal, making it turn a slightly darker shade of purple. The second hit Cicada, and pushed both her and Lila into the portal before it closed behind them.

“NNOOOOOOOOO!!!!!” Twilight screamed as she stamped her hoof down on the ground, where it broke the skull of the changeling corpse that lay there.

The six ponies and dragon looked at the changeling, none wanting to be the first to speak what they were thinking. They just looked between themselves, not sure exactly what they were supposed to think. Finally, one of them broke the silence.

“Wow Twilight.” Pinkie said. “Who knew you could be so bad?”

An Interesting Discussion

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“I’m surprised by how you’re acting.” Twilight spoke up after Spike had made lunch for the group. “From what you told us, I would think you’d be more uncomfortable around us.”

“Oh don’t be fooled.” Cicada told Twilight. “I’m still terrified on just being in this room. There are only three reasons I haven’t already left in fear.”

“And what would those be darling?” Rarity asked.

“The first is that none of you have tried killing me yet, which is a good sign. The second is that Pinkamena-”

“It’s Pinkie Pie!”

“Right… Anyway, Pinkie Pie looks different than she normally does, though she’s still mostly the same. The last reason is the young wyrm here.”

The ponies looked around before finally figuring out what Cicada meant.

“Um, you mean Spike, right?” Fluttershy asked.

“If that is his name, yes. I did not know of Twilight to own sentient monsters of any sort. And I would also think she wouldn’t have a wyrm, but more likely a wyvern or dragon instead.”

“But I am a dragon!” Spike exclaimed.

“And were you told this by your mother?”

“Yes! No. Well, sort of. Twilight was the one to hatch me, and she was told by Celestia.”

“Well, I guess neither of them knows the varieties of drakes. I, on the other hoof, have gotten the pleasure of meeting two of the different species in good circumstances.”

“How can you tell which he is?” Twilight asked. “I only knew about dragons.”

“Wyrms are the only group of drakes that are hatched without wings. The other two are usually already born with wings, though sometimes dragons are born without their wings.”

“But doesn’t that mean Spike could still be a dragon?” Pinkie asked, making Cicada flinch.

“Yes… if he had them now. Any dragon born without wings will have them within their first year of life, and I’m willing to bet Spike is much older than just one year.”

“I’m nine years old! Almost ten!”

“I prove my point. The only reason I can think that he wouldn’t have them yet is that it was Twilight who hatched him, and her magic might have affected him. If that’s the case, he’ll get them shortly before becoming an adult. And while there is a way he could grow them in now instead of waiting all those years, I wouldn’t try it. Unless, of course, one of you can cast an age spell.”

Twilight looked almost nervous before she spoke to Cicada. “I, actually think I know what you’re talking about. And I’ve actually seen both ways played out.”

“And did he have any wings?”

“No… but do you think a very powerful age spell might affect what happens.”

Cicada thought for a second. “I guess… if the magic were powerful enough it could make it so he wouldn’t grow any. Basically that would affect him enough that it might cause the mutation that most likely helped distinguish dragons and wyrms in the first place. In that case, he technically both.”

“Um, n-not to be rude, but could we maybe go back to talking about where you’re from? If you don’t mind that is.”

“Oh, yes. I’m afraid we did get off topic there. Was there anything any of you wanted to know?”

“Well, one question I have…” Twilight started. “Is that you said this other Twilight started her rule about seven years ago. If our time lines are matched up, that would mean she was only eleven when she started. Is that true?”

“Well, actually, no. She was sixteen. I guess that means that my dimension is a few years further.”

“Interesting…” Twilight said as she scribbled down on a notepad she had gotten.

“Oooo! Oooo! I have a question!”

“What about?”

“Well, now that I know you’re good, I can throw you a party. So I wanna know what kind of cake you want.”

“Uhh, well, I’m not really a fan of cake. But I do like pies. My favorites are pear and rhubarb.”

“Got it!” Pinkie said before zooming away.

“Should I be concerned?” Cicada asked.

“Pinkie can be a bit of a… hoof-ful sometimes, but I highly doubt she’ll do anything that you need to be concerned about.” Rarity answered.

“Hey!” Rainbow spoke up. “You got anything like the wonderbolts over there?”

“There’s an air patrol called that, making sure no changeling is doing anything suspicious.”

“Oh, okay.”

“Um, you said you were hit by the other Twilight right before going through your portal. Is it something that should be looked at?” Fluttershy asked.

Cicada hadn’t really thought about that. Now that she had been reminded of that, she realised it sort of stung around the area she had been hit, thought it felt more numb where she was actually hit.

“I don’t know, I haven’t checked yet.”

Cicada lifted the leg that was hiding the area where the spell had hit her. She hadn’t felt like looking at it yet, but first at the others reactions. Seeing them didn’t really make her any more eager to look at the damage.

Fluttershy had instantly turned away after seeing it. The rest just looked like they might be sick. Cicada quickly hid whatever was there again.

“Something tells me it’s pretty ugly.”

“Going to a doctor now would be best for that.” Twilight said. “Do you think you’d be fine going there?”

“I think so.” Cicada said, getting up. She felt a little dizzy as she did so, but it wasn’t too bad.

“Wait, doesn’t she need tah disguise herself or somethin’ if she wants to go outside?” Applejack asked.

“Do you think you can do that?” Twilight asked.

“I don’t think so. At most I’ll just be able to take the base form of a changeling right now.”

“Base form?” Twilight said, absent mindedly bringing her notebook closer to her.

“Before a changeling starts to learn how to disguise themselves as another species, they sort of take on a generic form of that species called a base form. Usually the first thing a changeling is ever able to change into is a base form for changelings. Normally we’ll disguise ourselves in changeling base form so that our enemy can’t tell us apart from each other. The thing is, we also normally stay as that because we can’t even tell each other apart when we’re disguised.”

“Interesting… I guess that’s why the changelings we fought couldn’t tell us from them when they were all disguised as us.”

“What do you mean, you fought changelings?” Cicada asked, shifting uncomfortably in her seat.

“I… uh… well…” Twilight sputtered.

“Um… maybe we should just take you to the hospital to get that looked at now.” Fluttershy suggested.

“Yes, I’d like that.” Cicada replied.

“Spike, can you get a room ready while we’re out?” Twilight asked. “Cicada will need somewhere to stay until we figure out how to get her back.”

“On it Twilight!”

“Come on Lila!” Cicada called to her pet. “I hope to see you later Spike.”

“Thanks.” Spike said as he waved goodbye to the changeling.

A Trip to the Doctor's

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Cicada had been nervous going through Ponyville. All the different ponies stared at her, whispering to one another. If ponies were good here, did that mean changelings were evil? Were they to always be enemies, no matter what version of Equestria she found?

The queen wasn’t paying attention to where she was walking, and stepped in a rut on the dirt road. She normally would have been fine, but because she was so weak, Cicada fell instead.

At first, no pony came to help. Twilight and her friends (minus Pinkie) hadn’t noticed because Cicada had started to lag behind. Finally Fluttershy had turned to look for the changeling, only to realise what had happened.

“Oh dear! I’m sorry! We didn’t notice! We should have-”

“It’s fine. I-I’ve had worse happen to me.”

The group continued again, but this time Fluttershy made sure she stayed right beside Cicada as she walked and helped her along. Eventually the mare decided to talk to Cicada to try and make her more comfortable.

“So, that blue phoenix is your pet?”

Cicada was shocked at first, not thinking that a pony would want to hear about things like that, but then she remembered this Equestria was different. “Y-yes. Lila’s a nightshade phoenix. She used to be my mom’s pet.”

“I’ve never seen one before! I didn’t know they existed!”

“Well, they’re very rare. Supposedly there’s only one born every other thousand years.”

“She must be very special to you.”

“She is. Not only is she one of my friends, she’s one of the few things I have left to remind me about my mother. Sometimes I forget how old she is compared to me because she’s so playful but also somewhat shy. In fact, Lila, can you please come out? I don’t want my mane getting all tangled.”

Lila poked her head out for a few seconds to look around before coming out. She almost retreated back into her owner’s mane when she realised how close Fluttershy was.

“Oh, don’t worry. Fluttershy seems to be nice enough.”

After a bit of reluctance, Lila finally let the timid pegasus pet her. By that time, the group was almost to the hospital.

“Thanks for walking with me. It… feels a bit weird to try and be friends with a pony, but I’m glad I’m getting the chance. Do you think you might be able to care for Lila if I ever need it?”

Fluttershy’s eyes seemed to glitter. “I’d love to! I already help care for other animals and it would be an honor to take care of Lila!”

Cicada gave a small laugh. “I don’t think it would be that important. But then… I’m not you. But I could try!”

Cicada enveloped herself in a ring of green flames before revealing herself to look like Fluttershy.

“How did you do that?” Twilight asked, taking notice of the changeling’s transformation. “I thought you said you didn’t have enough energy to do that.”

“Well I didn’t before. I got some from Fluttershy. You see changelings can feed off the love of other creatures, mainly other sentient creatures. It can be any kind of love, like love of a object, but romantic love is one of the most powerful forms. In this case, it was her love for…” Cicada paused. “Pretty sure that’s love for animals in general and not just Lila.”

“Wait, you can sense what the love is for?” Twilight inquired.

“Generally, yes. Sometimes it’s hard to tell, but I can usually figure it out.”

“Um, darling, we’re almost to the hospital, and I think after this you should be more concerned about going in there.” Rarity said, pointing right near where Cicada had been blasted.

The changeling felt the area to find she could still feel the damage from the spell. “That’s odd, I can normally cover that up when I’m disguised. Wha-”

Cicada had looked down and seen what was there. The area where she had been hit looked all charred and dead. The damage continued and made the veins around it all black, like they had been burnt too. In her shock, she dropped her disguise, which just seemed to make it worse. The parts she had been able to disguise were a sickly purple color. The queen visually looked like she might empty her stomach, but she held it in before looking away.

“Alright, let’s hurry up. I don’t want to have anything happen from us taking to long.”

“I’m not sure about this.” Nurse Redheart said as Twilight and her friends tried to admit Cicada into the hospital. “Are you sure this changeling won’t try to harm the other ponies here?”

“I’m not fully sure.” Twilight responded. “But sure enough that I think she should at least be let in to be treated.”

The nurse hesitated for a few seconds before replying. “Alright, but I’m putting her in a room that’s farther away from many of the other patients.”

Cicada was brought to a room where she was given a bed and Nurse Redheart looked over the changeling. It didn’t take long for her to see how serious this was. After getting a few details, she went to fetch Doctor Horse to also take a look at the queen. Before leaving, however, she told Cicada to rest while she waited, since could be a while.

“That sounds like a good idea. Do you five mind letting me sleep for a bit?” Cicada asked her new friends.

“Sure, ah think we can give ya that.” Applejack answered. “Come on girls, let’s leave her be.”

Lila perched herself next to Cicada’s bed and the five ponies left the room, closing the door behind them. They obviously hadn’t gone far, because unknown to them, Cicada could still hear them chatting about her right outside the door.

“I don’t know Twilight. I mean, she does see nice and all, but you remember about the changelings from the wedding.” Rainbow said.

“I think she’s rather nice.” Fluttershy retorted. “Besides, don’t you think she might be more distrustful of us that we are of her?”

“That’s true. She did say that there were other versions of us that were almost as bad as this other Twilight. Ah’d hate to see what those versions of us are really like.” Applejack said.

“For all we know, it could be some obscure plot to make her trust her.”

“Darling, do you really think the poor thing would be able to come up with the whole ‘Twilight’s an Evil Empress’ idea just a few seconds after meeting her?” Rarity asked.

“What about you Twilight?” Fluttershy questioned. “What do you think?”

“I’m honestly not sure yet. So far she seems like she’s telling the truth.”

“Ah haven’t noticed anythin’ odd from her yet. As far as ah can tell, she is.”

“It could also just be what she believes to be the truth.” Rainbow jumped in. “For all we know, that other changeling queen brainwashed her or something like she did with Twilight’s brother and doesn’t know the real truth.”

“That’s stretching it a bit much there Rainbow.” Twilight said to her friend. “Right now, I’m trusting her, but I do also want you girls keeping an eye out incase anything strange happens.”

At that moment, the conversing stopped. It caught Cicada by surprise. She opened her eyes after having them closed so she could concentrate on listening to the conversation. Instead of finding herself on the hospital bed, she found herself in a room she didn’t recognise. Turning her head, Cicada saw a window connecting to another room. In the other room was someone she knew. Before getting the chance to call their name, the changeling blinked, and found herself back in the hospital room she had been in before, though now, she was standing.

‘Huh. Must have actually dozed off and got up in my sleep.’

At that moment, the door opened to let in an orange unicorn stallion with a brown mane. In shock, Cicada immediately raised a small shield before figuring out it was the doctor Nurse Redheart had mentioned.

“Sorry!” She apologised. “I’m still a bit jumpy around all you ponies.”

“That’s fine. I’ve heard from the princess about what your story is. Let me see what the damage is.”

As Doctor horse examined the wound, Cicda looked quizzically at Twilight. “You’re a princess? I didn’t know that.”

“Yes, actually. I’m the princess of friendship. I only recently got the title though.”

“So… you’re not a queen or something like that?”

“No, just princess. And even then I don’t like to be called that. I wasn’t even an alicorn until a few months ago either.”

“Oh… OWWW!!!”

“Sorry about that miss.” Doctor Horse said. “I’m sorry, but from what I can tell, you’ve been badly damaged from a dark magic spell, and I’m not familiar enough to know how to treat this. You might be able to find another doctor somewhere else that would be able to help treat this enough to fix the damage, but all I can do is give enough treatment that it won’t be life threatening to go around normally until this is fixed.”

“Do you happen to know anyling, uh, anypony that might help?” Cicada asked.

“Well, you may find a unicorn in Canterlot who could help. There are enough unicorns with advanced magically knowledge there that would most likely be able to help.”

“Canterlot? Where’s that?”

Doctor Horse walked over to the nearest window and opened it, pointing over towards a large mountain. Cicada went to the window and looked out, following the doctor’s hoof. In the side of the mountain, she could see a large city.

“That’s Canterlot?!” The changeling exclaimed.

“Yes.” Twilight replied. “That’s where I lived before I moved to Ponyville.” The alicorn turned to the doctor. “I know of one or two doctors up there who might be able to help her, and we’ll be needing to see the princesses anyway. Thanks for your help.”

“Don’t mention it Princess.”

“Just Twilight is fine. Come on Cicada. We should get you back to the castle before it gets dark.”

“What?” The queen asked, still gazing at Canterlot in awe. “Oh, yeah. Just give me a few seconds.” The changelings looked out the window for a few more seconds before deciding to follow the group.

“So wait, where am I going to be staying for the night?”

“Don’t you remember? Twilight said you were going to be staying at the castle. Spike stayed behind to set up a room for you.” Rainbow told Cicada.

“Oh… right. Y-you sure I can’t stay somewhere… else?”

“I’d actually prefer if you’d stay at the castle right now.” Twilight told the changeling.

Cicada thought she heard Rainbow Dash mumble something about friends and enemies before Applejack hit her in the ribs.

“F-fine. Uh, come on Lila, I think we want to leave.”

The nightshade phoenix fluttered over to her owner before perching on her back. The two of them left the room right behind Twilight and her friends.

“I’m not sure what to think of this place yet Lila. What about you?” The changeling asked, not getting much of a response in return.

“Sentry!” A voice called.

A pegasus guard was positioned just outside the room his ruler was currently in. The guard entered the room to find out what her was needed for.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“I was able to narrow down where the escapee might be while with our prisoner. I believe she may be in a hospital located somewhere in sector five. I want to to gather some of the guard and search every infirmary in that area. Do you understand?”

“Yes Empress! I’ll get straight on it!”

“I knew I chose well when I chose you as captain Flash Sentry.”

“I was honored to be chosen.” Flash said before leaving to follow his orders.

Twilight turned back to the room she had just been in. Through a window in the room, she could see a changeling that resembled the old queen.

“Soon,” She started, not caring that the changeling couldn’t see her, much less hear her. “I’ll find your sister, and then neither of you will stand in my way.”

An Argument at Dinner

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After arriving back at the castle with Twilight, Cicada and Lila were shown to the guest room by Spike.

“Sorry if it seems a little… empty.” he said. “We still haven’t gotten around to decoration the whole place, and we didn’t think we’d be using the guest room so soon.”

Cicada took a peek inside. Sure enough, there wasn’t much in the room besides a bed and side table for a lamp. There wasn’t even a lamp to go on side table yet.

“Don’t worry. I’ve had to sleep in worse places. This actually looks comfortable compared to most of the places I have to sleep in.”

“Well, once you feel like it, you can come down to where we’ll be having dinner in about half an hour.”

“Was it a left at the end of the hall and then a right four doors down?” Cicada asked.

“No, you want to make a right six doors down. And after that you’re going to want to take another right two doors after that.”

“Okay… I think I’ve got it.” The changeling replied as she finished writing herself a note. “Thanks for the paper by the way.”

“Yeah, I always keep some around just incase Twilight feels the need to make a list or note about something at that second. Pinkie actually helped me put them around the castle along with eyepatches, balls, and party cannons.”

“Why did she feel the need to put those around the castle?”

“Because she already had them hidden around the rest of Ponyville.”

“Actually I meant… *sigh* nevermind. Something tells me this is usual for you guys. But anyway, yeah, I’ll join you guys later.”

Spike left the room while Cicada worked on fixing up the room a little. For the most part, all she did was move around what little was in the room so it looked better to her. The only other thing she did was try and make a perch for Lila. There wasn’t much for the changeling to work with, but eventually she chose to open the on window in the room and use her magic to yank a branch off one of the trees she could see. It took a while with the tree being so far away from her window and her magic rather weak, but soon enough Cicada was able to get a branch to clean up and use as a perch.

It took the changeling the good part of an hour to work on getting the rough bark off and getting to the softer wood inside, but eventually she finished and took one of the few sheets on the bed to make a stand so the perch would stay up.

“There, that should work for now. Lila, don’t go on it until it had a proper base. I’m going to see if I can find one.”

Before Cicada could start to leave, her stomach growled a bit. “Alright, first you can come with me to have something to eat, then I’ll find a proper base.”

The changeling quickly turned to start leaving the room, but paused and turned back. When Lila gave a questioning caw, Cicada replied. “Sorry, just thought I saw something for a second there and I took a double take. I think it was just my imagination. Let’s go.”

Spike and Twilight had already started their dinner when Cicada and Lila arrived to eat. Each of them was eating a piece from a large thing that looked like it had started as a circle. After getting a bit closer, Cicada could see that the main part seemed to be much like bread, though it seemed to be darker than how bread normally looked after being baked. On the very top was a yellowish substance with some of the area with a few gems, most likely for Spike. In between the bread and the odd substance, was a chunky red layer, which unfortunately reminded Cicada of some of the horrible food to come from sector two.

Twilight cut a new slice and placed it on the place where Cicada had sat down. The changeling recoiled slightly as the food was put in front of her.

“Don’t worry!” Spike said, taking another bit of his own slice. “It’s good! You’ll like it!”

Cicada wasn’t so sure, and the red spots left around the drake’s mouth didn’t help, making her gag instead.

“Sorry, but I think I might go for something else.” The changeling shifted in her seat. “This is a little… too odd for me right now.”

Cicada couldn’t help thinking. ‘Are the ponies here any better that the ones back home? What if this is all some act before they turn on me? They mentioned some interactions with changelings already. For all I know, this is the same. How else would both Twilights be alicorns? Surely this one wouldn’t want to use dark magic willingly, right?’

“That’s fine. We can save it for later. I just thought you might enjoy having pizza for dinner and didn’t know if you had ever had some before. What do you want instead?”

Cicada had only half heard what Twilight had said. She looked between her two hosts, hoping one of them would repeat what was just said. Twilight opened her mouth to repeat herself, but Spike was the one who spoke.

“Not much of a loss if you don’t want it. What do you want instead.” Is how he summed it up.

“Not much of a loss?!” Cicada’s eye twitched. For a second or two, she could picture Twilight’s armor on her. That just made things worse. “You think lives ‘aren’t much of a loss’?!”

“Wait, Cicada! What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean! Food is hard enough for you ponies and while I’m pleased my changelings are being kept alive, you use them as slaves and barely feed them. And then when they die either from bad conditions or accidents, or maybe even in battle, you still use them to benefit yourselves in ways I am appalled by!”

The changeling got closer to Twilight, her horn lit up and starting to spark. When she was almost on top of the alicorn, Spike stepped in between the two, causing Cicada to stop and then blink a few times. She shook her head, before slowly backing away.

“I-I’m sorry… I didn’t mean… I just forgot… I-I’ll… can I just have salad in my room?”

Cicada ran out of the room a few tears just starting to form in her eyes.

“I almost attacked her. She didn’t do anything wrong. I was just thinking about the other her, and then I got angry at the other one. Then I started to get angry at this one. I don’t want to hurt any innocent changelings. Ponies… I mean ponies. Arrgg! Why did this have to happen!”

Cicada flopped on her bed to stop herself from pacing anymore. She kept replaying the scene over and over in her head. She could think of different ways she could have made it better, but the thought of her visualizing Twilight wearing her Twilight’s armor seemed to have been a big part of her breaking point.

“I’m the worst guest ever. They’ll just see me as some evil queen now, trying to take over the whole country for my own use.”

There was a knock at the door. Cicada didn’t open it at first, but the knock came again.

“Cicada? Twilight asked me to bring me the salad you wanted. Also, your phoenix is out here and she looks like she wants to come in.”

Cicada almost zoomed over to the door. before opening it, she calmed herself and peeked out, allowing Lila enough room to fly in, and enough for her to look out.

“Uh thank you Spike. Cou-could you maybe tell Twilight I’m sorry? I was thinking about my home right before my outburst and the… what was it called? Pizza? Anyway the food reminded me of something my Twilight does and it’s really cruel. I kind of decided to take out my anger on this Twilight instead.”

“Yeah! I think I can do that. Here’s your salad.”

“Thank you.” Cicada replied, picking up the salad with her magic.

She closed the door and went over to the bed. The salad was quickly devoured and the bowl set aside before the changeling quickly left the room and came back with a rather heavy and somewhat large vase.

Cicada jammed the branch she had cleaned into the top of the vase, where it fit in firmly. The vase alone was heavy enough that when Lila perched herself on the branch, it didn’t tip over or even wobble.

“I hope Twilight doesn’t decide to kick me out of here.” Cicada said, before giving a small laugh. “Never thought I would ever say something like that.”

Lila wasn’t paying much attention as she worked on finding a comfortable position to sleep in.

“Y’know what Lila? I think that’s a good *yawn* idea.” the queen said, finding herself sleepy. “Getting frustrated makes me more tired than I thought.”

Cicada got into bed and tucked herself in. She went to blow out the candle before realising there wasn’t one. She stopped to just tuck herself in some more before calling out. “Goodnight Nymph.”

She was replied only by silence.

Nightime Meetings

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Twilight was waiting in her castle for a certain pony to enter. That night had been eventful and she had some questions. She only trusted one pony to give her the answers she needed. As she was pacing in the throne room, there was a knock on the entrance doors which made her pause and sit in her throne.

“Enter!” She called out before the doors started to swing open. A grey stallion with a white mane and tail stepped in.

“Ah professor! I’m glad to see you could make it. There’s been something on my mind as of late that I want to speak to you about.”

“And what would that be?” He asked, before quickly adding. “Your highness.”

“No need to be formal. We are here alone. I need a few question answered and it will go quicker without any formalities. Is that clear Neigh?”

“Y-yes!”

“Good. Now, I was wondering if you might know what might happen if a dark magic spell were to hit a portal before a pony would be able to go through it.”

“It would depend on what kind of spell. While normal magic would pass through a portal normally, dark magic mixes with the portal. It would be like how certain powders added to water will help create various drinks.”

“And what if it were a spell like this?” Twilight showed Professor Neigh a book.

“A spell like that would most likely rupture the portal so it would send a pony going through it to another planet, or even another dimension.”

“And what are the chances of being able of opening the same connection on each end.”

“Well, if you were trying to remake the portal to return from where you came, you would just have to make a portal and use the same spell.”

“It’s that easy?” Twilight questioned.

“In theory, yes. But I have never personally tested either way.”

“And what about trying to follow somepony to wherever they ended up after the portal had already closed?”

“That method would be much harder. You would have to have some connection to where you wish to end up. That would involve an object from the place of question or some sort of communication device with the pony you wish to follow.”

“Is that all?” Twilight prodded.

“All that I can think of now. If you want, I can do research?”

“That would be perfect, thank you.”

The professor was about to leave when he stopped to ask one last question. “Why do you need to know about this Twilight?”

“I have somepony that needs to get home, and I’m hoping that can happen sooner rather than later.”

Cicada couldn’t get to sleep. She kept tossing and turning in the bed. The room was too empty and she didn’t feel comfortable. And it wasn’t the lack of objects in the room. It was the lack of occupants.

There hadn’t been a day Cicada could remember sleeping in a room without someone else with her. At first it had been her mom. Then it was her sister. If she couldn’t sleep with her sister, she had sometimes slept in a room with Selena.

Twilight… she didn’t want to share a room with Twilight for the night. She was so nice compared to the one that she had left, which made it even more unnerving for the changeling. There was only one other choice.

Cicada made her way out of the bedroom after leaving a note for Lila. She walked through the castle, hoping she might find what she was looking for.

‘I would expect all the bedrooms would be near each other.’ Cicada thought. ‘I hope I can figure out which room is his.’

As Cicada made her way down the hall, she thought she heard Twilight somewhere else in the castle talking to someone else. She couldn’t tell if it was a mare or stallion, all she knew was she didn’t recognize the voice.

Finally, Cicada saw a faint light coming from under one of the doors. She peeked in the crack between the door and the wall. It was blurry, but she could see a purple shape with bits of green moving around inside.

The changeling knocked on the door. Inside, she could hear Spike stop moving.

“What do you need Twilight?”

“Actually… it’s Cicada.”

The door opened and a somewhat tired looking Spike looked at her. “What do you want?”

“I was kinda wondering if maybe you might let me… I don’t know… sleep in here with you for the night?”

Spike looked at her, scanning her up and down. “Uh, no offense, but why? Are you afraid of the dark or something?”

“Not the dark, no. More it’s that I’ve never really had to sleep in a room by myself, and just Lila wasn’t working. My sister and I would always sleep together so that if anything happened, we could keep each other safe.”

“Okay… well, why not Twilight?”

“She reminds me too much of my Twilight. And not just because of how she looks.”

Spiked looked at her skeptically as he let her walk in. “What do you mean? I thought the Twilight from your world was an evil empress or something like that.”

“She is, but she wasn’t always. Back when we were younger, Celestia would sometimes visit for meetings with my mother. We ended up spending time together while they were talking.”

“Why was Twilight with Celestia? Why not back home with her own family?”

“As Celestia’s student, Twilight came with her on certain meetings and made sure she came to the ones that involved relationships between changelings and ponies.”

“Why the hay did she turn evil then?”

“Might have something to do with a disagreement my mother had with Celestia. I never found out what it was, but afterwards, they never came again and it started to get harder and harder for changelings and ponies to live together before it was almost unheard of other than Selena.”

“Selena?”

“She kind of became my mentor and even helped a bit after my mother died and I had to rule the changelings. Later on she and Celestia had a battle. Selena lost and the last thing she did was give her magic to me. I kept it somewhere else since I didn’t think I should use it. Twilight, on the other hoof, stole Celestia’s magic after the battle so she could be more powerful.”

“What do you think caused your Twilight to turn evil?”

“No idea.” Cicada answered as she shook her head. “Maybe if I knew, I’d be able to make her nice again.”

Spike yawned. “Well, I guess you can find out tomorrow. If you need one, there’s a few extra blankets in the corner over there.” he pointed to the corner, giving another yawn.

“Thank you.” the queen said as she covered herself with one of them. “You’re the nicest *yawn* ‘ling I’ve met so far.”

Spike gave a small laugh. “I’m not a changeling.” He retorted, even though he knew what she meant. Cicada, however, didn’t notice as she was already asleep.

Twilight made her way toward the dungeons. She would normally be asleep, but she had one last thing on her list of what to do today.

“Open the door Sentry!” She ordered the guard.

“Yes Empress Twilight!” He responded before following the order.

The second the door was opened, the empress flew through it and down the long staircase. She landed at the bottom in a hall with many doors. After walking about halfway down, she entered a door to her left. Inside was Cicada’s sister, Nymph.

The changeling looked very different from her sister, but there was enough in common with them that one could see they were related when they were near each other.

“How are you tonight?” Twilight asked as she kicked the changeling to wake her up.

Nymph jumped up, her wings letting her hover for a second before a ring on her horn started to glow and she clutched her head in her hooves.

“Now now, you know trying to use magic with just end up with a headache. Why don’t you try talking again today.”

Nymph didn’t reply, she just gave an angry look toward Twilight.

“The longer you stay quiet, the longer it will be until you learn what I know about your sister.”

Nymph just rolled her eyes.

“Fine be that way. I just thought you might like to know she had dinner with me this evening.”

“WHAT?!” Nymph yelled, before clamping her hooves over her mouth.

“There we go! And yes, she had dinner with me. I believe it was pizza. I didn’t get enough time to check much else.”

Nymph looked strangely at the alicorn. “What do you mean.”

“What I’m saying is, Your sister is no longer on Equus. And from what I can guess, she’s somewhere with another Twilight who looks exactly like me.”

The changeling raised an eyebrow. “You expect me to believe that?”

“It is the truth. You see… just before your sister went through her portal, I blasted her with a spell that lets me switch bodies with who I hit when I choose to. An hour is the longest time though. Here’s the funny part. Right now, I can only switch between ourselves for a few seconds at a time and it’s completely random. I think I can get to her to bring her back, but I need your help.”

“Why would you want my help? As long as she’s there, she can’t do anything to you. Besides, why would I want to bring my sister to you?”

Twilight smirked. “Ah yes… why would you? You see, I need your sister for reasons of my own. And as for why you should help, the reasons are simple. I’m the only one who can get her back. She won’t be able to herself and even if I’m defeated by your pitiful changeling army, she can’t ever return. I’ll also add in the fact that I believe my little switches with your sister may get longer as time goes on, to the point where I could make things for her wherever she is just as bad as they are for her here.”

“She’ll figure out a way before that happens, so I’m not helping.”

“Suit yourself. But I’ll be back. And I hope you’ll change your mind, because the longer you wait, the worse it will get.”

Twilight left the cell, slamming the door behind her. Nymph crumpled down on the ground and tried to get to sleep. Before falling asleep, she whispered one last sentence. “I miss you sis.”

She could almost swear she heard a reply as her consciousness faded into her dreams.

Welcome Party

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Something tried to nudge Cicada to wake her up. “Give me a few more minutes Nymph.”

There was another nudge, and this time Cicada felt claws scratch her as well. She tried to brush the point where she was scratched with her hoof. “You know I like to sleep in Lila.”

“Wake up! Twilight wants to talk with you!”

Cicada was instantly up. It took her a few seconds to remember where she was. Spike had tried to wake her up, not her sister or Lila. After a second more, she remembered which Twilight they were talking about. As she got up, Spike asked if there was anything she could think of that she might like for breakfast.

“Normally I’ll just have a piece of toast or something. Sometimes I can even get butter on it! There was even that one time someling managed to get a few jars of jam. Best breakfast ever. But yeah, toast would be fine.”

“What kind of jam do you want?”

Cicada stopped working on folding up the blanket she had used. “Wait?! You actually have jam?! You’re kidding!”

“No, I’m not. We’ve mostly got apple since Applejack’s family makes that. I think we might even have a little bit of zap apple jam left.”

“Do you have any raspberry? That’s the kind I once had.”

“I think so, but it might be blackberry. If it is, do you want to try?”

“Yes please!”

Spike left Cicada to finish folding the blanket. She left Spike’s room to find her own and opened the door to be greeted with a blue blur flying into her. The changeling found herself on the ground with Lila on top of her squawking at her owner.

“Alright! I’m sorry I left you last night. I was just having trouble sleeping so I went somewhere else. I wrote on my note to you that I didn’t want to wake you up since you had already fallen asleep.”

Lila still seemed angry at her, so Cicada tried something else. “Hey, I hear they’ve not only got toast, but they’ve got jam too!”

That got the phoenix to lighten up. “Alright, let’s go down to where we’ll be eating.”

Before Cicada could reach where she would be eating, she was distracted by the sound of music coming from another room. The changeling changed her mind about going for breakfast and decided to find out where the music was coming from instead. She walked off in the direction of the music to eventually coming to a large door. Cicada pushed the door open, making the music get louder for her.

Before she could even get a good look inside, something exploded in Cicada’s face. Out of instinct, she fired a rapid succession of magic bolts followed by a small bubble shield around her. When she finally opened her eyes. In the room of the door she had just opened was what seemed to be the remains of a party.

“Surprise?” came a voice from one of the few ponies in the room.

Cicada looked around and saw Pinkie Pie with the cannon she had fired when Cicada had opened the door. “Ah! Oh, I’m sorry! I mean, I got scared when you fired the cannon. I thought I was being attacked! Is anyling hurt?”

“Nah, I think you mostly hit the decorations, though you did manage to hit Derpy’s tail.”

Cicada looked to see a grey pegasus with a blond mane and tail with her tail looking a bit charred. The only strange part is that a little bit of it had even caught fire, and it seemed like the mare hadn’t noticed anything had ever happened in the first place. Another mare, this one a unicorn and mainly blue, put her friend out with some water.

Cicada looked around some more and noticed how the party was made entirely of ponies. She started to get nervous and tried to back away from the room. Before she could get far, Pinkie got behind her and started to push her into the room. Despite trying to use her front hooves to push back, the changeling soon found herself standing in the middle of the room with everypony staring at her.

Cicada looked around, hoping to find something to get attention off of her when she spotted a figure in the corner of the room reading a book. As the other ponies in the room slowly went back to what they had been doing, she made her way over the figure and find out why they were being so reclusive.

As she neared them, Cicada could read the title of the book. ‘Daring Do and the Ring of Destiny’ On the cover were two pegasus mares, one looking like Ambassador Rainbow when she would be out looking for changelings, the other looking like a grey and gold version of her.

Cicada was about to Leave the reader alone when she saw their horn poking up above the cover of the book. Unlike most unicorns, this horn was curved and very pointed. Cicada, surprised by that, pulled the book away to reveal to very blue eyes looking at her.

“Y-you’re a changeling!”

The changeling nodded, then went back to his book.

“Wait! What’s your name? Why are you here? Why are you in your base form?”

The changeling didn’t respond and just kept reading his book. At this point Pinkie came over, nearly scaring Cicada to death.

“Sorry about that.” Pinkie apologised. “But this is Scout. After the invasion of changelings we had in Canterlot a while ago, he got knocked out while reading some Daring Do books when the changeling shield went up. He kind of went in a coma for a while, but Fluttershy took care of him. He came to the wedding we had in Ponyville recently. Some of the younger ponies were scared of him, and the older ponies still are nervous around him, but I’m hoping maybe you two can be friends!”

“I-I guess I can try. But it doesn’t seem like he wants to talk right now.” Cicada told Pinkie.

“Well that’s alright. Hey! Why don’t you try the pinata! Oh, or pin the tail on the pony! There’s also some of the pies I made for you!”

“You were able to make pie?” Cicada asked the pony.

“Yeah! I mean, I wasn’t sure exactly how to make rhubarb pie at first, but I figured it out and also got the pear pie you wanted.”

“How did you get all the ingredients?”

“We had them in the kitchen at Sugarcube Corner. ‘Cept the rhubarb, which I had to buy.”

Cicada walked over to the food table and took a slice of each pie. “I haven’t had pie since I was twelve.”

The queen took a bit of each before gobbling them both down. “They’re just as good as I remember!”

“That’s good! What do you want to do next?” Pinkie asked, hoping to help Cicada have fun.

“Uh, what are those ponies doing over there?” Cicada pointed to an area of the room where ponies were moving around while music was playing nearby.

“Oh, you want to go dance with them?”

“How do I dance? It looks fun.”

“You don’t know how to dance?!” Pinkie exclaimed, aghast at this statement. “Vinyl! Play track 47!”

Cicada saw a white unicorn mare with an electric blue mane and wearing glasses change the record they were listening to and put on a new one.

“Alright, just follow what the words of the song say and you can look at other ponies if you’re confused.” Pinkie explained to Cicada as she brought her over to the dance floor.

The music started up, and at first the changeling wasn’t sure why none of the ponies were moving. When the lyrics started up, she listened like Pinkie had told her. After a line or two that seemed to sort of introduce the song, the lyrics shifted to tell the dancers which way to move. Slowly but surely, the song got faster. There were times Cicada messed up, but she quickly got back in motion with the other ponies.

When the music ended, Cicada asked to do another one. When another one didn’t come up, she went looking for Pinkie. However, before she could, she saw another familiar face.

“Twilight! Look at this party! It’s so much fun!”

“That’s a Pinkie party for you.” She responded. “But we have to go! The train for Canterlot is leaving soon!

“Oh, do we have to leave now?” Cicada asked, wanting to stay a little bit longer.

“Yes. I tried to tell Pinkie last night that she should wait until after we went to Canterlot, but she insisted with this morning. I’ve already told her to head for the train since Celestia wrote back to me saying she wanted all of us when you came.”

“Alright… let me call Lila. Lila!”

The nightshade phoenix looked up from her small slice of pie before seeing Cicada. She took one last pear from the slice before flying over and landing on her owner’s back.

“Alright, now we can go!”

“Good, follow me to the train.”

Before she left the room, Cicada looked back toward Scout and called out a goodbye to him. As the room went out of view, she saw the changeling wave back in reply from behind his book.

Train Ride

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It had taken a relatively short time to get situated on the train. Twilight had used her royal status to get a car all to themselves. Once they were allowed to move around the car again after the train left the station, Cicada immediately got up to look around the car. Lila had already started to fly around as well, not really caring that they were supposed to be in some sort of seated position when the train started moving.

“Wow, you act like you’ve never been on a train before!” Pinkie said to Cicada.

“Yeah, that’s because I haven’t. We mostly use them for goods. Ponies use them more for self travel.”

“I’m glad you seem to be enjoying yourself.” Fluttershy told the Queen.

“It is kind of nice not to have to worry all the time about things like war for once. It gives me a chance to be the kid I never really got the chance to be. Instead of having to stay strong and make sure everyone knows what to do, I get to relax and have a bit of fun. Who knows, maybe this short bit of relaxation is all I really need and when I get home, I can finally defeat Empress Twilight.”

“And what will you do after that?” Rainbow asked.

Cicada stopped exploring the car to think of her answer. “I’m not fully sure. I mean, it would be bad for me to make all the ponies leave Equestria since it wasn’t really them who have been the cause of the war. More likely just put the ponies who were really at fault on trial.”

“But what then? What about all your changelings?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well you’ll be ruling again, so they’ll take the chance and start doing whatever ponies were doing to them.”

“I’ll make sure they try to treat each other more like equals. Anything less would be enough for me to come and try and fix.”

“Right… you would personally go to every place where a pony and changeling were arguing to fix whatever problem they had.”

Cicada’s wings buzzed a bit as she scrunched up her face in anger at the blue pegasus. “Well of course I couldn’t do that! It’s going to be tough enough as it is with how changelings have been treated by ponies for the past few year. We had tried to work on that before, but then something happened between my mom and Celestia. I at least have some good experience with ponies after they turned on us because of Selena.”

“Who’s that?” Fluttershy asked.

“Celestia’s younger sister.”

“Don’tcha mean Luna?”

“No… Did she keep that name here? Because she changed it in my Equestria after coming to help us.”

“Yeah! She’s still Princess Luna here. But I bet if everything works out you’ll still get to be friends here!” Pinkie Pie said to the queen.

“Yeah… hopefully that’s the case. I’d hate for me to get to see her and have her be too different for what I know. It would be heartbreaking.” Cicada took a few seconds to think before adding. “Wait… everything seems to be the reverse here. She’s not evil or anything, is she?”

“She used to be, but we helped fix her!” Pinkie responded as she bounced towards the door of the car. “I’m going to go get some food from the diner car. Anypony want to join me?”

“I’ll follow you darling. Not much else to do around here that I can think of.” Rarity answered.

“I think I’ll come too."

"Could one of you bring something back for Lila and I? Anything small like a few crackers would do."

Fluttershy was the one to turn back and nod her head in response, making Cicada smile. There was an awkward silence in the moments after the small group left the train car. Finally, Cicada spoke up.

"Would you stop glaring at me like I'm about to attack you?" she said, turning to Rainbow.

"No."

"And why's that?"

"Because I for one, don't really believe you."

"Rainbow!" Twilight exclaimed.

"Ya don't have to treat her like a villain before ya know her that much."

"Well she's a changeling isn't she?"

"I'm right here you know! And by your logic, I should have tried killing you when we first met. But guess what? I didn't! So why don't I get the same privileges?"

"Stop you two!" Twilight called out. "Seriously Rainbow, this is worse than when you and Applejack compete." She turned to the orange mare. "No offense."

"Don't worry 'bout it. Ah'd say that it called for it."

"Are you two seriously going to believe her?" Rainbow started.

Cicada thought she heard the pegasus continue her argument, but her mind drifted to envision how her sister might be doing. She pictured Nymph in the same room she had before. This time she seemed to look thinner than earlier during the party when the queen had zone out and imagined her then.

'She needs love, and fast! She'll starve within the day without it!' Cicada thought before she returned to the train. There she found Applejack waving her hoof in front of her.

"You okay there? Ya kinda zoned out for a minute there."

"Yeah sorry. Just remembering how bad a situation my sister is probably in right now. Are we almost to Canterlot yet?"

She got another angry glare from Rainbow Dash, most likely for dropping their previous conversation. Before Twilight could answer Cicada's question, Rarity, Pinkie and Fluttershy returned from the food car. Lila instantly swooped down from where she had been pretending to be asleep and grabbed one of the crackers Fluttershy brought back. It briefly startled the timid pegasus, but she quickly recovered and gave the rest of the crackers she brought back to Cicada.

"We should arrive in Canterlot in about an hour or so." Twilight finally answered. "Which reminds me, you might want to try and disguise yourself for when we're in Canterlot. Ponies there are less likely to be welcoming to changelings than the ones you met in Ponyville."

"I think I can do that, but it'd probably be easier if she left for a little bit." Cicada answered, nodding her head toward Rainbow Dash.

"You can't be serious!"

"Can you maybe just leave for a few minutes? Please?" Fluttershy asked her friend.

"Fine!" Rainbow sighed before zooming out of the room.

The changeling queen gave a small sigh of relief before concentrating.

'A horn would probably be best, so I can ditch the wings for now. I can just make my eyes look like normal pony ones, so no need to change their color. Maybe I can get my coat to be a nice cream color. And purple would be a nice color for a mane.'

Cicada let her magical fire surround her before she changed how she looked. Looking down at herself, she saw her disguise had worked for the most part.

'Alright, my coat is a bit darker that I hoped for. My mane didn't really change at all that I can tell. Wings?' She felt her back, but there was nothing there. She also felt her horn to make sure it was like a normal unicorn's horn, which it was. 'Good! As long as my eyes are fine, I think this is good enough.'

"How's this?" She asked the ponies in the car.

"What about your cutiemark?" Pinkie asked.

'Shoot! Forgot about that!' Cicada thought. Before making a burst of fireworks appear on her flank.

"How's that? You can call me Fireworks."

"How about Sparkleworks?" Pinkie suggested.

"No." Cicada deadpanned.

"Well, if that's all, I'm going to find Rainbow to tell her she can come back." Twilight started. "I might be a while because I'm going to see I can find Spike too."

"That's right!" Cicada exclaimed. "Where has he been?"

"Spike met up with Pony Joe on the train. He works in Canterlot and the two of them became buddies before we moved to Ponyville. Spike told me they were going to catch up and he'd find us later, but I think it's been long enough now."
With that, Twilight left. Within a few minutes, Rainbow Dash was back in the train car. She took a few seconds to look at Cicada’s disguise.

“Eh, doesn’t look that different.”

“I just need to look like a pony! Though I did want to have my mane be purple instead of deep sea green.”

“Might have been an improvement.”

“I don’t need any snarky comments.”

“It was not snarky.”

“Eh, might’ve been Dash.” Applejack commented.

“Whatever. I’m just glad we’re almost there.”

“And for once,” Cicada started. “I can agree with you.”

Nymph jumped in shock as the door slammed open.

“And how are you feeling today?” Twilight asked her. “Ready to open that portal I presume?”

“Of course not!” Nymph spat at her. “Wouldn’t if I could.”

“What do you mean by that.”

“I mean, even if I wanted to help you by casting the portal spell, I can’t. I barely have enough energy to move around.”

The empress frowned. “I thought you would survive longer than the other changelings with you being royal and all. I even made sure you got better food than the others that end up in these cells. Now here you are telling me you don’t have enough energy to move? I find that very unlikely.”

“I’ve had plenty to eat and drink, there’s just one thing your forgetting. I’m a changeling!” Nymph exclaimed, wincing a bit afterwards.

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“I’m still hungry. While we can eat and drink anything a normal pony could, that’s not how we survive. I’m starving because I don’t have enough love.”

“Love? You’re starving from not enough love? You’re kidding right?”

“No. Changeling feed on emotions. Love is the best source. In fact, all I get around here are negative emotions, which is actually starving me more than none at all. Emotions are wired into our systems so much, some of us are empaths. Listen… I think I’ve got until the end of the day unless you change something for the good. So unless you don’t want that portal, I suggest you fix that.”

Twilight thought for a minute. “Fine. Normally I wouldn’t trust anything your kind has to say, but seeing as I have seen almost every other changeling I’ve caught only last a few days at most, I’m trusting you this once.”

“Why not trust us all the time. I think I can still remember some of the times I saw you visit with Celest-”

“Don’t speak her name, changeling! Besides, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I think you do.”

“Enough! I will return later.”

“That’s fine by me.” Nymph said as Twilight slammed the door again behind her.

The changeling collapsed on the floor, exhausted from the act she had put up for Twilight, before she started to cry herself to sleep, hoping her sister was okay.

Hospital Followed by an Argument

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“Here we are!” Twilight announced as she helped Cicada off the train. “Now Celestia said she’d be in a meeting when we first got here, so we should probably go to the hospital here in Canterlot first.”

“Will I be able to see Luna as well during the meeting, or will she be unavailable?” The changeling queen asked.

“She said that one of the reasons she was holding it off for another meeting was so that Luna could also be present. It will still be the time she would be asleep, but she’ll at least have had some sleep rather than none at all.”

“That’s true.” Cicada replied. “So, where is this hospital anyway?”

“It’s not far from the old library I used to live at. It should only take, at most, twenty minutes to get there.”

“Good! Lead the way!”

“Oooo!” Pinkie exclaimed. “Let’s make it a race! Ready?! Set?! Go!”

Cicada watched as the pink pony zoomed off. She stared in the direction Pinkie had gone in before realizing that the group was going in another direction.

“Wait, does she even know where the hospital is?” Cicada asked.

“I have no clue.” Was all Twilight said.

When they did reach the hospital, they entered to find that Pinkie was already there, along with a basket of freshly baked cookies.

“How did she…?” Cicada started, pointing at the mare and slowly turning her head to look at Twilight.

“I have no idea. Just go with it. Anyway, Celestia helped with setting up an appointment for you here already. We’re looking for a pony by the name of Healing Touch.”

“Healing Touch?” One doctor asked. “I know him! He told me you would be coming.”

“Hello Cure!” Twilight greeted the Earth pony.”Girls, this is Tentative Cure. He was one of the doctors I usually went to when I was little before he started working here.”

“It’s nice to see you again. who knew that I was helping a future princess when you came for your checkups.”

“Please, Twilight’s fine. I’m still not used to being called a princess by the ponies I already know pretty well.”

“Alright Twilight. Anyway… Healing Touch wanted me to send you to room 27B. Take the stairs down the hall to your right. It will be on the second floor.”

“Thank you!” Cicada smiled at him. “It was nice to meet you.”

“Hope you feel better.” the stallion responded.

The group found the room rather quickly and entered the room to find a unicorn mare.

“Hi.” Twilight started. “Uh, sorry. Did we come to the wrong room?”

The mare faced the group entering the room. “Wha? Oh, not at all. You must be the group Healing Touch said he was meeting with. He had to step out for a second, but I’m helping, so I guess I’ll start checking up on you. Now who’s the patient?”

“Ooo! Ooo! She is!” Pinkie exclaimed, pointing to Cicada.

“Alright! Just hop up on the bed here and I’ll start looking at the damage.”

Cicada followed what the mare said and got on the bed. The doctor grabbed a clipboard that was attached to the door and approached the disguised queen.

“Okay, my name is Life Cross. It says here your name is Cicada, is that right?”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“Good. So it says that you were hit by a dark magic spell. You don’t know what the spell was, but it gave you a very bad burn-”

“That’s putting it lightly.”

“-and upon arriving in Ponyville, Princess Twilight helped you to the hospital there where your wounds were treated as best as could be. We were contacted by both the doctors in Ponyville and by means of Princess Celestia herself telling of your arrival and that Healing Touch was to be the main doctor for his main focus of healing rare spell injuries.”

“That… sounds about right. I didn’t personally know about the last part though.”

“That’s fine. May I examine the wound please?”

“Uh, yeah I guess.”

Life Cross started to look at the large burn area. She examined the worst parts of it before looking at some of the less damaged areas. As she looked at the outer area of the wound, she started to get a confused look on her face. Just as she took a breath in to speak, a stallion walked in.

“Ah Life Cross! Getting started I see. Sorry for taking so long. How’s our patient so far?”

Life gave a wary smile. “Good to see you too Healing. So far it’s been going well, but I’m having trouble here.”

“What with?” Healing Touch asked.

“The wound is an odd shape. Look here.” Life pointed to an area near the edge of the burn.

“What’s wrong?” Fluttershy asked the doctors.

“Well,” Healing started. “The wound seems to just disappear once it reaches certain points. There’s no gradual damage to normal area, it just ends.”

“Oh, that might be my fault.” Cicada admitted. “There was one thing you didn’t have on your clipboard there that might complicate things a bit.”

“How much is ‘a bit’?” Healing asked.

Cicada sighed before dropping her disguise. Healing’s mouth dropped open while Life Cross jumped back.

“A… a changeling! We’re supposed to help a changeling?!” Life exclaimed. “Do you know how many ponies ended up in here because of them?” She asked Twilight.

“Yes, but…”

“No, I’m not doing this. Those things have caused too much trouble for me. I don’t care how long ago it was, my brother still had nightmares about the things.”

“Life Cross!” Healing Touch said firmly. “I don’t like them anymore than you do, but we have to help her. As doctors, we have to help all patients that come in this hospital, regardless of who or what they are.”

“Can I say something?!” Cicada exclaimed. “I’m still not sure exactly what all happened during the changeling invasion here, and from what I’m hearing from you…” She pointed at Life. “It was worse than what I thought. But I agree with Healing Touch, unless a pony were trying to kill me like Twilight, Empress Twilight I mean,” She quickly corrected herself. “I would still try to help them if they were hurt.”

It didn’t take too long after Cicada’s statement before Twilight and her friends helped to straighten out all the details with the doctors to the point that Life Cross finally agreed to help. She and Healing Touch examined Cicada a bit more before they started to heal the wound. In the end, the two doctors were able to heal most of the wound, but the center was still too damaged for Cicada to cover it up when they were done.

“We did as best as we could in fixing the damage caused by the spell.” Healing started. “Unfortunately I didn’t recognise the spell that cause the damage in the first place. After more research, I might be able to ask you to come back so I can finish because from what I can tell, the damage the spell caused to you isn’t going to fully heal itself for a while.”

“Most of your wound would be bleeding if it weren’t for whatever spell it was being hot enough to cauterize any areas blood would come from.” Life added. “However, while I was working, one area did start to bleed enough that we needed to stitch it up. I don’t want to have to do it again, so don’t do anything that might make it come out.”

“Got it.” Cicada replied. “Thank you for your help.”

The doctors nodded, and the group left the hospital.

“We still have some time before Celestia asked us to come to the castle.” Twilight said to the group. “Anypony want to head somewhere for something to eat?”

“I think that restaurant we went to a little before the wedding was near here.” Pinkie said cheerily.

“Yes that does sound like a fine idea.” Rarity agreed. “I did like the iced tea I was served there.”

“Do you think that’s good?” Fluttershy asked Cicada.

“Yeah, I guess.”

It didn’t take long for them to find the restaurant. For the most part, the group only bought themselves drinks, but Cicada decided to order the ‘Endless Breadsticks’ off the menu. Spike had packed himself a decent sized gem to munch on and didn’t order much. Shortly after everyone got their orders, Twilight decided to make conversation with Cicada.

“So, what do you normally do where you’re from? Besides fighting ponies I mean.”

“For the most part I try to help get changelings out from the cities to our camps so they can get stronger and help. Slowly our numbers are increasing, but it doesn’t help we lose a few changeling as well. Other than that I’m normally helping out with our tactics for anything from small raids to larger battles.”

Twilight’s eyes glittered with excitement. “Really?! Is there anything you can tell me. It would be interesting to hear how you do that.”

“Alright I guess. Normally I start with figuring out which changeling I’ll have for the certain mission. One time, we were having a small raid on a food compact in the second sector. I had two of my more bulky changelings to help move the food as well as two quick changelings to take care of any guards nearby.”

“Why not do it the other way? Seems kind of pointless the way you do it.” Rainbow remarked.

Cicada glared at the pegasus. “Yes, it might seem like that, but we want to obtain as much food as possible. The stronger changelings I can rely on to make it back to our main base themselves with the food while the faster changelings wouldn’t be able to defend themselves at the same time they have to move the food. Instead, they can swiftly move to each guard and take them out so that the resources we need can be taken without any problems.”

The queen started to chew on one of the breadsticks after finishing her basic plan.

“So you’re basically just stealing from these ponies? Not to mention maybe killing them. And all just for some food?”

Cicada’s eye twitched. Once she swallowed her food, the changeling responded to Rainbow’s questions. “First of all, we wouldn’t have to steal any food if Empress Twilight hadn’t taken over Equestria in the first place. Maybe we have to kill a few ponies here and there, but changelings die every day from starvation, even in the third sector which is the main producer of food. We also usually look some healthy soldiers just by trying to get the supplies we need.”

Cicada’s wound suddenly stung. She gripped it as a headache formed. She thought she could hear Twilight saying something, but when she looked, everything was blurry. She could still make out the shapes of Rainbow Dash, as well as Rarity and Applejack who were on either side of the rainbow pegasus, but she could also make out the shapes of other ponies she couldn’t easily recognise.

Cicada felt a hoof touch her. She quickly slapped it away as she stood up. Slowly the pain went away and Cicada could see everything, but she still had a headache. It turned out she had slapped away Fluttershy’s hoof, and with enough force that the mare almost fell over. Rainbow had quickly gone to her friend’s side to catch her.

“Hey! Be careful!” she exclaimed.

“Don’t tell me to be careful! I’ve had enough of you!”

“What do you-?” Twilight started.

Cicada gave an exasperated laugh. “To think I actually thought you were different than where I’m from. But no, you’re still the pegasus I hate the most, so stay away from me.”

Somewhere in the city, a bell started to announce the top of the hour.

“Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a meeting to attend.”
With that, Cicada stormed off towards the castle.

“Spike, do you think you can make sure she gets there safely?” Twilight asked her assistant. “I think she needs to be with somepony she doesn’t have past experience from where she’s from.”

“You got it Twilight!” He exclaimed, giving a short salute before racing off after the changeling.

A Few More Meetings

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It didn’t take long for Cicada to reach the castle. She had taken a few wrong turns, but she was glad Spike had followed her and shown her the real way. Even though she had time to calm down after her argument with Rainbow Dash, Cicada just kept thinking about it.

'Why can't she just see I want to go home? Honestly, I bet she and Ambassador Rainbow would get along perfectly.'

The changeling kept storming toward the castle's throne room. Two guards outside were blocking the door. Cicada was in enough of a bad mood she didn't think much of it and just threw the doors open to let herself in.

Upon entering, Cicada found the two guards that were in the throne room directing their spears at her. She rolled her eyes and used her magic to throw them out of the room, where they collided with the two guards from outside before she shut the doors and used her magic to lock them.

"Who are you and why are you here?!" Princess Celestia boomed at Cicada.

"Queen Cicada. You asked me to come here for a meeting with you and your sister, did you not? I apologize for being late. I had some trouble finding this place."

The princess calmed down a bit. "Ah, you would be the changeling queen my former student told me about. I'm sorry for how my guard may have treated you on your way in, but in all due respect, we were expecting you to arrive as yourself and not a pony."

Cicada looked down at herself. Indeed, she was still disguised as Fireworks and not in her normal changeling form.

"Sorry about that." She said, dropping her disguise. "I was informed that the ponies of Canterlot were less accepting of changelings than those in Ponyville are. I created a pony disguise for when I was in public. I'm so used to never having a disguise on that I forgot I was in one."

"That's quite alright. I can understand why you would have wanted to do that. If you would follow me, we'll be moving to the meeting room in the castle. We'll be meeting my sister there."

"Wonderful. I've been looking forward to meeting her."

It didn't take long for everypony to settle down again, but it did take one pony a bit longer to finally stop worrying.

"I wish to assure you all that that was the first time I have actually tried to activate the spell myself. I assure you all that when she is a bit closer to me than currently, It will work in a much better fashion."

One mare raise her hoof. "Yes Miss Shimmer?"

"Not to rain on your parade Empress." The unicorn addressed the ruler, "But last I heard, the changeling you held in captivity was unwilling to help."

"I finally convinced her otherwise. She says she will eventually. And you know the royals in particular do not go back on their word easily."

Another unicorn mare spoke up. "From what I've seen so far from the changelings we've captured so far, none of them have made it past three days. The latest reports I had heard made it sound like she wasn't going to last that long."

"For your information Lulamoon," Twilight started. "She actually told us how to fix that. Because of this, another changeling that has been quite useful to us so far has been moved to her quarters in the dungeon."

"Not to say you're wrong or anything, but you really think it's a good idea to have two of these beasts in the same room?" Ambassador Rainbow asked.

"I know that Twilight recruited extra guards for these two including my husband." A pink pegasus mare answered. "She's obviously got things handled."

"Yes, I assure you," Twilight confirmed. "As long as my brother is there to help guard the two changelings, I feel there is no reason for us to worry about them causing any problems."

"Why don't we just execute the one changeling?" A white unicorn stallion asked. "With their main leader stuck in another dimension with no way of getting back and their only backup currently in our dungeon, getting rid of this one would force the changelings to surrender."

The empress looked at the stallion. "You make a good point there Fancy Pants. Still, I told you all that at random moments I've been able to see what this supposed queen can see. She ended up in an Equestria with different versions of all of us. I believe from what little I've seen that she has been successful, for the most part, on getting these ponies to side with her. To make matters worse, there is a good chance there is still Celestia and Luna in that Equestria. I had some trouble beating her yesterday with the magic strength of her power combined with what she received from Luna. If Cicada finds a way back and brings help back, there is no chance for us to win."
“And what are we supposed to do while we wait?” Trixie asked.

“Well, I want Fluttershy and Applejack to go ask the changeling some more questions.” She turned to face them. “I want you two to question him more once we’re done here. He may know if the other changelings had any plans for if they lost both their leaders at least temporarily.”
The two mare nodded before the alicorn went on. “Now, if no pony has anything to add…” She paused and looked around. “Alright, this meeting is over. Go back to your regular schedule and I will summon you all again if we find something out.”

Cicada followed Celestia to the meeting room. As they got closer, Cicada had trouble keeping stone faced at the idea of getting to see Selena again, thought it would be different with her going by her old name. Selena had been like family to her and Nymph after their mom had been killed.

When they reached the doors to the room, Celestia let Cicada open them herself. Upon opening the doors, the changeling quickly entered the room. She wasn’t surprised to only see one pony in the room, what put her off was that she didn’t know who it was.

“I thought you said I would be meeting with you and your sister Luna.” Cicada said to Celestia.

“Yes I did. Don’t you see her sitting there?”

Cicada looked back at the mare in the room. The mare was also an alicorn, but she had a dark blue coat. The spotted part of the mare’s coat on her flank was black though the cutie mark was a moon. Instead of the white crown Selena always wore, this mare wore a smaller black one, as well as being smaller herself. The mare’s mane, while similar to Selena’s, seemed more solid than the ethereal mane she had sported.

“That mare seated there is not Luna. The Luna from my world looked nothing like that, and except for the slight change in mane style that this world’s Pinkamena has, every pony has looked exactly like their counterpart.”

The mare got up from her seat to greet Cicada, being far away enough that she had not heard the debate on who she was.

“Hello there, you must be Queen Cicada that Twilight informed us about.”

“Yes I am, and who would you be?” Cicada asked the supposed Luna.

“I am Princess Luna. I’m sorry, it had not occurred to me you might not know who I am. Twilight’s letter suggested you would recognise us.”

“Twilight was indeed suggesting that in her letter.” Cicada agreed. “The problem is, I have never known a mare that looks like you ever in my life.”

The two alicorns looked at each other, confused by Cicada’s reaction, especially when she started crying.

“Selena was part of my family. She was the closest thing we had to a mom after ours died. She loved to take care of Nymph and helped me when I didn’t know what to do ruling Equestria. I was so excited to finally get to see her again, and instead I’m told that a mare I’ve never met before is supposed to be the one I grew up with?!”

Before either of the princesses could respond, Cicada ran away towards the castle vault. When the sisters thought it had been long enough, they went off to find the changeling, hoping that she had calmed down. The two of them finally found her in the hall filled with stained glass windows. Cicada was still crying a little bit, crumpled down in front of one of the windows.

When the two alicorns neared her, Cicada noticed them walking over and wiped some of the tears off her face. “I-I’m sorry, I guess I should have realised there was something off when Luna was still with you.”

“What do you mean by that?” Celestia asked the queen.

“Since anyone bad from my world is good here, and vice versa, that meant Selena was the bad version of your Luna.” Cicada looked back towards the glass. “What did she go by here?” she asked Luna. “I mean, if not Luna or Selena, what did you call yourself when you were…”

“Nightmare Moon. I chose that because it’s what I heard some ponies call me when they thought neither my sister or I was able to hear them. I ended up deciding if that’s what they wanted to see me as, that’s who I would become.”

The group of royals looked around somewhat awkwardly, none of them sure what to do next. Finally, Celestia broke the silence by asking Cicada, “Should we return to the meeting room and finally have the meeting we were supposed to.”

“Yes, that would be nice. Sorry for the outburst earlier.”

“It’s fine. You’re still coming to terms with this place. It will take time.”

With the royals seated once more in the meeting room, they were finally able to begin their discussion.

“So, where would you like me to begin?” Cicada asked.

“I am very interested in your Nightshade Phoenix, Queen Cicada.” Luna started. “You do realize that their eggs only hatch underneath a moonbow, correct?”

“Yes, my mother told me. Lila was actually hers.”

Curious, the alicorn asked, “Oh? Do tell me how she came across this magnificent being.”

“Oh, I'm sorry, I don't know. I never got to learn how she found Lila's egg, or even if she found Lila as an egg.”

“I see…” Luna paused to think of a new question. “Then, can you tell me about your mother? She seemed to be a wonderful changeling if she was able to raise a daughter like you.”

Nervously, Cicada responded. “Oh um… my mother was indeed a good leader. She helped to make sure we had enough love so that we wouldn't starve. At first she tried to work on relationships with ponies via your counterpart Celestia.” She gestured toward the older sister.

“Then what happened?”Luna asked.

“Well, I'm not fully sure what happened. All I know is that one day, Celestia came for a short visit to tell that the meetings between them were done, and I didn't see her again until I became queen myself.”

“If you were to become queen yourself, then that must have meant that your mother was... disposed of.”

Cicada pursed her lips slightly “Yes... it was actually my world's Twilight that did it. I hadn't seen her since the last time Celestia had come to visit before her final visit. She had been rather nice to me before, and we were becoming friends... I don't know what happened.”

At this point, Celestia decided to join the conversation.

“So my sister mothered your family after the passing of your mother? If the ponies of your world are evil, then why would my sister assist in your cause?”

“I figure it has something to do with how in this world, Luna became Nightmare Moon. I feel that it may have been that Selena was actually genuine in her feelings towards the ponies, because she decided to start living with changelings before the other you stopped visiting. 9:49

“My change as Nightmare Moon… That brings back some painful memories.” Luna said.

“I'm sorry, I didn't mean to…” the changeling started.

“No, it's alright. I was reverted back into this form you see now due to the influence of the Elements of Harmony, Queen Cicada.”

“Wait… Elements of Harmony?”

“Yes, the that’s what I said.”

“Forgive me, I don't know what those are.”

“They are six magical artifacts that are capable of impressive magical feats.” Celestia answered. “They represent the core elements of friendship; Honesty, Generosity, Kindness, Laughter, Loyalty and Magic.”

Princess Luna continued her sister’s words. “Before they were returned to the Tree of Harmony, they were wielded by Twilight Sparkle and her friends.”

“Wait... are you referring to the six gems of accord?” Cicada asked.

“The six gems of accord?”asked Celestia. “What are those?”

“Nearby the castle I one ruled at before it was taken over by Empress Twilight, there is a jeweled tree. Implanted in the tree are six gems, which legend states that they are one of the few things that show rightful punishment to the powerful and evil.”

“That almost sounds like the Elements of Harmony. Tell me, did your world's version of Twilight and her friends take possession of these gems?”

“Not that I know of.” Cicada answered. “When the threat of ponies first became known after my mother's death, we made sure to seal the area in hopes that if something were to happen, only a changeling could find them. That may have changed now that Twilight rules the castle”

“If she does have possession of them, then this is worrying news.” Celestia said. With these gems, how powerful would you estimate her to be?”

“So far, they have not been used in our world. At least not that I know of. You would most likely have a better judgement at that than I would.”

“I trust that she does not have possession of those gems.” Luna spoke up. “If she did, then your world's version of me would have been supporting your enemy. Is that correct?”

“Again, I am unsure.” the queen replied. “Even though Twilight has been around changelings before, I don't believe she knows much about us. The main things we know about the Gems of Accord are from legends, and even we barely know how they work.”

“Regardless, there are a few pieces of information brought into light. The Gems of Accord are your world's version of the Elements of Harmony, and the Elements of Harmony allowed me to live my life once more. Therefore, the Gems of Accord should be able to have a similar effect on your world's version of me.”

The lunar princess paused for a second before she asked, “Remind me again about the condition of your world's version of me.”

“A-are you really sure about that…” Cicada asked.

“Positive. If it is important information, then I demand that you tell me everything you know about her.”

“Currently she is... de-deceased…”

Princess Luna paled “D-d-deceased? But how? She should not succumb easily to death!”

“She and Celestia battled when her sister tried to take the rule of Equestria about a year after I had claimed the throne.” Cicada explained. “The battle lasted for almost a day. In the end, Celestia won. Selena, hopeful she would recover asked me to get her to a place to recover. Before I could, she asked me to take her magic so that the balance of night and day could still exist. I was foolish enough to do it close enough to her sister that she was killed after she gave me her magic.”

“Wait, does that mean that I was trying to take the throne and not Twilight?” Celestia asked.

“Originally... yes. But then she seemed to betray you much like... as it seems... Luna did when she became Nightmare Moon. For a short time, I felt pity for her. Now it is Twilight and I who have the powers to wield the sun and moon, and I do not know exactly how. Because of this, the sun and moon are stuck on opposite horizons, giving just enough light to live by.”

“So your world's version of my sister killed your world's version of me. So now, you have the power of night and Empress Twilight has the power of the sun.” Luna asked, making sure she had heard correctly.

“Yes. In fact, after she gained her Celestia's magic and finished her off with use of dark magic, then she was able to become an alicorn herself. I didn't know that was even possible!”

“Now we get to the biggest question; why are you even in our world? Do the changelings of your world need you to find a way to learn how to keep the balance of night and day?” Celestia asked.

“No! I don't know how I even got here. The portal I created was supposed to take us back to our base. Instead, Lila and I ended up here. We want to go back and hopefully sooner rather than later. If I stay too long, the empress with see it as a chance to take down my forces and secure her reign over Equestria.”

“This is indeed troublesome.” Luna spoke. “My sister and I will lend our assistance to you in helping you return back to your world.”

“Thank you. Is there anything else you wish to know?”

“Nothing else. We have all of the information we need to know.”

“Thank you…”Cicada said. “Though there is one thing I would like to ask you two…”

“You can ask us for anything. Especially If It might be able to return you to your home.”

The queen gave a slight pause before saying, “Seeing just how much our history seems to differ, I want to see if i can track down the point in time where our two timelines first separate. Since you two seem to be the wisest of the ponies here, and seeing as this is the capital, I was wondering if I may be able to have a place to live in Canterlot. Hopefully someplace that I won't be easily disturbed.”

“That can be arranged.” Celestia told Cicada. “There is an empty house nearby the library Twilight lived in back when she still lived here in Canterlot. I believe she told me she let an old friend of hers have the library there, so you may want to contact her if you need help finding resources.”

“Thank you, I’ll be sure to do that. And if that’s all, I think I will go to find this place.”

“It was nice to meet you Queen Cicada.” Celestia said, holding out her hoof.

“Please, If we need to meet again, just call me Cicada.”

“I hope everything goes well for you.” Luna told her, giving a slight nod as her goodbye.

“I hope so too. Thank you for all of your help.” and giving a nod in return, Cicada left the room, off to find the vacant home.

A new house and a crazy neighbor

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Shortly after leaving the meeting room, Cicada met back up with Spike.

“Cicada! How did your meeting with the princesses go?”

“It went great! In fact I’m going to be getting a place to stay in Canterlot until I can figure out how to go back home. But first I think I need to find the girls again.”

“Oh, yeah! They arrived here a little bit ago. They decided to wait in the garden while you were in your meeting.”

“Good. I hope Twilight can help me find the house I’m going to be staying in. Celestia told me it was near where she lived before moving to Ponyville.”

“Maybe I could help too.” Spike told her. “I would know too since I lived with her.”

“That would be great!” Cicada exclaimed. “Come on. Let’s find them so I we can go and find it.”

It didn’t take long to meet back up with Twilight and her friends. After explaining to them what had gone on in the meeting, the queen went off with the group to find her temporary home. Twilight was able to get her most of the way to where she was going to live, but Spike actually stopped taking a wrong turn at one point.

“So this is where you’re going to be staying.” Twilight said, as much to herself as to Cicada.

“It looks like a nice place.” Fluttershy commented. “There’s even a small area for a window garden.” She added, pointing to a planter just outside one window on the second floor.

“It seems like it’s a little bigger than what I need.” Cicada commented. “What do you think Lila? Lila?”
Cicada looked around and realised her phoenix wasn’t with her.

“Do you guys know where she went after I left for my meeting with the princesses?”

“Ooo!” Pinkie exclaimed. “I saw her fly off after you and Spike, but she may have gotten lost after that.”

“Oh no! What if she can’t find me again?!” Cicada panicked. “She could be lost in this Equestria forever! She might never be able to get back home with me! Nymph will be devastated!”

“So? It’s just a bird.” Rainbow commented before quickly slapping a hoof over her mouth.
Cicada glared at her before Applejack got her attention.

“We tried tah get this one tah stop speaking badly about you, but apparently she’s still havin’ a bit of trouble.”

“Don’t worry. It doesn’t matter. Besides she actually makes this place feel more like home. And Lila is not just a bird.” the queen retorted to Rainbow Dash. “She used to be my mom’s and she told me that as long as Lila’s by my side, nothing too serious can happen to me. And yes, I do believe that.” She finished before the pegasus could say anything back.

“I think if she needs to, she’ll be able to find you again.” Fluttershy said, trying to comfort Cicada.

The changeling frowned. “I guess, but we keep seeming to get separated and I don’t like it.”

“Well, why don’t you stop thinking about that and go inside.” Pinkie suggested. “Don’t you want it to look nice inside once you do find her?”

Cicada agreed and headed toward the door. It was just a little too small and her horn hit the top of the frame. She bent her head down an inch or two and entered into the main room. From what Cicada could tell, the room seemed like some sort of recreation room or gathering room. Connected to it was a room that was slightly smaller. The chandelier type lights in there suggested a dining room. The fact was proven more after seeing that it was next to a kitchen and pantry room.

After taking a quick look at all the rooms on the ground floor again, the queen went up the stairs to look at the rooms there. On that floor there were rooms for three bedrooms, a bathroom, and even an extra room for an office.

Cicada came back downstairs where the girls were looking around. “I was right that it seemed big. There are three bedrooms upstairs.”

“Does that mean we can have a sleep over?” Pinkie asked. “Ooo! Or maybe if you figure out how to get back to your home and also how to come back here again, you and your sister can live in here together!”

“First I want to focus on actually getting furniture in this house.” Cicada pointed out.

“Well, If you wish, you could come with each of us to find what you need for your temporary home.” Rarity suggested.

“I guess that can work. Who should I go with first?”

“Ooo! Ooo! Pick me! PICK ME!” Pinkie yelled out.

“Okay fine let’s go.” The changeling agreed.

“I call finding all of the kitchen stuff!” The pink mare said before dragging Cicada away to go shopping.

“So ah guess we just wait ‘til the two of them come back?” Applejack asked to nopony in particular.

“I guess so.” Fluttershy answered.

It didn’t take long for Pinkie to find a store that sold kitchen appliances. Inside were enough stoves and refrigerators to fit hundreds of styles of houses. For each style, there was also a matching set of other appliances.

“So, what kind of kitchen do you want? Do you want something with lots of hearts? Or how about one that looks like it’s made of clouds? Or what about one that is made with clouds! You can touch clouds, right?”

Cicada had barely known this Pinkie for a day and already she was getting annoyed by her.

“Look, I don’t need anything too fancy. I’m only going to be staying in that house until I figure out a way back home. And I’m not sure if I’ll ever find a way back. I don’t want to get anything fancy if I’m barely going to use it.”

“Oh come on!” Pinkie whined. “You still should have something nice. Liiiike… we could get something in your favorite colors.”
Cicada thought for a second before answering. “Well, I guess we cou-”

“Great! So what colors do you like?” Blue? Pink? Chartreuse?” Pinkie asked, somehow dragging them to a stove for each color almost instantly.

“Well, I do like purple and green…”

With that Pinkie zoomed off into the store. In a few moments, she reappeared behind Cicada, scaring her.

“So they have plum and emerald, or lavender and spring green! Which do you want?”

When the queen recovered from her shock she asked Pinkie to repeat the question. Cicada eventually chose the second choice, which followed by her being dragged all over the store to look and all the various appliances that went along with the color choice Cicada made.

Eventually, the two of them finished up in the store, and left with a stove, refrigerator, blender, plates, silverware, pots, glasses, and even a set of kitchen knives.

“Maybe we should have gotten more than that.” Pinkie said as they left. “I mean, you need more stuff than that if you want to make a cake.”

“I think we were pushing it what we got that blender thing. I mean, I don’t think I really need something like that.”

“Oh don’t be silly!” Pinkie replied. “Once you’ve had a smoothie you be glad we got it. Now come on! We need to get everything back to your house so then you can go out with everypony else!”

After getting back with Pinkie, Cicada started to furnish the kitchen before she was dragged out by Applejack to get furniture for the dining room, followed by Rarity for the bedrooms, Fluttershy for the office, and even with Rainbowdash for the family room after being persuaded.

“Alright! I think this will work for your home!” Twilight said as the last items were put in their places. “Anything else that’s left to do?”

“Well, Celestia told me that the library you used to live in was nearby and I might be able to use it. Though she did also say a friend of yours was staying there now.”

“Oh! That would be Moon Dancer. I gave it to her as an apology for not being the best of friends back when I lived there. Just remember you might want to get your disguise on before we get there, she might possibly panic if she suddenly sees a changeling.”

Cicada nodded her head, but before she could disguise herself as Fireworks, she was startled by a voice she didn’t recognise.

“Oh, how sweet! Have you decided to help reform another villain? Let me guess, next you’re going to bring the old stair lover back to make him nice too.”

Cicada whipped her head around to see one of the oddest creatures she’d ever witnessed before. I looked like someone had jumbled together at least ten animals together to make just one.

Twilight sighed. “Hello Discord. Mind telling us why you came to find us?”

“Oh I heard sunbutt herself say that you girls were helping a changeling queen and I wanted to see if you were trying to reform Chryssi. I also found this little guy flying around and wondered if any of you knew who it was.”

Discord pulled a very large bird cage from out of his ear. Inside was Lila, who upon seeing Cicada, tried desperately to get out. Almost immediately after that, the changeling charged a spell to blast at Discord.

“Now, something tells me you still need to work on her friendship skills.” Discord said as he wet his claws and put out Cicada’s horn like it was a small candle flame.

“Can you just let Lila out of there!” The queen slightly growled.

That caught Discord’s attention. “Oh, so this bird is yours. Well, you should work on keeping track of her.”

Fluttershy walked up to the draconequus. “Discord, can you please just give Lila back to her? She’s only been here two days and she’s already had it rough.”

He rolled his eyes before saying “Oh fine.” to which he raised up the birdcage in his hands… and proceeded to crush it.

Cicada’s eyes almost bulged as she watched the cage crumple in front of her. As it was crushed into a ball, a few blue feathers flew from the remains. To make it even worse, Discord threw it in the air, and when it came back down, he was dressed as a baseball player and hit the metal ball over the buildings with a foot long.

The queen felt like she was about to tackle Discord before he reached into her mane and brought out Lila unscathed. “Oh my Faust! I thought he killed you! You don’t know how worried I was! I mean, I know phoenixes can regenerate from their ashes, but after something like that, I wasn’t sure.”

“What? No applause for my performance?”

“You scared me half to death!” Cicada yelled at him. “Who exactly are you anyway?”

This time, Twilight was shocked. “Wait, you don’t know Discord? Or even someone like him?”

“No, I don’t. If I did, I probably wouldn’t have freaked out there.”

“Well why would you have gone and asked her a question like that?” Discord asked the alicorn. “Since I mistook her as Chryssi, why would you think we already knew each other?

“That’s because Cicada’s from another version of Equestria! One where changelings are good and ponies are bad.” Pinkie explained. “If she doesn’t know you, there might not be a you where she’s from. Wouldn’t that be sad?”

“I don’t think so.” Cicada answered, but it does mean that something different in my Equestria’s history must have made it so he doesn’t exist or something. Can we just get to meeting Moon Dancer so I can start to find out what?”

Discord started to float before making a couch out of pink clouds to lay down in. “Fine, I’ll go so you can do what you need to. Just know that I might come in to visit you.”

“Wonderful.” Cicada said sarcastically as he and his couch poofed away. “Remind me to find a way to keep him away from me.”

“Ah don’t think ya can.” Applejack told her. “Ya just have ta deal with him when he does decide ta show up.”

“Great… Let’s just go.” Cicada finished, before following Twilight and Spike again toward Moon Dancer’s.

New Friend, New Enemy

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Cicada looked at the tower like building. It was far enough away from other buildings and the main portion of town to look like it was out in the open, but just looking behind her reminded the Queen she was still in the capital. “So, you’re friend lives here?”

“Yes,” Twilight answered. “She used to live in a small, run down house further in the middle of Canterlot, but I gave it to her not too long ago. Last time I came to visit her here, she still had one last box to unpack. But then again, that may have been because she got distracted by all the books here.”

When the group entered, Cicada awed at how big it was inside. There were more books than she had seen when she first appeared in Twilight’s castle. Though, that wasn’t saying much since she had only gotten to see them that once, and wasn’t paying much attention to the number of books then.

Twilight called out for Moon Dancer, hoping they didn’t come when she was out and she just left the door unlocked, but the alicorn got a reply back and soon a tan unicorn with a red and purple mane wearing glasses came from elsewhere in the library.

“Hi Twilight. Came in for another visit?”

“Well, that’s one of the reasons. This is Fireworks” Twilight said, gesturing to Cicada. “She recently moved nearby and she’s going to be working on a project. She’s hoping she might be able to come in here now and again to find books to help with her research.”

Moon Dancer shifted her glasses to get a better look at ‘Fireworks’ “Well hello there. I’m sure Twilight has told you my name.”

“Yes, she has. And she’s said it multiple times just talking about you. You sound like a nice pony.”

“Thanks. I’m fine if you want to use the books here. I mean, Twilight gave them to me in the first place, so if she suggested you use the books here, it makes sense I let you. The only condition I have is that you tell me what it is you’re researching.

Cicada internally panicked. How was she going to tell Moon Dancer without revealing she was a changeling. “Well, you see… I um, accidentally mixed two spells, and apparently they made a new spell which for a brief time created a portal to another dimension. I uh, want to figure out if there was a way the version of Equestria I saw there could have been us.”

“Really? A cross dimensional portal caused by a mix of two spells? Tell me, how did you manage that?”

“Well, um, I’ve been working on a portal spell that can let more than one pony through as a way to improve a teleport spell, but another spell hit the portal I had been testing and made it see into the other Equestria.”

“May I see your portal spell?” Moon Dancer asked.

Cicada pretended that it was hard for her to cast the spell so it would look like it wasn’t perfect yet, but she did show Moon Dancer her portals before quickly making them disappear. The unicorn thought a few seconds before going to some of the bookshelves and soon pulled out a book.

“Here. You might want to start with this book. It’s just really old myths, but as some ponies have learned, some of the supposed myths are real.”

“Thank you Moon Dancer.” Cicada said, taking the book. “I can’t wait to see you again.”

As the queen started to leave, Pinkie ran up to Moon Dancer and hoofed over a letter.

“It’s an invitation to the birthday party I’m making for you.” She said, smiling.

Moon Dancer looked confused. “It’s not for months from now. Why are you giving me this now?”

“Well, we don’t normally come to Canterlot without something special going on so I wasn’t sure if I would get much of a chance to give it to you. By they way, there are a bunch more so you can send them when you want. I even already put their names down, but added some blank cards for anypony else you want to invite.”

“Uh, thanks I guess.”

“You’re welcome! And that reminds me… hey when’s your birthday Fireworks?”
Cicada turned back to look at Pinkie. The pony’s gaze just told Cicada to run, so she did.

“WHAT DO YOU MEAN TOMORROW?” Twilight yelled. “You said tonight!”

“Yes, I did say that, but things have changed. The changeling you had with me was treated badly enough that I had to give him some of the love I had for him to survive. It was either I delayed the time until you could go find my sister, or you would never get there.”

Empress Twilight’s eye twitched before she started to give a crazy smile. “Fine, but remember, just because I don’t want to hurt you, doesn’t mean I can hurt others.”

Nymph looked with concern as the empress briefly left the room and came in with another changeling. Upon seeing the changeling, Nymph’s eyes widened. “Locust! I thought you were at the base!”

“He actually came and tried attacking the castle by himself today after neither you or your sister came back. He was especially concerned about you.” The alicorn explained with an evil smile.

Her eyes flashed a yellow color as he shot a blast of magic at the changeling. The spell ripped through him and his eyes went blank. Blood was splurting out from the hole that was left in him body. Nymph cried out once she registered what had just happened, but it was too late. Locust was dead, killed by the evil empress.

“You’re a monster!” She cried. “Not even my grandmother would have done something as cruel as that!”

“I do what I need to to get on top. You stupid bug race don’t matter to me. I’m better than any of you, and my ponies should be the ones in command!”

Twilight’s eyes flashed again. “I want the portal no later than tomorrow night.”

“You’ll get it the morning day after tomorrow after what just happened. I can’t do it any sooner than that and by your own fault.”

“Fine, but that will be your last chance.” Twilight told her before leaving the room with Locust’s body, not bothering to clean up the mess she had left. The changeling she had staying with Nymph was let back in to find the large pool of blood and a crying changeling princess. At first the changeling thought she was hurt, but after learning what happened became slightly less concerned.

“That was the last straw for the Empress.” Nymph told her cellmate. “When she leaves, we take Equestria and get rid of the ponies.”

Researching

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The second Cicada closed the door behind her, she dropped her disguise. Twilight and the others had gone back to catch a train to Ponyville. It was strange. She had known them for only a day and already they were friends. She was starting to feel sad that eventually she would have to go back to her own home and only have her world’s version of them.

“Lila! I’m home!” The changeling called out.

It didn’t take too long before the bird flew down from upstairs. She quickly perched herself on Cicada’s back, being careful not to dig her claws into her owner.

“I got this book to start looking at. Apparently it’s got some of the oldest legends from this Equestria. Maybe some of the legends here and the ones from home.”

The queen started up the stairs to the office. She set the book down before pulling up a chair. Next, she grabbed a few scrolls to take notes on as well as an ink bottle. “Lila? If you don’t mind, could I..?”

She didn’t have to finish as Lila plucked out one of her navy feathers. Cicada clipped the end of the feather and put a quill tip on it. She dipped the quill in the ink and let it hover over the first scroll. She moved the book closer and they opened it.

Years and years ago, to long for anypony to count, Equus appeared from almost nothing. Only the being known as Faust existed, and she is what created the universe. For the beginning of the planet’s life, Faust lived by herself, caring for all the plants and animals. Eventually, she became lonely, and decided to make two children for herself. The first one she named Lucia. The second she named Umbris.

Cicada looked at the pictures that were given for each of the names in the book. There was a Faust in her Equestria, but here, she was pictured as an Alicorn, not a changeling.

“Does that mean that’s the whole reason our worlds are different?” Cicada said making a note on her scroll.

Then she looked at the pictures for Lucia and Umbris. Lucia looked like she was parts griffon, pony, breezie and maybe buffalo. She also, wasn’t fully sure, but the picture also suggested maybe she was part sphynx.

The picture of Umbris looked like a changeling and minotaur centaur with thestral wings, a dragon’s tail and the arms of a diamond dog. There was also a gem in his chest, but she wasn’t sure where that was from. The more Cicada looked at his picture, the more she felt she had seen it before. Like in her dreams or something like that.

Turning her attention back to the words, the queen began to read again.

The three of them lived on Equus with just them for a longer time than Faust had been by herself, but eventually, they felt lonely again, and a the two siblings started to grow apart trying to decided who their mother liked best. Eventually, Lucia decided to make her own children and created a small group of sentients which were the first alicorns.
Umbris became angry because she had been able to give them parts of the powers he only had. She told her brother it wouldn’t matter since she made so few. In response, her brother created his own race which became changelings. He too gave them some of his sister’s powers but while he made many, Umbris made sure they were not as powerful.
Eventually, the two created race after race, populating the planet. In the end Lucia had made one last race much like the alicorn but only with one of its powers in each of the three types creating ponies.
Trying to make his own race like the ponies, Umbris created the thestrals to live with the ponies. In the end, his changelings were still his favorite.
Faust looked at how her two children had populated Equus with their creations, but she favored Lucia’s more. Umbris grew angry that his mother had chosen his sister who had taken his powers for her own race and tried to battle his own sister for control of Equus.
In the end, Lucia won and she gave her ponies rule over a large land mass which would someday become Equestria. Changeling eventually became the enemies of ponies and were sent to a place where hopefully they would never be seen again.

Cicada wrote down a few more notes from the story. “Lucia and Umbris… Lucia and Umbris… The more I hear their names, the more they sound familiar. Can you think of anything Lila?”

The nightshade phoenix shook her head. “I just can’t think of where I’ve heard it.”

Cicada yawned. “It’s been a long day. I know it’s early, but maybe I should head in for the night. Who knows, maybe sleeping will get me to think of it.

The changeling went over to the room she had picked as her own. She got in her bed, and Lila landed on the perch she had gotten for her pet while out shopping for furniture. After the two were settled, Cicada turned out the light, and tried to get to sleep. It didn’t take long for her to drift off and start to dream.

In her dream, Cicada saw a figure. She couldn’t fully recognise it, but it made her feel like it was someone she knew, someone she had grown up with. Was it her mom?

‘I’m here. Right here. You know me. Was I wrong? Was she right? It’s better here. Maybe I should come and fix it. But do you need help? She is waking up. I don’t know if I can. Will you live long enough for me to help? Let me help. I can make it better. It will be worse if I can’t. They’re all in danger. Why won’t you listen? You have to save her.’

Cicada woke up, startled. She looked out side before looking at her clock. It was darker, and clock told her about an hour had past. Lila was fast asleep on her post.

“What was that?” She whispered to herself. “What’s going on?”

Then, her wound started to feel like it was burning, and she passed out again.

Thief in the Night

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Cicada woke up to a vision of pink.

“Oh yay! you woke up! Do you normally sleep on the ground? *gasp* What if we got you a bed for nothing!”

Cicada groaned. “Pinkie, what are you doing here? I thought you guys left to get back to ponyville.”

“Oh, we did, but then I remembered we didn’t have a housewarming party and I just had to come back. I wasn’t sure who to invite on such short notice, so it can be a small party with just us!” Lila gave a small squawk as she woke up from the noise. “Oh yeah, and Lila too!”

“Look Pinkie, I don’t really want a party right now. Do you even know what the time is?”

“Yep! It’s just past two in the morning. It says to on that clock.”

Cicada turned to see that Pinkie was right. “How are you so hyper? Have you even gone to sleep recently?”

“No, I haven’t gone back to sleep since I woke up yesterday morning. You being here just makes it too exciting to sleep. So, how about some pie? I remembered you like pear!”

“First, you only found out recently, so of course you remember. Second, I’m not hungry right now. I just woke up.”

“Oh, okay. Should I give any to the pony downstairs?”

That got Cicada to wake up fully. “What do you mean pony downstairs? Who’s with you?”

“No one. I came in the window. I heard them downstairs before I woke you up. I hope he slash she likes pear pie. If not, we can just put it in your new fridge.”

The changeling wasn’t really paying attention to Pinkie anymore. She disguised herself as Fireworks and went to the top of the stairs. Just like Pinkie had, Cicada could hear somepony moving around downstairs. She changed her disguise just enough so she was an alicorn and flew down the stairs.The second she reached the bottom, Cicada made the wings disappear.

Now that she was downstairs, the sound was louder. It sounded like it was coming from the dining room. The door was closed, so she peeked through the seam of the door. There was what at first looked like a pony inside the room, but then she noticed his bat like wings.

She locked the doors to the family room with her magic so he wouldn’t be able to escape that way. After taking a short breath, she went through her plan. First she would go back and get a glass of water. She would walk into the dining room pretending to be half asleep and sit down at the table. While levitating the glass, she would be able to disguise the fact she was locking the door behind her. Once the thief thought she wasn’t a problem, she would use her magic to trap him.

It was when she first turned the sink on that the movement in the next room stopped. Once she filled her glass halfway up, she started into the dining room. The second the door opened, the thestral’s head whipped to her. He had been trying to quietly make his way to the family room’s doors.

When Cicada sat down, she could barely see the thief staring at her nervously, not sure what she would do. When the glass was only about a fourth full, he started to relax. The thestral finished moving toward the family room doors. When he tried opening it, he found them locked. Surprised, he went to the kitchen door and found it also locked.

Cicada decided to change her plan of trapping him now and instead wanted to play with him a bit first.

“I locked them.” She said, making the thestral go stiff. “You know, If I hadn’t just moved in here today, I probably wouldn’t have caught you, but my friend upstairs heard you when she came in.”

The thestral didn’t say anything, but turned to look at her.

“Now, if I were a normal pony, I probably wouldn’t try something too bad, I still won't, but let me tell you I come from a place where the ponies I know are some of the worst. So then, let’s go put you in jail.”

Cicada had seen some sort of police station on the way to her house so she opened a small portal and took her and the thief through it. She used her magic to make sure the thestral didn’t escape and entered the building.

"Hey," Cicada said to one of the officers inside. "This guy was trying to steal some of my stuff. He broke into the house Celestia just gave me while I'm in Equestria. Can you please lock him up or something?"

The officer quickly took the thestral away and Cicada left, opening a portal to her room. She jumped when she saw another pony in her room, but quickly remembered it was Pinkie Pie.

"So, who was it?"

"Eh, some thief. I took him to the police. I should really see what he grabbed before I caught him." Cicada replied, holding up the thestral's loot bag.

Inside was some of the centerpieces she had liked when shopping with Applejack. Apparently they were good enough to steal, but at the bottom of the bag was a golden medallion. She wasn't sure exactly why, but looking at it gave her a bad feeling.

"Ooo! What's that? I don't remember seeing that before."

"That's because this isn't mine. I think it might be from wherever he came from before breaking into this place." Cicada replied.

"It could also be his. Why would he just take one thing from a place and leave?" Pinkie asked.

"Maybe you're right. Seems strange he would just take one item from someplace. Then again, it could have been that someone heard him and was able to escape."

Lila cawed again telling Cicada she wanted to go back to sleep. The queen asked Pinkie to leave, and the pink pony jumped out the way she came, leaving Cicada to close the window herself.

Getting in bed, she picked up the medallion and looked at it. She tried to figure out what the picture on it meant, but before she could, her eyes started to get heavy and she fell asleep.

Somewhere in the ethereal realm, a figure's eyes shot open. For a split second, she felt something happen on the mortal's realm.

"Have I really lost track of time? That wasn't supposed to happen for at least a Millennia. Let's see... Last time I felt something was when the tree was attacked. That was just recently too. So how on Equus..?"

The figure spread her wings and flew off to find the only one she knew needed to know right away. She had to find Faust.

A Strange Artifact

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This time, it was the light that woke Cicada up. It was pretty late in the morning, but it seemed reasonable to the queen after the night she had. Looking around, Cicada could see Lila was already awake and most likely downstairs.

After a few stretches, the changeling made her way to the bathroom. She washed up and brushed her teeth, though to her the toothpaste tasted weird. After her wings felt dry enough, Cicada started downstairs to the kitchen.

“Morning Lila! Sorry I woke up late.” Cicada apologised. “Need me to get you anything or… okay, never mind.”

Lila had already gotten herself some breakfast. She had found some granola and managed to put in in a bowl which she was eating out of.

“Well, after I finish breakfast, I’m going to go to Moon Dancer’s to see if I can find anything that will tell me what the medallion we got from that thestral means. If you want to, you can come as well.”

Cicada knew she didn’t really need to ask. Lila was going to come along anyway. The phoenix nodded her head before going back to her granola. Cicada went with her usual breakfast and just made some toast.

When the two of them finished up, Lila flew upstairs to get the medallion for Cicada. She came back down with it in her beak and perched herself on Cicada’s horn as she disguised herself as Fireworks.

It didn’t take too long for the two of them to reach the library. Apparently Moon Dancer was out at the time, but she had been kind enough to give Cicada a copy of the key to the place right before the queen left.

The pair started to look around the library for books that might help them figure out what the picture on the medallion meant if not the medallion itself. After about an hour of looking, neither Cicada nor Lila had had any luck.

“How are you supposed to find anything in this place?!” Cicada exclaimed. “Why would anyling put a book about plants next to one about gems? They literally have basically nothing to do with each other. They aren’t even in alphabetical order! This one starts with an M and this one starts with a G. And the G book comes second!”

Cicada threw the books against a nearby wall. The fell against the floor just as the front door opened. “Oh! Fireworks! I didn’t expect you’d come back here so soon!”

Cicada was happy to see the unicorn. “Please! Help me! We have been looking for the past hour for some sort of-”

“Wait, What do you mean ‘we’?” Moon Dancer interrupted.

“Me and my pet Lila.” Cicada said pointing to Lila. “But that’s besides the point, We’re trying to find a bo-”

“You have a pet phoenix?!” Moon Dancer exclaimed. “And not just any kind! It’s a nightshade phoenix! Do you know how rare these are?!”

Cicada was starting to get a little annoyed. “Yes! I realise that all! But can you please just help us find something that will tell us was this is?” She asked, holding out the medallion.

Moon Dancer shifted her glasses to get a better look at the medallion. After a few seconds, she asked Cicada, “Where did you get this?!”

“There was a thestral who broke into my house last night. I took him to the police station and grabbed his bag for myself. This was the only thing in it which wasn’t mine. Why? Is something wrong?”

Moon Dancer looked at Cicada like she was crazy. “This is the Golden Balance Medallion that disappeared for the Canterlot museum last year! Didn’t you know that?!”

“No, I didn’t. I only just came to Equestria about two days ago. What should I do?” Cicada asked almost nervously.

“Take it back to the police or somepony! Who knows, for finding it, you might get a reward!”

“But, I don’t really need anything for finding it. I’ve got basically everything I need. What would I do with it?”

“If you want to, you could just go and donate it so you won’t have to bother with the reward.”

“Alright, thanks! C’mon Lila, we should go do th- wait! I never found out what it actually is. And I mean besides the name.”

“Oh! Each of the symbols is supposed to represent a different race.” Moondancer pointed to the medallion. “The horseshoes is for ponies, while this feather is for griffons. There are also symbols for deer, buffalo, breezies, and seaponies.”

“Wait, what about that paw symbol?” Cicada asked, pointing to the symbol in question.”

“No one’s entirely sure. We think it might be a race no pony has found yet.”

“And where are all the other symbols? Like for minotaurs?”

“There’s supposed to be a second medallion that represents the others. The pony who discovered them found that this one is older than the second, so the races shown on the other one are probably races ponies found later on.”

“Huh, I guess that makes sense. Anyway, I’m going to go turn this in. See you later!”

It didn’t take Cicada and Lila too long to get to the police station again. When the two entered, the changeling could hear two of the officers talking.

“They sent in Officer Ride Along from Fillydelphia. I hear she aced the test to become an officer.”

“Yeah, But she’s the one who just wanted to be the siren.”

“Wait? That’s Ride Along?! Great, We’re doomed.”

Cicada eventually decided that she should speak up, and interrupted their conversation. “Excuse me?”

One of the officers looked up at Cicada. “Hey, Weren’t you the unicorn who came in last night?”

“Actually, it was very early this morning. Early enough it was still dark. Anyway, you remember why I came, right?”

“Yeah, you brought that thief in that broke into your house. Why? Did he destroy something in you house?”

Cicada shook her head. “No, I took the bag he put my stuff in after I brought him here. For the most part everything in the bag was mine, but in the bottom of the bag, I found this medallion.” The changeling finished by showing them the golden medallion.

The two officers were stunned. Both of them recognised the medallion. After about a minute of just staring at the artifact, one of them went over and picked up a phone and called somepony. As soon as the officer hung the phone up, there was a flash. Cicada covered her eyes and Lila shielded her face with her wing. When the two looked again, they saw Celestia standing in front of them.

“Who found it?” was the first thing Celestia said, not even looking at Cicada yet. When she finally did look at the changeling, she almost let the secret slip. “Ah, Que-”

“I did princess. I found it in a bag of some items that were almost stolen from me. My name is Fireworks.”

One of the officers looked at Cicada strangely before Celestia replied to the changeling realising what the pony had been thinking. “Ah, that’s right. You must forgive me. You came in early enough yesterday your name had slipped my mind.”

“Well you must normally meet with hundreds of ponies everyday, so I can understand. I know I still never learned the names of some of the ponies on the street of my old home.”

Celestia finally went out with Cicada so they could talk in a more private manner. Cicada gave her story on how she found the medallion one more time. “But I have to admit Celestia, it’s a little strange that I found it last night. I was reading something recently that seemed to go along with it.”

“Was it the story about Lucia and Umbras?” Celestia asked.

“Yes, how did you know?”

“It’s fake. They don’t exist. It was actually created after these two medallions were made. Unfortunately, since they were found after the story was made, there are ponies who still want to think it’s real.”

“But what about Faust? In the book she was an alicorn, but where I’m from, she’s a changeling.”

“And to the griffons here, she’s a griffon. And to the minotaurs she’s a minotaur. No one knows what she really looks like, so they all picture her as their own kind.”

Cicada pondered about it for a few seconds before replying. “Still, it can’t be just coincidence they all picture her the same for the most part. She always has blue eyes and a red mane. Or maybe a crest for the griffons.”

Celestia explained how there could be the possibility that she was real, but it could also be that those features were a favorite of the races when they made her over time. Cicada wasn't fully sure, but it almost seemed as if the alicorn wasn't telling her something.

"Celestia, tell me the truth. I can tell when someone isn't saying everything."

The process looked somewhat nervous. "I don't know what you mean."

"Listen, if my sister were here, I wouldn't need to ask, but seeing as it's just me, I'm asking."

Celestia sighed. "If you don't mind, it's not something I like to bring up. Last time it was mentioned, it was the original reason Luna became Nightmare Moon."

Cicada's eyes widened. "Fine, I don't need to know now, but if I ask again, I want to know."

Celestia agreed with Cicada, only asking that she at least wait a while. Cicada agreed to that as we'll and gave the medallion to the alicorn. The two short departed after they exchanged goodbyes, leaving Cicada and Lila to go home.

Researching History

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After her meeting with Celestia, Cicada couldn't stop thinking about what the princess had said. The queen just kept looking at the book, trying to figure out the secret Celestia was keeping. What exactly could it have been that helped cause the Luna here to become evil?

Instead of going straight home, Cicada had gone back to Moon Dancers to tell her what happened and to get a few books which could help her find out what Celestia was trying to hide. So far, she wasn’t finding much that she didn’t already know.

“Lila, do you have any ideas.” Cicada finally asked her phoenix. The bird replied by flying over and close the books she was looking at. “Fine I’ll take a break, but not for too long. In fact, I’ll work on what I was researching before!”

The changeling picked up a different book which was about confirmed history in Equestria. Flipping randomly, she found a chapter about the forming of Equestria. It talked about the three pony races and how they fought with each other, almost causing a wipeout of their race.

Cicada could remember a similar part of history where two royal changeling siblings would not agree on what exactly could be done to advance the kingdom. Slowly, all the other changelings took sides getting close to an all out war. In the end, the child of each royal changeling revealed there was a third answer to the whole problem. The cousins helped fix the kingdom and it became the area now known as Equestria. The original problem had been lost in time, but changeling’s still speculated what it really was.

The date chosen to celebrate the historical event was also different by a couple of days. But it didn’t matter to Cicada as much. The changelings had been in Equestria the whole time, they had only expanded their territory.

Flipping through the next few pages, she could see history on the princesses gaining power, history about that one creature, Discord, and something small about a place called The Crystal Empire.

The story about the empire caught her eye, and she started to read it to see what it had to say. Apparently there had been a unicorn kind there who enslaved the entire empire. Celestia and Luna had gone to defeat him but the entire empire disappeared as they were able to do so.

The story ended there, but it also had a notation to look on a different page of the book. Flipping to the page that was listed, Cicada found herself in the ‘Recent History’ chapter of the book. It started off with the return of Nightmare Moon, and then on to Discord’s return. Right after that was a story about a royal wedding and changeling attack. Finally, Cicada found a page entitled ‘Return of the Crystal Empire’.

The queen was more interested in the story before and quickly turned back to the royal wedding. It talked about how a princess name Mi Amore Cadenza was marrying a stallion of the name Shining Armor. The princess had been replaced by a changeling queen from this world and Twilight had been able to figure it out. She found the real princess and they returned to the wedding before it could finish. The queen revealed herself and her changeling subjects came in causing an invasion. The two lovers had been able to create a shield, blasting the changelings away.
Reading through the story again, Cicada tried to find a name for the queen, but there was none listed. “What if that were me? What’s the other me like?”

Looking at one of the artist’s renderings of the queen, Cicada thought it didn’t look too much like her, but then again, Luna looked different from Selena. Besides, this wasn’t an actual picture, who knew what she actually looked like. She moved the book over and grabbed her scroll to take a few more notes.

Cicada closed her eyes for a few seconds to think, but when she opened them again, she had a different scroll in front of her. At first, she was a little shocked and didn’t even fully read the scroll, just looked at it. But as she started to calm down a little bit, She noticed a word she recognized and also caught her attention.

One the paper was her sister’s name. Cicada quickly tried to read the sentence. Before she could finish, the queen blinked again and found herself back in her house.

“Ow! Hey! Lila, stop!” Cicada ordered her pet who was scratching her. “What’s wrong? Why are you doing that.”

The blue phoenix glared at Cicada before giving a quick nod of her head and flying away to the bedroom.

“What was that all about?!” The changeling called out to Lila.

After no response, Cicada gave up and started to think about what she had read. “The changeling called Nymph will open a portal…” The queen murmured to herself. “Open a portal what? Is Nymph trying to find me?”

“That stupid bird!” Twilight yelled. “If it weren’t for her I might actually try to go back, even if it did give me a headache!”

Sunset Shimmer walked in the Empress’ room to check on her. “Is everything alright?”

“You know how at the last meeting I mentioned the mix of the spell I used on that changeling queen mixed with her being in another world meant we sometimes randomly change our viewpoints?”

“Yes Empress. I remember that.”

“Well, it happened again, and she happened to have some information in front of her about the world. The problem is, Somehow her bird seemed to know it wasn’t her owner and attacked me. I didn’t get to read most of it, though I did get to see one thing.”

That got the unicorn a little curious. “What would that be?”

“There was a picture of a crystalline looking tree. It labeled it ‘The Tree of Harmony’ but there was another note that said ‘Elements of Harmony = Gems of Accord?’ Since this tree and the elements seem to go hoof in hoof with each other, I’m guessing that these gems are somewhere in this world.”

“Is there something you’d like to do with that information.” Sunset asked, since usually when something like this happened, the alicorn took action.

“Yes,” Twilight replied. “I want you to alert the guard and start asking every changeling they can about it. I want it found either before or while I’m away trying to find that pesky royal changeling.”

“I’ll tell them right away.” Sunset said, quickly leaving the room.

R KCDDI SGOP R XGX, R KCDDI SGOP R BRCEFPDQ

Art of the Dress

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Cicada decided to go explore Canterlot to try and clear her mind. “Hm, where should I go? She asked herself. Cicada walked up to a unicorn and asked if there were any interesting places to go to around there. The pony told her about a new boutique that wasn’t too far away so Cicada headed towards there.

Upon opening the door, Cicada could hear a bell ring as she entered. Another unicorn greeted her. “Welcome to the Canterlot Carousel. My name is Sassy Saddles. Our owner happens to be in today so she’ll be out soon.”

The changeling thanked her and looked at the dresses while she was waiting. A few of the dresses looked to small for her if she wasn’t disguised, but looked like they would fit her unicorn self perfectly.

“Hello. Sorry to keep you waiting.” Came a familiar voice. Cicada turned to see Rarity in front of her. “Rarity?”

“Oh, I’m sorry. Who are you again?”

Cicada face hoofed. “We just saw each other yesterday! It’s me Cicada.” She finished with a whisper.

“Ah, yes! Sassy? I’m going to be with this customer in the back for a little bit. She’s an old friend of mine.”

Rarity lead Cicada into the back. When the queen was sure Sassy wasn’t looking, Cicada changed back to herself. “Really? You couldn’t remember my name?”

“No dear, I could remember perfectly well. It’s just that I had introduced Sassy to my friends back when the place first opened. If I had recognised you of the spot, she would have asked why you didn’t come to our opening day, and I didn’t want you to try and come up with some excuse on the fly.”

“I could have just told her the truth that I just moved to Equestria.”

Rarity gave a small role of her eyes. “But then how would you have met me before? Designers don’t just pay attention to details in their work, they do it in everything.”

“I guess I didn’t think of that.” Cicada replied almost embarrassed.

“Well then, would you like to change back into Fireworks and go back in the main store area? If you want to, I could make a dress for you. I’ve already made some designs for you.”

As the two started to walk into the main room, Cicada asked. “But wait, how would I pay you, I mean, I barely got a house here. It’s only really because of the princesses that it go furnished.”

Rarity gave a smile. “Oh please, I always make the first dress for my friends free.”

“Really Rarity, you don’t have to do that. Besides, when would I even wear it? It’s not like I go on special occasions at home. And I’m not sure I’ll have any chance to wear it around her before I have to leave.”

“Oh please! There’s going to be a small party at the castle tomorrow night.” Sassy told Cicada, entering the conversation. “Everypony who can make it has been invited. Celestia and Luna had wanted a party that wasn’t just for the ponies who were rich enough or lucky enough to get tickets for the Gala.”

“It was actually Twilight who helped suggest it.” Rarity explained. “Not too long after moving to Ponyville, she was given two tickets to the Gala and each of us wanted the second one. Even though it worked out in the end, Twilight still thought about how other ponies other than the six of us had wanted that second ticket and suggested a party anypony could attend to the princesses.”

“Excuse me Rarity,” Sassy started to ask. “But I don’t believe you mentioned your other friends to Fireworks. And I didn’t think she would know since you haven’t seen each other in a while.”

Rarity didn’t have an answer for Sassy, but Cicada was able to answer instead. “Well who hasn’t heard about them. They’ve helped save Equestria a few times.” She was glad she had heard a few stories from them on on the train ride to Canterlot.

“Ah yes, I guess I hadn’t thought of that at first.”

“Anyway,” Rarity started. “If you want, you could look at the designs right now and choose your favorite. I’m actually ahead of schedule and have the free time to start working on it if you tell me.”

“I guess if you do have the time and want to…” Cicada said before Rarity yanked her back into the room they were in before.

“Alright, now I thought you might do well with a dress with blues and greens. I’ve got a few basic designs already drawn because I couldn’t help myself, but they’re still far from done.”

“You sure?” Cicada asked. “I mean, I don’t really want something too fancy. Something a little simple would be fine, but if I’m wearing it at a large event, it shouldn’t be too simple.”

“Well here are the few simple designs I have for you so far.” Rarity told Cicada, pulling out four papers from a drawer with her magic. The unicorn then laid them on a nearby table for Cicada to look at.

The first was a rather simple design. mainly different shades of greens. The second was a little more fancy while more of a dark teal for its main color. The third was rather fancy compared to the others. a large piece of sparkly fabric was in place of the skirt on that design. The last was a very sea like base of colors and rather poofy to the changeling, though it still looked like it would come out well.

“I’m not sure. They all look nice. I mean, I want to wear them all, but I should only chose one right?”

“Well, I could make the others later, but for now I think I only have the time to make one before tomorrow.” Rarity explained. “Though I personally think this dress would look great at the party.” She said, pointing at the third sketch.

“Okay I guess that would be nice, you sure it’s a good idea?”

“Well of course! Now would I try making a dress you wouldn’t like?”

“I don’t think so… but maybe you might.”

“I think you’re confusing me with that other Rarity I simply wouldn’t allow it. Now come on. Let’s get started with fitting you of the start of the dress.”

Cicada didn’t follow. “You know, you don’t have to. I’m a changeling, I can fit any dress you make.”

“Dear, I don’t think that will really be helpful here.” Rarity told the queen.

“Why not? I mean, it’s not like I need to be a changl- I’m going to the party as my normal self, aren’t I?”

“The princesses would really enjoy it. Besides, it could help make ponies less afraid of changelings.”
Cicada shook her head. “No way, it's just a disaster waiting to happen! I want to get home safely and not mess up this place too.”

“Oh come on! You can relax for at least a little while. You’re getting all wound up like Twilight does sometimes. The ponies at the party will be fine with you once they see that Princess Celestia and Luna aren’t surprised by your arrival.”

“She… she… she…” Came a voice from behind them.

The two turned around and saw Sassy standing in the doorway. “She’s a…”

Cicada’s eyes widened. “No! No please don’t say anything! I’m not going to do anything! I just want to get home!”

Cicada didn’t get to say anything else before Sassy fainted. The two stared at the unicorn. “Now what do we do?” The queen asked.

It wasn’t too long before Sassy had gained consciousness again. Cicada hid while Rarity explained to the unicorn what was going on and the changeling didn’t come out until Sassy understood and promised she wouldn’t do anything if she did come out.

“I still can’t believe you would let a changeling in here let alone be friends with it.” Sassy remarked.

“You could at least pretend I’m living and not just call me a thing.” Cicada said, frowning.

“Forgive me, I just had some trouble at the one place I was working at when the changelings came during the royal wedding.”

Cicada sighed. “Can you please stop talking about that? I don’t like to hear how in this place changelings are the bad guys.”

“Sorry, I’m still trying to wrap my head around this.” Sassy said to the queen. “I apologise for not being perfectly polite right away.”

The changeling gave a small shrug. “It’s fine. You don’t need to apologise. I’m starting to get used to it unfortunately. Can I just get fitted for my dress with Rarity and be on my way.”

Sassy nodded and the next little while Rarity helped Cicada while Sassy attended to the customers in the shop. It wasn’t too long before Cicada was able to leave to let Rarity continue with her day.

PFE OPQDRXDQO HFGOD BQDOO PFQDD

Almost Fatal

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Cicada was hiding in her house. She had almost run out of energy outside and had come close to revealing herself as a changeling too soon. She stood a few minutes behind her door to catch her breath before running upstairs to find Lila.

‘If I were Nymph and not myself, I wouldn’t have made it.’ The queen thought as she reached the top of the stairs. She entered her bedroom to see Lila taking a nap on the bedpost. Cicada decided to try and rest a little bit too while she waited for Lila to wake up. She grabbed one of the books she had brought to her bed earlier and started to read. Eventually, her stomach started to growl and it actually woke Lila up.

“Sorry about that Lila. Guess I’m pretty hungry.” Cicada apologised.

Lila looked at Cicada for a few seconds before giving a quick flap of her wings and landed on her owner. Once she had settled down, the bird nuzzled Cicada, rubbing her head in the changeling’s mane.

Cicada gave a small laugh before giving a small sigh of relief. “There, now all I need is something to eat.”

Getting to the kitchen, Cicada started to look around for something to eat. Since she didn’t normally eat anything that was currently in her kitchen. Lila was also helping to looks for something they could have for dinner.

“Find anything Lila?” Cicada called out. The phoenix was rummaging through the cabinets when she found a can of food. Next to it was a can the same size with the same label on it. She poked her head out and gave a small to Cicada so the changeling would come over to see what was there.

“What’d you find?” The queen asked before looking at the two cans of food. “Two cans of something called Chowde- wait, Clam Chowder. Ooo, Seafood! You like that!”

Cicada took the cans out and read the set of instructions on the label. She dumped the contents of the cans into a pot and turned on the stove. After a while, the food started to bubble enough that when Cicada went to check on it, a bubble popped and splattered a little bit of the chowder on her face. As she tried to wipe it off, Lila flew over and turned the burner off herself.

“Thanks Lila. Could you maybe get something cold I can put on this?” Lila nodded and flew over to the sink. The phoenix grabbed a towel and put it under the faucet before turning on the cold water. After it was somewhat soaked, Lila turned the water back off and placed the towel on Cicada where the food had hit her.

“Thanks again. I don’t know what I’d do without you.” Lila buffed up her chest before Cicada gave her a small nudge. “Okay, you don’t have to brag about it.”

Cicada grabbed the pot and two bowls. She also found a rather wide straw that Lila could use to eat her dinner. As they ate, Cicada started to feel a pain near her chest. For the most part it wasn’t too bad, but as the queen finished eating, a large burst of pain shot through her. Lila was startled by Cicada but flew over to see what was wrong.

Cicada was gripping her chest right where the burn she had gotten from her Twilight. On it was part of the chowder which had landed there when she had been splashed. Cicada tried to wipe it off, but instead of being easy to wipe away, the food was actually hotter than before.

“Ahh!” Cicada cried ask she brought her hoof away and waved it in the air. “We need to get back to that hospital.” Cicada said to Lila.
Cicada got up and tried to become Fireworks, but when she tried, the burn hurt more and she fell to the ground. “Lila, Can you help? Please go find Healing Touch.”

Lila flew to the other room, but quickly flew back with an object in her talons. Attached to it was a long spiral cord. Lila put the object near Cicada’s head and pressed a combo of three buttons. Cicada heard a buzzing sound come from one end of the object. Finally, after the buzzing stopped, a voice came out from it. “Yes? What is your emergency?”

“Cure?!” Cicada asked. “What are you doing in there!”

“Um, I'm just using the phone. Who is this?"

Cicada breathed in sharply and her eyes teared up as another burst of pain came from the burn, worse than before. "Look, I came in yesterday with Twilight and her friends. We came to see Healing Touch. I can't get there and he's the only one who can help."

Again the pain ripped through her, enough that it made her start to really cry. "Ple-ee-ease!"

And with that, the pain caused the queen to fall into unconsciousness.

“...Seems to be waking up now.” Cicada heard as she started to regain consciousness. She tried to open her eyes, but there was some kind of light shining straight in them. “Good, she looks fine now. I’m glad she called, or else it might have been too hot and it would have killed her.

“Wha…” Cicada tried to talk, but she felt to weak right then to say anymore. Instead, the changeling tried to at least sit up, but she was kept down by someling.

Finally, the lights dimmed and Cicada could open her eyes without being blinded. In front of her was Healing Touch, with Lila right beside him. It was still a little bright, so she still had her eyes halfway open, but she could still see them.

“Now, you’re probably going to want to stay in bed until tomorrow morning.” Touch started to explain. “It seems that whatever spell was used on you to create your burn is still active. Usually spells used on a pony, or changeling in your case, won’t last that long because of how your outer cells shed while new ones replace them. Because the spell is still working, it seemed to magnify the energy coming from whatever you had land on your burn. I found from your pet that it came from what you were cooking for dinner.”

Cicada gave a small nod, as that was all she could manage. Touch continued, “My one question is how your phoenix knew to call the hospital. There was almost know way she could find out for herself in the short time you’ve been here, and when I asked, she told me you told her. And I also heard from Tentative Cure that you had not idea what a phone really was when you called her.”

Cicada didn’t know how Lila had known either, but was fine without knowing for right now. The doctor made mention of how once he had come, Lila had also helped in providing care after he had finished the main portion.

“Your pet has a really knack for it. Makes me wish there were more like her. It would end up saving a lot of lives if there were.” Touch commented before reminding Cicada to stay in bed, and then left.

SLSR FRO FDRSLIE JGVDQO

Twilight and Sparkle

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"Make sure she doesn't try to escape or cause trouble." Twilight ordered her guards.

The alicorn, the guards and Nymph were standing in the throne room of the castle. The changeling still had her two magic suppressors on, but the one on her horn had a green gem implanted in it.

"Listen." Twilight barked. "I altered the magic suppressor on your horn so that you will only be able to use one spell. After you create the portal, the gem will break. Any spells you try to use instead to try and get your suppressors off will not work, so don't try."

Nymph gave a small roll of her eyes. "As surprising as it might seem, I actually want to make this portal for you. Then I won't have to see you for a while."

The empress glared at Nymph, but stopped as she remembered that the changeling would not be going back to the cell she had been living in, but to a place that meant no pony would ever see her again.

"Now, form your portal." Twilight shouted. "Guards, make sure she doesn't try to go through."

The portal formed in front of the group. Instead of floating in the air like Cicada's had, the portal was on the ground instead. Twilight stared at it, thinking Nymph had use a different spell. The changeling told her it was the right one, but because of how little energy she had, it was either a short lived floating portal, or one on the ground that would last a while.

The alicorn didn't want to argue with Nymph, so she cast the same spell she had used three days prior and fired it into the portal. The portal changed color, something that Twilight had not taken notice of in the rush of what had happened last time. The portal had gone from a bright green to a purple that seemed almost black.

"Yes! Finally! It won't be long before I am full ruler of this place without any chance of you things stopping us. Now, get rid of her, forever."

The guards started to take Nymph away in the opposite direction of where she had come from. The changeling tried to get away. "Hey, what's going on?!"

"Well, I no longer need you. You sister will help me get back before I get rid of her too. And them if I ever want to go back, your 'subjects' will get me there instead."

As Twilight turned back to the portal, her eyes flashed and changed color. "Now if you'll excuse me, I can't let her mess things up for me." And she jumped into the portal as the portal closed and the gem on Nymph's suppressor broke.

Using the exit of the alicorn as the best distraction she could have, Nymph was able to break free from the guards' grip. Catching them off guard, she kicked one in the ribs and the other she punched in the face. One of them was a unicorn, and tried to blast her with a rather powerful spell. Instead of hitting her, Nymph was able to move so that it hit the suppressor on her horn where he gem had been.

The suppressor shattered, giving the changeling a reason to smile. She was easily able to knock out both the guards and destroyed the suppressor around her neck as well. Nymph was able to change her wing shape just enough so she could zoom through the castle and take it over again.

A few miles away from Ponyville, in the Everfree Forest, a portal opened. The portal was it's regular color and not the purple of the affected portal. The Alicorn Empress came out easily and turned just as the portal disappeared. Looking around, She found herself in the ruins of what looked like a castle.

“Great, where am I supposed to go from here.” She asked herself as she looked around some more.

Not coming up with any other ideas, Twilight flew into the sky to see where exactly she was. Far away in one direction was a crystal like tree fashioned into a castle of sorts. Giving a small smirk, she flew towards the castle, recognising the crystalline texture from two days prior.

As she got closer, Twilight noticed a town near the castle. Deciding against taking to the sky for too long, the alicorn landed in the town. The second she touched down, Twilight was greeted by multiple ponies.

"Hi Twilight! Accidentally used a growth spell on yourself?"

"Hey Twilight, did you get those from Rarity?"

"Twilight! Where have you been?! I came over to find you an hour ago! I wanted you and the girls to come over so we can get ready for the party!"

The owner of the last voice came over to Twilight and tried to keep talking, but the alicorn quickly stopped her.

"Pinkamena?! Why are you here? And what did you do to your mane?"

It was then Pinkie really looked at Twilight. The mare stared at who she thought was her friend. After a few seconds, she gasped and yelled, "Evil Twilight!"

Twilight thought somepony might find out, but she was still a little surprised. None the less, she still went with her plan.

"What do you mean, 'evil'?" She asked.

"You're the evil Twilight that Cicada talked about."

The alicorn faked her surprise this time. "You mean she is here? It actually worked!"

Pinkie wasn't sure what to say, so instead she told the other Twilight, " I need to take you to Twilight."

"But I'm Twilight. I'm right here!"

Without saying anything else, Pinkie started to drag the empress towards the castle.

The two Twilights looked at each other. The Twilight that lived in Ponyville was glaring at the one from the portal. "Wow, you two really look alike!" Pinkie exclaimed, breaking the silence.

The two alicorns stared at each other some more until the real Twilight said, "why did you come here? Was it to capture Cicada?"

"Yes it was." The other replied. "I need to get her back so we can fix things."

"Well you can’t have her you meanie pants!" Pinkie shouted.

The empress looked confusingly at the two ponies she was with. "What do you mean? What has she told you?" She squinted as light hit her eyes. "Also, could one of you turn off the lights?"

"Silly, you can't just turn off the sun." Pinkie said, making the armored alicorn widen her eyes. She ran to the window and looked up into the sky.

"The sun! I-it's in the sky! And I don't see the moon! How did you..?" She shook her head and coughed. "Sorry, it's just been a while since the rotation of the sun and moon have been normal back home. You see, seven years ago, our two princesses ended up battling. Luna, who had taken the name Selena, was younger and weaker and almost lost. Celestia tried to reason with her, but before they could finish, Cicada came in and took her magic. It was rather gruesome to watch. She ended up being more powerful than Selena and tried to take Celestia’s as well. I tried to stop her but ended getting Celestia’s magic instead. On a normal day, our powers our equal, but because changelings can gain more power from love, she ends up having stronger magic. Because of that, I can’t wrest the moon from her power and she won’t move it because she doesn’t know how.”

The real Twilight scoffed at her other self. “You can’t expect us to believe that story! We know the truth!”

Pinkie wasn’t so sure. “Um, Twilight?” Both alicorns answered. “Well, first we should try and use different names for you two.”

The other Twilight nodded and suggested, “Well, since I’m not from here, I could go by my last name. I end up being called that anyway most of the time because sometimes ponies like to talk that I can actually fix it but won’t because it will remind them who’s the real ruler. It’s actually quite absurd.”

Twilight didn’t agree. “Really? Because it seems like they might have some idea.”

Pinkie tried to reason with her friend. “Listen, Cicada might have been the one making it up. She didn't really say enough that could show if she was lying or not."

Sparkle nodded. "Pinka- Pinkie is right. Please just ask me any question you want and I'll answer. If I'm really lying, I'll have trouble answering.”

Twilight thought for a second before coming up with a question. “Why do you need Cicada? How will that help you with fixing things?”

“She’s just enough stronger than me that I can’t move the moon myself without her letting me as I said before. We needed her so we could get back Selena’s magic.” Sparkle answered.

“But why would she want to help you”

“That’s just it, she wouldn’t. We’ve been trying to find her again for a while and we only found her recently. I’m sorry to say that in my desperation, I ended up using a dark magic spell to make sure we could find her again.”

“Why would she even want to come her in the first place?” Twilight asked. “And why would she try to escape if she’s the only one who can help?”

“I’m not fully sure about that. I’ve never really gotten to learn how a changeling thinks. For all I know, she was thinking that even if she gave her magic to me, it would be a lost cause. Not having proper sunlight in seven years took a large toll on our crops. Most ponies aren’t even sure If it can be fixed anymore. Everypony is starting to starve, and I need to hurry and fix things before it really is too late.”

Twilight looked at her counterpart, trying to think of anything else she had to say. “Well, If you’re trying to help your world, why does she think you’re evil?”

Sparkle started to look a little sad. “We’ve been at war. In war, each side believes the other is evil, and until the end, there is no definite answer. So technically I could be evil. It just depends the side you end up taking, and I really hope I won’t have to eventually go against myself.”

“But wait, just how long has this war been going on? What started it?”

“Well, it was most likely started from Celestia and Selena’s battle. Tensions between the two races were already high, but I believe that battle was what really started it. The changelings blamed the ponies since the battle was between two alicorns, but ponies are blaming changeling since Cicada ended up taking Selena’s magic and can’t use it. I hope that after this whole war is over and everything is fixed, we can try to improve our relations with the changelings.”

“Wait, but how are you going to force Cicada to give you Selena’s magic back?” Twilight asked.

“That’s just it, we’re not fully sure yet. A few of the ponies back home who are engineers are working on trying to make something to help us get it without hurting her, but if it does come to it, we might have to do it the normal way. My hopes are that we won’t have to though.”

Twilight still wasn’t fully sure but, Pinkie was a little more believing. “Maybe she is right Twilight, I mean, she is you. Maybe we shouldn’t have trusted Cicada right away.”

Twilight didn’t want to answer. Sure Pinkie could be right, but something about this seemed somewhat familiar. She wasn’t about to give her full trust yet. “Listen, she’ll be at a party tonight in Canterlot. We’ll ask her what she had to say about some of the answers you’ve given and see if you are telling the truth.”

Sparkle nodded. “That’s fine, though I would like to stay here. If I come, it could make things a little confusing at the party or could overwhelm Cicada.”

“Okay then. If you want, you could find yourself a room to stay in for now.” Twilight told Sparkle.

The older alicorn nodded, and started off to find a room giving an evil grin once they couldn’t see.

SCHLR LO PFD QDRS TLSSRLI

Different Worlds

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Cicada opened her eyes. She had slept in a little, but the sun was in the sky and she felt wonderful. Lila wasn’t around, so she was probably downstairs. The time was right that she might be finishing up with breakfast, but it was more likely she had already finished.

As she got ready, she remembered that she would need to stop at Rarity’s shop here in Canterlot to get her dress for the party. Hopefully she would get there after the dress was made.

Going downstairs, Cicada found Lila downstairs on a pillow set on one of the chairs. “Hey Lila, what are you up to?”

The phoenix turned her head to look at Cicada. After seeing the changeling, she looked happy and flew over to land on her owner.

I guess we don’t really have anything to do today until the party. I also don’t really want to risk trying to go outside again just yet. Do you have any ideas of what we could do?”

Lila flew over into the kitchen. She took out a box from one of the shelves and put it on the table. As Cicada looked at it, her stomach growled. “That’s right, I should probably have something to eat before I try to do anything else."

The box Lila had gotten out seemed to be a granola cereal with almonds in it. Pouring it in a bowl and taking a few bites, the changeling pushed it away. It was pretty dry and felt rough in her mouth. “It takes good, but I don’t think I could stand a whole bowl of it. Do you have any other ideas?” Cicada asked.

Lila seemed to think a few seconds before flying over to the refrigerator and opening it. She flew in and came out with a small jug of milk. “Oh! What’s this?” Cicada exclaimed as Lila tried to take the cap off.

Seeming the trouble the phoenix was having, Cicada opened it, and after Lila got it through to her that is was for the cereal, the changeling poured some into her bowl. It didn’t take long after that before she finished and asked what they should try next.

Once again, Lila flew off and came back with one of her books. “Ah yeah, I should probably work on that. That’s the whole reason I wanted this place. Let’s see what I can find out about that Crystal Empire place I was reading about last time.

After a while of reading Cicada had finished reading through all the books she had. She tried to grab another book, but when she was met by none, the changeling started to review her notes.

"So far many things have almost matched each other, but none of them match exactly except the names. Even some ponies that exist here don't back home and vice versa." Cicada threw her notes into the air. "I just don't get it! Everything is so different, but there are still things that are the same!”

She started to pace around her room, trying to think of what she could do now to work on her project. When she finally thought she couldn’t come up with an idea Lila flew in to see what she was doing. “Ah! Lila! That’s it!” Cicada grabbed her quill and a scroll and then handed them to Lila. “I’ll talk, you take notes.”

When Lila was ready, Cicada started to talk. “So in the books, there’s a place called the Crystal Empire here. I don’t know if it exists back home, but if it does, we could get ponies to live there. Write that down.” Lila scribbled a note to search for their Crystal Empire. “The princesses here defeated the evil ruler by using the Elements of Harmony, which I found out are our Jewels of Accord. Now please write the following.” Cicada paused to make sure Lila was ready.

“Alright, red equals loyalty equals red. Next line is blue equals laughter equals blue.” Cicada paused until Lila finished that line. “Purple equals generosity equals magenta. Yes, magenta.” She assured Lila when the phoenix looked up. “After that is orange equals honesty equals orange. Then pink equals kindness equals green, and finally is magenta equals magic equals purple.”

When Lila stopped writing, Cicada looked at the paper to make sure it was right. After checking, the queen gave it back and continued. If the the jewels work the same as the elements, we need to find six changelings to activate them, one for each element. We’ll also need to make sure the jewels aren’t away from the tree for too long, but they should be able to last at least a thousand years if not more.”

Cicada and Lila continued until the changeling realized something. “Now somehow Discord exists her but not back home. We might want to find changelings like that. Sort of like… Cadence!”

Cicada quickly started to go through multiple books that mentioned the wedding. Each book gave the same picture of the princess. She quickly grabbed an extra scroll and drew the shape of a normal sized pegasus. Next she drew Cadence’s features before staring at the drawing. The picture looked exactly like one of the ponies she had seen at the castle helping her Twilight.

Cicada quickly started to flip through the books for Cadence’s origin. Only one book gave any sort of hint, but it said she had been found and adopted by an earth pony couple. Other than that, there was nothing in any of the books.

“And yet the ponies of the crystal empire seemed to instantly recognize her…” The changeling mumbled looking at one other book that mentioned the return of the Empire.

Before Cicada could think anymore about it, the timer on the stove went off. “Shoot! I need to go over to the boutique and get my dress from Rarity. Thanks for setting that Lila! Want to come?”

The phoenix seemed unsure at first, turning her head away toward the bed, but it didn’t take long before she agreed and started to follow Cicada. As they left the sheets covering the space under the bed ruffled.

“Rarity! Where are you? I came to pick up the dress you made for me.” Instead of Rarity, Cicada was met by Sassy Saddles.

“I’m sorry dear. Rarity only pops in for a day or two here. But she was able to finish the dress before she left. She actually finished last night since it was a simple, yet beautiful design. If you want, you may come into the back and try it on.”

The queen agreed and went to go try the dress while Lila stayed in the shop area with Sassy. In a few minutes, the changeling waved the two in, to see how it looked.

“I see Rarity has done it again with another wonderful dress. I can’t wait to see you in it again at the gala tonight.”
Cicada smiled at the unicorn. “If you happen to see Rarity again before the party tonight, can you thank her? I’ll still do it myself, but I want her to be thanked as soon as possible.”

“I’ll be sure to do that.” Sassy agreed as Cicada took off the dress and gave it to the unicorn to put safely into a bag until that night.

As Cicada left, she was stopped by a pegasus and her daughter. The filly saw Lila on her way in and said. “Hi again birdy.” Before her mother pulled her away to talk to Sassy.

Cicada was a little confused. Lila was unique enough she couldn't be mistaken for another bird that easily. Looking at Lila, she asked, "Do you know her?"

Lila gave a sheepish nod. "That's fine. Just as long as you're enjoying yourself when you don't come with me. Now come on. If we don't hurry home, we won't have that much time to eat lunch before we need to start heading towards the castle. Besides, it's already going to be a late lunch."

PFD HQUOPRS DXJLQD DYLOPO

Into the party

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"Lila! Hurry up! I want to be there as close to the start as we can so I can find the princesses! And yes, I know by the time we get there it won't start for another half hour, but ponies like to start arriving fifteen minutes before and I want to have a good fifteen minutes before that to get ready!"

Cicada was dashing through the streets, pausing every once and a while to let Lila catch up with her. The Phoenix was having some troupe as she carried the bag with Cicada's dress.

Finally, the queen stopped to let Lila land on her back. The second she did so, Cicada started to race towards the castle again. The phoenix barely held on from the sudden movement, but was able to keep from falling off. The queen weaved her way between each of the ponies, needing to go over them as some points.

“I’m… glad… I… decided… to.. be a… pegasus… instead… today…” Cicada huffed, flying over a group of ponies going down the street. A few gasped in surprise, but the changeling took no notice of them. When she was close enough to the castle and nopony was around to see her, Cicada revealed her horn and created a portal a few yards ahead of herself. She ran towards it and came out right near the castle gates, where she tried to stop but skidded a few feet before she crashed into it.

Upon crashing, her wings disappeared and two of the guards came running over. “Ma’am, what are you doing here?” One asked. “The gates don’t open for the party for another twenty five minutes.”

Cicada jumped up. “Twenty five minutes! I wanted to meet with Celestia five minutes ago! Please let me in!”

The guards were about to send her away when Celestia came out. “What was that noise? Is something… Ah, Fireworks! “I thought you would show up early. Come in, please.” Celestia said, opening the gates.

The two had sat down in the meeting room once more. Celestia was about to ask Cicada why she came this early, but the queen spoke before her. “Look, I’m really nervous about what might happen. I mean, one pony already found out and she fainted. I don’t want that to happen to everyling, sorry, pony at the party.”

“Don’t worry,” Celestia assured her. “If you want to, you can spent the first few minutes with Luna and I greeting the ponies who come in.”

“That might be nice.” Cicada agreed.

“When Luna leaves to go into the party, you can go with her. I’ll stay a little longer before I’ll follow.”

“Oh, why won’t you come?” The queen asked.

“My sister still has to take the night watch. She’s actually waking up a bit early to come to the party a little bit this time. We even set it up earlier than normal so that she could enjoy it.”

“Oh that’s a nice thing to do.” Cicada commented. “I hope I can enjoy it with her and my other new friends.”

Celestia smiled before looking at the clock. “We should get ready. We’ve only got about six minutes to get dresses and in place before the guests start to come in before the party.”

Cicada nodded and took out the dress from the bag. “Come on Lila! You can talk more with Celestia’s phoenix when we’re greeting everypony.

The two royals were able to finish up getting dressed with a minute to spare. They met up with Luna at the top of the stairs into the ballroom. Right before the guests started to enter, Cicada started to get rather nervous. Luna saw how she was feeling and tried to help.

“Don’t worry, I felt the same at my first event after I was freed by the elements. They’ll be shocked at first, but later on they’ll be fine with it.”

“I hope so.” Cicada replied.

“Besides, you look beautiful, there no question about that.” Celestia complimented, making Cicada give a small blush.

“Thanks. I needed that.” She said, making sure her dress was straight.

As she looked up, the first ponies started to come in. The first pony to see her was scared at first, but the princesses quickly assured her. Right after the first large group finished coming in and the next started, Cicada felt a little more sure of herself. Unfortunately for her, there was a certain white unicorn stallion at the head of the group.

“Hello Aunt Celestia, hello Aunt Luna.” He looked at Cicada, who could hear a few giggles behind her. “What is a changeling doing here?! Did both of you forget last time?! You’re making a huge mistake.”
Celestia gave a slightly confused look. She turned her head to look around until she looked at Cicada. “Ah, you mean Cicada. No, she is our guest tonight. If you disapprove of that, I welcome you not to come in.” As she finished, she whispered into the stallion’s ear. He nodded and continued on shoving through a group of mares who had been looking at him.

“What a rude pony!” Cicada exclaimed. “And he’s related to you? How do you stand it?”

Celestia paused to stop greeting ponies for a few seconds. “A few years ago, he met a mare at one of the galas and fell in love with her. Since he’s a royal, all the mares would try to get him to love them, but he kept explaining there was another mare.”

The princess paused again to greet some more guests. “He started to get tire of explaining it to ponies, who still sought his love after he had told them. One day, Blue Blood gave up and just ignored them all, doing anything he could to get them to leave. Eventually Blue found that if he painted his image to the nobles as a pony who they would never want to be with, they wouldn’t try to have that. Of course, there’s almost always a pony who doesn’t know yet at each gala.”

As Celestia went back to greeting the ponies, Cicada asked, “So this is going to be a hard party for him this time?”

The Solar princess nodded. “But he was fine with the idea for this one time. He’s even hoping to find his love again since anypony can come.”
The last group to come in before the party started was Twilight and her friends. Cicada was so excited to see them, she flew over the group they we greeting to say hello.

“I was wondering when exactly I was going to see you. Rarity, I have to say I love this dress you made. It’s beautiful!"

Rarity smiled, but to the side, Rainbow scoffed. Cicada gave her a small glare before looking at the others. Pinkie and Twilight didn't seem to happy, but she guessed that was because of how their pegasus friend was acting. Following them were threes young fillies with almost identical cutie marks and Spike.

"You look nice Spike." She said complimenting the little suit he was wearing. "Who are your friends?"

"These are Applebloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo. The first two are the sisters of Applejack and Rarity while Scootaloo is as close to Rainbow's sister as she can get without them actually being related."

"Well then, I hope you four have fun. I'll be coming in soon after you go in."

The group entered in and one last pair of ponies just made their way in before Cicada could leave with Luna. The queen recognized them as the pair she saw earlier at Rarity's shop when she had been getting her dress. The older one greeted her as she tried to get her daughter to greet the princesses as well. Luna and. Cicada decided to follow the two ponies into the party that way another group wouldn't stop them.

As they walked in, the mother whispered in Cicada's ear. "It won't help, but I'll send Lila."

Cicada was a little confused. She knew they had met Lila before, but why did she need to send Lila anywhere? There wasn't any reason for Lila to be doing anything other than have fun.

Getting into the ballroom, she looked around for somepony to party with. Her first choice was Fluttershy, but she couldn't find the mare. Her next choice was Pinkie Pie, who was currently up on the stage with the same pony who had been doing the music at her own party. Hoping no one would mind, Cicada made her way to Pinkie

"Hi Cicada! Don't you love this party?!"

Cicada gave a small laugh. "Well I'm not sure yet. I only just got in here. But so far it’s pretty nice.”

At that moment, a stallion came up on stage and handed Pinkie a record. “Hey Pinkie! Glad to see you again! I thought you might be here, and seeing as it was a party I wasn’t running, I guessed you would be doing it. If you don’t mind, could you play this song I sort of made when you get the chance.”

Pinkie nodded. “Sure thing Cheese!” Pinkie took the record and hoofed it over to the dj.

Pinkie turned back to Cicada. “So if you want to, you can go party. I might be stuck up here all night.”

“That’s fine.” Cicada told Pinkie. “I should probably find Lila in this mess anyway.”

As the queen looked around she saw Spike and the three fillies with Lila and the other filly she had seen coming in right before they had gone into the ballroom. Lila seemed to be getting along with them really well, especially the mystery filly.

“So, who are you?” Cicada asked her as she walked towards them. The filly looked at her a little nervously.

“Uh, I’m, well my name’s, eee!”

“Don’t worry, just because I’m a changeling doesn’t mean I’ll hurt you. I just want to know your name.”

The filly whispered it so that only she could hear. “What was that?” Cicada asked.

“Volcanic Rose!” The filly squeaked, just loud enough for Cicada to hear.

“That’s a pretty name. I’m glad you made friends with Lila. It’s kind of hard to do that.”

As Cicada walked elsewhere, Twilight trotted up to her. “Um, Cicada, could we talk for a moment? It’s kind of-”

“Can you wait a little bit! I want to go dance! This song sounds good for dancing.” Cicada exclaimed before running off.

“That’s okay.” Twilight whispered to herself. “Not like it could change everything.”

LP'O JQGIGCIHDB HFGQCO

Switched

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Cicada had been having a great time at the party. so far everything was working out fine. Very few ponies were still wary of her after seeing the changeling get her party on, but there were still a couple. Cicada had helped two ponies capture and escaped animal or something that looked sort of like a cross between a bunny and a pony. When the party was a little more than halfway over, the queen remembered Twilight had wanted to talk with her.

After a small bit of searching, Cicada was able to find Twilight in the crowd. “Twilight, you said you wanted to talk earlier. I’m sorry I forgot about it.”

Twilight waved her hoof. “Don’t worry, I guess it could have waited. I just wanted to ask a few more questions about where you’re from.”
Cicada started to focus all of her attention on Twilight now. “What brought this up?”

“I… found a book the other day and it made me think about some questions I wanted to ask.”

“Ah, okay. I just wanted to know.”

“First, I kind of wanted to know why you ended up here in the first place. Like, why did you end up coming here.”

Cicada gave a small laugh. “Your guess is as good as mine. I was just trying to make a portal home and it sent me here instead. My best guess i-”

Cicada cut off in the middle of her sentence. “What was that Cicada?” Twilight asked.

“Hmm, oh, never mind, just thought of something. Please continue.”

Cicada blinked as she talked to Twilight. “-s as good as… hmm?” She looked around and found herself in Twilight’s castle. In fact, she was in the room she had slept in her first night. She blinked again, but still found herself in the castle. “Oookay? This is new. Okay, did someone teleport me here? Let me guess, it’s one of those pranks I heard Pinkie mention. I should also stop talking to myself and make a portal back.”

The changeling started to summon her portal, but something didn’t seem right. “I… I should be able to do that easily. The only ways it wouldn’t work is a null stone or magic suppressor.”

She looked down, but there was no magic suppressor on her neck stopping her normal magic. The one thing that confused her was that instead of seeing black, her body was lavender. She ran to a window since there were no mirrors in the room. After a second of focusing, Cicada was able to see her reflection. “Oh no. What did she do.”

“So, you said your home was stuck in Twilight. Why’s that?”

Sparkle looked at her other version. “I can’t control my magic. At least not what I got from Selena.”

“What really happened at the battle between your two princesses? It didn’t seem like you were saying everything.”

“My Twilight got Celestia’s magic then I got Selena’s. After that, war started to break out between our races.”

“I thought you said you got Luna’s magic first. Then Sparkle took Celestia’s.”

Sparkle looked at Twilight. “Who’s Luna. I thought we were talking about Celestia and Selena.”

Twilight’s head instantly turned to look in Sparkle’s eyes. “Spar-?”

Before she could finish, the doors to the garden burst open. A mare and a filly had slammed them open and a blue blur zoomed between them. Before anypony could figure out what was happening, Sparkle sent out a magic burst towards the blur. The spell missed, and his a pony instead.

“Ha! I knew she couldn’t be trusted!”

The blur screeched and attacked Sparkle. At one point, it slowed enough for her to see what it was. “You stupid bird!”

Lila continued her scratches and peck until the mare who opened the door called her over and sent her off.

“Ha ha! Thanks you stupid pony! It was really annoying me.”

Twilight tried to stop Sparkle, but she was stopped by a spell being cast on her before she fell to the ground unconscious.

“Twilight!” Her friends called out.

“Why would you do this?” Fluttershy asked. “I thought we were friends.”

“Face it Fluttershy, I was right that she was faking being nice. We shouldn’t have trusted her.” Rainbow said with an air of pride.

Cicada pounded on the door, but it was hard to break down. Even her all-spell magic wouldn’t work because there was a supressor on her horn. Eventually she gave up and tried the window. With one solid kick, she broke the glass. She tried multiple time so make it big enough to fly out of.

After looking around for something to help her escape, she noticed shards of something away from all the broken glass. Looking again in the shattered glass, Cicada got a better look at the suppressor on her horn. there was an empty slot where a jewel had once been.

‘So that’s how she was planning to get out of this later.’ The queen thought. Moving over to the window sill, she smacked her suppressor on it and watched it fall off as everything went black.

“Queen Cicada. I thought I could trust you and let you come to this gala. But tonight you have shown your true colors and I must stop you from harming my subjects.” Celestia announced to Sparkle.

The alicorn attacked, with with Sparkle’s new changeling powers combined with the old magic of Selena, she was able to easily take down the solar ruler.

“Now there is no one to take m-” Sparkle was cut off as Luna attacked from behind. In her last glimpses of her settings, Sparkle saw Luna. “Who…”

When Cicada woke back up, she was in another new place. In the corner of her eye, she saw a pony near a doorway. “Excuse me, but how long have I been out?”

The guard laughed. “Since last night. It’s sunrise now.” He finished looking at a barred window.

As the changeling really started to look at her surroundings, she noticed she was in some sort of cell. Feeling her horn, she touched the metal ring around its base. “Oh shoot.”

PVLSLEFP VGI'P SDP UGC GCP

They don't listen

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Cicada kicked the bars, hoping they might break after a while. As she started to get tired, the guard nearby finally spoke up. “You know, those bars can hold some of the strongest earth ponies. Maybe not the strongest, but some of them.”

Cicada got a little bit angry again. “And an alicorn? Would it hold them.”

“Well, we haven’t tested tha- Hey! Why am I telling you that?””

“Because you didn’t think it would help at all.” Cicada answered as she reared back one more time and her hair started to sparkle before she kicked the bars down. “Ha! It worked! Alicorn powers cannot be stopped!”

The guard’s eyes widened. He pressed his hoof on a yellow button nearby. From far away, Cicada could hear some sort of siren. “Of course they have that.” She shook her head to get back on track. “I need to find someone who will listen to me.”

The changeling ran out of the dungeon and found herself surrounded by guards. She started to dodge them, though still got hit by a few spells from the unicorn guards. Eventually, Cicada escaped from them and found herself in an empty hall. She paused as she tried to think of a way out.

Before the queen could come up with any plans she saw something orange fly towards her. Cicada was barely able to move out of the way before Philomena zoomed past. The phoenix turned as she started to come back. Cicada realized what the bird was about to to and started to run down the hall. She was able to dodge a few more attacks, but as she reached the end of the hall, A large white figure blocked her path. “Celestia!”

“Well, I guess our dungeons cannot hold an alicorn, or at least alicorn powers. I was surprised to see you could do such magic.”

“Celestia, please,” She pleaded. “Let me by. You’re making a mistake.”

Celestia’s expression became one of almost pure anger. “You tricked my sister and I along with Twilight and her friends that you could be trusted. I already made my mistake. I see that our cells are not enough to hold you, so I can think of only one fitting place.”

Celestia’s horn started to glow, and next to her, a portal like gap was created between the castle and whatever was on the other side. When the gateway to the other place was finished opening, Celestia used her magic to send Cicada towards it. As the changeling struggled to stay on the castle side, Lila soaring in through a window and scratched Celestia’s horn. The gateway closed letting Cicada escape, losing only the tip of her tail to it.

Celestia still looked angry, but a lavender alicorn came to join her. “Celestia, I heard an alarm! What’s wrong?”

Twilight looked at Cicada. “How did she get out?!”

Celestia looked at her former student. “I haven’t found out yet. But have you found what I asked for?”

Twilight took out a greyish pink stone. She quick ran towards Cicada and attached it to the suppressor on her horn. “Now she can’t use any magic. We can send her back to the dungeons since there’s no risk of her escaping with that null stone there.”

Cicada was taken back into the dungeon with Lila and put in a new cell. Lila was put in a separate cage so she couldn’t help Cicada escape in any way. As Twilight walked away, she slammed the door of the cell Cicada was in and left.

The door to the dungeon opened, waking Cicada up. She raised her head to see Twilight walking in again. The changeling looked the alicorn over once or twice before deciding it was this world’s Twilight. She set her head on the ground again so it was facing the alicorn.

"Why did you come here?"

"I wanted to talk to you and find out why you finally decided to attack everypony."

Cicada rolled her eyes. "I didn't do that! My world's Twilight is here and somewhere in that castle of yours."

Twilight gave a weak scoff. "I know she's there. I'm letting her lived there. She's the one who got me to ask you those questions. I didn't want to believe her at first."

"And you believe her now? Just because she told you you ask me? You didn't even get to hear my answers." By this point Cicada had stood up in anger. "If you can believe her, why can't you believe me?!"

Twilight bit her lip. I was... given a fairly good argument not to... help you."

Cicada noticed the princess's body language. "What are you hiding?! Why can't you believe me."

"I can't-"

Cicada was yelling now. "You can't tell me?! Listen, that Twilight is evil. Not just any evil, but the embodiment of evil incarnate. If you're not going to listen, then leave!"

"Ci-"

"Leave!"

'I felt it again. He's definitely here.'
"Lucia, don't worry. Harmony banished him from his last host and he will not be able to do such again for at least a millennia lest you free him."
'I know Faust, but I can't shake the feeling he's not. I'm so sure I felt him again, In rage this time too. And you know I can't ence him out of his prison.'

"Well, if it happens once more I shall allow you entry to wherever he is at the time. Then I wish for you come back once you have finished and tell me just what you learned."

Lucia noded to the bipedal being. 'I'll be sure to tell you right away.' And the turquoise maned alicorn left back to her pocket dimension.

Cicada tried to get Lila out of her cage. If the phoenix could get out, she could find someone to help get the changeling free. Unfortunately, the cage was made of a rather strong metal and Cicada couldn’t ever bend it, not to mention and earth pony powers couldn’t currently be used with the null stone on her suppressor. She had tried to get the stone to come off, but it was put in in such a way that the queen couldn’t figure out how to get rid of it.

The door to the dungeons opened again. This time, it was Pinkie Pie. Cicada had remembered how both she and Twilight had been acting a little strange before going into the party. “Were you on the Twilight’s side too?”

Pinkie was a little surprised that Cicada had already noticed her, since she thought the changeling was asleep. She bit her lip. “I-I guess I was.”

“Then leave. I told the same to Twilight.”

Before Pinkie could say more. Lila started to flap her wings in her cage to get Cicada’s attention. “What is it Lila?”

The bird wouldn’t stop making a racket, so Cicada thought it was because of Pinkie.

“Unless you’ve decided to help, leave. It seems Lila doesn’t want you here.”

“Bu-but, I wanna- But I can’t! Arg! Why does this have to be so hard?!”

Cicada’s wings seemed to flare up. “It can’t be that hard for you to leave!”

Pinkie shifted around on her feet before she walked out. Cicada heard her say something to another pony, but the queen wasn’t sure what she did say who who the mare was talking to. After a few more seconds of waiting, Fluttershy came in.

“Fluttershy? Y-you came? Or are you just here to tell me you’re glad to see me here like the others?”

“I don’t think any of them said that to you. But I wanted to see how you were doing.”

Cicada growled. “I’m stuck in here. How do you think I’m doing? Oh, and also, my Twilight is apparently in Ponyville and your Twilight knows about her and is actively letting her stay there.”

“Actually, we’ve been calling her Sparkle.”

Cicada whipped her head towards the pegasus with her eyes as wide as they could go. “What did you just say?!”

“We’ve been calling her-”

“No I heard what you said, I just can’t believe it. You’re actually helping her?” Cicada’s eyes teared up. “I thought you would be like them. I thought we were still friends.”

Fluttershy looked sad too. “I want to help, but Twilight said we can because you said-”

“I didn’t say anything! That was Sparkle! This is her fault. And if you don’t believe me, th-then” Cicada started to cry. “Y-you can leave too.”

The changeling laid back down on the ground, facing away from Fluttershy, trying to keep herself from crying. When she heard the door to the dungeon slam behind the mare, Cicada cried as hard as she could, letting it all out.

“Spike, do you know where I can get something to eat in this place?” Sparkle called out. She was fascinated that her other self had been able to capture and even tame a dragon.

“Just go out into town and find someplace else to eat.” He answered, frowning. “Since Twilight is spending one more day in Canterlot, I’m only cooking for myself, and I don’t think you’d eat gems.”

Sparkle also frowned before asking. “Oh come on. Twilight trusts me. So do the others. Why aren’t you the same?”

Spike got angry at the alicorn. “You did something to Cicada last night! I heard you say something she would never say! I don’t know what you did to Twilight because I saw her realize it wasn’t her but I know it was you.”

Sparkle recoiled. “I.. actually don’t know what you’re talking about. I didn’t do anything to my counterpart. I admit I thought she would turn against me too, but she hasn’t. The thing is, you might convince her otherwise, so I might have to fix that.”

Spike covered his face, scared about what was about to happen, when the door opened. “Hey Twilight! We wanted to see how ya were doin’ after last night.”

The empress turned around to see a group of three fillies. “I’m sorry, but I’m a different Twilight. I came from the place the changeling that attacked last night was from.”

“Woah! That sounds cool! Did you get to beat her up and stuff if she did something bad?” Scootaloo asked.

“I guess I did. Did you know she has a sister who is almost as bad as her?”

“No, we didn’t” Sweetie Belle answered. “Hey, maybe you can tell us. We were heading over to Sugarcube Corner. Do you want to come?”

Sparkle smiled. “That sounds nice. Let me just finish with Spike here and I’ll be out to join you.”

The fillies went outside to wait and Sparkle turned to look at the dragon. “You got lucky this time, but when I get back, I’ll make sure you can’t help that bug pony friend of yours.”

The alicorn headed outside while Spike wiped his forehead. ‘Maybe Celestia will listen if I tell her what just happened.’ He thought before running off to find stuff to write with.

'EGGBAUD OJLND'

Escape to home

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Cicada had been brought to a small stone room with a solid iron door. She had been ordered to sit in one of the two chairs in the room, which were separated by a table. It didn't take long for the queen to recognize it as an interrogation room.

Cicada was glad to be out of her cell. except for the one time she escaped when she was first put in there, the changeling hadn't managed to escape again.

It had been four days since Cicada had first been put in the Canterlot dungeon. Nothing too exciting had happened since then. Fluttershy coming to visit everyday was the best thing Cicada had done. Apparently the pegasus had gotten a friend of hers to take care of her animals while she had been away.

Cicada had been getting weaker over the four days she had been locked up. She was glad Lila had been able to stay with her, since that had been helping, but the visits had helped as well.

The queen was rather nervous about her current situation. There was a good chance that someling was finally going to ask what really happened the night of the gala, but there was also a small chance her meeting would go well. As Cicada waited, she started to hear voices coming closer.

"Now remember, if anything goes wrong, just shout and I'll come in. Got that?"

The next voice sent a small chill up Cicada's spine. "Hopefully I won't need to do that. though I'll remember if that bug queen tries anything."

The changeling stared at the door until Sparkle walked in.

"I'd say I'm glad to see you again, but I'm not. I'm only happy you haven died just yet so we can go home, though you wouldn't have died anyways."

Cicada continued to glare at the alicorn, trying to figure out what she meant and how she thought they were getting home.

"The good news is I've convinced everypony here that you're the evil one. Oh wait, it's not for you. But it won't matter to you for too long. Once we get back, this thing can join your 'sister'." Sparkle said gesturing to all of Cicada,

"W-what do you mean? What happened to Nymph?"

Sparkle very obviously pretended to be sad. "Aww, did you actually care for that thing? To bad, I had her killed."

Cicada became filled with rage. "You killed my sister?!"

Sparkle laughed. "Oh come on, stop with the act. You can't expect me to believe after all these years you still haven't done anything with her."

"Who are you talking about? What are you talking about?"

Sparkle stopped chuckling. "Oh my gosh, you're serious. Are you really willing to be that weak?"

The alicorn put her hoof on top of Cicada's, which had been resting on the table. The queen tried to put her hoof away, but couldn't. Slowly, Sparkle started to push don harder and harder with her leg.

"The only way this can work is if you're awake, so maybe pain will help!"

Cicada wasn't listening to the empress as she tried to free her leg. Eventually the queen cried out in pain. It was loud enough that Sparkle quickly pulled her hoof away and turned to look at the iron door. Within seconds, It was opened by the guard that had led her down.

"What happened? I heard somepony yell."

Sparkle waved her hoof at him. "Sorry, I pushed her a little too hard. "Nothing I can't fix when we get back home. If you don't mind, I think it's time for us to leave."

The guard nodded and let the empress leave. After about one or two minutes, The pony grabbed Cicada, and led her away from the room to where ever Sparkle was headed for.

The null stone on Cicada's magic suppressor had been replaced by a gem so she could cast just one spell. The princesses had come to make sure nothing went wrong. Twilight's friends had also come and Spike was next to them holding Lila so she couldn't help.

“Now come on. Cast your portal spell so we can get home and fix things. Remember, that gem will only allow you one spell, so I suggest you do it.”

Cicada frowned. She started to cast the spell, when Lila broke her concentration. Over to the side, Lila was flapping almost uncontrollably. Spike was trying hard to stop her but at one point he had to let go of her with one hand to shield his face.

“What’s going on with Lila?” Cicada exclaimed. “Is she okay?”

Sparkle made Cicada shut up. “Can you try and get her pet to quiet down? She might not be able to cast the spell with all that noise.”

The alicorn looked from Cicada, to the bird, and quickly back to Cicada. Her eyes widened and she quickly went over to Spike. “Here, let me help.”

As Sparkle helped Spike, Cicada looked at the others, but her gaze fell on Fluttershy who was also trying to get the queen’s attention, albeit, quieter. The pegasus pointed back and forth between her neck and her head. She stopped immediately when Sparkle started to come back.

“Well, now that she’s quiet, do you want to open the portal now?” Sparkle asked.

Cicada ignored her, trying to figure out what Fluttershy had been trying to tell her. Not realizing she was doing it, the changeling did the same motions as Fluttershy. Sparkle looked at her, horrified as she watched Cicada try and figure it out. When the queen did it a second time, she placed her hoof on her neck and kept it there as her eyes widened.

“Shields up!” Sparkle called, putting a shield between her and Cicada.

Before any of the others reacted, colored flames covered Cicada’s horn for a split second, and the magic suppressor fell to the ground. Before anypony could try to attack her without her horn, the queen quickly made it appear again.

Cicada put up a shield of her own, but instead of keeping it around herself, she expanded it, shoving everypony into the walls. Using the shock from the attack, Lila flew out from Spike’s grip and towards Cicada. The changeling Put up a circle of fire as Sparkle got closer. It went up right before anypony else could enter the area.

Sparkle nodded with her eyes closed. “You’re right. This is just between us.” The Alicorn opened her eyes back up, revealing them to be gold instead of purple, earning gasps from everyone, even Cicada.

The alicorn let off a powerful blast, sending Cicada to the edge of the circle. Sparkle walked up to Cicada. “Stop hiding and fight yourself. I know you can hear me in there.”

Before Cicada could respond, Lila flew in and attacked Sparkle. “That stupid bird again! First when we were at that house and then at the castle!”

Taking the distraction as an advantage, Cicada blasted Sparkle in her chest the same place Cicada had when this whole journey had first begun. “That’s for hurting me!” She blasted the alicorn again. “That’s for convincing them I was evil.” and she attack one final time, this time making Sparkle break the fire barrier. “And that’s for killing my sister!”

Cicada’s hair started to lower a bit from become more like an aura than just hair when she cast her previous spell. Glaring at the alicorn, Cicada was taken aback when she started to laugh.

“I-I knew you were in there! Thinking your host was strong enough to not need your help. Looks like you were wrong. And that’s all I needed!”
Sparkle sent a spell directly towards Cicada’s horn. It hit the very tip, and her purple aura started to slowly turn to green.

Cicada let out a blood curling scream as the two colors of magic shifted from purple and green to white and black respectively. Random spells started to fire off in every direction. In some odd coincidence, a portal spell was fired off, followed shortly thereafter by Sparkle’s dark spell. The portal changed from green to dark purple, creating a pathway back to their world. Lila tried to stop the flow of magic between the two rulers, but couldn’t get near enough to help. As Cicada continued to scream in pain, no pony did anything to help. But someone did.

Spike ran towards Sparkle and shoved her as hard as he could. The alicorn was pushed straight into the portal, knocking Lila in there as well. From the momentum of the push, Spike slammed into a column which in turn push him back towards and into the portal.

At that point, Cicada had gotten back up, and while still dizzy, made her way into the portal to follow the others. Before anypony else could make a move, the portal closed and a new one opened up. A new being none of them had seen before stepped out. Instead of speaking, she spoke to them in their minds.

‘My name is Lucia. None of you will really know who or what I am, but I must tell you that you have all been put into grave danger.’

Back home again

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Cicada tumbled out of the portal and into a wall. “Stupid portals! Again with the wall?”

She looked around and saw Sparkle was nowhere to be seen, but one of her shoes had come off and was laying on the ground. Cicada decided she wasn’t going to risk being seen and disguised herself as Fireworks. She hoped the alicorn wouldn’t be able to figure it was her at least long enough for her to get Lila and get out.

After a few steps she found Lila had come out from the portal in such a way she fell behind a rock. With her was Spike and both were currently out cold. Cicada started to walk around the area the had come out in. At first she thought they were just in a cave, but as the queen walked around, she thought it to be more like a cavern.

At one point, Cicada found herself on a ledge of a pony made cavern as she could tell from all the marks on the edges, revealing that it wasn’t natural at all. Looking away from the wall, this part of the cavern was filled with various equipment. Not seeing anyone looking in her direction, Cicada went back and grabbed Lila and Spike. She brought out her normal wings instead of pegasi wings and flew down to the bottom of the cavern.

Upon reaching the ground, she shapeshifted her bug like wings away and hid her two friends. Cicada started to walk towards one of the stations, but hid at the last second when she saw Sparkle talking to one of the ponies there.

“We’ve been working as best we can here, but while you’ve been gone, there was a… situation at the capital. Fortunately, we were able to finish our first project.”

Cicada paid so much attention to the small meeting that she didn’t see another pony walk up behind her.

“Hey, what are you doing here? I don’t remember a pony like you in this place before.”
Sparkle came over to Cicada and the other pony. Before anypony could ask why she was and why she was there she gave her answer.

“My name is Fireworks I happened upon this place while in the mountains. And I must say, I didn’t expect to see you Empress Sparkle. Where did you disappear to? There were rumors around where I live that you were dead, or at least imprisoned.”
Cicada felt nervous but tried not to let it show. She hoped the ponies here would buy her story. Fortunately, she had lucked out.

“She’s right.” The pony who had seen her said. “We were worried and had to hide out operations here from the guards.”
Sparkle looked confused. “Why would the guards attack this place? You help create their weapons and other items.”

Before the empress could get an answer, there was a yell from across the cavern. “They found us! Get out! Changeling raid!”
Ponies everywhere were running about the place, trying to escape. Many objects were knocked over, and a large vat of a gel like substance fell right near Cicada. The gel covered the changeling and she couldn’t get out. Instead to changeling guards pulled her out while another found Lila and Spike.

The three of them were put in a steel cage along with Sparkle who was wearing a magic suppressor on her horn. The cage, which was more of a metal box, started to move and the four occupants started to head to an unknown location.

Cicada didn’t know how long she had slept, but by the time she woke up, they had stopped moving. Both Lila and Spike had woken up. The doors of the box had opened and multiple changelings in armor were standing on the outside. Three of them stepped in and grabbed Sparkle. The empress tried to fight back, but she was stopped.

Two more grabbed Cicada, one of them quickly placing a suppressor on her horn. The queen was confused at first, but then she noticed she was still a pony. She tried to change back, but something was stopping her.

Cicada was able to briefly turn her head around and see Lila riding on the last guard’s helmet while he watched Spike. The guards taking her made Cicada keep facing forward, so she could make sure the were okay.

Before long, Cicada realized they were in Sparkle’s castle. When they reached the throne room, the throne itself was empty.

“Your highness, we found the ponies’ operations in the mountains to the north. We also happen to find that former Empress Sparkle was there.”

A voice from behind the throne asked, “And what happened there?”

“We captured her along with another pony, a dragon, and your sister’s pet.”

Both Cicada’s and Sparkle’s eyes widened. Nymph walked forward and sat in the throne. She looked at the beings in front of her. The changeling waved her hoof beckoning the nightshade phoenix. Lila flew to Nymph and landed on her head.

“How are you still alive? I ordered the guards to have you killed.” Sparkle yelled.

A few of the changeling guards who had spears or swords held them up the former empress. Nymph made them lower their weapons and she walked up to the alicorn. “The second you left, I was able to escape. Without you, it was actually very easy to win. I’ve already won over land from each of the ambassadors, and the changeling army is gaining more each day, pushing all the ponies out of the country.”

Cicada looked scared. What had happened to Nymph? They had planned earlier that the pony citizens would be treated well until it was deemed right to make them leave. There’s no way the ponies could have even prepared to be forced out of their homes, and who knows how far they were going.

Nymph turned her head to look and Lila. “What happened to Cicada? Why are you here and she’s not.”

Lila flapped her wings and went over to Cicada and started to fly in a circle around her. Nymph summoned the bird back and she landed on the changeling. Nymph walked over to Cicada with one of the angriest looks the queen had ever seen on her face.

“Piller! Cat!” Nymph barked. “Take her to be executed.”

“No!” Cicada cried. The two guards grabbed her as she tried to run towards her sister. Lila looked shocked too and was about to fly to follow when Nymph pulled her away while she walking in the other direction.

“Now don’t worry, we’ll watch from a bit further away.” She nodded to two guards as she passed them, and the changelings took Sparkle to a jail cell to stay.

Cat pushed Cicada into the execution room. A window could be seen near the top of the opposite wall from where Cicada had come in for viewing. Currently it was empty, but the queen thought that Nymph would be there shortly with Lila. She tried to think of a way to get out of this, but Piller gave her another shove disrupting her train of thought.

The door slammed behind Cicada as she fell to the ground. She lifted herself up and started spitting out the dirt from her mouth and rubbing it from her eyes. When Cicada could see again, she used her hoof to try and dig at the ground, but under about two inches of dirt there was a stone floor.

Suddenly, the wall to her left gave a hissing sound. The seam to a door appeared and opened. A new changeling came in, this one not in armor. Instead he had distinguishing features like red orb like eyes and orange tinted fin like hair.

He closed the door behind him and it disappeared back into the wall. The changeling walked over to Cicada as she watched him, and when he was close enough, he yanked her upright to stand next to him.

‘Nettle’ Cicada thought, looking at his cracked horn. Nettle caught her staring at it and hit her across the face.

“So why are you here instead of Sparkle? You must have done something horrible to be executed before her.”

The truth hit Cicada hard. She has know why she came here, but she didn't accept that her sister would do it until just then. There was no way she could get out of it, especially since she couldn't change back to normal. The only way there was a chance she could escape was if Cicada could take barely any damage from what was supposed to hurt her, and that was only if the disguise would take it instead and disappear.

Then, the queen thought of a new idea. She raced toward the last wall and crashed into it. The second she could, cicada raced back and slammed into the wall Nettle had come from. When Cicada tried to slam herself against the other wall again, Nettle stopped her.

“What do you think you’re doing?” He yelled at her. Cicada tried to push him away, but the changeling kept his grip.

“Nettle, just let me go.” Cicada told him. In shock he did just that.

“H-how do you know my name?” Cicada didn’t answer, but kept throwing herself against the walls. “Why are you trying to hurt yourself?”

“Trying to get my disguise to disappear. Yeah I’ll lose it forever, but it’s better than being killed.”

Nettle stopped Cicada again. “You’re crazy, come on!”

Up in the window, Nymph appeared with Lila. The phoenix started to freak out when she saw Cicada in the room below. Nymph paid no attention to the bird, staring down at the scene below. “Almost time…” She mumbled to herself as a door below the window opened with another changeling and a guillotine. It was brought to where Nettle wanted it, then put upright. The changeling that brought it in quickly left Nettle to do his job.

Cicada kept trying to get way, but she couldn’t get out of the changeling’s grasp. “Nettle, please, don’t do this. I’m not a pony!”
Nettle continued getting Cicada set up as he talked to her. “Then why can’t you change back? Even the foals can do that.”

“I don’t know. Lila and Spike went through the portal with Sparkle, then I followed her disguised as this to find out what was going on. Some sort of gel fell on me when the guards came, and I haven’t been able to change back since. Please Nettle, I’m telling the truth!”

“Try and convince me then. I don’t want to keep the queen waiting.”

Cicada tried racking her brain for something to tell Nettle. As she thought, he started to get the guillotine ready. “Uh, we planned the attack on the castle we had before Nymph was captured a month before it happened. We wanted to try and take down the smaller pony bases first and actually get ponies on our side. Thrip once had a crush on a pony but had to take her life to save everyone else.”

Cicada looked at Nettle, but he showed no signs of believing her. Cicada’s brain went on overtime. What could make him believe her more than those facts. As Nettle started to look like he was about to release the blade, Cicada thought of the answer. She yelled it out at the last second. “Locust was going to propose to Nymph in six months or the end of the war, whichever came first!”

Nettle’s eyes widened, but he had just let go of the rope keeping the blade up. He quickly thrust his hoof towards Cicada’s head. The wood keeping her head from moving out of the way of the blade broke and the blade missed Cicada. Unfortunately, Nettle hadn’t pulled his hoof back in time and it sliced most of his leg off.

Blood started to ooze onto the dirt. Nettle felt to the ground, screaming in pain. Cicada was glad she was a unicorn at the time. Nettle, though in pain, helped take the suppressor of her horn and the queen was able to start using healing spells. She wasn’t that good at healing, but Cicada was attempting to help mend his bone and reconnect Nettles nerves to the leg.

Cicada had trouble when she heard a shattering noise from above. She quickly glanced to see the window’s glass was cracked with a hoof shaped mark where the cracking started.

When Nettle was patched up as well as the queen could manage, she helped him to the door she had come in. He was about to help her open it when it was opened from the other side. It slammed into the two of them, throwing them to the ground. Nymph was on the other side, and used her magic to pick both of them up, taking them elsewhere.

BGI'P VGQQU, UGC'SS BLD OGGI DIGCEF.

Make her believe

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“Nymph, let us go!” Cicada exclaimed as the new queen kept carrying her and Nettle.

“I am Queen Nymph! And for the same reason you were to be executed! If my sister wasn’t dead, you would just be sent north.”

At that point, Nettle spoke up. “So you’re saying a changeling would kill their own ruler?”

Nymph turned to look at him, her face filled with rage. “She’s a pony! Can’t you see that?! We’ve never changed into ponies because of what their kind has done to us! The only one on our side was killed by her own kind! Why do you think a changeling would willingly disguise themselves as a pony?”

Cicada looked at Nymph. Her sister’s side left side was facing her, and she was just close enough to the lower part of Nymph’s ribs that she might be able to escape the new queen’s magic. Cicada whipped her head to the right so her horn jabbed Nymph’s side. Her guess had been a bit off, and her horn seemed to have made her sister bleed a little, but the changeling dropped her prisoners as her magic flickered from the jab.
Nymph put a hoof to her side, looking at it surprise, and then moving her gaze to Cicada with the same expression.

“How did you…” She started to say, but shook her head and got up, her horn started to glow again, and summoned a small dagger.

Cicada’s eyes widened in panic. Her sister had learned how to summon magic weapons in the time she was gone. Or possibly before then and never used it. Either way, weapons like those were rumored to be able to kill even alicorns. Changelings were obviously not immortal, so it was easy for Nymph to kill her with it.

Nymph was about to lunge at Cicada when something fell on top of her. The real queen stepped back as her sister fell to the ground. A tired looking Lila flew down from the ceiling, and perched herself on Cicada. From on top of Nymph, Spike waved. “I thought you said changelings were good here?”

Cicada gave a sad nod. “They usually are, but I have no idea what happened to my sister.” She quickly lifted her head in shock. “Wait a second, I thought the other guards were going to lock you up. How the hay did you get out?”

Spike pointed to the navy blue phoenix. “Lila got me out, though she did have trouble keeping Sparkle in. She also carried me up into the air so we could stop your sister and would have let me go sooner, but held of as I wasn’t sure if I was high enough yet.”

Spike looked at Nymph, and asked if she was going to be okay. Cicada shrugged at the dragon, and picked her sister up to find a bed or something soft so she could lay down the changeling. Nettle helped by showing them where Nymph slept now and the five of them were soon in the royal bedroom.

At first, Cicada didn’t know where to put Nymph down because there were two beds, but Nettle explained the new queen took the slightly smaller one of the two. Cicada took her sister to the bed and tucked her in carefully.

“So, what happened while I was gone? I suspect now that we finally won the war that Locust proposed.”
Nettle shook his head. “No, he went missing right after Nymph was captured by Sparkle. When anyling asks about him, she goes awkwardly silent.”

Cicada still looking at Nymph asked. “Nymph got captured? What do you mean?”

“When you didn’t come back, she went to look for you. The empress captured her and she was gone for a few days. She got back out the day Empress Sparkle disappeared and was able to take down most of her forces.”

Spike looked at Nettle. “Woah, really? That’s impressive!”

Nettle shrugged. “Well, there were ponies who wondered about that happened to their ruler, though the majority were thinking of rebelling since the empress had been the reason that the war had been going on for so long. With her gone, storming the castle easy because of her being the main reason of previous failures.”

Finally, Cicada walked over to a window in the room. Both she and Lila, who was still perched on her back, looked out and gave a little smile. “Well, at least Nymph did one good thing while we were gone. It looks a bit nicer here.”

Spike looked over to them. “Really? Can I see?”

He ran to join them when Cicada waved him over. The window was high enough that he could barely see out and look at the city. Nettle walked over and helped lift the dragon up.

Spike looked out, eager to see the city, but his ears drooped down as he viewed it. the sky was how Cicada had explained it to him and his friends before. The sun and moon were on opposite sides of the horizon, leaving the sky a purple and slightly pink color. Many of the houses in the city looked old and unlived in, but he could see various changelings going in and out of them.

“Look at that,” Cicada said, pointing out the window. “They’ve been fixing the place up a bunch. It actually looks like the houses here aren’t condemned. Though, that just might be since I’m seeing it from the castle instead.”

Spike turned his head to look at Cicada. “You mean this is supposed to be better?!”

Nettle gave an equally confused look. “Why does he think this isn’t better?”

Cicada gave the changeling and explanation of the other Equestria and how they had never been in a war there, at least not recently. Nettle tried to argue saying it couldn’t be true, but Spike backed her up.

“There is no way that Sparkle could be good. She’s pure evil!” Nettle shouted. “She was raised by Celestia, who might have been more evil than her if not as evil. She enslaved us all, even some of the ponies wanted to rebel. And then here you are saying she’s good somewhere?!”

“Nettle! It’s completely different there. Besides, She and I were almost friends here. I wish I knew what changed her, but I don’t.”
At that point, Spike spoke up again. “So what exactly is she like? I haven’t gotten to see her that much. Well, other than her mainly pretending not to.”

One of Cicada’s eyes gave a small twitch, much like if she winced. “She… Well, back when we were younger, we were friends. After Celestia stopped coming to visit my mom, I never got to see her. The next time we ever met was… well…” She sighed. “Selena had taken me to meet with her sister, for one last chance at letting our societies merge. Her sister lashed out and the two battled each other. When Selena fell and gave her magic to me with her last breath, in the corner of my eye I saw Celestia collapse too.”

At that point, Cicada gave a small choking sound. “I looked up to see Twilight behind her, Her horn smoking as well as this weird purple smoke dissipating from around her eyes. She used dark magic to defeat Celestia, and took the alicorn’s magic as well. The Twilight I had known wasn’t there anymore. In place of the friendly unicorn I had met was a murderous alicorn, with an unstoppable thirst for power.”

Spike had covered his mouth in shock at the story, but Nettle looked even more shocked. Cicada had once said she didn’t want to talk of the subject of how Selena had died, and here she was, explaining what had happened and even saying that the evil empress Sparkle had once been her friend.

“Why finally tell that story now?” Nettle asked. “What makes him special?”

Cicada’s cheeks puffed up. “I was stuck for over a week in an entirely different Equestria, and he and Lila were the only beings there I felt I could always trust as I’ve not seen them as evil here.”

“And why didn’t you go find any changelings there instead.”

“Because they’re evil there!” Cicada yelled at the top of her lungs. “I was scared and alone. He was the first one I felt I could try to trust and especially after it seemed everyone else betrayed me. Now even my sister seems to have turned on me, though she does have the excuse of me being a pony right now.”

Spike wrung his hands. “Um… Should we maybe talk about something el-”

Before Spike could finish, Cicada suddenly burst out crying, catching everyone off guard. She cried out about how she wished something big would work out for once. Lila and Spike tried to calm her down. Nettle would have too, but near them, Nymph was starting to stir.

He tried to stop her from waking up enough for her to be able to fully react to Cicada being there. As she tried to get up, the changeling mumbled Cicada’s name. Nymph shook her head slightly, trying to clear her vision. It was still blurry as she looked at Cicada. The color of the mane and tail reminded her of her sister, but the body color seemed more like a pony. It also seemed like Lila might be there, willingly next to the pony.
Nymph shook her head again and saw the pony she had wanted executed, but escaped with Nettle. The traitor was trying to hold her down as well but the queen easily pushed him away into the wall.

Nymph fluttered out of bed and landed next to Cicada, pushing away Spike and carefully moving Lila away. “You stupid pony! Why even come in here?” She waited for some kind of answer, but all she got was sobbing. “Come on! Say Something!”

Nymph picked Cicada up in her magic and slapped her multiple times. “You cry almost as much as my sister does when she finally takes a moment to. And she at least has reason to unlike all of you pony scum!”

When Cicada still didn’t say anything, Nymph threw her across the room. Without giving her time to recover, the queen started to come towards her with a murderous look in her eyes. Cicada coughed a few times, with blood spattering out. She tried to say something, sounding almost like a song.

“To the... indoo-” She tried to say in between coughs and crying.

Nymph faltered at the tune. It was familiar. She had made it up herself when she was little. That second she stopped allowed Nettle to grab the queen and keep her from advancing any further.

“Nymph, that’s Cicada! Leave her alone.” He shouted at her.

Nymph stared at her sister in horror at what she had almost done. She teared up thinking about it, but kept from crying. She didn't want to believe it, but the truth was staring at her in the face.

FRJJU FGSLBRUO

A change back

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Nymph had locked herself in her bedroom and asked Nettle to take Cicada to the infirmary. Two changeling twins named Azuli and Rosa were currently in the infirmary to take care of any injured changelings.

The two of them started to patch Cicada up, even able to finish healing the last of her burn from Sparkle. Spike, Nettle and Lila waited outside until the two medics let Cicada out.

She looked and felt a little weak, but she was still able to walk. Nettle helped her leave the area with Spike helping out as well.

Eventually, Nettle led them all to the large dining room of the castle. The room was had white walls adorned with gold and sometimes a bit of purple. The floor was of the finest of marbles. The ceiling was tiled with marble and basalt in a checkerboard pattern. At the end of the room was a set of double doors with a circular window in both of them revealing what must have been the kitchen with all of its magically powered ovens and what not. Each of them taking seat on velvet plush-cushions near the closer end of the large mahogany dining table sitting in the center of the dining room. Nettle called for a servant and soon a changeling wearing an apron came through the doors leading to the kitchen.

The changeling started over toward Nettle, but trotted over quickly when he saw Cicada. The servant whispered something in Nettle’s ear. He answered out loud, “Oh, don’t worry Cricket, that’s Cicada. She just can’t change back for some reason.” Cricket whispered something to Nettle again, while giving Cicada a sideways glance. “Well, she ended up going to an opposite version of our world where ponies are nice but are scared of changelings after they attacked one of their cities or something like that.”

Spike nudged Cicada, asking why Cricket was whispering. “Well, he’s rather shy. He even whispers instead of talking if it’s just his friends around.”

“Wow, he sounds worse than Fluttershy.” Spike remarked.

Cicada gave a half-hearted laugh. She didn’t feel like telling Spike that Cricket used to speak normally around the changelings he knew well before he met this world’s Fluttershy. Now he couldn’t help but whisper.

“Anyways, Cricket is here to ask what we want to eat for dinner.” Nettle explained. “I’ll just have my usual, thanks.”

Cicada ordered herself a sandwich and a small dish of meat for Lila. Spike said he would eat just about any food, but if it was possible, he’d like a few gemstones.

“I heard dragons liked gemstones, but I didn’t think it was real.” Nettle commented after Cricket left with their orders. “There are enough around this place that he should be able to round up a couple for you.”

A few minutes later, Cricket came back with their orders. Cicada got a turkey sandwich, Lila received a bit of cooked rat meat while Nettle had a plate of various crackers and an orange. Spike was given a sandwich similar to Cicada’s, but with a few gems in it as well. Nettle grabbed his orange and was about to throw it away before Lila hissed at him.

“Nettle, if all you’ve been eating are crackers then you really should consider having that orange, too. Just because we couldn’t have them before, doesn’t mean we still shouldn’t.”

The changeling glared at her before peeling the fruit, splitting it in half and shoving one of them in his mouth. He bit down, reacting only a few seconds later to the bitter taste. Cicada fell of her pillow, unable to contain her laughter, just as she saw Nettle stuffed some crackers in his mouth, too. As soon as the queen finally manage to contain her laughter, merely giggling at the scene that had transpired merely seconds earlier, she got back onto her cushion and took a bite of her sandwich to calm down the rest of the way.

“You know, Nettle, most eat them one slice at a time for a reason...” Cicada told him after she swallowed in a teasing manner. In response, Nettle just grumpily chewed on his crackers while he glared at her. If glares could kill, this one would do some serious damage to Cicada, Nettle still a bit annoyed with the whole orange deal.

By the time most of them had finished eating, Rosa and Azuli joined them along with another changeling named Lavanda.

“Ma’am, we went to talk with our cousin…”

“...About something we noticed while healing you…”

“...We questioned some of the captured ponies…”

“...We believe that we can help you with your ‘pony’ problem.”

Cicada looked at Lavanda. The queen always had a little bit of trouble following what the twins said, mostly because they liked to speak as one, continuing of where the other one left.

“Apparently the gel like substance you mentioned was something the ponies were making for changelings to keep them from being able to shapeshift. They were going to start putting them in the magic suppressors so that even if we got them off, we couldn’t escape once we were in the dungeons.”

Cicada didn’t know exactly how to respond. She was happy that they could fix her shapeshifting problem, but worried about what might happen to other changelings. There were still ponies that escaped the lab and some of them might have a way to make more of the gel.

“So, what do we need to do to fix this?” Cicada asked.

“Well, we’re not exactly sure.” Lavender started, only for the twins to take over.

“We have a couple of theories…”

“...Until we try them out…”

“...We can’t be sure that they’ll work.”

Cicada put her head in her hooves to think. “Fine, we can try them all out, but leave the talking to Lavanda, got it?”

Azuli and Rosa nodded their heads before leading Cicada away. After she was gone, Spike looked awkwardly at Nettle. The room was silent except for Lila attacking the last of the changeling’s orange.

“So, um, how are you doing?”

“Okay, so what should I do?” Cicada asked Lavanda.

“Well, currently we don’t know exactly how it’s affecting you. You might not be able to change into yourself, but you’re bigger than a pony.”

“So, you’re saying i should make myself smaller like a filly?”

All three of the changelings nodded. Cicada tried, but nothing happened. They asked if she could try to change to a pony filly, since she was currently a pony. Still, there was no effect.

“Alright, have you tried to make a portal yet? It could be like a null stone and make it so you can’t use any changeling magic at all.”

Cicada tried, and a portal appeared in front of her. At the same time, a second one appeared across the room. Lavanda started to pace around, grumbling at the unyielding puzzle, “I don’t get it. Somehow this stuff only stops you from using your changing abilities, but not blocking any other forms of magic, which is a bit odd considering that they wanted it to work well enough to capture us, it would have need to stop it all.”

“Well, why can’t we…”

“...Try and look at…”

“...The stuff that’s making her…”

“...Unable to change back?”

Cicada glared at Azuli and Rosa, but Lavanda voiced her agreement cutting out the queen before she had time to voice her displeasure. She tried multiple times until she got some sample of the gel. The changeling got a microscope out and put the sample under it. She tried to figure out exactly what it did, and after a while, Lavanda perked up and walked back over.

“All we should have to do is get the dried gel off of you and you should be able to change back. The gel seems to be strong, but if we can make it absorb water, it shouldn’t be hard to wipe it all off.”

Turns out she was wrong, very wrong. Even after the gel has absorbed a bunch of water, it was still hard to get off. By the time all of the gel was off Cicada, she had basically be rubbed raw. After they let her soak a bit more, Cicada waved goodbye to the changelings and thanked them for their help.

It wasn’t long before Cicada found herself meeting up with Nettle, Spike and Lila. Spike ran over and hugged her when he saw she was back to normal.

“Please don’t leave us without you again.” He whispered. “It’s really weird to be alone with him.”
Cicada laughed, but then walked the rest of the way to Nettle. “Has Nymph come out yet?” The changeling shook his head. “Please see if you can get her to come out. In the meantime, do you know where the dungeons are? I’d like to have a chat with one of the ponies down there.”

check back in this spot later

Lots of Yelling (un-edited)

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The dungeon door slammed open. Many of the ponies looked up to see who it was. Most were expecting to see the new changeling queen, but were surprised to see Cicada. The started to whisper, but Cicada quickly silenced them. She kept walking towards a cell with a purple figure in it.

“Twilight… We need to talk.”

Many of the ponies shrunk back in their cells at the alicorn’s name. Sparkle was looking away and answered without trying to make eye contact. “So the new queen finally turned the tables.”

“I wouldn’t say new, but I guess I was replaced for a short time.” Cicada answered back.

Sparkle turned to look at the changeling. At first she was shocked, but then grew angry. “No wonder you called me Twilight. No one else ever does. Anyway, how did you even find your way back here. Did you finally find out what dark magic spell to use with your changeling portals? I actually should applaud you for actually using one.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Though it’s good to know how to get Spike back home, I actually used the same portal as you.”

“WHAT?!” Sparkle yelled. “If you had, you would be dead by now!”

“Well you seemed to like me earlier.” Cicada answered, changing into Fireworks again.

“I thought you made a law against anything like that!” Sparkle growled.

“No, I removed that law. But all the changelings still think of it as a law, which is why no one does it.”

Sparkle was silent for a while. Staying silent even as Cicada opened the cell and brought her out. The two left to go to the cell area which had higher security. They entered the first one and Cicada was about to slightly push her in when she noticed a large red area on the floor.

“What’s that?” Cicada said, looking at the spot.

Sparkle started to smile evilly. “Oh yes. That is fairly recent. You know, your sister was the last one in here, and that wasn’t there when she first came in.”

In the blink of an eye, Cicada had Sparkle against the wall, one of her legs on the empress’ neck. “What in Tartarus did you do to her?!”

“Oh, nothing directly to her, but you may want to ask what happened to that changeling that came to ‘save her’ after she tried to find you.”

Cicada’s horn lit up. “What did you do to Locust?!”

“Oh, was that his name? Emphasis on was.”

Cicada blasted Sparkle and headed for the door before the alicorn could recover. “I can’t believe I thought of you as a friend once, Sparkle!”

The door slammed and Twilight’s eyes widened. She started to cry before her violet eyes turned golden and her tears evaporated. Sparkle clenched her teeth before yelling as loud as she possibly could, reaching all the way to the occupants of the normal dungeon.

Cicada quickly made her way back to Nettle, Spike and Lila. Without giving them a chance to speak, she asked Nettle where a full bathroom was that she could be left alone in. He told her about one near the bedroom her sister was in and the queen quickly made a portal there. She looked at the different doors in the hall before finding the bathroom and entering it.

She locked the door behind her and started to run a bath in the large tub there. Before the bottom of the tub had a full layer of water, someling knocked on the door.

“What is it?” Cicada asked, trying to sound nicer that she felt right then.

“Sorry to bother you ma’am, but there is something I would like to discuss. is it possible for me to ask you through the door?”

Cicada sighed before accepting the proposal, but only once the bath was fully run so it would be easier for the two of them to talk with each other. Cicada chose to only fill it most of the way, leaving the tap on a low flow so she could still talk to the changeling at the door while the tub filled the rest of the way.

“So, who is talking?” Cicada asked.

“Oh, sorry, I thought we were still going to wait. My name is Leaftier. I was one of the guards searching for pony colonies still in Equestria. My team recently found another group in the forest nearby.” The changeling answered.

“I remember you.” Cicada commented. “You only recently were made head of your own team. You’re currently the only female field leader since we pulled many of the leaders for my own team.”

“Yes, that is me. I was wondering what we should do with them. Your orders were to send them either to the far north, but since they’re so close, we could just put them in the dungeons, though we are running low on room down there.”

Cicada was confused. She never ordered something like that. And she couldn’t think of anyling who would. She shut the water of and got out of the bathtub. She quickly grabbed a robe and went to the door.

“Who ordered that?” Cicada asked as she fumbled with the lock.

“Well you did. Shortly after reclaiming the castle and Equestria.”

Finally, the door opened. Cicada looked at Leaftier, and the leader looked at the queen. Her eyes widened, and then she corrected herself. “Make that your sister.”

“Find an area to make a large pony colony. We’ll send all the ponies there and figure out who is good and who is not. In the meantime, I’m going to see if Nymph really decided that, because I know my sister, and I can’t think of any reason why she would decide to do that.”

Leaf nodded, but asked if Cicada wanted to finish her bath first. Cicada looked at the steam over the warm water, and gave a nod.

“Fine, but while I do that, I want you to find a way to keep anyling from coming to this hallway unless they absolutely have to, because if something goes wrong, I don’t want anyling hurt from our argument.”

Leaftier quickly nodded. The two sisters didn’t argue much, but no one wanted to be around the few times they did. The changeling quickly made a portal that she could barely fit into and traveled to another part of the castle.

Cicada closed the door after the guard left and then grabbed a large bath bomb Sparkle had left and threw it in the water. It quickly made the tub filled with a navy color and was filled with sparkles. The queen dipped herself in as she thought about what could have really happened. She stared into the water for a while before she thought she saw eyes in the water. Cicada almost jumped out when she saw them but relaxed when the quickly went away. She waved it off as her reflection and that she just saw her eyes, and that the differences she saw was just from the odd color from the water and it moving around.

When the queen finished up, she quickly drained the tub. She thought she saw her reflection again, but when she tried to see it, the rest of the water drained out and the bathtub was fully empty.

As Cicada left the bathroom, she couldn’t help feeling those weren’t her eyes she saw. but if they weren’t hers, she must just be imagining them. She thought about it for a few more seconds before she suddenly heard Leaf again.

{Anyling on level three near hallway seven should exit the area unless it is of the utmost importance they stay there. Those who must stay there should remember to be cautious at all times while near there.}

Cicada turned and looked around for the source of Leaf’s voice. Finally, she saw a speaker in the corner of the room. Leaftier must have found the control room for the speakers and broadcast from that place. Not wanting Nymph to leave if from hearing that, the queen went straight for the bedroom her sister was in.

Upon entering the room Cicada saw that Nymph was asleep, most likely from crying herself to exhaustion. Cicada carefully shook her sister awake. She quickly created a small portal back to the bathroom and retrieved a glass of water for her sister.

Nymph reluctantly woke up, but quickly took the drink. She quickly gulped it down and rested for a few seconds before asking Cicada why she came back in there.

“Well, first of all, I wanted to see how you were doing.”

“Eh, I’m tired. I guess that comes from crying yourself to sleep. I’m still so sorry about what happened.” Nymph apologised.

“Don’t worry. It’s not like it hasn’t happened already.” Nymph glared at her sister. “Okay, fine, nothing exactly like this happened, but I did get put in the dungeon back in the other Equestria.”

Nymph questioned Cicada about what happened there, but the queen wouldn’t answer. “First, I want to know what you know about sending the ponies to the north. The far north. I know many of them were fine with Sparkle and supported her, but not all of them. There were a whole ton escaped changeling slaves talked about that wanted Sparkle out of the throne just as much as us.”

Before answering, Nymph noticed something. “You’re not calling her Twilight anymore?”

“No, I’m not. We can talk about it later, but I want to hear your answer first.”

“About sending the ponies north? Yeah, I ordered that once we got Equestria back.” Nymph answered easily.

Cicada was surprised by the answer. “Why… would you do that?!”

“You were gone, and we’ve been at war with ponies for years now. Too many have died to them!” Nymph exclaimed.

“And all the most important ones died to one pony, who many hated having as a leader.”

“Oh, so it was only Sparkle who did anything wrong?”

“No! I’m not saying that! But not all ponies were to blame. We’ve put changelings in jail which goes to show all of a species are not going to be the same.”

“The ponies betrayed some of their own kind!” Nymph retorted.

Cicada shook her head. “No, Thestrals have always seen themselves as separate, much like how Hippogriffs separate themselves from griffons.”

“She killed Locust!”

“I KNOW!” Cicada yelled.

Nymph took a step back at her sister’s exclamation. “You think that one changeling matters more than a whole species. Maybe I should have taken you out on missions more often. You could have learned that they are so much like us! Instead, you stayed home and thought as them only as monsters, when maybe you were making yourself into one! What if Twilight were a hero? What if Pinkie was a friend? What if Fluttershy was kind? What if Rarity and Applejack were there to help? Even I would prefer Rainbow Dash OVER YOU!”

The two sisters started at each other. Nymph looked like she was on the verge of tears while Cicada looked like she was about to tear her sister to shreds. Then, Nymph lost it.

“I have been alone for years! You always leave! Everyone leaves! I never met Dad, Mom was gone too soon, even Selena was killed by them! Then I finally had someling and he was taken away too!”

“You don’t think that ever happened to me too? You were the only one I had and I was always away. I got to know the ones we loved before they were gone and I was too broken hearted to lose another. You can name only one not in our family that you mourn, but I have six. And it was only four before I left.”

Nymph tensed up. “You never told me! Who were they? How did the last two go?”

“One was you, though I might have actually lose you long before today. The other was a pony. I had him disguised as one of us so he would be left alone. All I know is that I haven’t seen or hear from him since I returned home, and all I can think of, is you found him, and got rid of him.”

Nymph’s face paled. She remembered the pony she was talking about. “Is that why Grub was sick? Because he was actually…?”

“Yes! And though he was really a pony, he was a changeling at heart. There was no reason to harm him, much like the rest of the ponies you’ve punished for doing nothing.”

Nymph tried to say more to answer to Cicada, but the queen wouldn’t listen. She couldn’t believe what her sister had done, and couldn’t tell how long before she could forgive her.

Battle with Friends

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Cicada stomped through the halls, blasting random things as she went. Her mouth was starting to hurt from clenching it. She would have liked to make a portal back to her friends, but she had no idea where they currently were.

There were Changelings who ran into rooms to hide when they either saw or heard her coming. No one wanted to ask what was wrong. The queen looked as if anyone tried to do anything with her, she would explode with an outburst of anger. Normally someling would have been brave enough to try already, but no one had seen her so mad. A few changelings had to make sure it even was Cicada

Eventually, one younger changeling was too scared to run from the hallway when he saw Cicada. He was especially scared when Cicada noticed him and sped up slightly.

“You! Find the changeling Nettle or the dragon Spike. Tell them I’m looking for them.”

The changeling gave a quick nod but stayed in place. “What are you waiting for? LEAVE!”

The changeling started to run as fast as he could. Cicada stood angry for a few more seconds before giving a large sigh. She went up to one of the walls on the side and pressed her head against it. Before long, she could feel something on her shoulder.

“What do you want?” She asked whoever it was. The reply that came was a caw.

Cicada turned her head just enough to see Lila perched on her shoulder. Cicada gave a small smile before turning back to the wall. She kept standing there while changelings started to move through the hallways again. The queen was paying so little attention that she didn’t hear a different set of steps coming her way.

“Hey, Cicada, are you feeling okay?”

Without needing to look at the voice’s owner she knew who it was. “Not really Spike. I could feel better.”

“How about your sister? How is she doing?”

That made Cicada angry again. She started to briskly walk through the halls, making Spike need to jog to keep up with her. Spike asked again and this time Cicada answered. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t have one, not anymore.”

Spike stopped for a second in shock before running to catch up again. “What do you mean, ‘Not anymore.’ Did something happen?”

Cicada nodded, but didn’t answer. Spike could tell he shouldn’t prod her anymore. They walked for a bit more until the changeling Cicada had shouted at earlier found them, following him was Nettle.

“Ma’am, I found the changeling you were looking for. I’m sorry I didn’t find him sooner. It also looks like you already found the dragon you also wanted me to look for.”

“Thank you for finding him, and I’m sorry for yelling at you earlier, I had no real reason to.”

The changeling nodded and left quickly. Nettle was glad he found Cicada again, but was concerned about what happened with Nymph. “How is your sister?”

Cicada growled at him. Spike told him it wasn’t something she wanted to talk about that much. Nettle decided not to ask about it anymore, but made a mental note for later.
“So,” Nettle started. “Why is it you wanted to see me again?”

Cicada sighed. “You know what your job is, I want to know how much you’ve been doing it recently.”

Nettle turned his head away a bit. “Too much recently. I’ve secretly helped a few ponies get away since I didn’t feel that they deserved to die.

Cicada nodded her head. “That’s good. Still, we need to find some place for the ponies to stay until things are settled around here, I don’t want fights to start just because ponies are living near changelings. Nettle, I want you to take the rest of today off, with pay as long as you keep the ponies in the dungeons from being killed.”

“I will, ma’am.” Nettle responded, before running off to follow orders.

“Aww, I was just starting to like him.” Spike said when the changeling was out of view.

That made Cicada smile a little. “Yes, but he still has other things he needs to do, I’m surprised he even stayed that long. Come on, I want to show you around the place.”

But before they could really start, Lila became very tense, as the alarm went off throughout the castle leaving no time for a tour. Cicada placed Spike on her back and created a portal to elsewhere in the castle.

“What’s going on!” Cicada yelled the second she was out of the portal. She was loud enough that Spike’s ears started to ring a little bit.

“A few of the ponies that got away are attacking, ma’am.” Cicada asked how many. “Four ma’am. It’s the ambassadors, though one hasn’t come.”

Cicada nodded grimly. “Keep the dragon safe, I’m going out there.”

The queen put down Spike next to a changeling who presented himself as Willow. The two of them watched as Cicada and Lila left towards the exit leading them to their battle. A changeling to Spike’s right cast a spell on the wall, allowing them to see what Lila was seeing.

Cicada was racing as fast as she could, and eventually decided to start flying. That was a mistake. The second she was in the air, a rainbow blur crashed into her taking both of them down. Rainbow Dash was able to recover before the two of them hit the ground. Lila zoomed after her owner, taking a peck at the pegasus on her way down.

Cicada got back up and took back to the air, zooming towards the pegasus. She created a portal mid air to take her next to Rainbow. The sky blue pegasus sped up and Cicada followed close behind. The two raced for a time before Cicada looked below. Three ponies were following down below, and from their colors, she could tell who they were.

Cicada noticed a blue light heading towards her from the group below. She swerved away at the last second as a bolt of magic whizzed past her. A few more came towards her and the changeling barely dodged the bulk of them while a few nicked her in a few places. One even made it through one of the holes in her legs, making it sting badly. Paying more attention to Rarity’s spells than the pegasus she was tailing, the queen didn’t notice Rainbow’s attack until it had already hit her. Cicada started plummeting back towards the ground, this time with more to worry about.

The queen’s vision was blurry from pain, but she could see the light of more magic bolts heading towards her. Without proper vision, she couldn’t tell where to go to dodge them. Instead, they seemed to suddenly disappear, hitting something else instead. Cicada’s eyes widened as she saw blue flames appear a few feet down.

“What happened?” Spike asked when the image changed to static.

“Lila was killed.” Willow told him. “She was hit by at least ten bolts of magic. Until she regenerates herself from her ashes, we can’t see anything.”

“Well, how long until that happens?”

“It usually doesn’t take long, but she died in the air. Her ashes, while they have magic to help keep close together, will have separated at least a little. Until it’s all back together, she won’t be able to come back.”

“Is there any other way to see what’s going on?” The dragon asked.

“No,” A changeling nearby replied. “We can only hope she can get back here alive. She may be powerful, but it’s still four on one, and she’s not the best at anything she’s doing out there.”

Spike looked at the blank wall, wondering what was going on. How long would the battle take, Who would win it? Cicada was out there risking her life for everyone inside and nopony would help. Finally, he decided enough was enough. Spike had been asked by Twilight to stay home for too long. Sure he was a baby dragon, but he was still older that the Crusaders, and they had done some dangerous things to get their marks. With no time for any of the changelings to stop him, Spike ran to the exit to help his friend.

It didn’t take long before Spike could guess where Cicada was. He could see the magic this world’s Rarity was firing into the air, one disappeared in the air before reappearing, most likely from it passing behind Cicada. Spike ran as fast as he could manage towards the fighting group, but his short legs made him slower than he’d like. Before too long, Spike saw that after his running, he was still closer to where he started than where Cicada was.

The dragon was about to give up when he decided to try something he barely ever did. Spike went on to all fours and ran slightly faster than before. His hands hurt from not being used to it, and his body felt somewhat odd in the position, but it was better than before in speed. It wasn’t long before Spike could tell he was almost there. Just a bit more and then he could start to help.

Spike was mainly focused on running, but finally he noticed there was a magic bolt heading towards him. He stopped and stood up, hoping he could jump out of the way before it hit him. He didn’t.

The bolt went straight past Spike below his feet as he was lifted into the air. Cicada lifted him up and onto her back before soaring back high in the sky. “Spike, why did you come up here?”

“You needed help so I decided to come.” Spike answered. “Besides, they won’t expect a dragon. to help, right?”

“No, they won’t,” Cicada answered back before swerving out of the way of an attack. “But at least one of them must have seen you right before I picked you up. Look, I’m going to have to put you back down soon. If you’re on my back when I get hit, I can’t save you.”

Cicada cast a quick spell on Spike. “There, when you want, you can levitate about an inch off the ground, but you can go about twice as fast as you normally would running.”

Cicada dropped Spike and he started to fall from the sky. He panicked for a few seconds before trying to get his levitating spell to work. He couldn’t tell if it was working until he got closer to the ground. Instead of crashing into the stone paths below him, Spike slowed down to the point he stopped right above the ground.

None of the ponies seemed to notice him, so the dragon raced towards them. Getting close, he spouted fire, catching the ones on the ground with him by surprise. That gave Cicada a chance to go after Rainbow without being impeded.

The pegasus was surprised when she saw Cicada had caught up. The queen tried using magic bolts of her own, but Rainbow swerved out of the way of each attack. Cicada tried to get closer, but she had already strained herself enough. She slowed down to try and make it easier to think, but it helped in a different way. Rainbow Dash noticed her stop and flew towards her instead of away.

Cicada started to charge up her horn, using as much energy she thought wouldn’t hurt her. As soon as Rainbow was close enough that it was impossible to dodge, the queen fired her attack. The pegasus started plummeting toward the ground. Cicada, who had been close enough that she had been hit by some of the spell herself, sped towards the falling mare. She stopped Rainbow before both of them could hit the ground.

Realizing that her opponent was going to be knocked out for awhile, Cicada turned to where Spike was. Her eyes widened when she saw that even though Spike seemed to have doing well at first, Spike now seemed to be losing against these versions of his friends. Not wanting to see him hurt, Cicada created a portal taking her right next to Spike. The second she was through, the queen put up a shield covering both of them before expanding it to push the ponies away.

The three ponies focused on Cicada. She stood ready to fight before her fatigue got the best of her. The changeling crumpled to the ground causing Spike to run and check on her. “No! Get up! You can’t stop now!”

“Aww, lookie there. Your friend can’t help anymore.” Pinkamena laughed. “Too bad, it looked like she would have almost beaten us. But we would get our Empress in the end anyway.”

Spike glared at the pink pony. “No! She would have won! I can do it for her! She’s like how you all are back home! She helps others, like you throw your parties, and she helps the town, and she makes time for others when she can.” Spike yelled as he pointed to Pinkamena, Applejack and Rarity respectively.

When Spike finished, the ponies stepped back cautiously. He was surprised he had done so well at stopping them, but he hadn’t been trying to scare them. He couldn’t figure out what had spooked them until a dark grey hoof appear next to him. Spike looked up to see Cicada was up again.

“You are endangering all of Equestria. I should put you in the dungeon with your Empress. Still, from what I have seen, I believe you should get your pegasus friend over there and leave. You have seen what I can do alone, but I have more powers than you have seen me use today. Nymph was able to win back control of this country and I am more powerful than that. How could you compete!”

The ponies looked in fear at the queen. Her voice was deeper, most likely to seem more threatening, but the changeling was starting to smoke, and her eyes had the faintest glow. The ponies quickly ran to grab Rainbow and left.

Cicada looked at Spike and asked him to run back to the castle and get someling to come and find her. Spike asked why he needed to do that and was answered by Cicada falling again to the ground.

The first thing Cicada felt as she woke up was how sore she was. The queen was in her room. A few pillows were propping her up enough to see various changelings walking around nearby. One seemed to be carrying something on a tray and was heading across the room when he tripped and the tray started to fall.

Cicada tried to use her own magic to save it, but it only lasted a second before the queen had to stop from pain shooting up her horn. A few changelings noticed Cicada’s attempt at saving the tray and went over to her.

“Your highness… your highness! Please respond!” One exclaimed.

Cicada looked at the changeling for a second before saying something. It hurt a little to speak, but mainly because she was sore just about everywhere.

“Please rest my queen. Do not overexert yourself.” Another one of the changelings in the group said.

Cicada glanced upon the concerned frowns of all the changelings surrounding her. She let out a weak smile.

“What, are you talking about? I feel fine.” Cicada lied. Still, she couldn’t let them get worried. Her sis- Nymph wasn’t in a good position to be ruling at the time, and with the ponies left out in Equestria most likely planning to get Sparkle out or at least attack to claim the castle again, she couldn’t afford to just be lying around.

One of the changelings scowled and looked upon Cicada with eyes filled with a mixture and worry.

“You are not alright! You collapsed on the ground and can barely breathe! Please, let us handle the situation from here. I don’t want to see you perish after you have returned to us!” The changeling pleaded with a choked voice.

Cicada shook her head. Yes, she may not be able to use magic right now, and she may be sore, but there was too much she needed to do. She was just one changeling and it wouldn’t kill her if she left. But if she stayed, other changelings might perish instead.

Another changeling approached Cicada with a slow and patient step. He ducked down towards his queen’s level with a gravity of uncertainty pulling him towards her. His eyes began cracking with tears.

“Why? Why do you wish to put yourself through further abuse? It pains us to see you suffering.” Clasping his front hooves around Cicada’s left hoof, he asked with a soft voice.

“Look, we are in a dangerous time, others have died protecting us and if needed, I’ll do the same. Still, I won’t do that much, I just need to take care of a few loose ends.” Cicada started to get out of her bed. She shakily took a few steps before she felt dizzy and weak.

The changelings around her jolted upwards and shrieked in panic. Two changelings brought their front hooves around Cicada’s shoulders, supporting her weight and preventing her from falling.

“Easy my queen.” One of the changelings said with a hushed voice.

“You have been in bed for a while. You need time to readjust your muscles.” Another of the changelings warned.

“I-I’m fine.” Cicada tried to tell them. “I-I just need something to eat, that’s all. And maybe a little to drink.”

“We would be glad to provide you with what you need my queen. However, be aware that you are walking in a weakened state.” A changeling stated.

“I get that!” Cicada shouted, before she stormed out of the room. The queen walked quickly at first. She tried flying, but her wings felt stiff. She wanted to make a portal away, but she knew magic would be hard to use right then. As Cicada brisked through the hallway her mind started to wander. What had happened? How had she gotten in this condition? Yes, straining one’s magic could be dangerous, but parts of this didn’t fall under the line of effects from using too much magic.

Last thing she could remember before passing out was creating a quick forcefield around Spike to- Spike! She had forgotten about him. The queen wanted to race back to the bedroom and ask the changelings there where he was, but she didn’t want to be near them again. Yeah, they were her subjects, but she wasn’t a fan of the ones who treated royals like gods and goddesses.

That last thought made her give a small laugh, like there was something that was funny and her brain wasn’t telling itself why. Shaking her head, Cicada started running again to find someling who knew where Spike was. A few times she tried to use her magic in a panic, only to be met with a headache.

The queen felt like crying. Because of everything that had happened to her, Spike felt like the only true friend she had left. And now there was a chance she had lost him as well. She didn’t even get him back to his own home. What kind of friend let that happen? All she had left was Lila and currently she was still regenerating.

“I suck at being a ruler…” Cicada blamed herself under her breath. “I did barely anything and when I did, it went wrong.”

The changeling would have said more when something hit her like a brick. She had woken up in a bedroom. Not her own since Nymph was locked up in there, but a bedroom nonetheless. She had been injured and not in the infirmary. If Spike was alive, he could be there.

Briefly she cursed, wishing there were a map for this castle, but wishing for one would do nothing. It took her half an hour, but eventually Cicada found the way to the infirmary.

“Ah, hello Queen Cicada. May I ask what you are here?” Asked a changeling.

The queen told him something she never thought she would say. “Shut it! Tell me if the dragon is here and if I ever hear another changeling fawn over me being the queen again, I may end up making it a rule for that not to happen!”

The changeling was surprised. He wanted to say something and ask if everything was okay, but he knew better. “S-second room on the right.”

Cicada gave him a quick nod and ran straight for the room. She looked inside and there on a bed, being cared by for a few changelings, was a purple and green dragon. The queen gave such a large sigh of relief that everyone in the room turned to look at her.

“You’re out of bed?” one changeling asked.

“Yeah…” The queen answered back, suddenly letting all the pain and exhaustion catch up to her. The room spun for a few seconds, obvious enough to the doctors that a few of them pulled her over to an empty bed. They quickly moved away from Spike’s, making it clear that they were afraid he might end up setting something on fire.

Cicada just laid back in the bed she was given. She hadn’t let him get killed. Her shield worked and saved them both. But wait… that wouldn’t have been enough to scare the ambassadors. So how did it happen? The changeling turned her head to look at Spike. Only he knew the answer, so they were going to need to talk as soon as possible.

A Change of Pace

by Votederpycausemufins

The Portals

A Confused Newcomer

The other Equestria

An Interesting Discussion

A Trip to the Doctor's

An Argument at Dinner

Nightime Meetings

Welcome Party

Train Ride

Hospital Followed by an Argument

A Few More Meetings

A new house and a crazy neighbor

New Friend, New Enemy

Researching

Thief in the Night

A Strange Artifact

Researching History

Art of the Dress

Almost Fatal

Twilight and Sparkle

Different Worlds

Into the party

Switched

They don't listen

Escape to home

Back home again

Make her believe

A change back

Lots of Yelling (un-edited)

Battle with Friends