Unraveling a Rainbow

by Rego

Rating: teen
Tags: Alternate Universe, Adventure
Length: 56755

Equestria's victory against the changeling menace is turned upside-down when Rainbow Dash is nowhere to be found. It is said that lies beget more lies, but perhaps it is better to live naively than face the unfortunate truths of our world.

ON HIATUS DUE TO REWRITES. KEEP AN EYE ON THE BLOG FOR UPDATES!
GOT AN EDITOR, COULD USE MORE EDITORS CAUSE I'M GREEDY!

Nothing can ever be simple. A wedding crashed by changeling invasion led by the fearsome Queen Chrysalis was already jarring enough for Twilight and her friends, but when Rainbow Dash goes missing after their victory, a loose thread leads to even deeper deceptions woven in silver scales which threaten to undo the very foundation of harmony itself.

It is said that lies beget more lies, but perhaps it is better to live naively than face the more unfortunate truths of our world.

Inspired by great Changeling works such as: Mister Friendly's The Irony of Applejack, vren55's Princess Celestia: The Changeling Queen, and Law Abiding Pony's For the Hive
Temporary Cover-Art by afrodille beaulieu (Source)

Written by Lord Regulus of Regocomics
Edited by jeray2000
Proofread by FinalFan
Pre-read by PrincessOfEdits and JustYourNotRegularBrony

Published 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
Last updated 2014-09-02 00:48:14 UTC

Chapter 02: A Dreamweaver's Nightmare

The full moon crept higher into the midnight sky of Equestria. A myriad of stars slowly panned across the void left by the moonlight, filling the gaps with little flickers of their own. All was finally quiet after an anxious afternoon following the postponement of the royal wedding. Tomorrow would begin anew for all the ponies of Canterlot as their dreams descended into an ebony sea, with the exception of a still bustling castle.

Canterlot’s guards kept themselves on high alert, doubly focused on ensuring the safety of its citizens from their newest threats. The reemergence of ancient, despicable evils seemed to be a never-ending theme in recent history, beginning with the return of Nightmare Moon and followed closely by Discord’s second chaotic reign. Now, they were faced a forgotten mythical race of shape-shifters only the most obscure tomes had mentioned in passing. With the recent invasion, old stories of oddities had proven to themselves be far more factual than mythical.

On a more positive note, the day’s search had gone fairly well. The invasion was fairly short-lived so most ponies had located and reunited with their friends and families, however, a fair amount of ponies were still missing without a trace.

This was painfully obvious to nerve-wracked Nightstride, who hadn’t seen head or hoof of his wingmare, Duskstar. Normally, it wouldn’t be so disconcerting for the Moori Lunar Guard. Everypony knew Dusky had a bad habit of sleeping in late before shifts, but every guard was scrambled during the surprise attack, including the nocturnal, bat-winged Moori. At the very least, somepony should have seen Dusky.

His situation was only made worse as the two had been charged with guarding the Elements of Harmony for the night. Nightstride nearly choked when a passing unicorn guard noticed the lack of a right door guard. His dread throttled his breathless neck upon seeing the embroidered rising sun on her armor, denoting her superior position in Celestia’s Dawnguard division. He saluted acknowledging her higher authority as she drew closer to his post.

“Good evening… Ma’am,” Nightstride gagged, trying not to eye the vacant spot next to him.

“You are Lieutenant Nightstride, yes?”

Nightstride wished he’d paid more attention to his daytime superiors’ names. Female guards were about as rare as Moori so this should be a no-brainer. Unicorn, beige coat, orange and yellow mane, dignified stride in her step, kind of cute, and… still nothing. He scrawled blank after blank trying to come up with her name. The dark spots forming under her red, cracking eyes detailed the extent of her utter exhaustion. Maybe she wouldn’t notice his improper greeting.

“Yes ma’am,” he replied with fake confidence, attempting to keep his eyes locked on a high-hanging chandelier so his gaze wouldn’t wander arousing any suspicion of broken protocol. He couldn’t help sneaking a few furtive glances when the Dawnguard sifted through several papers from her saddlebag.

“It’s Silver Spear. Captain Silver Spear,” she retorted as she eyed a missing guard report, glinting a telling smirk behind the paper.

“Yes, Captain Spear,” he stopped trying to think of some excuse other than ‘I never bothered learning your name’, but no other reasons seemed to be much better. “Sorry, Captain Spear.”

“I prefer Captain Silver. There’s already a Captain Spear in the Royal Guard with Captain Armor. The spear and shield suit each other, you know,” quipped the captain, trying to lighten the mood, but her attempted humor faded when she flipped through the missing Moori section. “It seems Lieutenant Duskstar hasn’t been found yet. Tell me, how long have you known her?”

This was a potential conversation he had prayed to Luna would never happen. Alarm bells sounded off in his head after overhearing rumors of forged identities and falsified family records beginning to surface earlier in the day. He knew Duskstar could be odd at times, not talking much about herself, rarely taking time off, no apparent relatives or relations outside of work, and, most baffling of all, never really enjoying the taste of fresh fruit from harvest time. What Moori wouldn’t be absolutely ecstatic sinking a fang into a perfect golden delicious from Ponyville?

Still, Nightstride couldn’t let himself think that Duskstar could be one of… them. She was his wingmare! Of course, a lot of ponies would probably have thought the same of their friends who could turn out to be changelings, but Duskstar was no liar. She simply kept to herself.

“Lieutenant?” Captain Silver pursed her lips after she asked, tapping her pencil on her clipboard waiting for the bat to break the silence with some sort of answer.

The Elemental Hall’s doors suddenly flew apart, slamming open leaving dark shimmers of magic in their wake, breaking both ponies away from the impromptu inquisition. Duskstar and Silver Spear steeled themselves for any oncoming assault. They had barely mustered a defense when a bolt blue as midnight shot between them, hitting the door’s hornlock with deadly precision. Energy surged through the wooden frame, bursting their powerful seals instantly allowing access to the Elements of Harmony. Barely a second passed as they saw their princess of the night streaking towards them at speeds once thought reserved only for the fastest Wonderbolts.

“Princess Lun-AH!” Captain Silver shrieked as the midnight blur shot past them, the pressure wave knocking both guards off their hooves.

Nightstride barely managed to catch himself with his wings while Silver was skipped across the marble floor like a smooth stone. He sped into the chamber to his princess’s side. Frantic was too weak a word for her demeanor. He gawked seeing her thrust the box open, mimicking a child ripping through a toy chest when searching for their most important stuffed animal before bed.

“Your highness! M-may I ask what in Equestria you are doing?” Nightstride squeaked as the princess tore the Element of Loyalty from its resting place.

Nightstride shrank as Luna turned to face him, her eyes pierced his with a near godly wrath. He thought he had seen her angry during Nightmare Night. However, the scowl now cratered upon the moon-wielding alicorn seemed to scare light itself away from her face. The bursting supernovae in her mane displayed the most beautiful array of fury, loathing, and dread.

“Praying I am wrong.”

Waning sunlight stirred Fluttershy from her shock as she slowly lowered her hooves in somber recognition of a voice barely remembered. Rainbow Dash registered her message had been received crystal clear with a terse nod. Silence lingered as Fluttershy was at a loss for words.

“We don’t have much time,” ‘Dash’ hushed weakly in a tri-toned voice, “if I am discovered by anypony, Rainbow will—“

“Fluttershy? Where are you, dear?” Rarity interrupted, trotting inquisitively around the bend.

“Perfect…” ‘Rainbow’ snorted, “Plan B: Stall, Now!”

Just as they had flashed open, Rainbow’s eyes regressed to her familiar magenta as they rolled to the back of her head. She collapsed in a heaped mess to the floor. Fluttershy quickly leapt to her hooves, barely registering the command from Dash. She bolted towards the door, thrusting herself uncomfortably close in front of Rarity.

“O-oh my! There you are,” Rarity remarked, brushing her hoof of soot and backing away to gain some much needed personal space. “Well, I just finished cleaning that nasty mark on the rug, and dare I say, did quite the lovely job for lacking the proper cleaning equipment. Roughing it can be so exhilarating, don’t you agree?”

Rarity blinked waiting for a reply from the blank-minded Fluttershy. “Umm… I suppose so,” she quavered, searching for words to string together in the form of a sentence. “Burn marks...”

"Yes?” Rarity cocked her brow while waiting for Fluttershy to say something, which could be a long while given her trepidation.

“T-there are more of them,” Fluttershy trailed off with a small, nerve-wracked grimace.

“Of course, darling, there was an invasion after all.”

“Do you clean a lot?”

“… Yes. Yes I do.”

“Umm… so do I. The chicken coop gets dirty a lot because… it’s outside all the time, too?” Fluttershy forced from her mouth as a question in barely audible squeak.

“Fluttershy, what’s wrong?” Rarity deadpanned, having lost all patience with a painful charade of small talk. “Did something happen in the hallway?”

“Yes.” Fluttershy wished she hadn’t said the first thing on her mind.

“Really? What was it?”

“A pony.”

“A pony? Who?” Rarity asked while trying to peer around the bobbing pegasus blocking her view.

“… An old friend.”

Rarity’s muzzle scrunched in frustration as the conversation was quickly going nowhere. Fluttershy lost her composure more and more as their worthless banter continued. Rarity bounced back and forth, trying to get past her aggravating companion.

“Fluttershy, let me through.”

“Not yet…” Fluttershy quavered.

“Why not?!” Rarity shouted indignantly.

Her dictionary had run dry as her excuses spiraled down the drain. “Because I’m stalling!” Fluttershy cried, hoping Rarity would miraculously lose interest.

“That’s it.” Rarity enveloped Fluttershy with magic and pulled the strange pegasus to the side. “Honestly, barring an encore of this afternoon, I can’t think of a single thing that could have possibly upset you so much,” Rarity exasperated as she rounded the corner to see this old friend of Fluttershy’s.

“… and that’s when we decided to split up,” Twilight finished, anxiously clacking her front hooves together after reporting to the attentive Princess Celestia. Shining Armor was listening in as well, cradling his sleeping Cadence in a nearby bed.

Celestia levitated her cup of water to her face. The glow wasn’t nearly as bright as usual, a side effect of the ether-infused bandages wrapping around her slender horn. She slowly sipped her water, savoring its crisp chill. It was one of the less cryptic sign’s Twilight had picked out of her mentor’s conversation repertoire meaning she was deep in thought. The swig had been slightly more audible than usual, informing Twilight that Celestia was more troubled than she was letting on. Confirmation all depended upon how she lowered the cup. Would she levitate it near her hoof or put it down on a nearby table?

Celestia slowly set her drink to her bedside nightstand. ‘Definitely worried’  Twilight concluded, the infectious drop of concern spreading to Twilight’s cringe. If Celestia had caught her, Twilight estimated an 85% chance that the next sentence out of the Princess’s mouth would be something comforting to address the slightest hint of fret her mentor might have accidentally loosed.

“Rainbow Dash is a resourceful pony, Twilight,” Celestia affirmed. “I’m confident she will return to us safely in due time.” She brandished her best calming smile of assurance. If nothing else, Celestia proved as predictable as her morning sunrise when it came to interpersonal dealings.

Twilight nodded, suppressing her curiosity in favor of respectful silence. Calling attention to Celestia’s regal mask had never ended well in the past, and there was no reason to start that now.  They knew the day had been trying for everypony. Celestia had enough on her plate with Prince Blueblood’s panic attack upon hearing about the forged records from his secretary. No doubt he and his dignified rabble would start something stupid to make things worse. There were already talks among the castle ponies of changeling ousting parties forming all around Canterlot. She hoped Shining Armor’s background check of the missing guards would have delayed such outbursts, but noble ponies always had a knack for finding the worst things to get stuck up their—

“More water, Princess?” Nurse Heartthrob inquired with a bow. Celestia offered a polite nod in reply, prompting the pegasus to fill the tall paper cup.

“Pardon my intrusion, your highness,” Doctor Triage apologized as he cycled through notes of a binder labeled Celestia, Princess: CR 900-Present, detailing her more recent medical history.

“There is no need for that, Doctor Triage. I am your patient right now, aren’t I?” Celestia corrected, making herself more comfortable on her large, royal medical bed, cup in hoof. “Tell it to me straight, doc, I can take it!” Her gleeful tone reveled in the cliché she’d always desired to say.

“R-right,” the bewildered earth pony stuttered as he brandished a folder of their latest health notes. “As you said yourself, the blow to your magic reserves was extreme, but aside from the surface charring on the outer keratin and slight head trauma from the impact, you’re perfectly fine! It’s this physician’s expert opinion that you may lower the sun at any time. You have that unfathomable alicorn resilience of yours to thank for that, I suppose. I’d expect nothing less from the perfect picture of health you’ve always been... well as far as our written records go any way,” Triage joked, placing the folder back into the plastic tome.

“Tsk, tsk Doctor,” she remarked, waving her hoof in a parental ‘no-no’ fashion. “You should never poke fun at a lady’s age. That’s poor bedside manner,” she corrected again while giving Triage a toothy grin.

Triage paled at Celestia’s innocent teasing, obviously taking the wrong conclusion to the extreme. Twilight rolled her eyes at the doctor’s fervent apologies to Celestia, who replied with only the best assurances that it was only in good fun.

A piercingly loud, blood-curdling shriek resounded throughout the hallways, breaking the silly back and forth between reeling doctor and his royal patient. Its volume lingered in the ears echoing between the ear drums as if the howl had been yelled directly into the ear.

“Rarity!” Twilight remarked at the ear-shattering screech, knowing only one mare who could reach that notably shrill octave.

Fluttershy’s devastated senses slowly returned with pained ringing in her ears as she slowly came out of her sound-induced delirium. It was the second time today she witnessed an earth-shattering blast first hoof. Rarity was sprawled on her back in a rather undignified manner, having passed out at the sight of what appeared to be a dead Rainbow Dash.

“Maybe nopony else heard that…” she lied to herself, wishing it would be true.

Her hopes were soon crushed as an entourage of guards galloped and flew down the hallway towards the source of the incredible, octave-shattering shriek. They slowed upon arriving at the side of the three mares.

The group’s brusque commander eyed each mare back and forth, trying to make some sense of the situation. “Get a stetcher,” he commanded a duo of gawking pegasi, both having lost themselves upon seeing the condition of one of their fellow fliers. “NOW!”

The pegasi sped off before offering even the slightest salute. They soared into sky, bringing back a small cloud to carry Rainbow off to the castle’s emergency room. Their commanded nodded at their ingenuity. Barking several orders to the other ponies around them, he quickly gathered Rarity and rushed off toward the medical wing. Fluttershy followed slightly behind, knowing the next few hours would be tricky given Rainbow’s… unique condition.

Luna stirred slightly before dusk. She usually wasn’t one to sleep in given the nature of her cosmic duties, but recent night watches drained her. Every night she kept an ever-vigilant eye out until midmorning while maintaining the shielding spell whenever Shining Armor had to sleep. On top of that, she alleviated the nightmares of the ponies that feared the unknown threat against the throne. She had dispelled all manner of frights ranging from frenzied dragons storming the city to a giant candy-coated cupcake raining delectable destruction upon all Equestria. She blamed Discord’s temporary reign for that particularly tasty terror.

She applied the finishing touches to her royal countenance, sparking the nebula of light into her ethereal mane and tail. With a quick flourish, she lowered the silencing spell she had placed over the room to quiet noises from the wedding festivities which would sabotage her much-needed rest. The stillness of her room was quickly replaced by frenzied rapping upon her door. She readied to rebuke the assailant until she noticed she had sealed it. Her force of habit resulted in a lock only her sister would manage to open it from the outside. Dispelling the alicorn runes, she cracked her door with apprehension, hoping nothing had occurred during her slumber.

Outside the royal bedroom was one of her lunar guards panting for breath from his flurry of blows to the door. The powerful stallion had managed to chip the wood, revealing he spent a great deal of time “knocking”. The corridor had not fared any better as it was covered from floor to ceiling in scars of a terrible struggle. Magical burns littered the hallways, paintings tossed aside, tapestries torn asunder, and various other forms of destructions were scattered outside of Luna’s private chambers. The maids and guards both rallied to clean up the lingering ravages of the fierce battle in the princess’s presence.

“It would seem as though I have missed something,” Luna remarked nonchalantly, hiding the churning in her stomach behind a regal mask.

“I…” the guard uttered between heaving breaths, “have a message… from Princess… Celestia.” He reached into his saddlebag producing one of Celestia’s usual sealed scrolls. He saluted before wobbling back to his post, his rear legs sore from bucking the door to alert the princess.

Luna began a slow trot through the hallway, hesitantly unraveling her sister’s letter.

Dear Beloved Sister,

You have likely noticed the castle’s apparent disarray this evening. Canterlot was besieged by a changeling queen and her hive. Evidently, she had masqueraded as Princess Cadence for nearly a week prior to today’s events before revealing herself at the wedding ceremony. I fear that she may have injured several of our subjects during the invasion as not everypony has been found and some will still likely be missing when you receive this message. I ask that you search the Dreamscape for any ponies who may be unconscious from the assault. I would aid you in the search, but unfortunately I was also injured in their assault and would rather not risk anything beyond lowering the sun. Do not be alarmed, dear sister, it is nothing at all serious and I will be fine by tomorrow morning.

Though it is important to locate every missing pony, I ask you first focus your efforts on finding Rainbow Dash. She was lost in the attack and you know as well as I do that being an element bearer, finding her takes priority. Twilight Sparkle and the other elements started looking for her earlier this afternoon, but if this is the only message you have received from me, assume that she is still missing when you start your search. I have the utmost confidence in you Luna. Please help my faithful student and her friends.

Your Loving Elder Sister,

—Celestia

P.S. You may want to consider weakening the seals on your bedroom door ever so slightly, Lulu. I would’ve gotten you up earlier myself, but I’d rather not risk melting half the castle just to wake you.

Luna’s dark coat was insufficient in hiding her flushing cheeks burning with embarrassment. Mayhap it would be prudent to lower the threshold of her bedroom seal a smidgen. After all, the threat of an assassination of the royal alicorn sisters had greatly diminished over the past thousand years, despite the most recent threat.

Luna was grateful that they had won the day, but the thought of anypony lost and alone during this harrowing time weighed heavily on her for not acting sooner. She had become quite familiar with loneliness in her banishment. Luna trotted to an eastward balcony overlooking the darkening horizon. Opting for a less grandiose display to raise her precious moon, her horn lit as she abruptly stomped her hoof, settling for a slightly early moonrise. A flick of her tail speckled the sky with her familiar star pattern which would glitter into existence once Celestia brought the sun down. To the princess, it was as easy as flipping on a switch.

“You! Guardspony!” Luna beckoned towards two of Celestia’s royal guards. The identical stallions exchanged a puzzled glance wondering which their princess was referring to. “You on the left… my left,” she corrected. Why Tia was so obsessed with uniformity to the point she enchanted every set of armor with illusion spells was beyond Luna’s grasp.

“Yes, your highness!” ‘Lefty’ barked with a salute.

“Inform my sister I have awoken and will begin my search within the Dreamscape. Also, inform Scribbling Sage she is to attend Night Court in my stead. She is only to take notes and leave a report on my desk for review upon my return,” Luna commanded the unknown guard.

“At once, Princess Luna!” ‘Lefty’ replied before bowing and galloping off to relay the messages.

The remaining guard was treated to a spectacle rarely seen. Luna crafted a delicate circle of mystic light in the air. Placing a hoof carefully at the frame’s epicenter, she lurched forward as the air itself beveled into a translucent lens. The area behind the emerging portal warped from a fish-eyed obfuscation of the royal garden into a brilliant sea of colorful threads of light. Princess Luna immersed herself in the gateway, letting a current envelop her as she drifted through the opening. As the last curl of Luna’s ethereal tail escaped into the Dreamscape, the lens sealed itself away in a faint twinkle, vanishing as beautifully as it had appeared.

Twilight rushed into the hallway towards the wedding chamber. She was met by guards rushing opposite of her towards the doors she’d left behind her. Rarity was splayed across a rather imposing guard’s back, but the cloud that two pegasi whipped past her with panicked fervor proved to be far more disconcerting. Before Twilight could get a good look, the fliers stormed the medical ward, hastily towing the cloud into the emergency room.

“Twilight!” a small voice called out before she could give chase.

“Fluttershy! What happened?!”

Fluttershy paused, trying finding an easy way to say it. “We umm… found Rainbow Dash…” she quavered.

All the unicorn’s neurons fired at once. The cloud must’ve been carrying somepony to the ER and considering it was a cloud, it must be carrying a pegasus and a fainted Rarity could only mean…

“Oh my gosh, Rainbow!”

Twilight burst into the busy ER with Fluttershy in tow. Several doctors were already prepping themselves as the guards lowered Rainbow Dash onto the bed. They carefully dissipated the cloud as she made contact with the mattress. Twilight used every last shred of willpower to stay out of their way, but even from a distance, she could tell Rainbow was in dire straits. The nurses linked every machine and IV they could to the battered mare. Twilight felt her breath quicken as her heart started racing. She retraced her thoughts, looking for positives to take solace in before neurosis kicked in. Twilight knew Rainbow was afraid of needles so at least she hadn’t been conscious to fight back. That unhelpful observation wasn’t the silver lining she was seeking.

The entire medical staff bustled around Rainbow Dash analyzing her condition and taking notes before passing their observations to the head physician. Several unicorns scanned the body with magic, feeling for broken bones and other internal damages.

“Triage! I can’t get a clear reading!” one of the nurses shouted in alarm.

“Calm down, Salve. Refocus and try again slowly.”

“No sir, that’s not it,” Salve cried back trying to remain calm, “my magic is being blocked! I can’t see anything!”

“Horseapples!” Triage cursed. “Get a telemetry booster and scan again. Magic or not, we need that X-ray!”

A swarm of possibilities descended upon Twilight’s thoughts whirling like a hurricane of dread.  Perhaps the emission of magic from the repulsion spell hadn’t yet dissipated, scattering any readings. Or maybe whatever had injured Rainbow Dash had inflicted a magic-scrambler, blocking all healing magic! She began running through a list of species capable of doing such a feat before a hint of reason kicked in. If it had been anypony, it must’ve been a changeling. All the while, she could swear somepony repeating her name over and over.

“Ms. Sparkle! Ms. Twilight Sparkle!”

Twilight slipped out of her neurotic episode without an utterance.

“Are you familiar with Magical Tomography?” he asked with a flatter tone, satisfied with her eye-contact.

“Oh, yes! It’s one of the cornerstone spells in Medicinal Magic for the Mending Mare. Never know when running into another pony can—“

“Great, good, perfect,” Triage interrupted her unnecessary explanations in a hurry. “See if you can get a reading on Rainbow Dash. You’re probably my best bet right now if there’s any magical interference or whatever you spell-ponies call it.”

Twilight frowned upon Triage’s semi-racist comment, but chalked it up to frayed nerves, now having a more important matter to attend to. It was a task, exactly what she needed to help calm her nerves. Twilight was just happy she could be doing something to help Rainbow Dash. Looking at the moon rising high in the east after a long day, Twilight knew everypony around her braced for an even longer night.

Luna let the flow of the Dreamscape ebb as she felt the cords of dreams unfurl around her. Fillies, colts, mares, stallions, all the slumbering imaginations of Equestria gathered in an endless ebony sea. Each thread bore its own color and personality, all leaving a print uniquely their own in a swirl of color and light. Luna usually let herself drift through the current as the currents were drawn to the nightmares of her subjects calling out for her hooves to help dispel them. Dreams revealed the deepest and darkest recesses of a pony which granted a unique opportunity for revelations in the secret world.

However, the princess’s task this night was evocation, an ability not utilized since she... was not quite herself. Even before the darkness had taken her, she could not recall when last she evoked the subconscious of anypony, let alone one she never encountered in her dream walking. In her musing, it dawned upon Luna: not once had any nightmare drawn her to Rainbow Dash. Even in the most harrowing of times, terrors never plagued the stunt flier’s slumber. If Rainbow Dash was asleep, locating her thread would prove to be a feat most difficult to perform.

Before attempting such a blind evocation, Luna thought it best to warm-up. She fluttered through the numerous cords rising from and wafting in the void below her. The night was still young and not many were asleep now. Additional sleepers would clutter the Dreamscape, making her job all the more difficult. Still, she thought it best to work up to the task slowly. There was no guarantee that Rainbow Dash would even be asleep, which she assured herself was the true reason for her trepidation.

A particular tangling pair of ribbons caught her attention, a most uncommon of occurrences in the Dreamscape. Such issues occurred when two or more ponies became intertwined in the same dream, usually caused by unicorn magic missfiring when asleep. Sometimes on accident during a slumber party, rarely on purpose by particularly engaging pairs of ponies, but all dangerous if left unattended. To say the least, nightmares become quite messy when two or more minds become enthralled.

Luna reached out, grabbing the two threads in her hooves. One was a thrashing cyan refusing to be still for even a second, but the other was far more eye-catching. It was a brilliant sterling silver, shining brightly in the dark. It waved methodically about as it coiled around its partner. Such a beautiful woven string reminded Luna of her sister’s illustrious cord. Perhaps Tia had recovered faster than she had anticipated and started searching for Rainbow Dash’s consciousness as well, her thread’s discoloration a remnant of whatever injury she had sustained.

“Y’all said what now?!” Applejack was absolutely livid after hearing the story from the two pegasi escorting her and Pinkie Pie to the medical ward.

“But… that’s what happened,” one of the pegasi remarked defensively, not wanting to be bucked by a farm pony. “We found her right outside the wedding chamber and took her straight to the ER once she was on the cloud.”

“But that don’t make a lick a’ sense! We checked behind every nook n’ cranny around that froufrou room, and there’s no way we coulda missed her if she was in that bad a shape!” Applejack southern drawl boomed in ferocity. “On top of that, if her wing’s as bad as you say, one of your folks shoulda spotted her from a mile away!”

The pegasi had no answers for Applejack as the group broke into the medical ward. Even Pinkie Pie was on edge after hearing the details of Rainbow’s condition. She mentioned earlier she didn’t want the celebratory “Dashie Found” party turned into a no-fun-funeral, a concern Applejack echoed. The guards led the ponies into an observation gallery outside the emergency room. Their faces sank upon seeing Rainbow Dash’s beaten form. The guards had warned them before of the extent of her injuries, but their description hadn’t done the scene justice.

“Princess Celestia!” Pinkie Pie yelped noticing the alicorn in the room for the first time. Applejack and Pinkie Pie began to bow instinctually until Celestia raised her hoof in objection.

“Please, not now,” her gaze not faltering from the scene, Celestia beseeched the two to spare the courtesies of court in such harrowing times.

Pinkie Pie pressed her face against the window, trying to get the best look possible. Applejack noticed Fluttershy off to Rainbow’s right, gently stroking Rainbow’s good hoof trying to garner some response from the unconscious mare. Twilight rushed back and forth with the nurses as they waged their arcane-fueled battle against time. Applejack opened her mouth to ask.

“Twilight is trying to find a way to break through a magical barrier around Rainbow Dash,” Celestia answered to the unasked question. “At first, the doctors thought it was just interference preventing them from getting a good scan, but we soon discovered not even my magic was getting through to her,” she detailed to the two. Applejack stole a good look at the Princess, her regal mask torn to shreds as deep concern wracked her ancient eyes. Twi had mentioned Celestia was quite familiar with death, but when it presented itself before a pony’s time, it weighed heavily upon the princess’s heart. “Whatever has done this to her is indeed powerful. If we cannot break through the barrier, I fear we may not be able to help her.”

“Couldn’t we just use the Elements of Harmony to break through to her? They seem to be able to solve everythin’ else.” Surely Twilight and Celestia had thought of that, but Applejack asked figuring there was no harm in a friendly reminder.

“That would totally work!” Pinkie interjected with a desperate grin. “All we gotta do is wake Rainbow up and we can all break that mean old barrier into bits!” Applejack realized the flaw in the plan as Pinkie Pie planned it aloud.

“We kinda need everypony to use ‘em, huh Princess?”

Celestia nodded solemnly. “Yes, and even if Rainbow Dash did awaken from her slumber, she is in no state to wield her element herself,” she added.

“And… and if she—“

“We will cross that bridge once we come to it, my little pony,” Celestia interrupted. “Perhaps there is still hope with my sister if she finds a way through.”

The dreamers’ threads had put up quite the fight against Princess Luna, but in the end it was her victory. The trophy she had waiting for her upon entering the dream was well worth the struggle. The realm she fluttered into was simply magnificent.

Grassy fields flowed forever towards the endless mountains resting on the horizon. Warm daylight stroked the night princess’s face accompanied by the faintest hint of a fresh summer wind offering its gentle, caressing breeze. All the wonder absorbed by her senses complimented the absolute perfection surrounding her. To Luna’s left, a majestic oak tree thrust skywards, scraping the heavens with unfeasibly gargantuan branches. The superstructure of wood and leaves climbed higher into the sky until its enormous trunk faded out of perception. Luna found the wondrous sight deserving of the utmost admiration. This paradise was beautiful in its simplicity, yet paradoxically complex at the same time. It reflected a brilliant mind in every way, expertly crafted down to the last blade of grass.

“There you are, Princess!”

“GAH!”

Luna whipped around to see her multicolored quarry hovering behind her. Not once in her entire lifetime had anything had caught her completely off-guard in a dream.

“‘Gah’? Yeesh, you sure are jumpy tonight, Princess.” Rainbow Dash deadpanned. “I told you I was gonna be practicing right over there while you were doing your, whatever stuff. You promised you’d race me, remember?”

“Rainbow Dash? Wait, this is your dream?!” dropped any semblance of royal dignity she bore previously as she questioned her presence here.

“Uh, yeah?” Dash quizzically answered. “But you already knew that, right? I mean, you were the one who told me you could waltz into other pony’s dreams. Wait, are you real, or am I dreaming of you wanting to race me now? I’ve never met another pony in a dream before. This is so confusing,” she mumbled rubbing both her temples.

Impossible was the only word that came to Luna’s mind. She admitted not being well acquainted with the Element of Loyalty, but not even Starswirl the Bearded had managed expertly crafting such a utopian place. This brash pegasus would not have a prayer of fabricating and maintaining such an awe-inspiring landscape in her mind. Usually there would be at least some degradation of the surroundings when a dreamer’s focus was drawn, but not so with Rainbow Dash. Now that she thought about it, Rainbow Dash was already well aware she was asleep before Luna had addressed her.

“Rainbow Dash, how have you managed to dream of this place?” Luna demanded firmly, regaining her royal mindset.

“Come again?”

“Not even my sister has the ability to construct such an existence so flawlessly. This level of mindscape should not be possible for a pegasus.”

“Really? I thought everypony dreamed up something like this,” Rainbow pondered aloud. “I always come here when I fall asleep. In fact, this is where I do a lot of practicing for my new stunts! Check this one out!”

Rainbow launched skyward, twirling into a triple aileron roll while corkscrewing in several streaking U-shapes in the air, only to come to a crashing halt after losing control of her reckless spinning.

“Heh heh, without beating myself up too bad either,” she amended nervously to her practice regiment.

Luna lifted herself for a moment before settling on the ground. ‘Normalized gravity as well?’ Luna perplexed. This was not right. Rather it was right, but far too right to actually be considered right.

“Rainbow Dash, you mentioned I spoke with you earlier?” Luna asked, remembering her quarry had said something to that extent before.

“Yeah, something about an ‘important’ spell you needed to do first before we raced,” Rainbow said, throwing quotation hooves up, stressing the word “important” in her reply. “I mean, I wasn’t thinking you were going to cheat or something,” Dash quickly corrected, “but then again, I’ve never seen another pony while dreaming so… nevermind. Are you ready, yet?”

“Not quite, Rainbow Dash.”

“OH, COME O—I mean, of course, Princess, take all the time you need,” Rainbow coolly remarked after failing to stifle her complaint. “I don’t mind waiting, Heh heh… hrm.” Rainbow furrowed her brow, flapped her wings, and stretched before takeoff. As she gained altitude, she looked back noticing the other lunar mare in the distance. “Hey, maybe you can help yourself hurry up so we can finally get some flying in before I wake up!”

Luna raised her brow inquisitively and glanced over her shoulder. Sitting in the distance was… herself.

“Catch ya later, Princess Luna!” Dash quipped before blasting off again to practice all the new stunts she dreamed up.

Luna let the aspiring Wonderbolt fly off, instead opting to trot over to herself. Her doppelganger appeared smaller than Luna’s usual self. As she drew closer, she noticed the dream Luna’s coat was a brighter shade of blue than her own and also lacked her flowing, star-filled mane. It was her as she had appeared right after Nightmare Moon had been defeated, leaving her weakened self in its wake. Luna slowly walked around the lesser Luna, surveying the spell crafting she was performing. Ancient motes and runes floated in front of her as the young princess looked lost in thought while gazing at diagrams of pegasi wings. Luna noted how accurate Rainbow’s imagination had presented itself.

“Excuse me, Luna,” the princess asked her dream self, “what is it that you are doing?”

Dream Luna barely acknowledged the superior presence of the real Luna, instead opting to focus on the task at hoof. There was a slight pause before she eventually answered. “We are planning our method of attack before competing with Rainbow Dash in a race most glorious.” She stoically answered, not gracing the true Princess of the Night with a glance.

The illusion preoccupied herself with the images of wings before her. She skillfully moved motes around as she manipulated the one of the wings in front of her. Luna noticed that one of the rings was fractured while the other was being deconstructed and reconstituted in various broken ways. Every so often, her lesser self would feel her right wing, as if trying to get a grasp on some structural aspect. Luna could only guess this was Rainbow’s interpretation the “preparations” she mentioned Luna was busying herself with.

“Me? Cheating? Of all the foalish things for that prismatic fool to imagine!” Luna fumed under her breath, stamping the perfect grass under her royal hoof. “I will have to have a word with Rainbow Dash about her low opinion of my character later.” Luna waved her hoof, dispelling the illusion of herself.

After nearly an hour of fighting, the fatigued Twilight Sparkle cracked a smile as she felt the curve of a femur with her magic. She bounced up, nearly losing her balance from exhausted glee, looking in the direction of her mentor and friends. Rarity had since woken up and joined her friends in the gallery outside the ER.

“Guys! I’ve got a bone! I can feel a bone!”

Nurse Salve joined in as she began her scan as well. “She’s right, the barrier’s gone!”

Triage reared up on his hind legs, kicking his hooves in excitement, almost forgetting he was carrying his notepad. “Finally, Some good news! Princess Cele—“

Celestia was already focusing a great deal of magic on the wounded pegasus. Bursts of light surrounded the wounded mare with waves of healing light enveloping the broken body, encasing it in light. Twilight gasped as a pained expression tore across the alicorn’s face. Celestia’s horn burned brightly with ancient power while she infused an immense fount of magic into the hovering runes, having obviously cast all sense of her own injuries frivolously aside.

Doctor Triage waved his arms frantically trying to grab the princess’s attention. “Your highness, that’s quite enough,” he pleaded as the Celestia continued her agonizing spell. Against his better judgment, he pounded loudly against the glass pane, shouting to snatch the diarch’s attention.

“STOP!”

Celestia blinked curiously before stifling a blush with her hoof. “Doctor’s orders?”

“Doctor's orders,” Triage confirmed with a smile, bonking his own head with his hoof to remind Celestia of her horn. Celestia offered her warm smile and curt nod in reply.

With Celestia’s sense restored, Twilight strode to Rainbow’s side, casting the tomography spell on her broken wing while the other nurses worked on rendering images of the rest of the mare’s broken body. Twilight felt around the magical picture she was receiving, relieved to finally be getting a response. Her small smile fell to an inquisitive furrow which then descended into a confused frown as her magic felt more and more around Rainbow’s wing.

“Is something the matter, Twilight?” Twilight looked up to meet Fluttershy’s concerned gaze questioning the glower her friend as wearing.

“I… I don’t know. It’s not that something feels wrong, per se…”

“Then what is it?”

Twilight carefully retracted her magic from Dash. She shot a blast, enveloping a piece of black imaging film pinned to the wall. She flipped the backlight on the image as it beamed its information. Dash’s humeris was broken clean through the center, straining the connecting ulna and radius. The blade of the scapula was bent at an odd angle, but nothing too serious. She looked over the other bones noting nothing else was broken. Looking back at the shattered wing, her horn clearly had not taken the image properly.

She peeked over her shoulder towards the rest of the ponies, also curious about the conflicting information Twilight had gathered. Salve did a quick scan herself to reevaluate the wing, only to produce the exact same image. The doors burst open as Rarity made it a point to enter dramatically.

“Let me see that photo!” Rarity exclaimed floating a stool under Twilight’s image as she galloped towards the backlight. She stood upright, resting her forehooves against the wall while her blue eyes buzzed back and forth over the image. She absorbed every last detail with scrutiny befitting the attentive seamstress.

Doctor Triage glanced over the fashionista playing doctor quizzically. “I was told you were a dress maker. What do you know of pegasi skeletal systems?”

“It’s not so much that, rather more of an uncanny resemblance, I assure you,” Rarity offered in reply. “Do you, perhaps, have a copy of Dash’s other wing injury from a few months ago?”

Nurse Heartthrob nodded, reaching into her folder for her previous tomography images. She pulled the most recent picture and strung the image up by hoof. The backlight’s strobe was met with silence falling over the room.

Twilight stumbled over her words and garbles when comparing both the older and newer images, both mirroring each other in every detail.

“But that’s…”

“…Impossible...” Luna finally uttered, frozen in shock. Where other visions would simply vanish, her lesser self remained, unfazed by the princess’s absolute power over dreams. Luna attempted a second time, only to feel her magic dissipate the other Luna’s spell casting before meeting the resistance of what was a very real presence.

“This complicates things,” the doppelganger asided to her lost progress.

“DECEIVER! WE DEMAND TO KNOW WHY YOU IMPERSONATE US SO!” Luna rang out with her the traditional Canterlot voice.

The other grit her teeth as the pressure blew against her face and mane. “You don’t have to yell. I was quite capable of hearing you before resorting to your ‘royal we’,” the imposter quipped. She summoned back the image she had been working on. “Great, now I have to start all over…”

“SPEAK, WHELP!” Luna demanded, slamming her hoof into the ground, causing a large rift in the dream shattering any semblance of concentration her imposter had mustered.

Fake Luna sighed. “Well, there goes plan D and E. To be honest, I wasn’t expecting company, and with Fluttershy utterly failing to hold up her end...” she trailed off noting the growing impatience of the real Princess. “Fine, fine. I’m play this part out of convenience. Dash heard some legend from Twilight about your powers which, sadly, was not an exaggeration,” she bemoaned the untimely appearance of the real Luna.

“Also, it seems my interpretation is…” she trailed off, inspecting the royal mare’s regal self, “slightly outdated.”

With that, the imposter took to her hooves, growing taller in a shimmering light reflecting the silver thread from before. Each fraction of her coat flipped like a waterfall of silver bits as she shifted into Luna’s more recent appearance. Her mane and tail glowed a brightly as it began flowing like the star-filled nebula Luna sported herself. Even her regalia trimmed itself to her new stature as both Lunas stared each other in the eyes.

“DOST THOU APPROVE OF OUR IMAGE?” Faux-Luna inquired royally with a smirk.

“THINE INSOLENCE SHALL BE THY UNDOING!” Luna shouted, taking to the air with fury of the blackest night. She supplanted the warm sky with her cold midnight, hoisting an icy-white moon above them. Luna called forth power from the Dreamscape, summoning a shining column of lunar fury from its cratered surface.

“BEGONE, DEFILER OF DREAMS!” she commanded before thrusting the massive pillar of energy upon her foe. At once, Faux-Luna disappeared under the harsh moonlight enveloping the area around her, a beacon of banishment from the princess herself. Not even the mightiest of dream parasites had withstood her brilliant onslaught, though mayhap she had gone a tad overboard in her anger.

“Princess! What the hay is going on over here?!” Rainbow Dash asked, bolting towards the airborne princess summoning her awesome super-death beam from above. “You know this is just a dream, right?”

“Fear not, Rainbow Dash, we were just dispelling a rather impudent presence from your slumber,” the Princess stated proudly, content with having vanquished the—

“Indeed, for we only wish the best for our most beloved and loyal subject’s nightly well-being.” Faux-Luna joined in with bubbly banter. “The safety has been doubled, literally!” she added, eyeing her counterpart with a toothy grin.

Rainbow Dash’s eyes darted back and forth between both royals. Faux-Luna’s face beamed accomplished joy as Princess Luna’s face contorted with astonishment and resentment at her unscathed doppleganger’s callback to her embarrassingly boisterous presence last Nightmare Night.

‘No illusion has ever resisted such a blast before, unless…’ Luna sighed at her realization.

“How silly of me to make such a simple mistake,” Luna muttered, raising her hoof to dispel the real illusion. She waved her hoof in front of Rainbow Dash to eject the image from Faux-Luna’s dream. She had a few choice words to give this ill-mannered ingrate for impersonating a princess in her own presence.

Both Luna’s eyes shrank back as the princess’s power hit Rainbow. The agonizing raspy scream resounding through the moonlit utopia quickly shattered half of the vision around them. Her body began phasing away as the magic strangled the life from her. Luna quickly retracted her hoof as her spell bounced back into her horn. Like a fly swatted from the air, Rainbow plummeted towards the remaining grassy knoll still below them.

“What have you done?!” Faux-Luna seethed as she dove down to catch the fallen Rainbow. She carefully stroked the colorful mane, bringing life back into the doubly unconscious mare. She cooed with ancient magic as Dash reconstituted back into existence with silvery light.

‘Neither of them were dreams?’ Luna puzzled as she lowered herself to the ground. ‘No, Dash nearly vanished whereas this cocky shape-shifter…’ she trailed off as the gravity of situation suddenly dawned upon the Princess of the Moon.

“I think you’ve overstayed your welcome, night princess,” Faux-Luna growled, pushing unconscious Rainbow Dash into the ground below. She drifted below the surface further into the safe recesses of the Dreamscape.

“I think not. I hold authority here,” Princess Luna retorted darkly, desiring to show the deceiver her place, “and if it is as I fear, you shall be held accountable for a most foul use of dream magic to impersonate the Element of Loyalty, changeling.”

“Impersona—" Faux-Luna began questioning before bursting into a fit of laughter. Among her uncontrollable guffaws, her voice slowly slipped into a tri-tone mockery of Luna’s own. “See, this is where you are wrong, night princess. Your ‘authority’ means nothing without the power to wield it,” Faux-Luna spited back, her eyes burning with scarlet intensity.

Luna’s eyes shimmered with starlight as she took to the air to muster her powerful retort. She opened her mouth as a mass of dark tendrils shot from below, coiling around the real princess, ripping her from the sky, and encapsulating her in shadow. The tendrils thrust themselves down Luna’s throat, choking out any reply she would have offer otherwise.

“You may hold power over the dreams of Equestria, but I control my own imagination here,” Faux-Luna spat as the princess emerged gracefully from the entangling prison.

The princess unfurled her wings at the zenith of her flight, towering before her doppelganger. “You dare try to strike against the princess of—” she snapped her tongue upon hearing her words uttered with a familiar frightening intensity.

A quiet pool of still water formed below Luna, allowing her to gaze at her terrifying reflection. Her ultramarine mane smoked with a nebulous energy bellowing around her newly darkened coat, a colorless void deeper than the strongest black hole. She inspected her hooves, covered with an accursed iron matching her familiar set of cosmic armor adorning her head and body. Once again, Luna became the aspect of the night everlasting.

“How can this be?!” Nightmare Moon reeled back, horrified by her ghastly visage. Her horn burst with magic as she flailed around to expel the darkness in her body, but it was to no avail.

Faux-Luna devilishly quipped an evil limerick, as she slowly allowed her true self to shine forth. Her real voice cackled a broken three part symphony of terror, all demanding total submission from whomever had the misfortune to hear it.

Luna, the Herald of Night,

Suffers from the silliest of plights,

Her silver body flashed brightly, unveiling a rainbow of colors which shot from her neck. The strobe of colors formed into a fiery, prismatic ethereal mane. It danced around with ferocity, bringing to mind that fateful harmonious blast that had once banished Luna for a thousand years. Her volume increased as energy bellowed around her.

She runs to and fro,

Scared of her shadow,

“Dream… It’s just a dream. There is no real power in this,” the quivering Nightmare Moon tried assuring herself as the very cosmos seemed to turn against her. The creature radiated with the intensity of unfiltered sunlight, casting away every possible silhouette. Nightmare Moon could barely keep her eyes squinting to see the shape-shifter shoot her beautiful wings out. A primal prismatic power flowed through colorful, translucent feathers, loudly charging a colossal energy. Suddenly, there was eerie silence. Nightmare Moon’s adversary’s scarlet stare burned as she finished with her poem’s last line.

A darkness which grants her true might…

The spectral barrier shattered with a violent explosion of colors blooming from the silver assailant’s launch at Nightmare Moon. The sharp horn connected in milliseconds, thrusting into Moon’s heart at supersonic speeds. The grassy fields shrank away as Nightmare’s peripheral vision stretched out towards infinity, shrinking the broken landscape to the size of a pincushion. As she was ejected from the dream, a feeling she hadn’t expected lingered as she fell through her ebony ocean.

Pain. Truly agonizing, throbbing pain felt from the dreamer’s strike.

There was no mark left to show where she’d been impaled, but the endings of her nerves fired distressed signals all the same registering the heart had been utterly destroyed. Moon sank through the bottomless void of the Dreamscape, threads dissolving around her when she lost her connection to the ebony sea.

Fizz Poppy walked with purpose towards Luna’s bedchambers as tonight’s spur-of-the-moment royal mailmare between the two sisters. Normally, the Lieutenant would dutifully charge with his orders in hoof, in fact, he had started a gallop upon receiving Princess Celestia’s letter, but after calling him by name, she insisted he take his time with his mission. Celestia said it would likely take some time for Princess Luna to return from the Dreamscap, so there was little point in rushing off. She even requested he make a stop by the royal kitchen to grab a fresh bottle of Stalliongrad’s finest “Strawberry Popinski” for working so late into the night. He wasn’t sure what impressed him more, how considerate the almighty alicorn was for her subjects or that she knew his name and favorite drink from his hometown. Regardless, he was thankful from the bottom of his soda connoisseur cutie mark for her generosity.

With the green, delicious half-filled bottle stowed safely in his saddlebag, Fizz made his way to Luna’s bedchambers to deliver Celestia’s royal message upon Luna’s return. He admired the progress his fellow ponies had made cleaning up the castle’s battle scars as he neared his destination. Aside from a few cracks in the walls, most of the damage and decorum was either repaired or replaced around the hallways between the Towers of the Two Sisters. A glimmer caught the corner of his eyes, a beautiful comet trailing blue and white sparkles made its way across the horizon. He guffawed heartily having such a beautiful ending to such a terrible day. He took another swig of his bubbly drink to savor the event as he watched the blue star streak beautifully across the marvelous night sky…

… until it crashed loudly into the side of Luna’s bedchamber.

Poppy broke into a blazing gallop towards the scene. Bursting through the double doors, he witnessed a harrowing monster groggily pull herself to her hooves. Flipping through his mental rolodex of “Possible Threats Against Equestria”, he listed the black mare’s frightening features starting with her armor and ending with her fangs.

“Ni figa sebe, Nightmare Moon!” he exclaimed, slipping into his native tongue.

Nightmare shot up immediately upon hearing her own accursed name. The Mare of the Moon sprinted to her reflection, taking in her terrifying appearance in the mirror with a mix of terror and confusion. Calling back to his training, he stood firm, favoring the diplomatic option with the Queen of Eternal Night showing signs of weakness.

“You need not do this Princess Luna,” he stated nearly verbatim with as much feeling as he could force from his memorized script. “You are much loved by the free peoples of Equestria as our beloved protector of the night. Uhh… do not falter—fall into despair as you once did so many moons ago, your highness.”

“Be silent, I am trying to focus!” Nightmare snapped back, eyeing him briefly in the reflection as she struggled with her own magic.

Her dark horn glowed from midnight blue to pure white moonlight as she forcefully dispelled the baleful illusion. Poppy sighed in relief as the monster shrank down to his more familiar benevolent princess. The earth stallion had little desire to test his hoofticuffs against a corrupted alicorn’s dark magic. His contentment was short lived as he noticed Luna sitting silently, glowering with solemn introspection. Fizz wasn’t sure if delivering the message or returning to Celestia in failure would prove to be more dangerous with Luna’s sour mood. He brandished the rolled parchment considering his options until a crumpling from the scroll nudged Luna’s ear.

Wordlessly, she ripped the scroll from his hooves breaking the royal seal. Her eyes quickly scanned the contents as the burly stallion shuffled his hooves like a frightened filly. With each passing second, the diarch’s eyes flared with confusion, anger, and terror as she neared the bottom of the letter. Her ethereal hair erupted with supernovae as the mix of emotions raged across her body. Poppy heard her mutter something about making little sense and changelings, but his eavesdropping was met with her icy glare.

“How long ago did my sister write this message?”

“Maybe an hour ago?” Fizz bounced back, distancing himself from the princess.

“And you have no word on Rainbow Dash’s condition since?!” Luna trotted Poppy into a corner demanding answers.

“I-I know nothing of the sort,” Poppy stammered back, as he pressed his flank against the wall “I met her highness outside the medical wing only for a moment! I don’t even know a Rainbow Dash!”

Luna rose, nearly pressing her horn against his muzzle before she backed down from her intimidating trot. Poppy lowered himself to all fours from reeling against the wall. Luna thrust the letter back in front of her face as she made sense of with what little she had to work with.

“If magical interference is blocking even my sister from reading Rainbow’s condition…" she trailed, pausing briefly as she connected mental dots to herself. "Heavens help us!”

Luna took to her wings, preparing to dart out the opening in the wall as she lit her horn with a powerful magic. Fizz raised a hoof to request further orders until Luna shot a glance back down to him.

“You are dismissed, Lefty,” Luna replied.

The midnight blur bolted from the room, streaking towards the Hall of the Elements, and leaving the newly nicknamed Fizz ‘Lefty’ Poppy alone in the tower with a gaping hole in the wall. He took one final savory gulp from his soda before leaving to find somepony with an architectural cutie mark.

Chapter 04: Playing into her Hooves

The veritable silence spoke volumes of confusion as the newest revelation in the series of absurd events unfurled in the emergency room. Abduction and subterfuge seemed to be the words of the day as another changeling had been unveiled after the Canterlot invasion. Another slew of questions of where, when, why, and how painted in hues of dusk and dawn slathered about the room as the diarchy silently gazed upon the shivering changeling in the corner. The other ponies had curiosity painted on their faces, but even Twilight Sparkle’s paled in comparison to the two royal sisters.

So many answers were needed immediately, most pressing the whereabouts of Nurse Heartthrob, but equally as critical was this new changeling’s reason for its actions against another of its kind. Twilight quickly remembered her clipboard to begin note taking immediately. This was the third different coloration of changeling they had seen today. Queen “Chrysalis” and her horde all bore the same dark green and blue features which, with the exception of Prisma, had led her to believe to be the homogenized color palette of the changeling species. Prisma was radically different enough to be an outlier if she truly was a changeling as well, but this newest orange development blew a hole clean through her observations. She had only mulled over the tip of her educated guesswork until her latest study was the first to break the silence.

“How?” the former nurse uttered as she gathered herself from the floor. “You should only have enough love to sustain yourself with those injuries.”

“Oh, so you have heard of me,” Chromina bubbled back as she shifted weight off her broken hind legs. “I just remember that particular shade of orange-ish amber really so I just guessed really.”

With a flick of horn, a patch of scales quickly scuttled from her barrel over to a large gash in her back leg held together by a mass of golden ooze. The area left behind by the shift in her silver armor bore a large circular scar filled with congealed gel which appeared to be the remnant of what would’ve been a lethal impact for any other pony.

“What kind of monster are you, Chromina?”

“Oh, so you do know my name,” she replied disinterested in the direction the conversation was going. "That's a shame, I was starting to like Prisma..." she trailed off in reminiscence.

"On second thought, I used to know a pony named Prism Dancer once. A showboating disco-obsessed jerk of a mule that one. Didn't even see me coming when I couldn't take his smug aura of self-importance anymore," she prattled onto nopony in particular. "I didn't even give him time to scream when I..." She chortled darkly as she closed her eyes to relive the moment.

"Oh, but I'm rambling about beating a dead horse who doesn't matter anymore. I'm used to my own name anyway so let's go just go with Chromina to make things easier for everypony plus one changeling," Chromina grinned happily upon seeing her audience's hearts sink at her nonchalance towards murder.

“No, no that’s not it. Even your magic should be limited by your emotional intake,” the changeling pondered aloud looking around the room.

"You're still on that?" Chromina complained seeing her misdirection fail. She heaved an exasperated sigh as she fell back on her bed.

“There is no pony here enthralled by you, was it the love you garnered as Rainbow Dash?” she pondered aloud pointing an accusatory hoof towards the other shape-shifter. Chromina idled away with a whistle enjoying her renewed lung capacity. She grinned waving a broken hoof at her new changeling comrade.

“No, no, it wasn’t directed love, it would only be enough to keep you in one piece…” she trailed off as she her face contorted in a way Twilight found oddly sympathetic, having worn the same frayed scowl many times. “Who is feeding you?”

Twilight recalled Cadence’s earlier stories of what she understood from changelings and love draining. Being the Princess of Love, she was sensitive to its emotional strength as it flowed freely between ponies. It was part of the reason she was replaced by Chrysalis in the beginning, her eye for love being a very real threat to the changeling’s infiltration plans. At least that’s what she could guess from what she was able to glean from her captivity and confrontation with Chrysalis. Twilight looked around the room for signs of mind control she had described earlier as “making the victim’s eyes go all wibbly-wobbly” during continual consumption. Her quick survey of her friends showed no signs of apparent control.

“Please, whoever it is, you must stop! Chromina deserves none of your compassion or pity!”

“Now now, let’s not get ahead of ourselves, little one. If you say anything more, I might not give it back.” she warned pointing to her horn with crooked confidence. The other imposter replied with a confused frown.

“Wait, compassion?!” Twilight reeled back, “You can feed off that too?”

“Perfect…” Chromina sardonically huffed.

“Twi! You mean to tell me you feel sorry for this silver-tongued liar?” Applejack shouted in disbelief.

“Why didn’t I think of this sooner. Compassion is a form of love that is synonymous with kindness!”

“Sinno-what now?”

“Fluttershy!” Princess Luna grimaced as she turned to the silent pegasus.

Fluttershy had taken to a nearby chair a short distance from Chromina. Upon hearing her friends call her name, the timid mare pursed her lips and pulled at her mane to hide her face. Twilight rushed over to see the element of kindness, pale and sickly. Dark circles had formed under her eyes as she forced herself through overwhelming fatigue. She didn’t react in surprise or fear, it was a sadness akin to a filly being caught with her hooves in the cookie jar.

“Sweet Celestia,” Doctor Triage couldn’t stop himself from exclaiming as he approached the exhausted pegasus. “She’s even worse than when Captain Armor came in this afternoon. What is with everypony inventing new ailments to suffer from today?!”

“I don’t understand. You were feeding her your love?” Twilight managed to force out in a whisper, pleading for an answer.

Fluttershy bit her lip and looked over at Chromina. Their eyes met and for a moment, the only response from the shape-shifter being an aloof hoof wave before refocusing on more pressing matters. Fluttershy beamed as much as she could before drifting off into slumber. Triage and Salve quickly picked her up and carried her out of the emergency room. Chromina resumed her normal antics by sounding a loud ping from the cardiograph.

“Alright! Your attention everypony plus one drone. Your patient is running out of patience so I need your undivided attention right now!” Chromina called out to the group, clopping her hooves together.

Princess Luna stomped a hoof down, having held her tongue long enough.

“No, deceiver. I have endured your idle banter long enough. I will have answers from your impetuous mouth!”

“Yeesh, the midnight flank calling the carapace black,” Chromina quipped at the night princess.

“I am having difficulty as well, Pris… Chromina,” Celestia added, correcting herself. “With your health’s recent miraculous improvement, I must wonder if you were merely buying time to drain our dear Fluttershy using my good faith.”

“You’ve all been so stingy since Rainbow left the room and in my defense,” Chromina paused to point at the other changeling trying desperately to switch her form, “she did try to poison me. Try being the key word.”

Chromina sniffed the water, probing with her forked tongue around the rim as she got a feel for the impurities.

“Lemme give her a lump right upside the head for ya, princess,” Applejack requested with a low voice filled with livid anger.

The shape-shifter gargled for a moment before she spat it back out with interest and ran magic through her mouth clean the residual toxins out of her mouth.

“Oh ho ho! You insidious little physician. You managed to brew this up in ten minutes with makeshift ingredients? Color me impressed,” she lauded with a lip smack and rainbow mane florish. “I’ll have to knock a few points off for lack of foresight on your part for not having the proper neurotoxins on hoof, but I couldn’t have chosen a better drone to care for me.”

“Ngygh, guh… wha? Take care of you?” the would-be assassin snorted in incredulous disgust. “What makes you think I’d even consider helping you?!”

Chromina pressed a hoof up to her chin with an exaggerated, ponderous “hmmm” as she squinted her eyes in mock contemplation as she considered her planned reply.

“No, that’s the wrong way to go about this, little one. The real question is why you are here at all. There’s only a hooffull of reasons I can think of why a changeling like you would enter Canterlot right after a botched invasion,” she mulled over, enveloping the powerless changeling in a sanguine aura, to the chagrin of her onlookers, “but considering your disguise is a Cloudsdale field nurse, I suspect you’re part of some sort of first responder team, no?”

“Put me down!” the orange captive yelled helplessly thrashing around trying to break free of the superior magical grasp binding her. Realizing the futility, the indignant imposter crossed her hooves, looking away from her deductive inquisitor.

Twilight felt the urge to interrupt, but seeing the princesses barely holding back to hear the exchange, decided to wait to see where this was going. Perhaps they’d glean a little more information through this new turn of events if they could just bite back their words for a little longer.

“It makes no sense to needlessly risk blowing your cover to save a few scraps of food.”

“They are living beings you heartless monster!” Chromina’s captive shouted back.

“Which means you actually care about the ponies of Equestria,” Chromina added allowing a knowing smirk to creep across her face as she preyed upon the nurse’s concern.

“However, taking your recent actions into account, you aren’t so noble as to soar into ground zero because your conscience got the better of you. You must have had a very good reason for coming here, something you’d move the sun and moon for.” She paused taking a good look at admire her good hoof.

“Or rather, a special somepony…” Chromina beamed slyly, the undivided attention she’d garnered from the orange drone being the only answer she needed.

“And this special somepony would very much like to have his very special somepony back,” Chromina taunted her captive. “Or her, this is the modern reign of our beloved Princess Celestial after all.”

Chromina eyed the other changeling like a predator with a voracious appetite. A brief moment of silence followed as it became clear that her prey was a few steps behind in the exchange.

“Oh come on, don’t make me spell everything out for you,” Chromina sighed pointing to the gallery window catching their reflections. “Let’s see that pretty pegasus face of yours.”

The captive changeling horn glowed with power as a quick orange flare shot across her frame. Twilight and the others shot confused looks as the changeling remained unchanged. Orange flames shot around her again as she tried to become somepony else, each flare burning out faster and faster as her angered indifference gave way to panic.

“I-I can’t remember what I look like…” the hapless changeling trailed off in horror.

“Alright Celestia,” Chromina chirped happily to the sun princess, “Now that everypony plus one changeling understands the situation, I think now I can finally get the help I so desperately need.”

“What did you do to me?” the lesser changeling quavered, fighting with every iota of her being to conjure her natural abilities. Chromina only replied with a wry grin.

Twilight was torn by the sight. It was a changeling, one of the thousands of the love-stealing invaders deserving of nothing but contempt, however seeing her earnest struggle with her own magic gripped at her.

“Here’s my offer. I’ll give you your little pony identity you’re so fond of back in exchange for becoming my temporary primary care physician. As an added bonus, I won’t even overshadow your mind. You’ll have nothing to worry about! I’m practically the epitome of generosity.”

Grinding her teeth, Applejack couldn’t bear the two shape-shifters striking up stupid bargains when there were still missing mares while belittling Rarity’s element in a single stroke.

“I’ve had just about enough outta you two! If you think I’m gonna stand here and let you two just talk up a storm while our friends are—Mmrmph!” AJ choked as the cup of mystery liquid was thrust into her face and forced down her throat with sanguine magic. She coughed as she paled, realizing she was just poisoned.

“Applejack!” Luna gasped as she galloped to the farmer’s aid.

“Taste good? It’s really just a harmless sedative to you pony types, perfect for keeping insolent ponies’ mouths shut,” which to Chromina’s explanation, Applejack replied with a slow eye spin before passing out, “but to a changeling, that little mixture is enough to temporarily lobotomize us, cutting off our emotions. It’s such a great way to stop your enemies from using their love against you!”

Princess Luna and Doctor Triage tried rousing the unconscious farmer. Luna felt pressed her horn gently against Applejack’s forehead, probing her mind. Relief blossomed across her face as both she and the doctor confirmed she was asleep and out like a light. She slowly draped Fluttershy across her back while carrying AJ with her magic before shooting a damning glare back at the silver assailant. With her anger crystal clear, she left with Triage and Salve to find a vacant bed for the incapacitated elements.

“ENOUGH!” Princess Celestia boomed, stopping just short of the Canterlot voice while losing what little control she had over her mask. “I have been nothing but accommodating, but you have just crossed the line! You will cooperate with me Chromina, and you will tell me what you have done to Nurse Heartthrob!”

Chromina bellowed a hearty distorted laugh as she held the trembling changeling in her deep red grip.

“Must I explain everything? I thought at least you would be quicker on the uptake, your highness. This is Heartthrob,” Chromina replied dryly while dropping the orange changeling to her haunches. “And with my little assassin’s plans now foiled, I have all the cards I need to receive proper changeling care from her which means you can all get your loyal mare back sooner. That’s a win-win in my book.”

“That is assuming you don’t have any other leads on Rainbow Dash, which the fact I’m still breathing means you don’t. Anything else to add?”

The mentor and student were finding it equally difficult to tolerate Chromina’s repulsive presence, but the looks they exchanged both agreed she was right. Even though she was an unbearable, sneaky, untrustworthy, conniving beast, she was also the only lead they had on Rainbow Dash. Checkmate.

Chromina chuckled victoriously, licking her lips savoring its wonderful taste. “Perfect. Also, as a token of my good will,” Chromina added as her horn illuminated with her blood-colored magic.

Heartthrob coughed a sanguine vapor which shot back into Chromina’s horn. The changling erupted in orange flames as she took a more familiar shape. The frills running down her neck grew back to the ponytail Heartthrob sported along with her sleeker, longer frame and unfanged face. Her eyes shrank from her bugged orbs to her normal pony eyes, except her irises still glowed a luminescent orange rather than emerald green. Her wings shifted from her back to her sides sprouting faux-feathers while her horn coiled to a more familiar unicorn shape. However, the lovely powder pink coat did not return, her body still covered in black chitin, but the holes were gone. It was like a halfway Heartthrob, having almost the same shape, but lacking the proper coloration. Even though she didn’t see herself in the mirror, Heartthrob easily noticed the incomplete change.

“I don’t have a choice, do I?” Heartthrob buzzed with a despondent chuckle, her distorted voice still sounding like her changeling self. To Twilight’s and Celestia’s surprise, she turned to the princess of the sun and bowed subserviently.

“I apologize for my deception, your highness. I will answer whatever I am able to when you have me arrested, but if you would permit me, I humbly request…” she paused choking on her discomfort but continued, determined to press forward, ”I humbly request you do not have me detained until I have properly performed my duties as Chromina’s physician.”

Princess Celestia stared at the changeling who kept her nose to the floor. She offered no reply to the groveling changeling having grown weary of giving into the whims of the changeling holding everypony hostage in one way or another. Agreeing to this would play right into Chromina’s hooves without getting any information about their missing element.

Hearing no reply from her princess, Heartthrob lowered her head even further, pressing her snout to the floor waiting for a reply.

Twilight looked upon the pitiable shape-shifter with a healthy skepticism. She knew nopony in the room had any reason to believe anything she said. It must be so easy for changelings to prey on sympathy by borrowing the forms so easily. Twilight had already faced down Chrysalis cloaked as her favorite foal-sitter. She knew better to not be tricked by the wiles of the love-eaters around them.

“Please, your highness,” she weakly pleaded, choking back tears with nowhere else to go. “I know I’m not who you thought I was, but… I-I love being Heartthrob. I never want to be anypony else but her. Please…”

Celestia drew a long breath through her nostrils. ‘All cordial creatures,’ she exhaled under her breath. She reached down to lift the head of the quivering changeling to meet her eyes. She looked upon the tear filled pools looking back at her, expecting deception in her gaze, but all she was met with was the unfortunate truth of a frightened changeling.

“Of course I will allow it, Nurse Heartthrob,” Celestia answered with a warm smile.

Nurse Heartthrob beamed upon hearing her pony name. “Thank you, Princess Celestia,” she replied with as much reverence as she could muster with a bow before recomposing herself to face her newly acquired patient. “Princess, if any color of my carapace changes for even a single second…”

“Spare the stupid theatrics already!” Chromina vehemently gagged from the bed. “I already told you I wouldn’t, Now move your flank over here already.”

Heartthrob reluctantly approached her rude patient’s bedside. They faced each other, staring straight into the other’s pupils. They nodded simultaneously signaling they were both ready before closing their eyes as their horns lit with magic power. A faint thread of light rose from each horn. A flow of orange and sanguine red wove between the changelings as they communicated secretly in plain sight. Chromina bore a strangely warm smile as Heartthrob remained solemn, her face glowering more as time drew on. It took nearly a minute before Chromina withdrew her from the link they shared. Heartthrob’s magic ebbed before returning to her horn, awaking her from the exchange.

“Not a single word,” Chromina warned Heartthrob.

Heartthrob didn’t open her eyes and mulled over the thoughts in her head. Without warning as if struck with an epiphany, the nurse whipped a strong hoof across the face of her patient as she panted heavily, eying the bedridden changeling with animosity.

“Okay, got that out of your system, good.“

“I don’t need your pity you despicable amalgamation!”

“Hey, hey! Doctor-patient confidentiality, or did you not understand the part about keeping your stupid mouth shut?” Chromina quickly spat in reply.

Her remark was met with Heartthrob’s glower towards her patient with cold resentment. Chromina huffed before laying her head down on the bed.

“We’re both getting what we want anyway. Now go do your thing, Doctor Heartthrob.”

Doctor Heatthrob quickly ripped Triage’s notes from her clipboard. She dispensed of the unnecessary details, which was all of it, and started a fresh page for their patient. She flipped through several pages, quickly scrawling the necessary preparations she needed to make and the materials she would need to begin the treatments. She returned the notes to Twilight who eyed it with curiosity.

“‘Precious gemstones such as sapphires, rubies, emeralds, and diamonds along with scorching sage and aetheroot,’” she quoted from the list more suited for a shopping trip with Spike. “What do we need all these for?”

“Dietary requirements for the rejuvenation and replacement of scales for her outer biotic armor layer,” Heartthrob replied matter-of-factly as she reached for what was left of the MT imaging film.

“She’s part dragon.”

Finally allowing herself to rest, Princess Celestia excused herself to her bedroom three hours late after speaking with Luna briefly about her actions against Chromina. Luna expected a verbal reprimand from her elder sister, but Tia was too tired to maintain the model elder sister role once they were alone. She reiterated her “all life is sacred” philosophy, but added, “it didn’t hurt to lightly kick it in the flank a bit when it gave you lemons like Chromina.” The two sisters vented frustrations and shared heartfelt laughs as Luna put her exhausted sister to bed.

Luna cherished moments like these the most: when the tiaras came off and they were just Tia and Lulu, two long-lived best sister friends forever, or for however long forever turned out to be. The fleeting moment quickly ended with Celestia resuming her usual demeanor.

“Luna, I must ask, why did you try to kill Rainbow Dash?”

“Tia, it wasn’t Rainbow Dash. It was a changeling. An unbearable, conniving changeling,” Luna replied, flopping herself to the foot of her sister’s bed face-first.

“Even so, the fact she was not does not justify your actions. There is already enough death in this world, we cannot allow ourselves to be so quick to add to its suffering. We are not goddesses.”

“You say that with such a straight face, sister. Though they do not admit it, our subjects already worship you as such, even more than they did a thousand years ago.”

Her sister frowned, averting her eyes remorsefully. Luna knew Celestia was sensitive about her place in the hearts of Equestria that had only been worsened with Nightmare Moon’s banishment. To everypony, Celestia was the immortal alabaster princess of peace who alone had held the sun and moon in her hooves. It had been the wedge between the two sisters that caused the Nightmare to arise in the first place.

“All the more reason we cannot allow ourselves to falter now. We must set an example for everypony, and actions like that will make them fear us for something we are not. Now tell me, what drove you to such extremes?”

Luna faltered as she sought the courage to answer her sister’s question.

“I stumbled upon her in the Dreamscape.”

“I see, so you knew she was posing as Rainbow Dash?”

“I only knew she was in the castle, I did not know if she had already taken her place, which was why I brought this,” Luna answered holding the Element of Loyalty aloft with her magic. “The elements do not resonate when separate from their bearers, so if it did not respond to Rainbow Dash in the infirmary…”

“Then Chromina would have already replaced Rainbow Dash, which would then prove she was a changeling imposter and you would kill her leaving us without any way to know where the real Rainbow Dash is, correct?”

Luna snorted in frustration as she chastised herself for her short-sightedness.

“Luna, please tell me that alone is enough to push you to such heinous actions.”

“It is not,” she replied, faltering uncharacteristically with concern. “It is what she is capable of that worries me. She bested me in the Dreamscape, much like how Chrysalis struck you down earlier today.”

“I was careless,” Celestia quickly offered in rebuttal, rubbing her horn. “I did not think changeling magic could be so… potent, but I couldn’t risk hurting anypony else there. You know how careful we have to be with our magic, sister.”

“Yes, but my encounter was slightly different.”

“Of course, you said you found Rainbow Dash within the vision correct? If I recall correctly, a pony’s dream can be tangled with another’s. There was no way for you to know if she somehow was holding her consciousness hostage. I believe retreat was the proper choice.”

“I had not considered that possibility,” Luna laughed despondently. “You think of me too highly, sister. My loss bore no such noble intention.”

Celestia cocked her brow in curiosity.

“When I faced Chromina, I held nothing back.”

With a quick burst of party poppers loosing streamers with as Pinkie’s slide whistle hit its highest crescendo, another Pinka-Polka-Pielooza drew to a close for the tenth time, topped with a bowl of fresh fruit salad from nowhere landing squarely circled in front of the excitable Nightstride. Many of the guards had been skeptical of the poofy pink mare as she made her own noisy sounds among the nightly rounds of the guarded grounds, but once she presented her framed letter of recommendation from Princess Celestia herself, they were eager to take a break to break down and party. The ones who recognized her were honored and thrilled to enjoy a personalized party hosted by the Bearer of Laughter herself.

“That was amazing!” the moori guard mumbled between munches. He delightfully sank his fangs into an orange, sipping the sweet juice with bliss bouncing between his eyeballs.

“I know! I never get a chance to mingle with moori since there aren’t any in Ponyville so this is so much fun!”

“Yeah,” he began as he peeled away the rind of his succulent orange, “we tend to stay around bigger cities with more night life, though I have a few friends who’ve taken a liking to daytime that live down near Hoovington.”

“I just wish I had known you were all so different before opening Glitter Blossom’s surprise party with DJ Pon3’s ‘Wubbable’…” Pinkie Pie added, clicking her forehooves together tepidly.

“No harm done,” Nightstride guffawed recalling the alarmingly loud dubstep suddenly booming from the courtyard. After that kerfuffle of nearly deafening poor Glitter’s sensitive ears, Pinkie decided to host invitational party breaks for the other members of the Lunar Guard, even if they weren’t moori. Since the shifts were rotating, she threw mini-parties instead, bringing the festivities to the guests near their posts so they could enjoy it to the fun-filled fullest. It was exhausting work opening and closing so many parties, but it was well worth it to see the happiness she shared with the guards who could use a fantastically fun fling from the silly filly herself.

“I’m just glad you didn’t run off after she flashed her fangs at you,” Nightstride continued while sizing up a banana. “Not a lot of ponies are comfortable around us, even though we’re pretty much pegasi with a penchant for fruit.”

“Are you kidding? I never turn any pony, griffon, manticore, hyrdra, or whatever if they’re up for a party!”

“You’ve thrown parties for manticores and hydras?”

“Well… no. But if they’re up for it, I am too!”

Nightstride laughed at her ridiculous honesty as he gleefully finished the last of his “party flavor”, the name Pinkie had lovingly punned her fruit salads for the moori guards. She took the empty paper bowl and placing it carefully with the rest of the mess from her impromptu party. Having worked her way to the western edge of the castle outside the Hall of Elements, she decided it’d be best to double back before trying to call it a night… or morning. She wasn’t sure what time it was anymore, not that it mattered.

“Thanks again for cheering me up tonight. Luna knows I needed it.”

After Pinkie had heard about Nightstride’s wingmare Dusky and her disappearance, Pinkie had partied extra-hearty for him, being in the same boat with Rainbow Dash. She knew better not to tattle about the shapey shifty parts of the tale, but she felt sharing sympathies would help break the ice a bit between them. Sure as her friend Shirley Sherbet, the little sadness was quickly forgotten for a fun-filled fifteen minutes.

“Yeah, me too,” Pinkie responded with the bubbly trailing into seriousness by accident, taking Nightstride somewhat off guard with how elated she’d been the whole night.

Pinkie Pie felt she needed to do something more for the lonely guard. She opened her arms, offering Nightstride a hug, who quickly reciprocated whole-heartedly. They both felt the other’s anxious worry for their friends through their interlocked forearms, making Pinkie realize her party still wasn’t enough. She couldn’t leave her new friend feeling all sad, she just couldn’t! Maybe she could sing a song super duper quick or another funderful party flavor fruit bowl would…

“Don’t worry, Pinkie, I had a blast,” Nightstride shushed with care, feeling fresh teardrops from the deflated party mare. “Everything will be alright in the end, I promise.”

Pinkie sniffled and tightened her grip.

After convincing Tia to let her raise the sun in the morning, Luna returned Loyalty to its rightful place next to the other elements before heading back to the medical wing, only taking a small detour to check on Rarity. Judging from the shreds of paper scattered about her room and the bottle of sleeping pills, it had been less than pleasant for the fashonista to fall asleep. She felt the urge to visit her dreams to check on her, but she needed to dispense with her nightly duties in favor of focusing her attention on more pressing matters. Any nightmares plaguing ponies in the Dreamscape would have to wait until the sleeping silver one in the real world finally ended.

The night pressed on with no rest for the small team of ponies working diligently into the approaching dawn. Per their written instructions, Twilight and Salve brought in an entire lab’s worth of alchemic reagents and equipment while Doctor Triage left to care for Fluttershy. When Luna asked Triage about it, according to the Doctor Heartthrob, the pegasus suffered from stage four emotional depletion, whatever that meant. More disconcerting than her condition was the fact for Fluttershy to drain herself so completely in a short time meant she actively pushed herself to shower Chromina with love and affection. Luna had so many questions for the pegasus, but just as the changeling doctor had predicted, she was too drained to be coherent even in her dreams. The changeling doctor never heard of anypony willingly exhausting their emotions of their own accord, but she guessed Fluttershy would likely be comatose for at least a day or two recovering her mental energy.

Luna watched with mild concern and curiosity as Doctor Heartthrob carefully fashioned a tall cylindrical pod using her orange spittle. Barring her disdain for her, it was impressive seeing how methodically a changeling worked. She somehow completely engrossed herself in her own preparations while also helping the two unicorns whenever they slipped up, regardless if either were aware they had or not. Twilight and Salve were also opening up to Heartthrob, despite the situation. Nurse Salve still showed some trepidation towards the shape-shifter, but Twilight Sparkle set aside her preconceived notions of changelings allowing herself to accept the slim possibility she really was Heartthrob. She multitasked mixing a brew as she busily assaulting poor Heartthrob with question after question to confirm she was who she claimed to be.

“So, how long have you been part of the Cloudsdale medical team?” Twilight inquired while stirring a viscous solution in a beaker.

“Over twelve years once I got my flight field nurse certification,” Heartthrob answered as she molded the tube carefully with her hooves. “I’ve even cared for a Wonderbolt once or twice.”

“If you’re a medical drone, wouldn’t it have been easier to disguise yourself as a unicorn?”

“I like flying more than magic. I can live without levitation, but heaven forbid being grounded for the rest of my life.”

“Do you eat food?”

“Yes.”

“What about love?”

“Of course.”

“Does it hurt the ponies around you?”

“No!” the doctor turned to her inquisitor and scoffed, visibly hurt by the notion. “How could I call myself a nurse if I flippantly put others at risk?!”

Luna saw the spark in Twilight’s eye as she tried to sneak in another less than harmless question.

“Are there any more changelings disguised as ponies?”

“… Doctor-patient confidentiality,” she replied flatly.

“That wasn’t a no.”

“That also isn’t any of your apple-bucking business! Now focus on your mixing before you ruin another batch,” the indignant doctor replied pointing at the black bubbling mess to her right that Twilight had so graciously ruined ten minutes ago.

Twilight gave a nervous chuckle before going back to her brew. Slowly but surely, their royal emergency room took on a more alien appearance. With their project quickly becoming more and more distant from the Lunar Princess’s understanding, she decided to keep to the halls of the medical wing which grew livelier as the night drew to a close.

By Doctor Triage’s request, had Luna opened the doors of the castle’s facilities to special cases of Canterlot Covenant Hospital, receiving emotionally drained ponies and other foreign ailments involving changeling magic. Thankfully, their secret project remained so as none of the medical staff broke their vows of silence regarding the matter of a changeling receiving treatment a few doors down. Heaven forbid anypony got wind of their foreign guest and resident specialist. With Heartthrob’s advising from the emergency room, Triage and his team were more than capable of handling a book’s worth of conditions and illnesses being discovered in the aftermath of the invasion. For the short time the changelings ran amok, they had done considerable damage to her subjects. The princess cursed herself for not being there for them earlier, but she was here now for her ponies. She busied herself by dispelling the disgruntled dreams of her emotionally deprived subjects as she made her way around the rooms. She took great joy in visiting the children who always showered her with adoration when she bested their bad dreams.

Proceeding to the next room where she had left Applejack sleeping soundly from the sedative that Chromina had forced her to imbibe. Upon entering her mind, she found the farmer bouncing around a bland, rubber golden delicious against a cardboard cutout of an apple tree in a white void, utterly bored within her mind.

“Applejack, what are you doing?”

Applejack bounced up after hearing somepony else’s voice, positively radiating with excitement upon seeing another pony with her.

“Oh thank Celes… well actually thank you kindly for showin’ up, Princess Luna,” Applejack exasperated to the diarch. “Since that ornery sneak slipped me that drink of hers, I’ve been stuck here waitin’ to wake up.”

Luna experienced momentary reverse déjà vu, if there was such a thing, when comparing her bland surroundings to the paradise of her earlier encounter with ‘Rainbow Dash’ and Chromina. “You are lucid dreaming? Why not imagine something more than… this?”

“Lucid dreamin’? Not sure what ya mean by that, but I already tried the latter after givin’ up on wakin’ myself. I heard you’re supposed to be able to do all sorts of fun stuff when you realize you’re asleep. So I reckoned I’d give it a shot, but I can’t even get a darn apple tree to sprout up right. Trust me, I’ve been tryin’ for the longest time and that sorry excuse for a sapling is the best one I— doggonit!” she cursed turning back to see the cut-out and bouncing apple she had made up had both vanished after losing her focus.

“I understand your frustrations, dearest Applejack,” Luna agreed as she barely managed drawing upon the farmer’s imagination to sprout a pitiful weed from the white nothingness they stood upon. “This must be a side effect of the sedative you were given. Being a counter-measure to changeling dream magic, perhaps it has affected your cognitive connection to your imagination as well.”

“Nevermind the reason, princess, ya gotta get me outta here! I can’t take all this nuthin’ I got around me much longer. At this rate, I’m never gonna be able to sleep soundly again!”

Princess Luna took in the situation Applejack was stuck in. Aside from their voices, there were absolutely no other stimuli to be perceived. Not even a single visual or audible hallucination manifested itself with that part of the farmer’s mind being cut off, it was only Applejack lost in nothingness.

“I will see what I can do. Perhaps Nurse Heartthrob knows of an antidote to stir you or, better yet, a counter-agent to free your creative thoughts. You still need the sleep after all.”

“Well hurry back if ya can’t. I’m gonna go plumb crazy if I have to be here much longer and I could sure use the company if I’m gonna be stuck here for a while.”

“Trust me, most honest Applejack, I understand far more than you could ever know.”

With that, the dream walker took her leave. As she awoke, she heard the echoing of Applejack shouting more farm-oriented obscenities when failing to make her bouncy apple reappear.

“Good job girls, you’re the best help a drone could ask for,” Doctor Heartthrob hummed lightly to her two unicorn nurses.

The weary Twilight had just enough energy to spare to marvel at the finished product of their labor. What had started out as a gob of changeling spit in the shape of a used paper towel roll had been meticulously crafted into an beautiful amber healing chamber. Their head physician called it a Changeling Medipod. Twilight and Salve were both surprised to see Heartthrob eyeing it with equal astonishment.

“I’ve heard rumors about these, but I never thought I’d see one so close,” the changeling doctor spoke reverently at her own handiwork.

“Umm… Heartthrob, you were the one who made it,” Salve remarked.

“This is an invention of Chrysalis’ hive, Chromina just gave me the details on how to construct one,” she replied running her hooves down the length of the outer hull. “Their alchemical technology goes far beyond any other hive, mostly having been acquired through conquest. With units like these, it’s no wonder Queen Chrysalis is both revered and feared throughout our lands.”

With the segue making itself apparent in Twilight’s mind, she took this golden opportunity with notepad in hoof, “So in changeling society, hives are separate states that are constantly at war with each other?”

“Not exactly. I’d rather not bore you with details of changeling politics,” the nurse replied to the dismay of the inquisitive unicorn, “but hundreds of changeling hives don’t fit pony definitions of kingdoms and nations. Hives range from a small colony of twenty or so changelings under a vassal of a larger hive all the way to the hundreds of thousands in Chrysalis’ personal hive in the Badlands. That’s not even counting the hundreds of other hives she overshadows. Chrysalis’ empire is a ruthless superpower in our world that lesser queens can only dream of creating.”

Twilight Sparkle’s eye twitched at the sheer volume of changelings Heartthrob was casually listing. Her jaw slacked as she began recounting population charts her mentor had shown off when Twilight was a foal. Canterlot itself was home to maybe two hundred thousand ponies, only being outmatched by Manehatten’s million and a half, but that city was a melting pot of ponies, griffons, zebras, and all sorts of other civilized species. Sweet Celestia, they were already grossly outnumbered in the surprise attack, but if Chrysalis had brought her hoof down in full force…

“Twilight?” Salve prodded in concern, Heartthrob sharing the same worried sentiment at the blank stare a light-year away.

“Wha…” Twilight distantly slipped with disbelief before rearing back to reality. “Oh! I’m sorry, please continue Doctor Heartthrob.”

“Well, larger hives continually vie for dominance of an area as new queens rise and fall, but small ones either sit on the sidelines as they try to grow in strength or bow to the dominant power in the region. Change is kind of a big thing for us,” she quipped with a small chuckle. “My queen was perfectly content with our little colony happily living our lives through an ever shifting balance of power,” Heartthrob recounted with warm nostalgia.

“Umm... if I may, Heartthrob,” Twilight started pensively, “what happened to them?”

Her warmth was replaced with a bitter scowl as she tried to form a reply. She stammered several times before stopping the words at the tip of her tongue. She bit her lip as she tried finding the right words to say, which seemed particularly painful as she kept forgetting she had fangs again.

“You’ll have to ask Chromina about that one,” Heartthrob replied distantly. “I wasn’t there to see… never mind, I can’t say that either. It doesn’t matter anymore anyway.”

Heartthrob returned to her stoic work. She ran through calibrations of the Medipod, having incorporated several of the surviving machines into its design for the others to keep an eye on. She poured the mixture of elixirs, potions, and other alchemical ingredients into the pod before sealing it in place with her magic. The device ready to receive their sleeping patient, the three nurses levitated Chromina carefully into the chamber, which absorbed the changeling through its semi-permeable membrane. Once inside, the medipod responded to the new addition by buzzing alive with activity to keep the patient suspended in the center of the nurturing mixture. Twilight found it amazing and unsettling to see the Chromina slowly breathe in the surrounding goo, but the aerated jelly bore qualities similar to amniotic fluid which Twilight kept reminding herself as she watched the respiration cycle continue effortlessly.

“Here you two,” Heartthrob said as she gave Salve and Twilight copies of her notes, “the Medipod will need to be inspected every thirty minutes to ensure the suspension is properly balanced as her body absorbs healing reagents. If you keep on top of it, she should be fully healed within the next few days.”

Heartthrob turned her reflection in the gallery window, gazing somberly at the mockery of her half-complete pegasus form. She walked over the Lunar guard uniform Luna had left behind for her once their preparations were complete. The doctor slipped the armor on as the illusion coated her black features in regal white and blue. She winced as the helmet dampened her magic and the armor invisibly bound her wings to her barrel. The armor weighed down more than Twilight had thought, encumbering the changeling and ensuring she wouldn’t be going anywhere fast. Heartthrob dragged her hooves out of the ER to the doors, through the crowded halls, and to the busy entryway of the medical ward followed closely by her purple escort. Heartthrob chortled gloomily as they came to the crossway.

“Oh right,” she hushed her buzzing voice between huffs and puffs. “Twilight, is the castle’s dungeon to the left or right?”

Chapter 05: Ancient Harmonies

Once again, the ponies of Canterlot joined together to celebrate the union of their newest prince and princess in matrimony. The apprehension from the invasion was still palpable with suspicions still lingering in the air as Princess Celestia looked upon the gallery. There were several holes littering the room devoid of the guards, nobles, and politicians that had occupied them a few days before. The most painfully obvious ones were being occupied by Lyra Heartstrings and Octavia who had replaced Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy in the bridal party. The two musicians were asked to fill in for the absent bird chorus with Fluttershy still in bed. Celestia thanked the stars the fragile pegasus had woken up earlier before the ceremony, but she was still in no condition to attend, much less conduct the music.

“I do…”

So much had happened to her little ponies over the past two days, so much heartache. Her eidetic memory worked against her as she mentally listed off the names she knew that had gone missing. Each face was another life connected to a friends and family who were worried about them.

“Aunty?”

So many were still missing, possibly taken and replaced by changelings, or perhaps they never even existed and were infiltrators all along. How could she let this happen so easily? She should’ve known Cadence better than to let her be snatched away so easily by an imposter. Just because you don’t hear from an old threat doesn’t mean they’re gone forever, she should’ve known better than…

“Aunty Celestia, I do,” Cadence hushed towards the princess of the sun, nudging her back down to earth. Princess Celestia blinked as she recomposed herself.

“My apologies, thank you,” she whispered back. She cleared her throat as she mustered herself to clear the tension she’d let loose in the room. “With great joy, I now pronounce you mare and stallion. May the coming years be made brighter for us all with your union,” she affectionately declared for the lovely couple.

Cadence and Shining Armor locked into a passionate kiss as the crowd around cheered for the two. Octavia raised her bow to the strings as she and Lyra strummed out a beautiful ballad of the love the newlyweds shared, the cello playing the part of the groom as the lyre strummed as the beautiful bride. Instead of rushing out of the room, Cadence and Shining looked out towards their friends and family. After the song finished, Cadence rose a hoof to address them.

“Thank you so much everypony for being here to share this beautiful moment with me and Shining. As the Princess of Love, it fills my heart with joy finally finding my own special somepony, especially after being a bridesmaid for so many of your big days,” she joked as many of her friends shared a knowing laugh of her match-making hobby.

“It also means so much to me and Shining Armor that you all are here to celebrate today despite the loss I’m sure we all feel. Every one of us has been affected by the invasion with our friends and family missing and our lives torn apart. I know I have,” she affirmed somberly as Armor hugged his beloved to give her strength to go on. She beamed a smile as she gathered her courage. “But it’s times like these that we all need to be strong and remember to press forward. Our love is our strength and Shining Armor and I know we need to share our strength with all of you in these trying times. We want everypony to know that no matter what, we aren’t going to let the changelings steal our love away from any of us.” Cadence left the altar and began to trot among down the aisle towards her friends and family.

“We are Equestrians, we help each other, we stick with our friends, and we love one another with all of our hearts. Let nothing take that away from us and we will all come out better and stronger than before.”

With that, Cadence nodded to Octavia and Lyra, who again played the newlyweds out as they gleefully galloped to their reception. The two whisked through the gallery who thumped a resounding applause for the marriage and for her words of encouragement. Almost no one noticed the pink blur following closely behind to kick-off the reception. Princess Celestia beamed with pride knowing Cadence and Shining Armor together would make Equestria an even better place. Sadly, her delight was fleeting as the other ponies filed out behind the happy couple, Celestia remained behind to meet Princess Luna who fluttered in through the window.

“It seems Applejack was able to attend after all,” Celestia started with a positive note.

“Indeed, I am glad I found her when I did.”

“Was her nightmare really that bad?”

Luna shook her head. “You misunderstand, it was not a nightmare nor was it a dream. She was simply trapped in nothingness. Being cut off from her imagination while fully aware in a dream state is a most insidious form of torture.”

“Torture?” she nearly choked taken aback by the mere notion.

“Indeed. In such dire straits, the mind can usually hallucinate to preoccupy itself when it perceives no other stimuli. It is maddening in itself, but it is a device used to cope with such pure isolation, but she was even robbed of that ability forcing her mind to endure it cognitively. It is a miracle she was able to maintain anything for long in her condition. If I had not remained with her while she slept, Applejack would not have woken up the same pony.”

Celestia remained silent as they made their way towards the castle dungeon. Her thoughts drifted to her sister’s banishment to the moon, isolated for a thousand years to watch the planet go on without her.  Luna never talked about the time she spent sealed away and Celestia would be the first to admit she was too frightened to bring it up. She had several ideas of the manner in which her Luna had spent the last millennium, something metaphysical with her silhouette being plastered upon face of the moon itself, the mare in the moon as it had become known over the forgotten years. Though Celestia had her own sorrows being separated from her sister for a thousand years, she hoped Luna had spent the time asleep, letting the centuries slip past quickly as she was purified. However, there was no way to know without discussing Luna’s other side, a darkness she did not want to bring up.

Luna broke the silence as they continued towards the dungeon. “Sadly, the nurse imposter’s antigen took Twilight most of the day to brew which left me without an opportunity to speak with the prisoner further.”

“You mean Doctor Heartthrob?” Celestia offered in clarification.

“Yes, the orange shape-shifter you are so eager to call by the missing pony’s name,” she seethed through her gritted teeth. “I thought an extra millennium among our subjects would make you more perceptive to lies, dear sister. It seems the slow dripping of decades has dulled your sensibilities.”

“I understand your hesitation, Luna, but if you were there—”

“If I were there I would have stopped her ploy to prey upon your love of our dear subjects!” the princess of the night argued stamping a hoof down as she stopped dead in her trot to eye her elder sister.

“Can you not see it? That is all they are after. Love, your love! What other stories they weave to weaken your resolve, you must not listen. You cannot allow yourself to fall for petty deceptions so easily.” Luna snapped back, each word bitingly strong with painful ferocity.

“I saw no deception in Heartthrob’s eyes,” the sun princess asserted wholeheartedly, standing straight with regal authority. “I have spent lifetimes governing both the day and night and faced many attempts of manipulation and subterfuge. Even our own ponies tried to sneak their way into my good graces hiding their true intentions, but in spite of all that, I persevered and helped them become better than self-serving liars and cheaters. I believe that everything, pony or otherwise, has good in its heart that can easily outshine what they keep in the shadows.”

Luna circled around her sister proudly, keeping her narrowed blue eyes locked onto her sister’s pools of magenta.

“What do you know of those who lurk in the shadows? What ponies hide from one another, their weaknesses, their fears, their lies that all stalk them in their deepest nightmares? You know nothing!” Luna spat in reply.

In front of Celestia, an illustrious hand mirror trimmed with beautiful white rose petals appeared a picture of Nurse Heartthrob looking at her beaming a radiant smile that welcomed all who would approach with warmth and affection.

“I do not envy your naivety, dear sister. You see their brilliant faces so clearly basking in your glorious light of day…”

The mirror whipped around to a fractured reflection of a charred black mirror revealing Heartthrob’s orange changeling backside. Her holey hooves held a vicious looking knife dripping with green goo designed to kill all who came close to her heartwarming grin.

“… but what truly matters is what lurks in the darkness where your loving glow fails to touch at their backs.”

Suddenly, the changeling crooked angrily to face Celestia’s attentive gaze. The monster hissed angrily, catching the sun princess off guard, as she lunged towards her prey with murderous intent scrawled on her terrifying visage. As she nearly leapt from the reflection, the mirror flared away in blue flames ending with Luna trotted in front of her startled elder sister.

“It seems time has let you forget changelings are natural born tricksters. It is in their nature to spread lies to keep you a hair’s breadth away from the darkness so they can steal you away when the time is right. Mark my words sister, your faith that goodwill and harmony are inherent in all creatures will betray you in the end.”

Celestia shut her eyes, chewing on the words her sister had given her. As she heard her sister continue towards the dungeon, she refocused her gaze on her sister meeting Luna’s searing ire with hope.

“And what if you are wrong about them and they speak the truth, Luna?” Celestia countered.

Luna turned away.

“Their truth is what I fear the most.”

It had taken Fluttershy the better part of the afternoon to finally blearily feel her way out of the bed. She had slept for so long, but she still felt incredibly tired as the covers refused to let her go without a fight. She tumbled unceremoniously out of bed to the cold floor, loosing a stifled “eep” as gravity took her down. Finding her strength from the sudden chill of the floor, she carefully trotted towards the door, avoiding the eyes of any familiar nurses bustling around the medical wing.

As she rounded a corner, the bitter aroma of fresh coffee crossed her muzzle.  She wasn’t particularly fond of the black drink that tasted more like licorice tossed around in dirt, but her need for a pick-me-up outweighed her distaste of the powerful concoction. She decided to risk the exposure, figuring maybe they had enough cream and sugar to mask the foul taste.

She tip-hooved her way to a coffee pot surrounded by concerned mares and stallions in a makeshift waiting room. Family and friends sat, paced, slept, and passed the time to keep an ear out for news of their injured or sick loved ones. Fluttershy carefully reached for the pot until a slightly familiar shop owner spotted her.

“Hey! You’re one a’ Spike’s friends, Butterscotch, right?” the burly unicorn brightly greeted under a thick Bucklyn accent to the cover-blown Fluttershy. “Hey, you don’t look so good. Feeling okay?”

“Umm, no. Well actually yes… but no… maybe? Not so loud please, sir,” she stammered in reply, her eyes darting around to see if anyone noticed her presence.

“I’m Fluttershy…” she whispered as she sank lower to the ground. The donut cutie-marked stallion watched as Fluttershy slowly reached for the handle of the coffee pot, her knees wobbling back and forth as if they were going to give way to her anxiety.

“Well, no need to be shy about it, Fluttashy,” he guffawed as he grabbed the pot with his hoof, pouring the terrified pegasus a cup. “Bet nopony thoughta that one before,” he said with a friendly wink. Seeing his joke fall flat on its face, he decided a different approach was in order to calm the mare down.

“I brew the best coffee in the city that’s sure to cure ya crummy feels,” he proudly claimed while offering the cup in hoof to Fluttershy, “and don’t let nopony tell you othawise, even if these noble types like their venti macchiato iced tea brewed espresso latte who-zi-ma-whats-its betta. Who puts ice in coffee anyway? It ain’t natural.”

“I… see…” she sheepishly replied. Eying the bitter concoction made her wish for her iced matcha latte with cream and chocolate sprinkles. The stallion gave a knowing chuckle to himself as Fluttershy somberly gazed at the black pool before her.

“Sorry about that Fluttashy, Joe knows a cream-drinka look when he sees it. Here, lemme mix ya up somethin’ special,” Joe offered, taking the cup out of her hoof and expertly mixing an impromptu brew together with what little was available. “Now there’s a pretty cup-a-Joe’s Joe for ya. Didn’t have much to work with, but at least the temp’s a good ol’ one-seven-five, perfect for bringin’ out the flavor.”

Fluttershy took a careful whiff of the enhanced coffee. It smelled considerably better than before, almost palatable. She took a quick sip to explore the taste as the intense heat assaulted her taste buds in a great way. It was amazing how easily its sweet taste could invigorate her.

“Oh my, this is quite delicious, Mr. Joe.”

“Please, just call me Joe, or Donut, or Donut Joe,” Donut Joe rambled on before laughing. “How about calling me anything but stupid unless I deserve it, that work for ya?”

She chuckled for a bit before recalling the reason she crawled out of bed in the first place. She attempted to guzzle down her coffee to get going, but only managed to nearly scald her tongue. She choked a bit as she coughed up hot liquid.

“Woah, easy there lil’ missy! I know ya high strung and all, but chuggin’ coffee ain’t gonna help nopony, yourself included.”

Fluttershy hacked and wheezed catching her breath from the burning caffeine shot straight through her head. “I’m sorry, I-just-really-need-to-see-my-friends-because-they’re-the-ones-in-deep-deep-trouble-and-it’s-just-so-frustrating-when-you-wish-you-could-do-something-for-them-because-they’re-both-very-dear-to-me-and—” she gasped for air from her breathless coffee-fueled tirade.

“I don’t know how to help them!” she cried as tears formed in her eyes.

“Hey, hey, hey, slow down! I understand,” he interrupted the panicked yammering trying to calm the meeker mare down gasping for breath. “It’s one of the reasons I been hanging around joints like this. I got a marefriend–well a friend whosa mare really—that I hadn’t seen around my shop since that whole swarm rolled through. Truth is, I’m bouncin’ around the hospitals asking about her. None a’ my regulars have seen her. You wouldn’t happen to know a unicorn named Sunny Skies, would ya Fluttashy?”

“Oh no, I’m sorry Mr. Donut Joe, I don’t.”

“Heh, it’s just Donut or Joe, and no need to apologize. I’m just glad a sweet little thing like you didn’t get hurt in all that shifty mess the otha day.”

Fluttershy blushed and braved another large swig of her coffee to pad out her part of the conversation.

“I just gotta find her, you know, before things start getting outta hand with all the talk a’ changeling hunts starting up soon.”

Fluttershy gagged on her coffee, gasping for air as she felt some coffee nearly settle in her lungs.

“W-wh-cough-WHAT?!” she choked out incredulously, drawing more attention that she meant to with her small yelp.

“Ya mean ya hadn’t heard?” Donut Joe incredulously asked, his accent somehow thickening as he fumed. “Lotsa of dem nobles are demandin’ the guards start arrestin’ families a’ missing ponies like sprinkle-snatchin’ criminals! As if it wasn’t bad enough havin’ a lost loved one, but now they wanna make things worse by accusin’ dem a’ harborin’ changelings? Da nerve! Da absolute nerve! I bet mosta ‘em got their noses stuck up so high in da clouds, they don’t even realize they got missing folks too!”

She quickly took one final swig to finish off what little was left in her cup. She quickly shoved the used cup next to the other dirty ones nearly toppling the ceramic stacks as she gave another frantic search to see if anypony had noticed her yet.

“I-I don’t know much about that. I’m sorry. Oh, and thank you M… Donut Joe. The coffee was really good and I’m sorry I spilt so much of it, but I need to go find my friend. Now!”

“Heh, well you’re very… fast?” Fluttershy zipped off around the corner as fast as her weary legs would carry her before Joe could finish his courteous reply correctly. He took her used cup in hoof and whiffed the remnants of the dark sugar and cream filled concoction.

“Maybe I shoulda gave her decaf?”

A catchy pop song blared from the royal pavilion as ponies danced the fleeting dusk away in elated celebration. Pinkie and Rarity had gone all out to make the event a success with Pinkie providing her trademark party antics while Rarity used the extra time she had after redesigning the bridal party’s gowns to help with the regal decorations. It was truly a party for all ages with everypony enjoying delectable delights, amazing music, and even a few childish party games. No one would soon forget Shining’s utter determination to win against his new wife at Twister, except for Twilight Sparkle.

Twilight pored over notes while nibbling on an apple fritter, shunning out the party bustling around her. The bloom love song or whatever the hay it was didn’t help her concentrate as she started piecing together what little she had discovered from the changelings. She knew the princesses were going to be questioning Heartthrob soon, but she had to stay for the reception being both Shiny’s best mare and mare of honor for Cadence. She wanted to be happy for her big brother best friend forever and newest sisterly addition, but she couldn’t focus on anything but the muddled puzzle she had in front of her.

“I hope that sour look of yours ain’t from my fritter, sugarcube,” Applejack joked as she joined Twilight at her table with her own plate of baked goods. Twilight forced a smile as her friend sat down, trying to downplay her own worries.

“Of course not, AJ. I’ve never heard of anypony complaining about something you baked,” Twilight affirmed. “Well, unless we count that one applebuck season when Big Mac broke—”

“Now now, don’t get into a rumble with a rattlesnake by rustlin’ the bushes,” AJ quipped before Twilight brought up the baked bads incident. “Seriously though, I know what’s eatin’ at ya, but just like the princess said, we can’t let some bitter bugs go and ruin a good time.”

“I know, I know, sweet-eating Celestia, I know!” she flailed her hooves skyward as she flopped down and headdesked the table. “I just can’t help myself. So much of this doesn’t make any sense.”

“How do ya mean?”

Twilight huffed as she plodded through her ever-growing notes she had kept to help her focus, another veritable spider web of speculation with very little evidence to capture any probable hypothesis buzzing around just out of reach. She began explaining to how impossible it was to pinpoint when Rainbow Dash had been replaced. AJ admitted she recognized a few of the bits of information as she shuffled through her notes: a three broken wing images, a page filled with wing power tables, a list of successfully performed Sonic Rainbooms, she had seen a few in passing over the past few months. Twilight tried to squeeze any helpful information she might have missed out of her friend, but Applejack wasn’t the best board to bounce off ideas and speculations.

“I’m sorry, Twi. I ain’t that great at figurin’ out congodrums…”

“Conundrums,” Twilight dully corrected, her face still pressed to the table.

“Bless you. As I was sayin’, I ain’t great a puzzle solvin’, but maybe focusin’ on somethin’ else for a spell might do ya some good.”

“Like what?” Twilight inquired with as much enthusiasm as the ever-jovial Tom the boulder.

“Well, I dunno how helpful it’ll be, if at all, but Princess Luna and I had a lotta time to talk about some stuff when I was under,” she remarked and flinched a bit. “A whole lotta time…”

“And?”

“Well, I don’t remember everythin’, but I reckon somethin’ mighty strong was botherin’ her too.”

“You don’t say,” Sparkle fizzled flatly.

“Yeah, but I could tell plain as day she knew a lot more than she was a lettin’ on. I thought she’d be a better liar, but it’s more her not tellin’ the whole story than anythin’ else, know what I mean?”

“The princesses can be rather cryptic sometimes, AJ,” Twilight replied, bringing herself up to face her friend, finding more interest in the conversation at hoof. “So what did you talk about?”

“Well, aside from her wowin’ me with her dream powers, we started talkin’ about the Elements of Harmony. Didja know she used to wield Honesty, Loyalty, and Laughter?”

“Really? I can see the other two, but Laughter?”

“I know, right? Boy howdy, can she be a hoot-and-a-half when you get some one-on-one time with her like I did,” the farmer lauded before regaining her more serious tone, “but she showed me somethin’ that… I dunno, maybe she was just showin’ off, but maybe there’s somethin’ in there you can make sense of.”

Applejack followed Luna through the white nothingness before them as it gave way to pillars and spires shooting around them. The farmer could only marvel in silent awe as walls stacked themselves brick by brick with the windows materializing from broken shards of glass. Soon enough, the night settled around them as the two mares found themselves in the middle of the Castle of the Two Sisters, or the ruins thereof, with the illusion of the Everfree growing into existence outside.

“Pardon me for sayin’ this princess, but when I said ‘let’s go someplace fun’, I didn’t really have a spooky castle in middle of the Everfree Forest in mind.”

“My apologies dear Applejack, I just needed a bit of your memory to rebuild from. Tell me, do you know where we are?”

Applejack looked around the room a bit, noticing the ceiling was blown clean off with the creeping forest breaking through the broken windows and missing roof. The most prominent remnant of a former decoration was the strange pronged ornament in the middle of the room with five orbs attached to what she thought was a sculpture of a dead tree. As she neared the dusty remains, she remembered the first Summer Sun Celebration with Twilight Sparkle.

“I remember now, this is the place where we showed up Nightmare Moon with the Elements of Harmony, right?”

Luna gave a curt nod in reply, “Yes, but it was not always such a ruined castle as you see now…”

Luna lifted her head shooting a pale beam of light into the middle of the room. The elements rattled as the room spun to life. The moon rose from the west, quickly shooting across the painted sky brightly as it fell eastward giving way to the sun’s glorious light of day which also sped across the blue cloudless expanse in mere seconds. The heavenly bodies quickened their pace as their passage ramped up faster and faster with the sun rising and setting followed by the moon, then sun, then moon, sun, moon, sun, moon...

As time continued its heavenly backtracking, the invading greenery receded to the edges of the room as Luna began returning to the castle in its former glory. Luna conducted a symphony of dreamweaving spells to forge the room. Broken columns were replaced by ornate pillars trimmed with celestial bodies embroidered with starlight, the marble walls bounced light around with beautiful murals depicting scenes embodying each elemental force with the stained glass windows beaming their colorful images as the sun and moon finally took their places in the sunset west and moonrise east. As the ancient magic subsided, Applejack gaped in awe at the completed palace’s magnificence.

“Welcome to the Chamber of the Harmony, dear Applejack, as it was known in a time long forgotten.”

Applejack lost her words, not from a lack of vocabulary, but there was not a single word that could capture its beauty. She slowly crept along the wall looking intently at the scenes depicted of harmony against chaos. Every millimeter revealed new details and stories nopony had ever dreamed in modern times. Sure she recognized Discord from their recent encounter and the Windigos from tales of Hearth's Warming Eve, but their tales were just a small part of the eons spanning the room. Harrowing battles, great evils, devastating cataclysms, all made right with Kindness, Generosity, Laughter, Loyalty, Honesty, and Magic, their unfurling stories were inlaid in the walls as if they were painstakingly etched onto each surface over countless years. Among the celebrations of the triumphant tales of harmony were confusing markings of the heavens and charts of stars, planets, and galaxies known only in the secret places of the immortal pony sisters. Applejack found herself lost in a world before there ever was one.

A vaguely familiar orb cast its caring pink light upon her, drawing the farmer out of her confusion. It drew her gaze away from the marvels on edges of the room for her to recollect herself. What Applejack recognized as the Element of Kindness led her to the center where the other elemental spheres danced around a beautiful depiction of a glass tree, emitting lights of their own. Generosity spun around, graciously giving light to the shadowy corners of the room; Kindness followed suit, gently shining different colors upon the murals and filling the still images with light; Magic hovered above them all, brilliantly glowing magenta as the epicenter of harmony. More striking though were Honesty, Loyalty, and Laughter, resonating with Princess Luna and surrounding her as she breathed in their brilliant warming caress.

“In the time before Celestia and I came to rule the three unified tribes of Equestria, we were known simply as the Two Sisters: the Shapers of Heaven and Keepers of Harmony. My sister wielded the powers of Kindness, Generosity, and Magic while I kept Loyalty, Laughter, and Honesty,” she giggled as laughter spun around her barrel, tickling her sides.

“Though they are only my figments, it is good to feel their welcoming presence again after so very long,” she reveled aloud. She looked towards Applejack, only to see the mare’s legs buckle under the pressure of the sights and wonders she beheld.

“I-I can’t… it’s so… this is too much,” Applejack quavered finally at wit's end, her knees refusing to let her stand. She wilted, having expended her strength merely uttering a sentence under the pressure of her emotions running relays of humility, honor, awe, and sheer terror. It took every scrap of pride she had left to not weep from gazing upon the ancient palace’s overwhelming splendor.

Luna carefully walked to the mare forced to the floor and helped her to her hooves with a warm smile. “I am most pleased by your respect for one of my favorite places. It took many years to craft these halls. Fear not, friend. As one who bears an Element of Harmony, you are most worthy to be here, Honest Applejack.”

“Well,” Applejack chuckled with small sniffle, “if ya say so, princess.” Applejack felt new life breathing into her as if verbal permission from the princess was all she needed to withstand the overload around her. She kept telling herself it was just a dream, that she could handle it, but it was once also a very real place.

“This room was a testament to their power to bring peace to the land, even before the time of Equestria,” she continued as she took to her wings to admire her craftsmanship. “Celestia and I carved into the rock the many triumphs over the powers that threatened the fragile balance we worked so hard to maintain. It served as a constant reminder for us that though the power of friendship is strong, harmony is something that must be fought for and protected. You will understand this in time.”

Luna fluttered to a landing as her familiar elements spun around her. She brightened as she spotted an element to bring Applejack back down to earth. “Here, here! Take it,” Luna excitedly whispered to her friend. With childlike pride, she quickly motioned Honesty to Applejack. “This is how the elements were when we first wielded them.”

Applejack felt the power of Honesty resonate within her as the elemental sphere drew closer. Even in this imaginary recreation, the power emanating from her element felt tangible. As she held it in her hooves, the orb recognized her as its bearer as she felt it pierce her chest with its power. Honesty always sought the truth no matter how hard it would be to hear, and Honesty’s familiar pull on AJ’s heart was one she knew well and felt comfort in where others would find very little.

“Each element radiates power when close to its true wielder. They have a will all their own, and only resonate with whomever they have chosen to be their rightful owners.”

“Ya don’t say… I guess that explains why poor Spike couldn’t do a thing to help against Discord.”

“Indeed, they respond to Harmony, which your friendship with Twilight Sparkle and your other friends was powerful enough to reawaken them after so many years, something that I clearly lack.”

With that, Laugher and Loyalty spun around slowly reflecting the face of the princess of the night in their pearlescent luster. Their glow dimmed before falling to the floor and rolling back to the center of the room. Drawing closer to the center, the two orbs sprung to life again, lifting off the ground when reunited with the other elements. Luna’s countenance sank as the ancient warmth seeped away, leaving her cold and alone.

“But that can’t be right,” Applejack disagreed, taken aback by the elements' rejection of Luna. “You used to represent half of ‘em! I’m sure they know ya too after all those years.”

The princess drew a remorseful sigh as the moon rose in the east, casting its pale beams into the chamber to replace the westward warming sun. She cast a pitiful gaze as she waved a hoof in front of the heavenly sphere, painting the visage of the Nightmare upon its surface.

“Indeed you are correct, Applejack. At times I feel they know me better than I know myself. The elements are fully aware of my treachery, thusly, I am no longer am worthy of their power.”

“But that ain’t true at all!” Applejack unabashedly objected. “Since you came back, you’ve done nothing but right by me and my kin. Sure, we were scared a’ you at first, but I know you work hard for the sake of everypony, even if we don’t always see it when we’re all asleep.”

Luna turned to face the farmer, raising her voice, “No, Applejack, it goes much deeper than that. I lied to Celestia, betrayed the trust of everypony I ever held dear, and lost my laughter long ago. I forced my beloved sister to do the unthinkable… to break the one rule that mattered, a sin that can never be forgiven causing the elements to lie dormant for a millennium…”

“But ain’t that kinda silly to fret over now?”

“You misunderstand. To them I am nothing but a worthless traitor.”

“Horesapples! We already took care of Nightmare Moon and the elements are back to normal—”

“IT IS NOT SO SIMPLE!” she boomed with visceral regal spite catching AJ completely off guard. “You speak in such petty terms of acts seen in days, weeks, and months to one who has lived to face thousands upon thousands of evils over the lost ages of this world! What do you know of the Fell-King Sombra, Tirek the devourer, or the Blight of Wormwood?”

“I don’t…” Applejack offered in an apology that was ignored by royal ire.

“I witnessed horrors unimaginable, their atrocities, their malice, their wanton destruction, yet for all of history’s lessons, I still conspired against my sister out of petty jealousy. I let the very same darkness take hold of me! I made her turn against me, something she never should have been forced to do!”

The irate princess spun around as her angry tirade continued. “And now, Harmony is once again threatened and I can do nothing but wait as the elements remain scattered among the frail, mortal hooves of—of…” she somberly trailed off seeing her rage reflected in Applejack’s frightened eyes. “My deepest apologies, dear Applejack, these words were never meant for you. I came to alleviate your fears and I only brought a nightmare instead.”

Applejack was torn apart inside seeing the alicorn compare herself to that monster. She needed to say something, but her leveled-headed temperament had been thrown out the window from being scared witless by a charging alicorn. Luna solemnly walked towards the ornate doors basking in both the sun and moon’s radiant beams of light.

“Let us depart from this place, it is nothing more than a distant memory.”

Before Applejack could stop her, she walked through the doors, breaking her spell. The canvas around her flashed to black and white as the dream shattered in an instant with a flurry of sparkling shards raining all around. Luna drew in a long breath and snorted contently as the memory faded into obscurity. She awkwardly brightened up as if she had struck by an epiphany. She ran to Applejack with a toothy grin stretching ear to ear, pushing the last few moments away as if it had never happened.

“Come, it seems in my absence, several ingenious unicorns have fashioned amusements by capturing and utilizing dream energy in strange devices to present us with the most glorious of interactive experiences!”

“Beg your pardon?”

“Tell me, have you ever played a Joyboy from the inside before?” Luna gleefully giggled as Applejack wondered if she was supposed to know what that meant.

 Twilight waited for Applejack to continue her story, having started jotting down serious notes when Applejack had described the Chamber of Harmony. With bated breath she soon realized AJ had run out of material for her to take down. She knew the answer, but figured there would be no harm in asking.

“Well, what happened after that?”

“I can’t rightly recall anythin’ else really important that you might want an earful about,” Applejack offered, biting her lip to come up with more details. “I do know I got the fourth highest score in all of Equestria on some game called ‘Super Bronco Blasters.’ Turns out it’s a lot easier when you’re the actual blastin’ bronco.”

Twilight sat in perplexed contemplation, gleaning over her notes to compare and contrast their relevance. It truly was a unique experience to relive the ancient wonders of the world through an alicorn’s eye, but how any of it could relate to anything now was beyond her presently. The more concerning matter was the question of Luna’s unforgivable sin she referenced and how it related to Princess Celestia.

Twilight had gathered the elements had lost their power sometime after the first battle with Nightmare Moon. Was banishment using the elements something bad? They more or less had done the same to Discord twice without consequence. Come to think of it, was starting to say something about the elements being scattered. Rainbow was missing, that much was certain, but they still had all the elements. She was missing something, but nothing stood out among the other bits of information that she didn’t already know. Twilight tore a bite out from her cold apple fritter as she munched on the puzzle pieces in front of her. Applejack, realizing her mistake, furrowed her brow as she bit the tip of her tongue.

“Shoot, that didn’t help a darn thing, did it Twi?”

“Nope,” Twilight drawled out between fritter crunches as Pinkie Pie cranked up the beats of DJ Pon3 as the reception ramped up with more ponies cutting loose on the dance floor. “But I’m glad you told me, AJ. It’s not every day you get a peek into an ancient ruin in its prime and I’m sure Spike will be relieved to know his sense of loyalty wasn’t the problem when we faced down with Discord. Thanks!”

“Your mighty welcome, Twi. Now, as RD would say, let’s drop this ‘egghead’ stuff and get to partyin’! You don’t want your new sister to be gettin’ bummed out because her mare of honor was all glum at the reception, right?”

Twilight gave a nervous chuckle as she sorted her collection of notes and folders into a neat pile and sent them away with a quick teleport to her saddlebags. The princesses would kill her if they knew how much time she had spent studying during her brother and foalsitter’s big day, but she couldn’t help but wonder how the interrogations were going. The sky lit with stars as the celebration carried on into the evening.

In the dark recesses of the rarely used dungeon, Heartthrob shivered from the unusual coldness of the underground cells. The royal sister’s kept the dungeon small and out of the way, tucked below a rarely trotted corner of the castle. No guards were ever normally posted, nor did any castle hands come to clean the aged catacombs without direct orders from either of the princesses. There was very little comfort to be found, with only a small, purple magic flare keeping her room lit. At least the little blue flicker had the decency to dim when she had tried to sleep on the stone slab the previous night.

She peeked outside the small window of her door to see the lunar guard that had been keeping a vigilant eye out for signs of trouble whistled a casual tune. The dark blue stallion looked up briefly to see the changeling’s peep out the iron bars. He snorted giving the changeling a stink eye glare to sit back down before she got into anymore trouble.

With a discontented sigh, she fell back to the floor to look at the pale green light as the guard started his little song again. So many thoughts ran through her head against her will as she tried piecing together where exactly everything had gone wrong. Of course it was that cursed changeling Chromina’s fault in the first place. She snapped her eyes shut as an image formed in her mind of that changeling that went beyond the reasonable definitions of “horror” or “nightmare”. From what she had been shown from the short link they shared, she wished she had never agreed to her deal. She opened her eyes again to see the familiar yellow ember dance in its glass container. If the princesses only knew and had listened to her pleas for—

Heartthrob consciously blinked, keeping her focus on the orange light. She blinked again to see it change to red, and repeated to see it become violet again. She fluttered her eyes open and close as it ran its way working through the color spectrum all over again.

“You forgot about the lights again, princess,” she nonchalantly commented to the ever-changing lamp in her room, the remnants of a defense mechanism foisted upon her by Chromina. “Like I said the last time, if I see rainbows, I’ll know I’m dreaming.”

There was a loud clash against a table as Heartthrob popped up from her slumber, unkempt drool pooling into a sloppy puddle around her head. She wiped the dribble with a blush from her face as she faced the two royal sisters, the sun frowning ever-so-slightly at the moon who had reared up on the table, snorting furiously while eying the changeling like her prey.

“I would not resort to such enigmatic methods if you would simply cooperate!” she flared, her anger somehow resounding throughout the dank inquisitor room like a thunderhead.

“I told you before, Princess Luna,” Heartthrob desperately reasoned against the oncoming storm, “I can’t tell you anything that Chromina has not permitted me to speak of. If she finds out I said anything she doesn’t want me to—”

“WE CARE NOT FOR THINE STOLEN FACE, DECEITFUL WRETCH!”

“I will speak for myself, Luna.” Celestia remarked, prodded her sister down to her haunches. The elder sister had heard more than enough of the obnoxiously loud, headache inducing “royal we” for one day. “The three of us will just have to find out what we can that won’t endanger her further.”

Luna gritted her teeth as she shot daggers with her narrowed gaze at the shape-shifting prisoner. “We should have you taste that despicable concoction Applejack had forced down her throat,” the moon spat, her words cleaving straight through Heartthrob. “Perhaps then you will be more… agreeable?”

Luna and Heartthrob shared in shuddering as the temperature suddenly spiked in an uncomfortable warm glow, making the the midnight alicorn immediately regret spouting her threat against the changeling. Even though medical drones supposedly weren’t adept at tasting emotions other than love and compassion, the Princess of the Sun’s unrelenting righteous anger burned with an unbearable spiciness that easily scalded the changeling’s tongue. Not needing empathic abilities to sense the elder’s ire, Luna’s fury fizzled out in her sister’s tapered white hot intensity.

“I will not tolerate any further threats against our guest or I will personally lock you in her cell for the evening while she rests in your bed. Do I make myself clear, Luna?” she asked sweetly hiding a solar flare behind her controlled eyes. Heartthrob doused the flames in her mouth with spittle, wishing she had a glass of milk rather than her own dwindling repurposed love to cool the boiling under her tongue.

Luna bit back her choice words for the contemptible changeling. Heartthrob marveled at the emotions bubbling between the two titans of their world as they continued clashing wordlessly. It hadn’t been so bad the other night with all their emotions being directed towards Chromina, but being the focus for the sisters’ contention was becoming unbearable having never tasted such strong feelings.

“So, sister,” Luna huffed, relenting to her elder, “if not the pickled threat upstairs, what should we discuss with our ‘esteemed guest?’”

Celestia ignored Luna’s less-than-gracious tone and shut her eyes to ponder for a few moments. Heartthrob idled nervously in her seat wondering what the princess of the sun would ask of her. At this point, she did not have much respect for Luna, but the changeling truly loved Princess Celestia and had always wished she could meet her, though obvious reasons kept her from getting too close. To shape-shifter’s surprise, the torrential emotions quelled themselves into a tender pool of contentment, one of the few flavors Heartthrob could taste clearly.

“I think I would like to hear about you, Nurse Heartthrob, and how you came to our aid despite your heritage.”

Heartthrob felt her jaw unhinge, leaving her mouth agape for a few moments in shock. Being a prisoner of possible war, she was had expected something more along the lines of changeling military strength or battle tactics, which she honestly knew nothing about. Furthermore, Celestia’s inquiry was backed with enough love to satiate her emotional appetite with a single lick. She wanted more than anything to savor the succulent flavor having lacked a source of love for nearly two days, but she was already on melting thin ice without feeding off of royalty.

“Chromina was right about one thing, your highness, I didn’t come to Canterlot because of my duty as a pegasus nurse,” Heartthrob started tepidly. “I actually came here looking for my husband.”

“Ah yes, Mr. Scruffy Bootly, former lieutenant of the city guard and current heir to his father’s caravanning company, the Bootly Connection, correct?” the princess of the sun commented with a pleasant smile.

“Yes, your highness,” Heartthrob replied, both astonished and frayed at the seams, wondering why the princess called his name so readily. “I got a letter from Scruffy two days before the invasion saying he was called back to Canterlot to bolster the guard for the upcoming wedding.”

“I remember he had the utmost zeal for duty while patrolling the city outskirts during his time in the guard. With the threat against Canterlot, we needed every able-hoof we could muster and he came with glowing recommendations from Captain Silver Spear, which he proved true during the invasion. He fought bravely for all of the ponies around him,” she proudly remarked trying to brighten the changeling’s spirits. Heartthrob was less than receptive as she fiddled nervously with her hooves, a nervous habit she had picked up during her first years as a pony, always feeling for holes in her legs. “Is there something on your mind?”

Celestia paused for a ponderous moment as she eyed the nerve-wracked changeling. The princess’s gaze fell upon the shifter’s fidgeting which she was unwittingly focusing around her wedding bangle. “Don’t worry, Heartthrob. Your husband is safe and sound.”

“He is?!” she exclaimed, brightening up immediately at the good news. To the solar princess’s delight, the changeling had forgotten to add “her highness” to her statement like a chronic royal sneeze.

“He helped many ponies take shelter during the changelings' assault and only came out with a few bumps and bruises. I look forward to awarding him for his remarkable courage once everything has settled down.”

Heartthrob caught her breath as she held a hoof over her heart and heaved a sigh of relief when Celestia lifted that exhausting burden off her.

“Of course, the first name out of my sister’s mouth is your supposed husband’s,” Luna retorted coldly, rolling her eyes at what she considered a disingenuous display of affection. “You expect us to believe it was serendipity that had you stumbling into the castle’s infirmary while on your quest to seek your lost love as well?”

“Yes?” Heartthrob meekly answered, not exactly sure how to respond to the question.

Princess Celestia chuckled at the exchange. “I for one would be surprised if she had not been summoned with the nature of Rainbow Dash’s treatment.”

“I’m all ears, sister,” Luna deadpanned, quite cross with Celestia’s continued rebuttals to her arguments.

Princess Celestia’s horn glowed with golden light as a scroll materialized in front of her wrapped with the usual red ribbon. She gracefully loosed the knot and unfurled the parchment as her eyes ran over the words within.

“Class A Field Nurse Heartthrob Bootly of the honorable Nimbostratus Hospital,” she proudly started as her she followed the list. “Awarded for Outstanding Excellence in Medical Service five times during her time at Cloudsdale Central Clinic, recommended for her current position by several notable physicians, including our own Doctor Triage of Canterlot Castle as well as two notable patients, Misty Fly and Rapidfire of the Wonderbolts, commended for going above and beyond the call of service during Discord’s second reign when she assisted pegasi with altered wings and other chaotic ailments suffered while airborne… need I go on?”

The sun eyed the moon with a knowing smirk. “You have made Nurse Heartthrob’s credentials abundantly clear,” Luna huffed, turning away from her sister’s haughty light to not press the issue of identity further to her stubborn sister.

“I couldn’t agree more,” Celestia stated whisking the parchment back from whence it came before recomposing herself as she turned back to Heartthrob. “I’m sorry I didn’t recognize your name when we first met. I’ve always wanted to meet the humble healer always hiding from her accolades.”

Heartthrob had forgotten about more than half of those the princess had listed for her younger sister. She never attended award ceremonies, fearing being put in the spotlight in case there were any errant changelings happening by to catch her. She now wished she had risked it, feeling the sheer admiration beaming from the princess’s warm smile. It was unbelievable, too good to be true. She looked for a rainbow light somewhere, but the only colors were hues of morning and midnight.

“But, Princess Celestia, I don’t understand,” Heartthrob remarked genuinely perplexed and touched by the princess’s honesty. “How can you believe I’m me so easily?”

“Simple, it’s because I choose to believe in you,” she replied casually to Heartthrob.

“You may have made a mistake in trying to harm Chromina by suppressing her magic, but right now I only want answers that may help us in our current predicament.” Princess Celestia giggled slightly. “After all, why should I bother questioning you if I can’t trust anything you say?” Celestia made herself more comfortable as she shifted into her seat’s cushion a bit more and leaned forward to give Heartthrob undivided attention. “So tell me about yourself, Doctor Heartthrob. Why have you served me and my little ponies so faithfully over the years?”

Heartthrob paused, looking at the scowling muzzle of Princess Luna counter to the warm glow of Celestia. No matter what she said, the room would be divided through the middle between day and night.

“Perhaps it would be better if I showed you, your highnesses,” Heartthrob offered as an inviting amber ribbon of arcane energy emerged from her horn. “Do you trust me?”

Far away from the comforts of Canterlot, deep within the sandy wastes of the Badlands, an unassuming canyon bustled with excitement and fear. Inside of what appeared on the surface to be a series dirty caves soon yielded to immaculate crystalline halls the color of emeralds and sapphires known to other lesser colonies as the hallowed halls of Queen Chrysalis’ Royal Hive. Her royal worship had returned two days ago from the failed strike against Equestria, their mangled deity quietly rushed to the depths of the hive to her own personal Medipod.

Inside the pristine healing chamber, Queen Chrysalis was listening to the Hive Mind as a chorus, hundreds of thousand voices strong, singing their reverent songs to her through the changeling Mindscape. She wanted to bathe in their glorious anthem to her greatness while slumbering in the warm regen-a-gel of her royal Medipod, but a certain presence was gnawing at her head, someone who had no business still being alive. However, if the brief moment she felt the thoughts of the forgotten changeling was real, then she had no business lingering in a stew. She took one last deep swath of gel before reemerging into the waking world.

From outside her serene container, a frenzied panic set upon her drones. They had stabilized her condition from being jettisoned from Canterlot like a cannonball, not many had fared any better with most ending up as black blots on the sides of mountains or little smears in forests to be feasted upon by wild animals. However, acting Prime Sarthii Varista struggled to regain control as the queen was stirring far too early in her treatment. With Chrysalis’ prime medical drone, Prime Quadraxi, was still missing from the failed invasion, it was up to him to maintain the queen’s health, and failure to do so would mean a swift death for him and his hive.

The team fought to regain control, but they soon realized it was Chrysalis herself overriding their healing efforts. With a severly cracked carapace and a broken foreleg, her majesty Queen Chrysalis emerged from her pod like a broken slug, dripping with healing gel and writhing in pain from forcing herself awake.

“Oh, no! Please, your majesty, it is still far too early! You shouldn’t be moving around for at least another two weeks!” Sarthii begged as he buzzed over to the irritable queen.

“Indeed, which is why I have faithful drones like you to keep me moving, now come!”

“Your majesty, I must insist that you—GURK!” Queen Chrysalis ripped the kind doctor from the floor wrapping her magic around the petty drone like a tight noose. She thrusted the doctor in front of her eyes lit with feral intensity.

“Tell me, what is the one virtue I have instilled in you since you were a lowly maggot, Quadraxi?” she spat, her eyes flared with vibrant intensity as she stared into the panicked eyes of her physician. “SPEAK!” she demanded to the captured changeling glanced around, seeing fear instilled into the eyes of every other shifter in the queen’s healing cabal. As his eyes pleaded for help, one of the braver sentries stood at attention.

“Your worship, if I may! This is not Prime Quadraxi, rather Sarthii of Queen Varista’s brood,”

Chrysalis looked over the features of the choking changeling in her vicegrip, noting the foreign hive’s purple coloration. “And that matters why?”

“The next best doctor for royal care is Doctor Boldren from Queen Felbi’s hive deep in the Forests of Leota.”

“I see, and that is at least two days away,” she replied ponderously. Realizing her hasty error, she kindly smiled at her honorable guard before turning back to Doctor Sarthii. “It seems I owe you an apology. It would be unfair of me to punish you for doing your sworn duty. As reward for your diligence, from this day forward you will be known as Prime Drone Quadraxi.”

The new Quadraxi cocked his brow for the unique reward his queen had bestowed upon him. His flinched as a painful pulse coursed through his body, shifting his hive’s purple coloration to Chrysalis’ green as she assimilated him into her hive. The small choir in his mind grew to a deep symphony, singing praises to their almighty queen. Not wanting to test her patience by mentioning the hive transition or the awkward femininity of his new title, he simply idled as the queen turned towards the guard who had bravely stemmed Chrysalis’ wrath.

“Oh, and sir…”

“Kexsrith, your worship.”

“Of course, Sir Kexsrith. You are now Doctor Sarthii,” she said matter-of-factly, “and as I was saying… ” Before the confused guard could react to his strange promotion, Queen Chrysalis’ kind gratitude quickly flared into an enraged scowl as she seized full control the guard’s horn.

“MY WORD IS FINAL!”

The guard’s horn sparked with green fire engulfing his body from the ground up as the poor guard to erupted into green flames. His painful, agonizing cries echoed through the dark halls of the hive as he the loyal guard was slowly reduced to an unassuming pile of goo and ash. With a callous flourish of magic, she destroyed what little remnants of the honorable guard spread across the floor into a simple black scar on the floor, not letting him have the dignity of his ashes being cast into the wind. She eyed the closest guard to her immediate right who quickly clicked to attention fearing for his life. “One of you send my condolences to Queen Varista for her loss,” the queen coldly droned to the guard. She turned to formally address the newly assimilated medical drone. “Now, Prime Quadraxi, what do we say?”

“I-I live to serve our savior, High Queen Chrysalis!” he echoed with the other fanatical drones now in his mind.

“Perfect,” the queen bubbled. “this is why I am so fond of you Quadraxi: you know your place in my heart so well,” she said grimacing with suppressed ire as she ran a hoof through the changeling’s fin, molding it into a longer gossamer drape falling across his neck. Making more cosmetic changes before channeling another surge of magic through his body, she callously dropped the frightened changeling to the floor. “Of course, if it turns out the former Quadraxi is still alive, you may have to return to being Sarthii, and I am afraid that no one likes Sarthii.”

The shivering shape-shifter sank, wholeheartedly accepted his… her new name and position within Chrysalis’ hive. For her sake, she prayed the former prime was eaten by a wild manticore.

“Yes…” Quadraxi trailed at hearing her new, higher pitched buzz before continuing. “I mean, yes, I obey, your majesty.”

“I prefer ‘Your Worship’ from my inner circle.”

“My apologies, your worship.”

“Very good, Quadraxi, you always were my favorite medical drone. Now, tend to me, we have much to discuss with our plans for a second assault against Equestria.”

The doctor stopped dead in her gender-bent tracks. Though she had only been summoned a day before once the queen was found, she knew Chyrsalis’ hive had suffered gravely from Canterlot. They had not yet begun to mend yet from their numerous losses, and Queen Chrysalis was now suggesting an all out assault against the two most powerful ponies in the world? Quadraxi knew enough to know that the hive had no hope in Tartarus surviving another heated encounter with Equestria, let alone an assault. Lower hives under the Overqueen’s rule across the empire would be at risk of breaking from their Overshadowed link and join with others such as the Keemah Concordant or fly under the banner of the Maroon Marauder, Queen Alistair. Spreading their forces further wouldn’t just be stupid, it’d be suicide.

“You are not so good at keeping your thoughts and hesitations to yourself, are you Quadraxi?” Chrysalis countered the not-so-private thoughts of her recent replacement. “Don’t worry your pretty little head,” she affirmed, bonking the small doctor across the horn, “we already have everything in place. We only need to help a lost soul find her way back to my loving embrace, and we will hold the power to wipe Equestria off the face of the planet!”

“Sentries, assemble the surviving members of Dawnbreaker, we make for the ruins of the Wyrmpyre Rock,” Chrysalis ordered to her personal guards. Quadraxi shivered under the sheer pressure of confidence emitted by the changeling queen. Keeping her own thoughts to herself, Quadraxi hoped the queen could live up to the title she had foisted upon herself.

“With a single, radiant hymn, I will bring the two sisters to their knees, leaving nothing but ash in its glorious wake.”

Chapter 06: Losing Control

A tempest of emotions swathed over Luna as she tried to find her bearings within Heartthrob’s unstable imagination. In place of her ebony sea was a dark, raging typhoon, formless and without direction, a chaotic storm of mental energy of illogical reasoning. A changeling’s mind proved to be a different beast than what she usually tamed, overflowing with visions and memories of intermingled thoughts, ideas, aspirations, and fears. For all of the princess’s efforts, she found it nearly impossible to make a sense of the nonsense around her.

“Changeling! You must focus upon one instance, do not let your mind shift focus from that image for a single second!” she called out into the darkness, hoping for a drop of steadiness in the swirling chaos. As she looked for any sign of the changeling, a familiar white figure came into view. It was only then did Luna noticed Celestia’s less than graceful entrance into the Dreamscape.

“She has a name!” Celestia shouted with a Doppler effect coming and going around the tempest like a cow caught in a tornado. She flailed around trying find up or down in the raging sea of spectral images.

Seeing her elder sister’s plight, coupled with her ungracious spiraling in the formless vortex sweeping her to and fro, brought a smile to Luna’s face. She watched the absurd spectacle of a hopeless alabaster alicorn streaking across the void like a flailing star struggling to maintain her place in the imaginary realm. Luna had often pondered why Celestia had been so pushy for her to resume her nightly duties once her proper alicorn magic had been restored. Apparently the extra thousand years reigning alone had not made Celestia any better when dealing with the workings of the dreamscape's unreality.

Refocusing on the task at hand, she felt a steadying presence within the madness. It was a single voice calling out to her among the myriad of memories which she grasped onto like a rope towing a lost vessel to shore. Feeling a sense of control seep into her hooves, Luna steadied her footing before tapping into the powers around her.

Instantly, the storm was quelled as a featureless sea of sand emerged from below Luna, or formed above Celestia from the sun princess’s upside-down perspective. Heartthrob appeared before the princess of the night in her original changeling form as the rapidly setting sun princess gracelessly hurtled towards the ground like an errant airborne piano before crashing muzzle-first into a nearby sand dune. A plume of silt and dirt bellowed in her wake.

“Wha… where,” the disoriented changeling babbled as she whisked her head around until she caught a sunny flank sticking out of the sand. Recognizing the limp legs and ethereal tail sticking out like a flag of a sandcastle, the nurse ran to the aid of the royal rump. “Y-your highness!”

‘Truer words have never been spoken by a shape-shifter,’ Luna thought as she chuckled at the rump.

Princess Celestia erupted from the sandy dune, falling to her back while coughing and hacking as she tried to spit out the gritty hot silt between in her teeth. She quickly brushed her tongue and teeth with a cleansing spell before looking up with a tinge of hot embarrassment and frustration seeing the former bearer of laughter nonchalantly admiring her rather shiny silver horseshoes. Tia nearly burst into sisterly rage until she remembered their literal head hostess’ presence. Princess Celestia adjusted her regalia while clearing her throat of the last bit of debris.

“You have quite outdone yourself, Luna,” she lauded with forced warmth behind her lustrous smile, “it is no small feat to replicate the bitter taste of sand so well. Shall we see what Heartthrob wishes to show us?”

Luna simply replied with a curt nod as she suppressed the urge to laugh. “Now, changeling, you have set the stage for your play, now it is time to bring the characters center stage. Close your eyes and think back to the moment you wish to show us.” Luna waited a moment as she felt the changeling meditate, bringing the image to the forefront of her mind. “Good. Now, extend that thought to the world around us, let me into your mind and I shall do the rest.”

“Yes, your highness,” she droned as she let her subconscious flow.

Princess Luna felt around the vision as she began casting her magic in tune with the flow of Heartthrob’s memory. She had never tried to reach into the mind of a changeling to pull out a memory before, and to say it was jarring reaching through Heartthrob’s memories would drastically undersell the morose catacombs of the changeling’s psyche. There was a deep loneliness pervading about, a disconnect of something missing from the mare, something precious and stolen from her. Luna could almost perceive visions of the past, ghosts of her friends and family, but she could sense their long dead feelings scattered to the wind when approached. Seeing a flicker of life, Luna outstretched her hoof to see it, but withdrew, suddenly getting a new perspective of her space.

Among the blacks and grays of the vacant mind were Heartthrob’s memories taking up an infinitesimal space when compared to the vacancy of the grand corridors. Thinking it only a small grain of errant thought, the vision burst forth revealing Heartthrob’s entire being for Luna to see. The princess took a step back, feeling a new appreciation for the enormity of the place she found herself in. Gaining a sense of size for the first time in the labyrinth, she could measure the size of the walls and columns rising high and curving into a ceiling several stories tall. She looked back and forth down the intermingled hallways stretching out into the horizon like the grassy hills of Chromina’s dreams, realizing she and Heartthrob  were alone in a dead and abandoned city.

Not wishing to linger any longer, Luna summoned forth the strongest image that Heartthrob was focusing upon. With a little force, she was able to pluck the necessary image from the spacious corridors of Heartthrob’s mind as she found herself back on the sands she had crafted. The picture grew clearly as the seconds slipped by. The cloudless sky spread across the horizon with a sun burning into view. In the distance, rocky spires and tall plateaus sprang from the sandy depths, creeping higher above the horizon to cast looming shadows. As their picture of the Badlands neared completion, silence lingered as darkness skulked through the arcane tides, casting the dream into deep shades of red, violet, and grey. A chaotic ebb of emotions contorting the memories into something less desirable as Luna felt the changeling lose control.

“I don’t like it here…” the changeling quavered, her id suppressing her thoughts as she tried to recall the event.

“Focus!” Luna barked at the shivering changeling. “Do not let your memories be clouded by irrational fear, you must keep your emotions in line!”

Celestia backed up from the channeling duo, feeling an ominous pressure rising from the two. She stepped back only to feel something grab her rear leg and begin pulling her into the sinking sands. Heartthrob began to hyperventilate as Luna felt her emotions soar from fear to terror. Luna gritted her teeth as she hadn’t expected a changeling’s memory to be so difficult to tame. This was a memory wishing not to be remembered.

“Luna, perhaps it would be best to try a different approach?” Celestia offered as the Badlands drifted deeper into a nightmare.

The vision became more muddled and chaotic as any sense of reality began slipping through their hooves. Spires began curving downwards like wilting blades of grass as entire mountains melted into piles of blackened sand and ash. The sun glowed a sickly violet as the vision quickly spiraled into a night terror. Celestia tried her best to regain control of herself as she took flight above the unfurling pandemonium, but black tendrils of a molten rock shot forth, entangled her wings, and forced her back down to the sinkhole forming below her.

“Luna,” the elder sister grunted as she felt her entire body seeping below, “now would be a very good time to end this!”

Luna forced her eyes open to see what the changeling’s mind had spiraled into. Seeing no way to calm the waves down, she breathed deeply as her eyes beamed with moonlight.

“BE STILL!”

There was a loud boom in reply from Heartthrob’s mind as the entire dream was forced to collapse in on itself. All three mares found themselves back on the formless sand dunes, bewildered from the breakdown. Luna stomped forwards toward the changeling as she forebodingly rose above her, narrowing her gaze and making sure to cast a long shadow over the offending shape-shifter.

“What folly is this?” Luna yelled as she grabbed Heartthrob with her magic. “How is reflecting upon traumatic memories easier than simply telling us?!”

“I don’t know,” Heartthrob sputtered as her eyes were transfixed on the angry blue eyes of the midnight princess. She tried averting her gaze until the angry moon snorted the changeling back to her full attention. “I tried remembering the moment I met Scruffy, but…” she trailed as she saw Luna’s irises had shifted to green.

“Oh no,” Heartthrob quickly blinked through a spectrum of color reflecting in Luna’s eyes, confirming her fears, “rainbows...”

Luna dropped the orange and black failure to the ground, staring off into the distance in disgust. She face-hooved as her ire began boiling again. “You mean to tell me that I, Luna, Princess of the Night, have been bested by a mere changeling’s block on your memory?!” Luna’s cheeks burned red at beholding such indignation.

“THE DREAMSCAPE IS OUR REALM! AS RULER OF THE DIMENSION OF DREAMS, WE SHALL NOT BE SO EASILY DEFEATED BY A SILVER-TONGUED SHAPESHIFTER’S SPELL!” the alicorn boomed as she rose higher into the sky, kicking up a tornado in her wake. “WE REFUSE TO BE DENIED OUR BIRTHRIGHT BY A MERE MORTAL! IF YOU CANNOT GIVE US WHAT WE SEEK, WE SHALL TAKE IT BY FORCE!”

“Luna, wait!” the elder sister cried out to no avail.

The Dreamscape swirled around as the ground flowed into a torrent of sand. Luna forced herself into Heartthrob’s memory, plucking out the closest fully formed memory within her grasp. Heartthrob reeled in pain at the royal’s sudden intrusion as the dream exploded with a blinding flash.

Topsy-turvy, upside-downy, sickly-spiny, wibbly-wobbly, and all other forms of nauseating vertigo flung Rainbow Dash around like a centrifuge for what seemed like an eternity. Bleary and blinded by lights around her, she tried focusing any senses on where she was. Her mind was a jumbled mess as she wasn’t sure when she had awoken or if she had been asleep at all. The only thing she could really perceive was taste, and it was sour. So incredibly sour like licking a lemon juice covered, acid leaking battery overcharged by a lightning bolt dipped in a rancid rainbow. She wasn’t sure if rainbows could be rancid or if they had expiration dates, but it was the only thing that came to mind.

Whatever she had done to deserve this, she was fairly certain of two things: one, it probably wasn’t her idea originally, two, Cloud Punch and Berrykicker were somehow involved. Blurred dancing lights slowly shaped into a spinning wicker ceiling fan gently wafting the scents of the sea into her nostrils. Letting out a painful groan as she stirred from her bewilderment, Rainbow lurched up from her daze taking in her new, tropical surroundings. Various potted plants decorated the room complimenting the floral wallpaper which met bamboo paneling halfway down the wall. The bamboo wove itself into a tubular floor molding sprouting into a sturdy bamboo trim which flowed along beautiful rows of polished wood flooring. Out a nearby window, she could see a white sandy beach meeting a serene ocean flowing into the endless horizon.

Rubbing a hoof against a spiked throb from her head, she felt the moist cloth of bandages on her brow. Carefully running a hoof around the area it was wrapped around, she rubbed a sensitive bump causing a wince and yelp of pain. Looking at the rest of her, she noted a rudimentary wooden splint fashioned upon her left wing. It was a strange sensation of déjà vu to say the least as she tried recalling where she was or how the hay she got there. A rumbling of frantic hooves shook her from her pondering as a vaguely familiar indigo pegasus skittered to a stop, nearly streaking clear past the room before catching the corner of the door with her wing to pull herself back.

“Rainbow!” the mare sputtered in disbelief, both shock and fear draped across her face.

“Uhh…” Dash flummoxed back.

“Oh, thank the sun, moon, stars, and whatever else is worth a hoof praising you’re awake!” The mystery mare barreled into the room with all the grace of a buffalo as she wrapped her forearms around the much confused Rainbow Dash. She meekly returned the gesture, finding respite in the familiar unfamiliarity. The two sat interlocked in a extensive hug that dragged on much longer than Rainbow was usually comfortable while the other found immense relief in the elongated embrace. The vibrant, red hibiscus flower bore a luxurious inland fragrance complimenting the sea breeze scent of the mare’s flowing mane bearing three beautiful shades of waning yellow, orange, and blue, a striking beauty reminiscent to the final moments of a summer sunset.

Finally breaking from the hug, the islander pegasus broke the hug with a sniffle and quick eye rub to recompose herself. “Geez Dash, for a moment, I thought we were in bigger trouble than I could handle,” the mystery mare sweetly sighed to Rainbow Dash as her scarlet eyes beamed upon seeing Rainbow rousing from her slumber.

“Wait, what? Whadya mean trouble? Where am I?”

“Where else but my esteemed personal little paradise island of… Paradisio,” she answered, stammering for a brief second, as Rainbow gave her a deadpan stare and brow raise. “Come on Dash, we already went through how bad I am with names when I bought the place. I didn’t hear you coming up with anything when I asked for your ideas.”

Silence settled as Rainbow continued to dart her eyes around the place, wondering what was going on. She put a hoof up to her head, feeling it wrapped like a mummy where a large bump had formed. Her mood sank when seeing pure confusion contorting around Rainbow Dash’s face.

“Wait, you remember who I am, don’t you?”

“Uhh…” Rainbow restated, nothing at all came to mind when seeing her. She looked over her features trying to come up with something. She was somewhat familiar, but she couldn’t pick it out. On her flank was an exploding flash of three circular rainbows forming around a center silver star, somewhat resembling her of her own Sonic Rainboom.

“I dunno, Spectral Flare?”

“Oh, thank goodness,” Flare lauded in relief, apparently Rainbow had gotten it right. She straightened up with a chastising fake glower, “You can’t pull the amnesia card on me after something like that! I told you to watch out for that coconut when you bucked that tree. You’re lucky you have such a thick head,” she sniggered as she flicked Rainbow’s nose with her hoof.

Of course, the coconut. Rainbow had completely forgotten about that little contest she had facing off her Flare to see which pegasus could buck the best. She swore her time with Applejack would have given her an edge, but she was bucked off of trees she had fallen asleep upon more often than actually lending a hoof to the apple family during harvest.

“Hey! Lay off Speck, I didn’t see you swoop down to catch it,” Dash remarked, crossing her hooves and rolling her eyes as she remembered the other mare’s nickname among a myriad of other little details throbbing into her head.

“Sorry for my terrible bedside manner,” Spectral Flare giggled as she wiggled her flank around. “After all, I don’t see a doctor cutie mark on my butt, sis.”

Rainbow couldn’t help but laugh at the silly spectacle her elder sister was putting on for her. She knew Speck was never one for shame or subtly having inherited their mother’s cruder sense of humor. Rainbow’s sniggering continued almost against her will as Flare shared in the fun with her infectious laughter and snorting. She was almost tempted to ask what their mother’s name was, almost.

“Ok, so did you get the coconut, Speck? I’m starving!”

“Well of course not, stupid! I was a bit more concerned with your concussion in the grand scheme of things. You’re lucky fixing your thick head is something I’ve gotten used to, Rainbow Crash.”

Why did Flare always know how the best ways to push Rainbow’s buttons to get her teeth grinding. Even if it was a stupid mistake, Speck wasn’t the one in bed. It was almost like she had known her all her life, which was a weird thought to Rainbow on a deeper level. Even though Speck, the best and coolest big sister in the world ever, was sitting right at her bedside as she always did, Rainbow couldn’t fathom why the name Spectral Flare meant nothing to her. Speaking of big…

“Hey Speck, have you always been so tall?” Rainbow asked, looking over her sister. She didn’t look so big coming in through the door or during the hug, but upon a second look the mare was massive to say the least. Not as tall as Queen Celestia, but probably a little bigger than Prince Macintosh for sure.

Speck blinked a couple of times before looking herself over. “Oh no, you don’t think I’ve gotten bigger, do you?” she quickly bounced out of her seat and stood straight against the door frame that bore little etchings marking her height Rainbow hadn’t noticed before. Speck glowered as she scrawled a mark on a preexisting line. “Now that’s a low blow, lil’ sis. You know how sensitive I am about my size!”

“You’re the one that brought up my flight school nickname. Besides, it’s not my fault you got dad’s bulk outta the lineage lottery, she-stallion.” Rainbow poked her sister’s big muzzle with a wily smirk.

“Well, you’re just saying that because you’ve always been jealous of your big sister’s big beautiful wingspan,” Spectral Flare huffed, grinning knowingly as she flashed her wings open. She displayed the full extent of her indigo feathers spreading gloriously across the small room. Even from sitting down, Flare had to be careful to not hit the ceiling when unfurling her spread.

“Pfft, yeah right. Big, beautiful, and slow. I’m the Wonderbolt material in the household, you’d fit in better at Sweetie Bell’s boutique with the rest of the Cutie Mark Creators,” Rainbow Dash bellowed loudly. “I bet Scoota Bloom and Appaloo would figure a great way to flaunt those giant feathers about.”

“Oh my, I don’t like the sound of that one bit,” the elder sister chuckled while patting her hoof atop Rainbow Dash’s muzzle. “Now give that little hot head of yours a rest up while I go grab us something to eat.”

The bed suddenly felt extremely comfortable to Dash as she gently lowered into the lovely feathers. She nearly turned over to go back to sleep as everything around her was demanding she go to sleep, but a feeling of going stir crazy quickly suppressed the nearly overwhelming urge to linger in bed.

“No way! I don’t get to see you often, sis. C’mon, let’s do something fun.” Rainbow hopped out of bed, placing her hooves firmly on the floor, feeling the refreshing solidity of wood on her hooves. She brimmed with confidence as she felt in control of herself for the first time in what felt like days.

Flare however was not amused in the slightest, rather she was flabbergasted to say the least. She was taken aback as her face was consumed by incredulity, her mouth hanging slack, eyes darting over Rainbow’s figure, and a cute, little brow twitch before she bit back her shock. “But Rainbow Dash, that was quite a bonk on the head, are you sure you’re okay?”

“Yup!” she gleefully replied. Rainbow went through her morning warm-up routine, a little ritual she had to rev herself up for a day of flying: clicking her hooves, flapping her wings… “Hey, my wing feels great!” she cheered as she ripped the splint off, giving her freed wing a victory flap as she took to the air.

“S-so you don’t feel tired?”

“Nope,” Rainbow answered, suppressing any further feelings of fatigue creeping into her.

“Sore?”

“Nuh uh,” she replied, feeling free of her headache as she unravelled her head bandage, the pain subsiding as she did so.

“Umm… stressed?”

“Stressed?” she questioned, dispelling any worries trying to gnaw at her in the back of her mind. “Why would I feel stressed?”

“No reason,” Flare replied sheepishly. “I just thought you might be a little more rattled by your impact… from the coconut.”

Rainbow thought about it for a bit, but shook her head upon further shallow introspection. “Not really, in fact, I’m more wondering why we had that bucking contest in the first place. We both hate coconuts.”

“You don’t say…” she trailed. “Well, don’t read much into it, sis. It was just a stupid competition. I’m just glad you’re alright.”

“Are you kidding me? It takes a little more than a stupid vegetable to keep Rainbow ‘Sparkle’ Dash down!” she rasped back to the sunset pegasus. Before Flare could utter a reply, Dash bolted from the room, speeding off into the main area. For the most part, it was a sparsely decorated beach house with floral patterned furniture and stereotypical islander decorum spreading around the area among the potted plants. It felt like a cozy little dream house Rainbow had always wanted to have for a getaway destination. Her sister’s job… of…

…

…

… Publishing?

Right! How could she forget Spectral Flare was a super-awesome, critically acclaimed Manehattan Press best-selling author? The bits she brought in from her books had afforded her the private little island the two had always wanted. Flare loved writing and reading enough to make a little career out of it, her books littering the… floor below the bookshelves. Somehow, Rainbow hadn’t noticed the giant wall of bookshelves behind her sister’s enlarge working when fluttering to landing in the room. Her writing area definitely stood out like a sore hoof among the rest of the beach-themed room. It was like a hurricane had blown through, ripping all the books from the shelves which had to have been painstakingly sorted knowing Flare’s flair for organization. Though a good number of the books were in their places, there were gaps everywhere in the hard-covered mess.

“Yeah, you caught me while I was reshelving them,” Flare commented as she trotted in behind her little sister.

“Geez, sis. Looks like something I would do when blasting into Spike’s library. That dragon is unforgiving when you mess up his and Rarity’s tidy collection.”

“Sounds dangerous,” Flare tepidly replied. “I was hoping I could get this done while you were asleep, you know. I REALLY didn’t want you seeing this big, embarrassing mess.”

“How did it happen anyway?”

Spectral Flare paused for a moment, biting her lip while digging for an appropriate answer in her head. “Let’s just say I needed to find a Daring Do book rather quickly.”

Rainbow begrudgingly resolved to leave it at that, knowing “let’s just say” was Flare’s kind way of saying, “Don’t ever bring it up again” whenever she had something to hide. Despite how bad of a liar her big sister was, she was an expert about keeping her secrets from everypony. She was an impenetrable vault of stupidity sometimes. “Well, let me help you put these books back at least, Speck. After all the times Spike has made me shelve books after botched stunts, I’m pretty good at it.”

“I guess you can, as long as you don’t try reading the…”

“‘I wasn’t about to let my friend win against me during our sudden Iron Pony competition without a fight. Since she was using that incredible earth pony strength to her advantage, I decided to use my natural wing talents to compete against her. It almost felt like cheating, but I hate losing and nopony stops—’” Speck ripped the book Rainbow was quoting from her hooves, and promptly slammed it shut on the nearby desk. “Hey! You could’ve asked!”

“Don’t. Read. The books. Dash!” the disgruntled pegasus snarled back. “You can either help put them away or you can go back to bed!”

Rainbow glowered at her irritable wingless sister. Speck could be such a stick in the mud when it came to invading her privacy. Rainbow chalked it up to what was known as “the privacy of her creative process,” not wanting anypony to even glance at an unfinished work. That’s at least what Rainbow was assuming since her sister had reacted so harshly to her peep. It was strange that Dash found the story vaguely familiar, but she figured it was probably based off of a squabble they had as fillies, probably making Rainbow out to be the bad guy in it all from the sound of it. Stupid, self-serving, she-stallion.

Rainbow started grabbing books and thrusting them onto the shelves, shoving them in their proper order without a second thought. Hearing the loud thwacking of hard covers on wood, Spectral Flare sighed and looked back at her angry little sister. “I’m sorry Dash. I didn’t mean to explode like that, I’ve been under a lot of stress recently. This whole mess is my fault anyway, why don’t you go out for a quick flight around the shoreline? It’s got to be more fun than being stuck shelving next to your big, dumb sister.”

“You’re right, it would,” Rainbow spiked back, “but I’m not gonna let my big, dumb sister have an excuse to call me a lazy freeloader. Besides, we never see each other.”

Spectral Flare bellowed a hearty laugh, one Rainbow hadn’t heard in a very long time. “I can be such a recluse, can’t I?”

Rainbow joined with a few raspy chuckles. “Yeah, you really should get out more.” Flare let her laughter die down as she seemed to chew on their exchange for a moment. She sighed as she enveloped Dash in her big wings. Dash wasn’t usually the sentimental type, but knew one thing for sure, Speck’s wings made for the best warm hugs ever. Rainbow Dash closed her eyes and nestled under the protective, motherly feathers “I love you, sis.”

Spectral Flare took a second to savor the moment. She could almost taste the younger pegasus’s genuine love for her as the fabricated feelings graced her tongue. She let what little grip she had on the situation slip away as she tightened her wing around her precious mare. “I’ll always be right here for you, Rainbow Dash.”

Luna hopped from her haunches to find herself in an alienating cavern. The surrounding was a sparsely decorated literal hole-in-the-wall room, adorned with strange luminous mushrooms emitting low blue light. To her left, Heartthrob lay sleeping half submerged in a gelatinous orange mattress next to a translucent amber nightstand. The foot of the jelly bed was adjacent to an ellipsoid membrane stretching the circumference of a small corridor barring entrance. Across from that sat a small desk and chair attached to a bookshelf dotted with books, tomes, and tiny knickknacks adding the smallest bit of personality to the otherwise bland room. Luna felt little comfort in the warm, stale air of the changeling’s former bedroom. She eyed the spines of the books, spotting several Equestrian titles, stolen no doubt. Other books bore no titles, which upon skimming their interiors, contained blank pages. The memory was incomplete, but it was more than enough to suffice.

Her plan was pure and simple memory synchronization. She would live the fragmented moments of Heartthrob’s life leading up to that sealed memory to gain access to its secrets the silver upstart was obfuscating from view. The method was sure-fire therapeutic, albeit slow way to break through the mental lock to glean the fullness of a suppressed memory. Luna didn’t care if the revelation would be helpful or not, she was determined to not lose to Chromina.

More concerning to the dreamwalking princess was the fact her hostess was asleep, yet still perceived changes in the world around her. Approaching the orange seal on the room, she could hear the humming wings of changelings, smell the fresh air breezing in through the gooey ventilation systems, see the shadows dancing across the opaque entrance of the room. Even if the host had picture-perfect memory, the surrounding area should be an imperceptive void when unconscious.

Seeking answers, Luna risked another peek into Heartthrob’s mind. All at once, her mind was assaulted by numerous distorted voices buzzing through her head. The princess reeled back, disconnecting herself from the changeling’s indiscernible thoughts. Curious about the reaction, Luna again reached to connect to the sleeping shape-shifter, this time slowly immersing herself in her thoughts as she focused to pick out one among the dozens in her head.

“… parsley and finally a hint of honeysuckle nectar,” a deeper voiced listed methodically. “There! That should be perfect for Bo Barrel’s lunch.” The voice paused for a moment with Luna perceiving a slight ringing to her left. She shifted focus as another mare’s words suddenly came into being.”

“…on’t see why you’re still following that big lug around,” a feminine tone replied indifferently. “That uncaring muttonhead doesn’t even give you the time of day. Maybe you’re just not his type.”

Luna leaned her head back to the right to hear the response. “What? No way,” the stallion buzzed deeply. Suddenly, a weird flow of his imagination caught Luna off guard as the stallion suddenly rose several octaves and lost its lower hum. “With a body like this, how could he think I’m a guy? I. Hit. Every. Right. Button!” she/he punctuated with a sensual murmur.

Luna leaned back in time to catch the tail end of the other’s laughter “All except your pheromones, Clicker,” the other guffawed at the other’s disguise.” No wonder you can’t get a drop of love off of him, you smell like the butt of a dead vulture!”

“What?! But this is exactly how Daisy Fair smells arou—” Luna ducked out of her eavesdropping realizing she was listening in on a conversation between two changelings linked in Heartthrob’s memory. Luna hazarded a fuller immersion as she sank into the resounding thoughts and conversations of the others in the colony.

She once again found herself in the large corridors of Heartthrob’s mind, but instead of a deathly tomb was a thriving community of changelings. Though Heartthrob was the only living mind Luna was channeling, the memories of the entire brood were being recalled through her head, while she was still asleep. Luna tried to make sense of it all, hearing too many sounds, thoughts, conversations, and emotions to get a read on anything. It felt like dream magic, functioned like it too, but it was written in a strange, befuddling language all its own.

 Among the disarray, once voice became clearer and crisper as the mind drew closer. It was repeating something, “…driste… Aud…st…?”

A sudden knocking roused Luna out of the collective thoughts and back into the room as Heartthrob finally started moving. An orange changeling wearing reddish amber armor rapped on the now translucent membrane separating the bedroom from a large, central chamber covered with similar doorways splotched up and down several stories, presumably being other sleeping quarters. The changeling huffed in annoyance as he pushed through the membrane into bedroom, which barely garnered the attention of the sleepy Heartthrob in bed.

“Oie, Audriste! Get up!” the armored changeling hollered. “I swear, not even the queen herself could wake you without smacking you upside the head.”

Heartthrob tossed in her bed, smacking her lips together and licking her fangs contently. “Just five more minutes, Rylota…”

Rylota grabbed a marred train whistle from the top of the bookcase, resounding it loudly as Heartthrob flew out of bed. She gripped the cave ceiling like a startled cat, hanging upside down with her bright orange eyes flared wide open in shock. Luna stifled a playful snigger with her hoof as she sat on the side lines to watch the spectacle play out in front of her. One thing she always loved about watching another pony’s memories, or changeling’s in this case, was that she could sit back as the day to day happenings played out while she kept to herself.

“And who are you supposed to be, Miss Twinkleshoes?” Rylota asked the midnight mare in the corner. It took a moment for Luna to register the impossible, the changeling from was addressing her.

“RYLOTA!” Heartthrob screamed as she dove for the armored changeling. “I told you not touch that whistle! It’s an antique!” The two fell to the floor as they formed a chitin covered wheel careening and crashing into the wall.

Heartthrob fumed as Rylota laughed, trying to hover the whistle to his mouth blow its blaringly loud tone again. “If you’re so against it, why do you leave it out for me to grab every day?” he joked back as she elbowed him in the barrel to stop his squirming.

“You’re impossible,” she grunted, placing the aged whistle back on display.

“What are little brothers for?” he chided back with a fang-filled grin. The two gathered themselves up off the floor, brushing the loose dust off their black flanks, a sneak of a smile crossing Heartthrob’s muzzle she tried so hard to suppress. “So Audrey, I didn’t know you were into role play. Got something for mystical alicorns?”

“Role play?” she questioned, furrowing her brow quizzically as she perplexed at her brother’s question. She looked over her shoulder to see the royal mare in question. Reality suddenly dawned itself back onto Heartthrob as her usual countenance returned to her, losing all the mirth she had when squabbling with her brother.

“By pony standards, she’s quite the looker,” his gaze falling upon the princess of the night. “Almost looks like Princess Celestia with all the regalia and her mane flowing like that, but the color's all wrong. Are you supposed to be some kind of perverted shadow mare or some—OWW!” Heartthrob interrupted with a quick hoof to the unarmored frills of his neck.

“It doesn’t matter. I’m up and you’re still on duty, now get back to work before someling sees you’re away from your post,” she ordered melancholically to her brother.

“Sis, are you alright?”

“I'm fine, just get going, you big lunkhead, before you get in trouble,” she offered, straightening up, holding her nose high, and smirking with faux-regality. “Now go, your elder commands it!”

“Aye aye, my queen-by-proxy,” he saluted with his tongue-in-cheek manner, buzzing out the door merrily. He poked his head back pointing a holey hoof back in reply, “Oh, and remember, you’re on water duty today!”

She watched somberly as he flew away, the webbing closing behind as she drew away from the door. “That was the last time I saw him, but it happened a little differently than that,” she said as she approached Princess Luna with a bow. “Even though he’s long dead, I hope you can forgive his informality, your highness.”

“This… this should be no more than a mere slideshow,” the princess said as she walked towards the door, motioning it open like the changelings had done before to see a veritable swarm of changelings fluttering about busily carrying on their lives. “This is not my doing, nor is it yours, is it?”

“I don’t know. I guess maybe it’s both?” she offered as a lukewarm answer.

“I sifted through your memories and there were no others. You were alone.”

Heartthrob heaved a morbid sigh as she stared down upon the other forms below her. “Yes, I am alone, but a changeling’s capacity for memory is only limited by the number of minds linked to its own. As more changelings are added to the hive mind, once you grow accustomed to its presence, the brain starts automatically cataloging their memories and experiences. It’s not something I can draw upon myself so easily, but the space in my head always lingers there, and it feels so empty when the space lingers unoccupied.”

The nurse cantered over to the doorway, looking out at all the familiar faces as they buzzed about the memory, continuing their little lives just as they had remembered them. “It is a strange feeling, being alone in your head. Even if you ponies have friends and family you whisper your innermost secrets with, they still pale in comparison to the shared experiences of our collective mindscape. Within the hive mind, we are never alone as we share so much with our fellow drones and never realize it. We leave almost nothing entirely forgotten, even if we wish to not remember it. Once someling has gotten into your head, they never leave, even after they've passed on.”

Luna realized for the first time the task she was up against. She was not simply going through a slideshow of events to be played out for her, she had forced open a floodgate of information, recreating an interactive microcosm of memories from Heartthrob’s head. It was a blurring of changeling magic and Luna’s dream magic, fabricating an entire community of changeling minds reconstituted into dreams from Heartthrob’s memory. She was brought out of her ruminating as Heartthrob chuckled longingly while looking around her old room.

“For a moment, I thought I was back home, hearing all of their welcoming voices singing to me in my head. I bet if you were to dig deep enough into my imagination right now, you’d find yourself talking to another changeling. We were never designed to be true individuals after all,” Heartthrob fell back on her bed, looking up at brown ceiling, hued slightly bluer from her room’s luminous vegetation. “I wish I could forget their song, it’d make the unbearable silence of Equestria so much easier to live with.”

Refocusing, Princess Luna pushed herself to ignore the changeling’s somber tone. This one was a prisoner withholding valuable information, not something she was to find relatable or pitiable. The mission was to uncover the truth that the treacherous bug was hiding from Celestia and herself. She did not require a lesson in changeling psychology, only the answers hidden away in the its lonely mind. However, she did find the absence of her elder sister curious, but she could worry about her later.

“Your brother called you Audriste, I assume that is your true name?” the changeling nodded hollowly. “Good, I was growing tired of using your stolen identity. Come Audriste, we do not have time to idle away in your past." The princess reassumed her cold distance from her prisoner, holding her head high and motioning towards the portal, "Lead on.”

The changeling offered a respectful bow and led the princess out of her room. She gave one last look into her former abode before shutting the seal to proceed with reliving the worst day of her life.

Shining Armor stood watch outside the Royal Inquisition chambers, a place usually reserved for initiation pranks on newly promoted captains. Shining couldn’t remember the last time it had been used for its true purpose, mostly because he hadn’t been alive over three hundred years ago to see it. He had requested personally to be present for the questioning of their special prisoner, but with both princesses setting time aside to question the changeling, he was regulated to guard detail being one of the few ponies who were aware of any royal prisoners at all. Keeping this a secret from anypony curious enough to ask was a matter of national security. If even a word of a prisoner was uttered, it could be easily deduced there was a captive changeling, which would spark an incident for sure.

The past two days had been tiring to say the least. The couple had postponed their honeymoon with Shining taking part of the changeling proceedings even though he was still recovering from emotion deprivation. Maintaining a semblance of control over his feelings and the shaky populace was more than a full-time job, especially with both princesses keeping odd hours. Suspicion was around every corner with more and more accusations of changeling infiltration popping up around Canterlot and spreading through Equestria like wildfire. If he was honest with himself, he wanted to lead that emblazoned charge against this new menace, taking the fight to the shape-shifters who had almost seized the capital. His guarded temperament barely hid his anger from those around him, Cadence being the only pony who knew the extent of his hatred. Inside, he was seething knowing there was a rotten shifter just beyond the shielded doors. He was right on board with the other nobles seeking to develop shifter counter-measures, but the strict orders from Princess Celestia forced staying his vengeful hoof.

He maintained a constant shielding spell upon the surrounding area as he was not allowed to let anypony in without a royal sanction from one of the princesses. Luckily, the detail had proven to be rather uneventful with the castle dungeon being a rarely cantered corner of the castle. Not many ponies were even aware of the dungeon outside of those employed by the two royal sisters. Crimes warranting royal imprisonment were not common enough for anypony to pay any attention to the nearly forgotten areas. It gave him time to think, or stew in his case until there was a knock from the other side of the door.

Shining dispelled the shield and opened the door with his magic, meeting the eyes of one very fatigued sun princess who was not amused in the slightest. Celestia trudged out into the hallway looking drained, her usually flowing ethereal mane hung idly without a single sparkle to her side as her magenta eyes sank low from a trying test of her patience, which had clearly reached its end. The captain wasn’t sure how to respond, never seeing the princess so visibly upset.

“Your highness?”

“Yes,” she replied, the icy tone nearly cleaving Armor’s controlled demeanor in two.

“Is there anything I can do for you?”

The princess sighed as she massaged her horn, indicating it was sore. “I’m afraid not, captain. It seems Princess Luna was a bit… forceful during the interrogation. She and Heartthrob are fine, but I must say, the experience turned out to be a bit much for me.”

“Would you have me take over for you in questioning?” Shining inquired, barely containing his desire to have a few choice words with the changeling himself. His rumination ground to a halt when Celestia leaned down with an irritated scowl.

“No, captain. You will do no such thing. Continue to guard this door like your life depended on it. No one is to go in or out aside from Princess Luna and myself,” she bitterly ordered with fury hiding behind each word. “Do I make myself clear?”

“C-crystal, your highness!”

“Very good,” the princess sighed as she began to slowly walk away. She turned back around to the frightened guard, “I’m sorry for my short temperament today, captain. I’m afraid this whole ordeal has been quite taxing on us all.”

Shining Armor straightened his stance as he recast the shielding spell on the door, “I understand, princess. It’s just seeing you so forward is a new thing for me. I guess I’ll have to get used to that with marrying Cadence and all.”

Princess Celestia blinked a few times as realization sank in. Unable to completely suppress a sudden red flash of embarrassment, she smiled sweetly as she regained control of her emotional outbursts. “Of course, Prince Shining Armor. We both have to look our best to not rouse suspicion, even if it feels my mind is in a million places right now.” Celestia and Shining exchanged smiles and bows as the princess made her way to the end of the corridor. She looked around, chuckling to herself as she turned to Armor again. “Umm… I must be more tired than I thought,” the princess added as she cast a furtive glance to the side while motioning directions with her wing.

“Tell me, is the medical wing to the left or right?”

Chapter 07: To Have Loved and Lost

Two days. Two days living with an insatiable hunger, that is if one could call its continued existence living. The bewildered black bug wandered down the mountain's side, battered and bruised from some catastrophe only vaguely remembered. It once was something, someling, somepony, or someone, but that one was obfuscated by a starving, unruly beast’s lost mind. It darted with fervent purpose towards the enemy’s stronghold of alabaster spires adorned in regal purple and gold. With each passing moment, it could feel its soul crying out for the most basics of needs as the creature made its way to the only place “she” could be satiated now.

The part that knew it was a “she,” among other things, was fading fast as the beast bore just enough sense to know its current plight. It was in enemy territory, injured, and, most damning of all, completely alone. It was not utterly doomed knowing its way down as it followed the babbling flow of water through the sparse mountain forest. The beast was guided by what little knowledge it still retained to dodge the patrols “she” had once known well as it continued towards the last hope they had. Brief flashes of memory still plagued it from the past few days. There was an explosion, panic, hurtling through the sky, and that sturdy tree branch impaling the hind leg, but all of that paled in comparison to the looming silence.

The absolute quiet gnawing at its lingering sanity aggravated and enraged the beast, a most beautiful melody of its family now lost to the nothingness around it. Before all of this madness, its purpose was always clear as it sang along when it knew how, a brilliant leash of a caring hand now just empty void in the back of its mind. The beast tried buzzing its familiar tune as it tried to recall those wondrous thoughts, but it only served to make the deafening quiet worse.

The voice of who “she” was slipping away with each passing moment, the maddened hunger knew only one thing: love was the only salvation now.

Maids and groundskeepers alike bustled about the courtyard, cleaning up the remaining food and decorations strewn about the nearly vacated venue. Rarity had hoped to keep the mess to a minimum, but Pinkie’s parties were less than tidy, usually involving the random party poppers and confetti bombs shot from her party cannon. Though Rarity remembered clearly banning the device from the soiree, it had made an untimely explosive appearance anyway. She sighed in exhaustion as she swished her wine glass around with her magic.

Reflecting on the aftermath, it had been a wonderful reception for the royal couple, despite the circumstances drawing the princesses’ attention away from the festivities. Every pony from the highborn socialites to the common mare had enjoyed the spectrum of activities available to them. Music, dancing, foolish party games, food, and fun were to be had in every corner of the courtyard. Rarity wondered why she and Pinkie didn’t collaborate more often. However, regardless of the event’s overwhelming success, Rarity had taken no pleasure in any of it.

Despite her best efforts in dressing the part, garnering heartfelt compliments and attention all night, she felt purple, like the fine grape juice she was bobbling back and forth. It was not a kind purple either, but rather a particularly putrid purple which tended to ruin things. It bore a dreadfully deep coloration with far more red than there should be, giving the hue a flaring temperament that ruined perfectly good ensembles. Yes, a single saturating blot from her could utterly destroy any fabric eternally, and she was it.

The usually outspoken fashionista had spent the entire party uncharacteristically biting back her tongue as she mingled with the mares and gentlecolts of high society, all of whom were bickering about the same thing, changelings. Changelings this, changelings that, complaints and concerns circling around the one issue she couldn’t talk about! Namely, it was because of the secret royal prisoner who had kidnapped one of her closest friends. If that wasn’t enough, according to her friends, another bug had crept its way into the confounding mix, a would-be assassin of the kidnapper. She wanted to join in the public damning of the new menace, but she knew all too well she could easily let a detail or two slip by that would hint towards the princesses’ prisoners. The whole situation was simply frustrating to no end, and her only comforter was a bottle of grape juice doing absolutely nothing for her.

“If only alcohol didn’t taste so foul…” she cursed exasperatedly to the drink which failed to drown her troubles. Letting her head down to the table's surface, she turned expectantly to the container, but the bottle offered no consolation either. She briefly mused scrounging for a salt lick, but those little cubes had a way of disgracing their abusers to an end they couldn’t live down.

Rarity watched as a groundskeeper whistled a cheery tune as he swept the last bit of streamer into his dustpan and sifted the contents into his trash before carrying on to the rest of the cleanup. Right, she was supposed to be helping, wasn’t she? She didn’t feel like it. In fact, she hadn’t felt like doing anything for the past few days. She’d barely managed to scrounge together a satisfactory dress for the wedding while coordinating the redecorating efforts in Twilight’s absence. She was tired and useless, another good word she hadn’t considered, useless.

When Rainbow Dash had gone missing, what did she do? Canter around the castle, succumb to fixing a rug, all the while a fake Dash had taken center stage. After that, she had daintily fled the moment the imposter had reared her hideous face instead of standing with her friends. While she retreated to false comfort of an herb-induced sleep, Fluttershy had been drained of her love or something, Applejack was forced into some hideous dreamless coma, and they all were no closer to finding their missing Rainbow Dash. If she had only been there to help, maybe she could have—no, it wasn’t healthy to linger on what-ifs. Besides, Pinkie Pie had proved to be of little help either to the changeling situation, and instead focused on cheering up the poor guards and ponies despite her own sadness… which, in hindsight, now appeared to be not only incredibly helpful, but self-sacrificial considering Pinkie’s internal strife.

Rarity downed a dauntless swing from the depths of her bottled friend, wishing something would hinder the onset of self-loathing.

“A bit for your thoughts, Rarity?” a familiar posh stallion offered as he pulled one of the remaining cushions to the table.

“Oh, Fancy Pants!" she nearly yelped while tearing the bottle away from her muzzle, hoping he hadn't noticed. "Surely you can come up with better line than that old cliché,” Rarity half-heartedly snipped back, trying to digress from her depression and embarrassment. A tiny ping of metal sounded as a gold bit bounced and rolled in front of Rarity’s muzzle before swiveling down into place.

“The offer still stands, milady.”

The alluring sirens of consolation and dandyism rang through her head. She admitted to not knowing Fancy Pants as well as her other friends, but having somepony to help take her mind off of things would be an absolute delight. However, there was the matter of changelings she knew he would love to talk about and she would love nothing more than to share. Either way, there was no hope for her stress relief.

“I must regretfully decline your generous offer. My private musings aren’t something to be purchased so readily,” she sighed as she refunded his bidding bit.

“Of course, Lady Rarity. I meant nothing by it. I had only hoped to offer better company than that bottle of Hollow Shades Select you’re keeping,” he added as he took a gander at the label. “I admit it is a particularly good brand of juice, but it decidedly lacks a way with words.”

Rarity surrendered that point as inanimate objects didn’t tend to be great conversationalists, unless a certain purple unicorn grows a bit overzealous with a come-to-life spell. Perishing the thoughts, Rarity clacked her forehooves together as she tried to find a proper way to direct the conversation. She wanted to confide in somepony and who better than the ever-understanding Fancy Pants, but even he would have his limits of secrecy when it came to what she was keeping under wraps.

“It’s nothing for you to worry about Fancy Pants, I’m just worn out from the recent events is all.”

“Ah yes, these are troubling times indeed for all of us, but might that be only a small portion of what is really wrong?” corrected Fancy as he took a wine glass for himself, filling his own despite probably having seen Rarity’s intimate delve into the juice. "Would it help ease your tension if I told you I already knew what was on your mind?”

Curiosity was instantly piqued on Rarity’s part. Suddenly taking a greater interest in the conversation, she sat back up, blowing some of her errant mane out of her way to listen intently.

“You are not the only one lamenting the loss of friends. You may think nopony noticed Rainbow Dash’s absence at the wedding, but with recent events being the way they are, ponies are paying very close attention to the headcount, so to speak.”

“Indeed, Fancy Pants, I haven’t seen mane or tail of Rainbow since that dreadful fight with the changelings. It has put me in such a sour mood.”

“Quite, quite. I too am missing a... a very near and dear companion of mine, but that is not the issue I wish to discuss with you,” he amended before taking a sip of the juice to catch his words. “I find it very interesting you say you haven’t seen Miss Dash since the wedding, as I can recall a certain guard detail claiming to have carried both you and Miss Dash to the infirmary two days ago. I thank the heavens and stars you were alright, however the two pegasi I spoke with said your friend wasn’t in the best of health to put it lightly. Could you shed any light upon the situation?”

“I see you have been apprised a bit more than I thought,” Rarity replied with tepid caution.  A unicorn as resourceful as Fancy Pants knowing a bit more than the common stallion did not come as much of a surprise to Rarity. However, his tone carried little concern for either herself or Dash. If Rarity didn’t know better, she would say she was speaking with a most polite inquisitor. “I did see Rainbow Dash in dire straits, hence the fainting spell I am not proud of, but what is truly bothering me is my inability to do anything for her.”

“I see. So that is why nopony has been given access to the emergency room for the past two days,” he pondered aloud. “Will she be alright?”

She paused trying to find the right words to say that were vague enough to carry some sort of truth with them. “With her condition as critical as it is, we’re not certain,” she commented to his thoughts. She decided to play the safe side and turn her drama up to a grandiloquent eleven. “Oh Fancy Pants, if only you had seen her in that frightful condition, you would understand my frustration,” she spouted accompanied with an appropriate near-faint and foreleg sweep to cover her eyes.

“Is it also why the princesses have been rather aloof as of late?" Fancy remarked thoughfully, dispelling any idea a drama queen act could misdirect his attention. "I understand Miss Dash is an important friend to you, Miss Sparkle, and the princesses for sure, but a mare in critical condition does not usually warrant such consistent royal attention,” Fancy Pants said matter-of-factly. “Indeed, Princess Celestia was at my father’s bedside the day he passed on, rest his soul, but I’d imagine death is a dreadfully close and constant companion to our immortal princesses. If they dwelled upon everypony knocking on death’s door for as long, I’m afraid their royal highnesses would never get anything done.”

There was a certain cold logic to his words. Ponies die every day across Equestria and the princesses barely have time to shed a tear for the ones they’ve grown to know and love. Spending a great deal of time on anypony, even one bearing an Element of Harmony, would not keep the princesses so engaged and secluded with an entire country to run. For having eternity at their hooves, the two sisters had precious little time to waste on personal matters.

“I cannot speak for Princess Luna with how little I know of her,” Fancy started, “but it is very unlike Princess Celestia to refuse anypony’s audience, especially in such troubling times where her sage direction would be most needed. It is hard for me to say this, but I cannot help myself but think there may be more to this mystery than concern for one mare’s well-being,” Fancy Pants added with an inquisitive gander towards Rarity. He swished around his juice methodically as if sifting through its contents to find an answer obscured by its purple hue.

Rarity felt little fondness for the course Fancy Pants was setting in their “delightful conversation”. To the casual observer, the kind and caring noble was consoling a good friend of his, but the level of suave probing he performed was nothing less than an investigative invasion of information which didn’t concern him. She saw possible paths their exchange could take in their verbal chess game, and they all ended with her saying too much. His experience in dealing with the upper crust of Canterlot, including Upper Crust herself, made him a formidable verbal opponent. Rarity found it difficult to gain any control over their banter and dodging the issue was only making things worse. To her continued aggravation, she simply couldn’t send him away as he had said nothing terribly wrong. Worse still, she wanted desperately to tell him everything about the changelings and that demon Chromina sleeping soundly in the ER, but that was simply out of the question. She bowed out, leaving her only one socially graceless option.

Rarity gathered herself, pressing herself away from the table and gathering her things. “Thank you for your concern, but I’m sorry, Fancy Pants. I wish I could discuss this with you further,” she apologized as it wasn’t a lie, “but the whole matter is simply something which I must sort out for myself,” which also wasn’t completely a lie.

“Why, of course, Lady Rarity. It was never my intention to upset you,” he said, helping Rarity to her hooves. “I would only mean to offer my assurances that you do not need to carry any burden alone. I am your friend too after all, am I not?”

His platitudes gripped Rarity by her neck, making her pause for a moment longer than she felt she should have.

“I have never had any cause to think otherwise, Fancy Pants,” Rarity replied sweetly and carefully, being the only time she had ever questioned the quality of their friendship.

“And I hope to never leave anything to that effect,” he affirmed with a noble bow. Rarity tried to trot away a little faster than she would normally from the scene, hoping to not see Fancy for a good while. It was not to be as she found Fancy Pants keeping pace with her. “However, I am afraid that I cannot wait for your feelings to be sorted out as it may be too late. I am terribly concerned for the princesses.”

“You’re worried about their royal highnesses? Surely such concern is unnecessary,” Rarity quipped back trying to play down any seriousness to the situation while trying to escape the rather forward Fancy Pants.

“Only because nopony aside from your friends and a hooffull of their closest ponies have had any word from them aside from Princess Celestia’s performance at the wedding. I attempted to stay behind to greet her, but was ‘escorted’ by Princess Luna’s personal guard to the reception.”

“P-perhaps they had other, more pressing matters to attend to after the wedding?”

“Which is my point exactly, Rarity!” Fancy punctuated his point with a powerful stamp of his right hoof, letting his monocle fall from his face and dangle from his suit’s collar. Rarity shrank away slightly from Fancy Pants, having never seen him so worked up. He was usually so composed regardless of the circumstance.

“My apologies, milady. I am afraid the time for pleasant exchanges is at an end as I must know...” Fancy Pants pressed with urgency. His gentle blue eyes had been replaced by a firm, regal glower demanding his curiosity be satiated. His apparent anger alone nearly loosed the words ‘changeling infiltrator’ from Rarity’s lips, but she caught a glimpse of the usually regal stallion's despair. Under his dandy exterior beat a heavy heart burdened with a dire concern. Fancy Pants had spoken of lessening burdens while he bore a mountain of stress all his own. Rarity wished to ask what was wrong, but seeing her growing alarm, he interrupted with the only question that mattered to him.

“Would you describe either of the princesses as…” he paused as he tried to find the words to use, “being terribly lovesick?”

Rarity mouthed voiceless words, utterly gob smacked by Fancy Pant’s out-of-left-field interest in the royal love lives of the princesses. Had she heard him correctly? The harrowing watershed moment of intense feelings simply dwelling upon knowing a matter of petty gossip?

“No? Perhaps lovestricken then?”

 “I-I beg your pardon,” finally relocating her words, Rarity strung together the first sentence to come to her mind. “You can’t seriously be asking me if the princess has some unrequited love…”

His glower remained unfaltering as his inquisitor stare awaited a solid answer from the fashionista.

“You’re serious,” she deadpanned with a hint of underlying disgust. “O-of all the... the lackadaisical nonsense to be worked up about!” she huffed loudly in disbelief.

“I assure you, Rarity, this is of the utmost importance.”

With an exasperated, shrilling "ugh" of petty dismay, Rarity flatly spat out the words he wanted to hear. “No. I don’t suppose either princess has been struck by the love bug as of late,” she reported with a lackluster eye roll. “Furthermore, I do not believe either of them would have the time to be caught up in such trifling matters at a time like this, nor how how their love lives should be any concern of yours!”

 “At least there is that,” Fancy Pants sighed as he recomposed his breath. His horn sparked to life as he raised his monocle back to his left eye with a quick polish of his hoofkerchief.

“You still haven’t told me why any of this matters, Fancy Pants.”

“My apologies, milady. I suppose there wouldn’t be any harm in telling you. Perhaps it would make me feel better if somepony close to me knew,” Fancy Pants said, offering a hoof in escort. “Shall we go for a stroll?”

Anxiety wasn’t a normal state for Nightstride, but the past forty-eight hours had been a consistent blur of worry. Tensions were riding high with suspicions creeping up around every corner, but the troubled moori’s mind dwelled upon other things, mainly the well-being of the missing Duskstar. Despite the growing unrest between noble ponies about backstabbing and shape-shifting potentially plaguing the prancy pony politics, Nightstride focused solely on the same nagging fear clawing deeply at his senses. His concern had grown to anguish waiting to hear any word on her whereabouts. At this point, even knowing she had died would be easier than riding this unrelenting wave of uncertainty.

Though he was supposed to be an ever-vigilant guardian of the night, tonight he was barely getting through the motions. He swept above the crest of the lower western waterfall, checking the lower platforms of the castle’s underside for suspicious ponies congregating in Canterlot’s shadows. He gave a few haphazard glances around, looking more for his missing wingmare than anypony suspicious. His flyby survey of the west waterways complete, Nightstride took to the skies above the streams flowing through Canterlot, flying against the headwater's course to search Sundrop Lake’s shoreline.

Luna’s night seemed especially beautiful from the lake’s brilliant reflection. If not for the changeling scare, he probably would’ve flown by other ponies taking a moonlit stroll along the lakeside with their special someponies. If absence made the heart grow fonder, Nightstride swore it must be doubly painful for those with formerly unrealized feelings. Over the past two days, the subtle feeling had grown to an agonizing throbbing of restless emotion, an unrelenting pressure building in his heart that could erupt at any moment. He couldn’t claim to know Dusky well with her always-aloof nature, but regardless of how well or not he knew her, Nightstride genuinely cared for Dusky. No, that was too weak of a phrase. His thoughts would not be so utterly consumed if it was a matter of simple caring.

 After tossing it around his sleepless batty mind, he was head over hooves in love with Duskstar. Every second he didn’t know where she was made him feel worse as she had become a physical need almost, though rarely a word was spoken between the two of them.

‘But you don’t even know her!’ the rational side of his head chided to his lesser wits. He tried to recall her favorite fruit or perhaps a song she liked singing when she thought she was alone. What were her interests? Her hobbies? What did she do just for the fun of it? Nothing ever came to mind. Despite his lack of knowledge, he had been utterly smitten by her, blowing right past “slight infatuation” and going full tilt, barreling straight into “gladly taking a lightning bolt for her” territory.

He loved her. By Luna’s light how he loved Duskstar, to the point it hurt terribly.

His attention drawn to the rumbling downpour of Twintail Falls, he felt his mood crushing him like the powerful cascade of the waterfall, a merciless deluge of icy water flowing with bitterness and longing. If not for the night guard’s strict conditioning of both mind and body, he would have collapsed in a heap of weeping bat pony hours ago from his irrational crippling sadness. Only hanging onto his duty by a thread, he pressed forward hoping to hear some word, any word, on his wingmare’s whereabouts while patrolling.

As he approached the lake, a sudden onset of strange heaviness pulled at his withers. Unable to contend with the pressure, he sat down near the north shore on the upper crests of the waterfalls. Nightstride took a moment to take a drink some of the fresh flowing glacial waters draining down from the mountain’s snowy peak. The coolness on his tongue not enough, he submerged his head into the cold waters, his mane swishing about like a rag trying to shake off the cumbersome anxiety weighing down upon him. Try as he might, he couldn’t psyche himself out of his depression, and instead heaved a heavy sigh before sitting down by the cliff to catch his breath for a moment.

He let his soggy head fall to the ground, paying his navy blue mane no mind as it fell into a nearby smattering of mud. He gazed longingly at the gently waves kissing the little beach beneath him. His copper slit-eyes followed the shoreline towards the horizon as he scanned the sides for any sign of life. Just as his wandering eyes neared the south end, the shifting of bushes caught his sharpened nocturnal eyes.  He spied a surreptitious black pony carefully skulking its way towards the lake. As he watched the it draw nearer to the water’s edge, he noticed it was hobbling mostly on three legs, letting its hind leg limp along behind it. Suspicious pony or not, he was duty-called to aid any injured ponies. Not feeling it in him to take to the skies, he unfurled his wings and let himself glide down the shoreline towards the pony in need.

As he closed in upon the wounded pony, he felt his heartstrings vigorously tug at him, pulling him onward with a strange flutter in his chest. It was an apprehensive nervousness that grew stronger as he neared the pony on the shore. The weightiness wisped through his shoulders and plunged straight into his heart as he neared the silhouette. What was once a featureless blackness faded away as his vision grew hazy. With a soft glimmer in his eyes, he wondered how he couldn’t see it before. Her dark forest green mane, her pristine leathery wings, and her ashen coat like dust upon the moon. All he needed to lose himself in her brilliantly blue eyes again to finalize the impossible miracle he desperately desired.

His heart grew impatient as he landed, every step feeling longer than the last. It started beating wildly as if excited by some foreign force. It was a terrific thumping his ears could hear, irregularly throbbing in his chest, overflowing with love and readying to explode at a moment’s notice. He wanted to joyously shout her name, but his throat choked, eyes watered, breath fled, and hooves locked as her name graced the tip of his tongue. What little balance he had wavered with his legs feeling like precarious pin needles boring into the soggy ground below, but his overwhelming desire to just see her face would not surrender.

“D-Dusky!”

The mare’s tufted ears perked up as she turned around, revealing those sapphire pools Nightstride wanted to see more than anything in the world. Meeting her wingmate’s wide grin, Duskstar flashed her fanged smile as she galloped as fast as she could towards him like a long-lost lover.

There were no words needed. Blinded by maddening desire, Nightstride found the strength to stretch his forelegs open with warm welcome as Duskstar lunged with carnal desire towards his loving embrace.

Rarity had nary a word to say to Fancy Pants as he finished his explanation of what the doctors had started calling "Dire Lovesickness." Hearing no further word from Fancy Pants as they continued down the eastern wall overlooking the lakeside, Rarity stopped to gaze at the gently flowing water, moving with slow purpose flowing from the falls to the tributary.

“How absolutely dreadful…” Rarity muttered as she tried to recompose herself. “How many did you say suffer from this?”

“Only three I know of, but who is to say at this point. As the days drag on, perhaps more ponies across Canterlot may begin suffering the same fate,” Fancy stated with a solemn finality in his words. “Two are close friends of mine and very influential ponies in their own right. All three bear the same illness in their hearts, like a consuming fire has burnt it to cinders, yet the ashes are ready to burst at a moment’s notice. Doctor Triage has yet to find a definitive answer, but a common thread binds them together: all three desperately desire the presence of a missing somepony to the point the mere mention of a name torments them. The good doctor tells me the symptoms are akin to substance withdrawal.”

“And you’re sure it’s the work of changelings?”

“If it was purposeful or not on their part has yet to be determined. Unfortunately, there are far too many coincidences falling into place for this to be mere happenstance in light of all that has happened.”

“I see…” she trailed as she let the information sink in. Changeling deception was a despicable thing, bringing ponies to their knees for what something as simple as love. What was the point of making another suffer so needlessly for something that can be given freely? Rarity couldn’t claim to know how Changelings worked, but for a race so obsessed with emotions, they proved to be bitterly cold. Was Fluttershy suffering the same way when Chromina sadistically devoured the love being poured into her?

 “You mentioned you only knew two of the ponies, who is the third?”

“Ah, yes. That last one is a touch more complicated,” Fancy said dryly, the courage and regal demeanor slipping away with each syllable. “You see, you’re speaking to him.”

“You?!” Rarity flabbergasted in reply. Her words paused breathless as her eyes scoured the dandy pony for ill signs. “But… but you seem so normal.”

“Of course Rarity, I pride myself on being a rather pragmatic pony when it comes down to matters of the heart,” he started while turning his eye to his three crown cutie mark. “I’ve always had a knack for keeping close networks of ponies which society deemed important while always a careful trot ahead of those I would befriend. Though I truly do enjoy the company of many a mare and gentlecolt, I am always careful to keep everypony at a leg’s length, knowing that a good number of them seek to use me for their own gain. That is until…” He trailed off, wondering if he should continue. Rarity waited, seeing a longing in his eyes for his heart to be heard. His lips trembled with uncertainty as if waiting for permission to tell his tale.

“Go on,” Rarity urged her friend.

“Fleur-Dis-Lee,” he uttered with a pained breath.“For being so connected, it is rare to meet someone who flew by completely under my radar. Even more curious was how well we hit it off in such a short amount of time. Before I knew it, she had stolen my heart like a bandit in the night, gaining more than my absolute trust mere months after meeting her."

Rarity had no words for what was presently occurring. Little by little, life seemed to fade away from the stallion. all the mirth in his voice was gone, his strength sapped from him as if he had been mortally wounded and left to die. Rarity had no words as she breathlessly held her mouth closed as she watched him slowly whittle himself down. He turned his gaze to the lake, not letting Rarity see his face.

“For a time, she was my whole world: an unmatched beauty like no other, gifted with a keen eye for even the smallest of details. The two of us let nopony pass us by at a party without knowing what made them tick. But more than that, we shared everything with each other. We had no secrets. Furthermore, she never once sought to better herself at my expense like many other before her had. The best thing was that at the end of the day, mingling with the movers and shakers of Equestria didn’t matter to her. All she asked in return was my love.”

Fancy Pant’s reminiscing continud with every word of praise for Fleur painted a bigger and better picture of this amazing mare Rarity had only met in passing. Rarity tried to remember anything close to the praise he was showering Fluer with when she had gotten to know Fancy Pants during her stay in Canterlot. Sure Fluer was gorgeous, as it was to be expected of a unicorn supermodel, however, when Rarity had approached the mare, the star was always listlessly staring off into space or commenting idly about something Fancy had said. To be honest, she had passed the mare off simply as high society eye candy.

More than that, she could see beads of sweat forming on his brow as he nearly became lost in his enamored recounts of Fluer’s greatness. “Umm… Fancy Pants?” she inquired as she tried to catch his gaze. “That’s quite enough, you’re starting to scare me with all this—SWEET CELESTIA!”

Rarity reeled back seeing the noble’s suddenly gaunt face. His pupils shrank to a thousand mile stare with a flare of enthrallment in his eyes with his own magic starting to turn against him with crackles and bursts from his horn. He wasn’t breathing anymore as it would interrupt the  constant stream of undying worship running from his mouth. She looked around for anything to snap him out of it before it worsened. Seeing the lake, she reached for the icy water with her magic.

“FANCY PANTS!” she screamed as she drowned the stammering stallion with a blast of icy water to his face. The sudden torrential surge of liquid forced into his muzzle knocked Fancy from the floor, carrying him several yards away from where he stood. The wave dissipated, the water flowing off the wall down onto the castle’s inner gardens below them, as well as an unlucky patrolling night guard caught by the sudden deluge. Hearing nothing about Fleur-Dis-Lee, Rarity charged to Fancy’s side to make sure the noblepony was okay.

“Thank you, my dear,” he hoarsely uttered between coughs as he pulled himself to his hooves. “It would seem that I lost myself there for a second. It was rather rude of me to speak so highly of a lady while in the company of another. I am terribly sorry.”

Rarity reached for him with her magic to help Fancy dry his clothes, now soaked with icy water. She offered a hoof to pull him to his feet, but instead of reaching out, he simply opted to remain grounded for a spell. His chest rose and fell gently as he recomposed himself, disappointment and self-loathing reflected in his weak eyes.

“Who knew that lovesickness could be so serious?” Fancy Pants struggled to nervously chuckle. “The worst part though is for all my cherished practicality, when presented with the very real threat that my Fleur… that Fleur-Dis-Lee—”

“Please, stop saying that name! Don’t speak it, don’t think it! Not after what just happened!” Rarity begged. Every utterance of her name when around Fancy seemed to spark another fire in his eyes as if she was controlling him without even being there.

“—could be a changeling...”

“T-that’s completely understandable,” Rarity assured him, trying to find a silver lining for the dour, sopping wet stallion to look towards to distract him. After a long pause, and coming up with anything better, she sighed as she leaned over to console the heartbroken gentlecolt with a helpful hoof. “Nothing is certain, after all. Perhaps the real one is waiting for you, her ever-loving Fancy Pants, to rescue her!”

“Thank you for your kind words, milady, but I do not wish to cling to a false hope,” he replied in a regaled quaver as he pulled himself up, his legs trembling all the while. It was as if the lake water had washed away all semblance of self-control as he now wore his once well-kept feelings on his sleeves, unable to stem the tide of emotions longing for their idol of affection. He shivered as he drew himself up from the ground, reaching for his monocle, now cracked like a spider’s web, on the verge of shattering into a thousand tiny shards. “Deep down, I feel it truly doesn’t matter to me if she is a changeling or not. If she were to suddenly appear before me as some… horrifying black demon of Tartarus bent on the destruction of all Equestria, I fear I would still do anything just to feel her embrace once more.”

He gently polished the useless eyepiece out of comforting habit before placing it in his coat pocket, ignoring the horrified flabbergasted slack-jaw disbelief of his present company. “I do not presume to think that either of our princesses would be susceptible to such a level of predatory deception, but the mere possibility it could be so frightens me terribly.”

Fancy coughed as he adjusted his soaked bow tie, striving to regain his composed sense of normalcy. To Rarity’s surprise, he once again bowed politely as he offered his hoof in escort to her. “Lady Rarity, it would appear I am due for a wardrobe change before checking into the castle's hospital. Would you mind treating this lonely stallion by gracing me with your company for a bit longer this evening?”

Refining her posture with dignity and happy to finally be of help, Rarity smiled warmly as she straightened to a proper lady’s posture proudly before giving a feminine curtsy in reply. “It would be my pleasure.”

How long? How long had it been since she could see clearly again? The explosion, the panicked hurtling through the sky, that tree… all of it was some painful blur. The last thing she remembered was slowly feeling herself slip away as she desperately used what little love she had remaining to seal her wounds. It had taken a great deal of magic and quick thinking to shield herself from the foliage. She counted herself lucky that her trajectory was angled up rather than shooting straight into the rock-face of a mountain which would’ve turned her into a little black and pink smear across its side.

The confused changeling had reawakened to find she was lapping up water from a lake like a dog. Seeing her own bat pony disguise staring back at her in the lake's reflection, she reached inside seeking answers from her hive. The music never began as she realized she was alone in her head. Remembering the blast’s sundering effects, she found herself on the verge of panicking as more and more of her current grim situation came flooding back to her.

Some foolish, overzealous changeling queen had attacked Canterlot! The entire race had been completely exposed in one fell swoop! What was she supposed to do now?!

‘Okay, calm down. There is protocol for hivemind seperation. Think carefully, who are you?’ she began running down an emergency introspective list for lost changelings. The lost changeling’s emergency disconnection training back at the hive had prepared her for such a situation, but it didn’t help dull the painful silence, especially if she had been wandering with little direction like a beast in the mountains for love.

‘You are Sarekii of Queen Keemah’s hive. Good,' she reminded herself with a mental pat on her back.'What is your purpose? Rogue Drone Reclamation. Good. What is your situation? Unknown, but signs of black out and presence of delirium are signs of complete love exhaustion, leading to total ego shutdown and personality collapse. Bad. You did manage locating a source of emotion to tap into, allowing complete resurfacing of self-awareness. Good.’

She took in her surroundings trying to establish where she had moved onto. There was no way to tell how long she had been out of her mind, but the least she could do is base her distance from her previous location to establish some semblance of where and when. Her heart sank upon seeing the beautiful spires of Canterlot on the other side of the shore. Still so deep in enemy territory and wandering the mountains starved.

“Bad, bad, bad, bad, very bad!” she stammered in a harsh buzz as she reeled back from the bright city, shining like a beacon in the night. She fell back on her back leg, now remembering the reason she had been drained of love in the first place, reconstructive surgery on her own hind leg, expending every last ounce of love she had. Seeing it on the mend, Sarekii was relieved that her efforts were not in vain as it was much better than the pulverized mess it was before.

A stirring and soft moan from a nearby bush spooked her from her shock. ‘Am I always this jumpy?’ she thought to herself as she approached with cautious hooves. Lying among the brambles was a shell of a familiar moori, utterly drained of his love. Seeing the color fading from his already dark grey coat, she was surprised he was still alive. She couldn’t quite recall the name of her meal, but his lunar armor was greatly unsettling to her as feeding so completely on a possible patrolling guard could easily break her cover. She looked once again at her moonlit reflection in the gentle waters of the lake, hoping the reflection would jar some memory in her. The form seemed only vaguely familiar. Who was this mare she was supposed to be? All these ponies looked the same!

She flashed through a few variations of outfits. She first tried a draping tunic akin to old vampony stories to see if she was supposed to be an actress, but reinforcing the negative monstrous stereotype of moori ponies probably was a social faux pas. She donned a maid’s outfit that she remembered. Her nametag from the Hay n’ Stay hotel read “Hearth Stone”, a name that rang more familiarity with an earth pony she had once posed as. Looking back at the guard, she tried on some pony armor options. Flashing between the different variations, she stopped at lunar guard and recalled the familiar reflection of blue eyes looking back at her through a helmet.

‘This looks right. Good. Now think carefully, who are you now?’ she again started her prepared lines of questions to her reflection. She took several moments of intense staring as she looked herself over, playing with her kelp colored mane and tail. She bit her lip, drawing blood accidentally after forgetting this form still had fangs. Every page kept coming up blank having lost all semblance of this pony’s identity during her mind’s absence. ‘Bad… very, very bad.’

Maintaining the armor, she cantered back over to the out-of-sorts batty stallion. She waited for an answer with what to do with him, but the right move never came. ‘So… so unsure of myself, why am I so unsure of myself?! I don’t remember being this flaky and scatterbrained!’ Sarekii chastised herself, bopping her temples with her hooves as she looked over his form. She couldn’t figure out what would be the best course of action that would raise the least amount of suspicion. She could easily kill off the stupid bat and assume his identity until she figured things out, but having no knowledge of the pony would make it nigh impossible to pull off convincingly. Donning a new identity would also be the obvious easy way to lie low, but crafting a personality alone from scratch would take time she didn’t have. There were a hundred other things she could do, but none of them seemed right. Suddenly, it dawned on her. There was no mental backboard to bounce her ideas off of. No network of infiltrators to collaborate with. She knew she was alone, but the reality hadn’t sunk it just yet.

There was a distinct lack of souls in her heart, a gaping maw of silence devouring all of her thoughts like a bottomless void. Where her hive’s beautiful song had kept her on the right path throughout her life, helping her with every decision she made with clear and precise purpose, there was just her now, alone with her own thoughts. The silence was accompanied by a strange ringing in her ear; a phantom sound echoing with a single tone she hadn’t realized was there before. She tried to ignore it, covering her ears with her hooves a tone amplified from a ring to a shrill screech in her ears. The harder she pressed her ears to drown it out, the louder it became. Not just panic, but absolute terror settled in as even the quiet ambiance of the still night had become an excruciating blare. She bit into a nearby log with her fangs and shoved her head into the water to release a muffled, agonizing scream.

Gasping for air, she kicked the log loose from her mouth. She didn’t feel whole. She wasn’t her usual self, lacking the purpose from her hive. It was maddening, almost the point where she didn’t hear the sound of a crossbow bolt being locked into place. With an ear twitch, she veered around meeting the gaze of another guard, this one was an earth pony daytime royal guard, a rare sight with the recruiting office’s fondness of unicorns and pegasi. She reactively assumed a defensive stance, hoping she could pacify him before going in for a quick kill.

“I see y’all’ve taken a likin’ to a bat coltfriends,” the guard deeply drawled out with an Appaloosan twang, blantly disregarding the guise of perfect uniformity within the royal guard. As she looked into his magically recolored eyes, she saw the look of unruly determination peering back at her. If not for his white coat and royal blue mane color, she wouldn’t guess he was a guard at all the way he carried himself. He drew closer, three hooves trudging the ground carefully with his right hoof pointed with a forearm strapped crossbow aimed at Sarekii, his eyes fixed on his target with lethal precision.

“We prefer moori, earth pony,” she corrected him with forced spite. “And I was about to take my friend with me to the infirmary. Now if you’d help me get him there, I would—”

“Normally I’dda found that right neighborly of you,” he interrupted with his country-cooked gruff. “That is, if ya weren’t gonna do the same to me the moment I dropped my bolt. I can’t say I’ve come across too many of your kind, but I do know it’d be foolhardy of me to believe ya that easy.”

“How dare you! The sun and moon work together, land-walker! What are our coats of arms for if you would speak such words to me? Such outright racism towards a moori will not be tolerated, especially among the ranks of the royal guard!”

“Oh, so you know about that, do ya? Well, color me impressed. Lemme clarify your confusion ‘cause ya got three things wrong ‘bout me. One, I’m no guard, least not anymore. Two, I wasn’t callin’ the moori nothin’. Can’t rightly take offense on their part when it wasn’t meant for them because, three, you ain’t one of ‘em, sister… or brother. Can’t rightly tell when you’re disguised like that.”

The guard must’ve seen her when she was trying to establish her identity. Kicking herself for making such a novice mistake, Sarekii began weighing her options in her head. She wanted to leap right for his jugular vein for a quick evisceration, but seeing how he already called her move, she would have to prepare for a longer confrontation. She waited for him to make a move to gather a bit more information in how to proceed.

“Listen, I’m more than happy to have a good ol’ standoff at high moon, but the fella next to ya is kinda on an expiration timer, and I’m pretty sure you’re the cause of it,” he eyed the disguised changeling with aloof ire. He circled around sizing up his target as Sarekii followed suit, both of them waiting for the other to act. “C’mon then girly. You got wings n’ magic against lil ol’ me with a crossbow. Let’s see what you can do with ‘em.”

Without a second thought, Sarekii pounced towards the royal guard. Knowing a crossbow was ready to fire, she dove for the ground beneath him while dropping her disguise, causing a flare of bright neon pink magic to burst brightly around her. With the guard blinded, she swept a rear hoof under him as she passed on his side, letting her leg kick as she knocked the unsuspecting guard to the ground. With the same motion, Sarekii in her true form buzzed her gossamer wings to life, rolling into a u-turn as she darted towards the fading embers of her fiery assault. Her powerful jowls opened for her killing blow, until she noticed her lunge was being met with a fired bolt aimed directly at her head.

For a split second, she saw him, lying belly down on the ground with his crossbow forearm pointed directly at her with a bolt already too close to miss its mark. Sarekii could do nothing as she barreled face-first towards the lethal shot. Accepting her fate, she readied for death. However, instead of everything going dark, his bolt simply nicked the top of her horn, knocking the changeling off balance and causing her to tumble to the ground with a forceful crash.

Her horn throbbed with pain having felt the blunt force of a weaker crossbow shot to her head. How it didn’t impale it or cleanly sheer it off was beyond her, but at this point, Sarekii wished it had. Barely able to focus from the pain, a steady hoof rolled across her barrel to flip her onto her back. Her attention was immediately grabbed with her eye’s crisscrossing to focus upon a sharp pointy end of another bolt near her muzzle. She glared up at the wielder, noticing a singing mar across his face and helmet, except for his eyes. The shape of the burn told her the stallion had pulled his helmet down to avoid the brightly burning flames. He had seen right through her misdirection. Had this Canterlot pony fought her kind before?

“Using the low light to your advantage. Gotta give credit where credit is due, I reckon. Now, are you gonna come along quietly or am I gonna have to—”

She felt a sudden jerk as a grey flash rammed the guard off of her. Sarekii rolled over as she noticed the nearly dead moori had barely managed to crash himself into the royal guard. How he was able to pull himself back to his hooves in the first place was beyond her. She could’ve sworn he was about to die.

“Get away from my Dusky!” the moori cried, his eyes burning pink with rage. His wavering stance told a different story as the bat pony was running purely on adrenaline and what little emotion he had left.

“Aw horseapples,” the earth pony guard sputtered, the wind clearly knocked from him as he scrambled back to his hooves. With the moori barely shambling menacingly towards his target, the royal guard readied another bolt, bouncing targets between the moori and his master. “You enthralled him? Yeesh, and I thought the nobles were worried over nothin’. You’re full of surprises.”

Sarekii crawled to her hooves, her smirk grinning from ear to ear realizing it was now two against one, ever so slightly tipping the odds in her favor. However, they both were injured, the moori barely standing and her with a massive headache quickly descending into a migraine among the already throbbing silence in her head. However, no guard worth their rank would raise a real hoof against one of their own. More likely than not, his intention would be to save this lunar guard. With him in such a weak state, there was little he would be able to do without killing him. She could use compassion against him to make her escape!

“Go, my love. Kill him. Kill him for me!” Sarekii chortled with delight as she frilled her neck fin.

Wordlessly heeding the command, the moori lunged with all of his might towards the guard with blind fury. Seeing her moment to flee come, she turned to away from the battle, making a break for the trees.

“Sorry pal, you’re gonna have to forgive me later.”

She looked over her shoulder as she ran to see the earth pony swiftly unfasten the straps of his armor. With a fluid motion, the guard flipped to his back while pulling his rear legs close to him as he tumbled backwards. The motion rolled him out of his armor as the hypnotized moori barely missed his target, darting harmlessly above him. With a powerful buck, the guard kicked his rear legs into the passing moori, throwing his killing trajectory completely off as he floundered skyward and towards the lake’s center before arcing down to the water with a splash.

Sarekii turned her attention back to see her miscalculation play out as she saw the white of the guard’s white coat wash away to a dusty orange. His cutie mark of a boot sitting next to a pair of binoculars came into view as he rolled back up to his hooves. Pulling another bolt out as he rolled over his discarded armor, he aimed and fired in the same motion towards Sarekii. She leapt for the safe obfuscation of nearby bushes to make her getaway. That was until a searing pain shot up her bad leg in mid air. She screamed and flailed to the ground as her neurons fired in agony with a chitin shattering bolt wedging itself into her now reopened wound.

The guard reached into a saddlebag attached to his armor and retrieved a silver vial from the pouch. He tossed it to the ground, unleashing a bright, ear rattling explosion of sparkles resonating with obnoxiously loud magic climbing higher into the sky, easily catching the attention of any other ponies in Canterlot. Completely exposed, Sarekii tried to scramble to her hooves, but the piercing bolt embedded in what was left of her bad leg’s joints refused to let her budge. The throbbing migraine that had settled ensured she wasn’t going to try flying or using her magic anytime soon. Sarekii was completely immobilized.

With a chilling finality, the gruff stallion retrieved one last vile instrument he had stored in his pouch and trotted over to the helpless changeling. It was a strange, flexible jelly orb filled with a dark amber colored liquid. He held it over with serious judgment over her like an executioner waiting to drop a guillotine.

“Do you know what this is, missy?” he asked, holding over the bitterly enraged changeling. Though she wore a scowl, her shivering told a different story. She shook her head in disagreement not knowing the substance. The guard sighed as he swished the loose jelly ball around, looking up and down the changeling noticing her bright coloration. “Use your imagination. Try picturin’ if it was pink.”

All the bravado fell from her visage as she painted the goo pink in her mind. The first thought was it was a bluff, but how could he lie without knowing what it was? There was no way this earth pony stallion could’ve gotten hold of Suppression Spittle. Equestria wasn’t aware of the changeling race until a couple of days ago. How could he have gotten his hooves on such a dangerous changeling substance?

“This here is a gift from the lil’ misses that I’d rather not have to use,” the guard said with a disturbing amount of sincerity. “Now, you listen to ol’ Scruffy good now. Us Bootlys can be quite the forgivin’ sorts, but if you try to get away while I go moori fishin’, I’m afraid this bit of unholy jelly might not give us the opportunity to make amends.”

Scruffy turned Sarekii’s head to the right, laying it flat on the ground while shooting a bolt directly through one of the holes in her horn. He then carefully placed the spittle bomb over Sarekii’s head, ensuring that if she tried to move, her horn’s edge would catch the edge of the gooey bubble, popping it to release its lobotomizing liquid all over her head and horn. She wasn’t sure if her captor knew just how much mortal danger he had placed her in or not. Cutting off her supply of love right now would be a death sentence, being unable to heal her own injuries.

“Glad we understand each other. Now you rest a spell while I go save your coltfriend.”

Beaten, humiliated, and afraid, Sarekii, a proud pink elite warrior of the Keemah Concordant, hoofpicked by Queen Keemah herself for infiltrating one of the most dangerous cities in the world, whimpered in the face of dying alone.

The bustling of nurses, doctors, and patients resounded throughout the halls of the castle’s medical wing. The post-invasion treatments had tapered off in number since invasion day, but it was still a never-ending barrage of sounds and voices bouncing around the pristine, sterile walls filling the entire area with a constant stream of noise. Doctors talked to patients about treatments, machines beeped and whirred as they recorded findings, and families chatted in both hope and fear regarding their injured, sick, or missing love ones.

However, for all the business filling the air with an orchestra of modern medicine, one quiet, protected corner of the medical wing remained ominously silent: the emergency room. Nurses and royal guards took turns keep an eye on the halls leading towards the ER by both princesses’ orders. Nopony was to go in or out without special permission, but at the same time, nopony could know the area was off limits. It was a quandary of curiosity, only stemmed by a sense of loyal duty to their rulers that they remained surreptitiously vigilant.

Of course, the obvious exception to this rule was the princess herself. With a dignified, yet hasty canter, Celestia made her way into the medical wing, seeking the familiar double doors of the emergency room. She smiled in relief having finally found her way through the maze of the royal castle. She had taken far too much time having lost her sense of direction several times on her journey, but time wasn't exactly of the essence with her current timetable. Pushing through to the sets of doors leading into the room, she braced herself for a conversation she was not looking forward to in the least.

Inside was just as she expected to find it. Chromina was still sleeping, suspended in the green makeshift regen-i-gel just as it should be. She couldn’t help but notice how grossly out of place the gooey, crystalline spittle structure was amid the other pony medical equipment. Jury rigged somewhat sloppily with just enough spontaneous work-arounds to keep it functioning, it was an ugly blemish on what would usually be a beautifully white room. She checked the room to ensure nopony was watching, however, out of the corner of her eye, she caught a glimpse of something, or rather somepony, who was not supposed to be there.

Lying on a cot pulled closely to the side of the changeling medipod was a forlorn Fluttershy. She said nothing or did anything as the princess approached her quietly. She either hadn’t noticed the room’s addition of a royal princess or she didn’t care. All she did was stare at the sleeping beast in her cage, her eyes puffy and red with unease and uncertainty scrawled into her face with every dried tear streak marring her beautiful coat.

“Fluttershy…” Celestia finally uttered as she neared the pegasus.

Fluttershy popped her head up hearing the princess’s voice. The meek pegasus looked over Celestia’s tired features with her royal magenta eyes having lost their depth developed over ages and ages of life and her glorified mane hanging listless to her side. Not bothering to address Celestia, Fluttershy sank back down to her sullied, depressed state.

“Fluttershy, what’s wrong? Are you hurt?”

Fluttershy played with her hooves, twiddling them slightly being obviously uncomfortable trying to find the right words to say. She nibbled on her lower lip as her eyes darted back and forth between her clacking hooves as if she was consulting them for their guidance. After a lingering silence between the two ponies, Fluttershy finally spoke up.

“Do…” she started before biting back her words. She tried again, mustering up the courage to talk about something she should never look into. “Do you think I’m being selfish?”

Celestia hadn’t been expecting that reply, but she hoped it was just a slip of the tongue. “Fluttershy, come with me. You shouldn’t be out of bed. You’re still emotionally compromised.”

Princess Celestia neared the downtrodden pony, laying a gentle wing across her back. Fluttershy didn’t reciprocate by leaning into the motherly fold, instead opting to look up to the princess waiting for the answer to her previous question.

“Come now, why would I think you, of all ponies, would be selfish?” Celestia laughed, trying to dodge the question as the two looked upon the suspended silver changeling.

“Because I want all of my friends back. I don’t want to say goodbye to any one of them ever again.”

Any sweeter, and Fluttershy’s sentiments would be enough to give the princess a cavity. Celestia felt the little trembles of the pony in her embrace. She could feel it in her voice. Fluttershy was scared, incredibly so as one shivers while watching a loved one slip away into death’s final embrace. It was a mental state that the princess had become very familiar with in her line of work.

“Oh Fluttershy,” Celestia softly spoke, trying to impart the warming love she was known for. “It’s not selfish to want everything to turn out alright. I too wish for everypony to come back safe and sound.”

“Every… pony…” Fluttershy loosely murmured as her gaze focused on her own convexed reflection staring back at her from the side of the medipod. “And what about Chromi? What’s going to happen to her when Rainbow Dash comes back?”

Celestia’s heart sank upon hearing those words. She knew Fluttershy was oddly attached to Chromina, the kind pegasus even had a cute nickname for her. To what extent, thought, wasn’t deemed important enough to have been shared in the link.

“W-why are you so concerned with her well-being? She kidnapped Rainbow Dash and has done who knows what with…” Celestia trailed as Fluttershy gazed up at the princess, her eyes telling her she wasn't going to fall for the misdirection.

“The princess said all life is sacred," Fluttershy offered.

“Yes, my dear Fluttershy, you are most certainly right. I did say that,” Celestia agreed with a sweet smile to the pegasus before turning an angry eye to the bottled changeling. “However, this one would see an end to so many lives. I cannot abide that possibility.”

“Oh…” Fluttershy somehow shrank further down into the cot as she tried to find more words to say as another pause lingered in the room. “Is… is that what she told you?”

“No. She didn’t tell me anything of the sort. But I do know what something like her is capable of,” Celestia sneered as her hot glower fell upon Chromina.

“I see. So she lied to you too, Miss Nurse,” Fluttershy sighed with sorrowful disappointment, catching Celestia completely off guard. She had chalked up the seemingly lack of royal respect to Fluttershy and her friends being special friends of the two sisters.

Heartthrob knew her disguise was lacking since not her former queen could pull off the ethereal mane, but she hadn't expected somepony to see through it so easily after all she went through to get here. Everypony had assumed she was just tired, why did Fluttershy see through her so easily? She could feel the fleeting shambles of her mask finally slipping off as the pegasus looked upon her in dismay. Maintaining her borrowed royal form, she straightened up, releasing Fluttershy from her wing’s embrace as she approached the tube and laying a hoof upon the side of the spittle glass. Words seemed to escape the her as she tried to figure out a good retort to test the waters of their exchange.

“And how can you be so certain she lied to me and not you?” Heartthrob offered, slipping into her normal buzzing voice.

“Because I know Chromi would never hurt anyone.”

That was not the right answer for anything in the room to hear. The changeling's brow furrowed at those words, ‘Chromina would never hurt anyone,’ as if Fluttershy had any right to say those words with such confidence! The fake Celestia looked back for the slightest hint of deception or enthrallment, but those bitter-tasting words rang clearly with no hesitation from such a kind, naïve pony.

“And how would you know that?” the disguised nurse spat back, recalling the thoughts Chromina had foisted upon her. “How could you? You were barely beyond a little filly when she met you. You can’t simply defend someling you barely know! She’s not some defenseless creature to be pitied, Fluttershy. She’s a monster!”

“But she’s not a monster! If you know about that, then you should know her better than anyone here!” Fluttershy pleaded, her eyes searching for tears to shed knowing their last hope was slipping away. She stumbled from the cot, approaching the shape-shifter with purposeful strides. “Don’t you see? Chromi is only acting like one because she’s scared! She’s so awfully scared of everypony and herself that she won’t let anypony close, not even me!”

  Heartthrob backed away from Fluttershy as the usually meek pegasus reached out begging for help, not from an immortal leader, but the changeling poorly dressed as her. “Miss Nurse, I’m sorry that I didn’t catch your name earlier, and I don’t know what Chromi did to make you hate her so much, but you’re the only one who can put a stop to this. Whatever she is having you do isn’t going to help anypony. We need to help her tell everypony the truth! Don't let her do this!”

Heartthrob searched her memories. So many blanks in Chromina’s tale littered her mind that it was hard to pick the truths from the lies. The added partial perspective conflicted with so many of her engrained, bitter thoughts that had built up for over a decade. However, when viewed from a distance, the holes formed a distinct pattern in the shape of a little pink-maned, cream-coated filly that held such a cherished place in that monster’s heart. In the end, all of this was for her, and it was a gift that now fully-grown pegasus no longer wanted.

“Please…  Princess Celestia gave Princess Luna a second chance. Can’t you give Chromina one?”

The changeling closed her eyes as she recalled the pity. That regret the monster couldn't hide from her. However, further below was the missing memory in the changeling's own life. It was the one trump card that kept her consistently in line with Chromina’s goals. Such sickly foresight had gone into this plan as the detestable shape-shifter had prepared for the possibility of Fluttershy trying to stop what she didn’t understand. Things were so much bigger than her now, and every moment wasted was another which could become a death sentence for everyone: pony, changeling, and otherwise.

“You’re right, you are being selfish,” she quavered darkly in Celestia's voice to Fluttershy as her horn began glowing with a sickly amber spell. “You need Rainbow Dash, I need Heartthrob. Now I have to hold up my end of the bargain.”

Before Fluttershy could react, an amber aura descended upon the hapless pegasus. She struggled to break free, but with every passing second, her eyes grew heavier under the oppressive power of the sedation spell. She reached a hoof out to Celestia’s imposter as Heartthrob dropped her disguise. Fluttershy mouthed one final plea before drifting away into silent slumber.

“I’m sorry, Fluttershy. I’m so, so sorry.”

Chapter 01: Dashing Through the Shadows

Outside Canterlot Castle, it truly was the perfect day for the swarm of changelings descending upon the hapless citizens of Equestria. Chrysalis surveyed the glorious chaos that would put even Discord to shame. Her love-thirsty minions happily terrorized their spoils of war. Before them, a free fount of constant renewable love energy for the entire hive was at their beck and call, just waiting to be extracted. All that was left to do was round up their new food source and move on to phase—

Something was wrong, terribly wrong. In her moment of triumph, she felt a terrifying build-up of powerful emotion shaking her entire being. It tasted of love, pure and strong, but the aura had the strangest tinge of powerful magic woven through it. It was luxuriously sweet, but the pressure it exuded felt like steel cords ensnaring the changeling queen. The very air strangled the nape of her neck like a noose. Chrysalis’ slit eyes darted around the castle grounds, hoping to find the source. She had subdued Celestia and the other royals herself. Barring a certain slumbering night princess, there couldn’t possibly be anypony left capable of producing such emotional strength!

Unbeknownst to her, six pairs of eyes were enthralled by the beautiful spectacle of lights unveiling before them. Princess Cadence and Shining Armor were wrapped in beautiful arcane light. Ribbons of magical energy ebbed and danced around the royal lovers. Exchanging knowing looks, the couple closed their eyes as their energies fused into one with mystical power lifting them skyward. Reaching their apex, they flashed a brilliantly pure white.

BOOM!

Chrysalis tore herself away from the window to see the blinding, shimmering wave of energy surging from her royal prey. ‘Impossible!’ she thought as an overwhelming fusion of love and raw magical power never before witnessed burst into an aurora of pinks, purples, and white. To the changeling queen, it was like staring down the throat of an erupting volcano. Chrysalis braced herself, casting her eyes away as if trying to wish it all out of existence.

However, under all the alarming screams of her loyal drones ringing through her head, there was a muted whisper of a changeling already encapsulated in the explosion. Chrysalis mind caught the shreds of a sleeping mental thread, somepony long dead and forgotten. It took only a moment for Chrysalis to perceive the changeling magic of her own design, a presence far more powerful than any other of her brood. Her mind’s sight was cut short as the titanic force smashed into her, ejecting Chrysalis from the castle. Under her own agonizing cries, Chrysalis managed to spit a single, venomous word into the depths the suppressed consciousness.

Traitor…

The magical light dimmed as Cadence and Shining gently floated down from their tantalizing spell. Twilight’s friends all smiled as the two ponies basked in the glorious affirmation of their love, all except for the awestruck Applejack. Their most recent victory thrilled her to bits, yes, but among the onslaught of deafening magical forces and changeling screams, Applejack could’ve sworn she heard somepony else. Before she mulled further, Twilight galloped past her to Celestia’s side, ensuring the safety of their benevolent ruler.

Applejack curbed her excitement to take in her surroundings. She knew something wasn’t quite right, but she couldn’t put her hoof on it. Candace and Shining Armor were nuzzling on the altar, Celestia and Twillight Sparkle were having a heart-to-heart, Pinkie Pie was bouncing around in a daze after staring directly at the blinding magic, Fluttershy and Rarity were locked in a friendly embrace, and Rainbow Dash was—

“Uhh, pardon me for breakin’ up our little celebration,” Applejack apologized as she trotted towards Twilight and Celestia, “but have any of y’all seen Rainbow?”

Twilight glanced over AJ’s shoulder to the gap in their ring of friends. “Wasn’t she next to you, Applejack?”

Rarity released Fluttershy also having noticed the absence of one of their group. “Oh dear, she was right there a second ago. Did either of you see where she went?” Rarity asked Pinkie and Fluttershy.

“I can’t see anything past all these pretty stars,” Pinkie replied, frantically waving her hooves about her face, failing to catch the delicious looking spots darting around her blurred vision.

“Oh, I’m sorry, no. I didn’t see her either,” Fluttershy added meekly.

“Well, shoot. Where’d she get to?” Applejack pondered, raising a hoof to her chin. She turned her attention towards the bride and groom. “Hey Princess Mi Amore Cadenza—“

“Just ‘Cadence’ is fine,” the pink alicorn offered.

“Right, Cadence, what the hay was that pretty light show of yours just now?” Applejack asked.

Shining Armor and Cadence looked at each other in uncertainty, Shining offering only a shrug. “I guess it was some sort of repulsion field, at least that’s what it felt like. All I wanted to do was put my shield up and push those changelings out of Canterlot,” he chuckled, “but I guess it went a little overboard with Cadence’s help.” Shining turned towards his fiancé, nuzzling her affectionately for her quite literal loving support.

Rarity gasped as she hopped onto Applejack’s train of thought, “Applejack, you don’t think poor Rainbow got caught in the blast do you?” she yelped, jumping to the worst possible conclusion. “I mean, we all saw how far it sent that wretched queen! What if—”

Shaking her head, Cadence interrupted Rarity’s fearful deduction. “I don’t think so. I’m not sure how to describe it since it was kind of spur of the moment, but it didn’t feel like we hit anything but the changelings and their magic…” She tapered off briefly. “At least I hope we didn’t hurt your friend, Twilight.”

“What about another changelin’?”  Applejack suggested, still wandering the room for any sign of Dash. “I don’t think there were any in here aside from her royal pain, but maybe one of ‘em managed to grab Rainbow before they got sent packin’.”

“It would be best not idle here in speculation,” Celestia stated warmly, her regal tone barely masking her own exhaustion. “Not just Rainbow Dash, but many ponies may be missing or injured in light of what has transpired today. Shining Armor, I am sorry to ask this of you having just reunited with Cadence, but please reassemble the guard and begin searching for any lost ponies, including Rainbow Dash. They are not to rest until everypony has been found,” she ordered with a calming maternal care. She paused before amending her instructions to the weary captain. “Oh before that, please escort Princess Cadence to the medical wing. Once your men have their orders, please report there as well.”

“Right away, Princess! Thank you, Princess.” Shining saluted emphatically, wincing as his hoof accidentally brushed against his sore horn.

Shining embraced his exhausted fiancé as she leaned against Armor for support. Her captivity along with bolstering her groom’s shield spell had taken their toll on the poor princess. They began making their way out of the wedding chamber.

“Princess, if it’s okay with you, I think we should start looking for Rainbow Dash,” Twilight requested as she rejoined her friends.

“I couldn't agree more. Also, I think I will be accompanying Cadence in the infirmary,” Celestia replied, glancing up towards her majestically singed horn. She wrapped an enormous wing around her faithful student showering Twilight with parental pride before making her way to the doors. “Please meet us there when you have found Rainbow Dash.”

Twilight and her friends bowed respectfully as the royal presence left the room. The five friends gathered around Twilight. “Alright girls, Dash couldn’t have gotten far. Unless something really did catch her before the blast…” Twilight trailed off, slightly shuddering at the possibility. “But Cadence said it didn’t affect anypony else, so it shouldn’t have hit Rainbow Dash. Let’s stick together and find our friend.”

“Yeah!” everypony quickly shouted in reply.

The last of the lingering sparkles flickered out from the massive repulsion spell. A tapestry of the sun and moon wafted over the head of an unconscious Rainbow Dash, who was just starting to come around.

“AJ… you gotta watch where you buck those trees,” Rainbow Dash groggily mumbled as she slipped out of her slumber. The room wobbled into focus around her as she took in her surroundings. Ornate pillars, stained glass windows, plush carpet: was she in the castle? Her momentary amnesia passed as her adrenaline kicked back in throwing her memory into high gear, “Oh ponyfeathers! Changeling invasion, KO’d Celestia, Queen Chrysalis! W-what happened?!”

Trying to connect the dots, Rainbow recalled only moments ago she had shut her eyes in anticipation of an awesomely-spectacular, elements of harmony-like super magic blast that’d probably save the day. What she wasn’t expecting was the blinding flash to knock her upside the head harder than her catapult into Twilight’s tree house. She then noticed the lack of a frilly wedding chamber around her. In fact, she was nowhere near it. Instead, she was slumped against a pillar in a hallway somewhere near the archives on the total opposite side of the castle. She found herself gazing at an imprint in a nearby wall of a familiar pony shape. Luckily the tapestry was hanging over the damage, partially obscuring the marred marble she’d left behind.

Deciding to deal with her impressionistic contribution to Canterlot Castle’s decor later, Rainbow took to the air to rejoin her friends. She furiously flapped her wings, speeding off as fast as she could to make sure she wasn’t missing out on any possible changeling flank-kicking. Rounding a corner, the walls began fading into a blurred mess colors. She tried pushing past the disorientation, but the spinning forced her to shut her eyes and refocus. Upon reopening them, she found herself staring at the crater she’d left behind the tapestry again. She hadn’t moved an inch.

'What the…' she rasped as she tried to take to the air again, but nothing happened. She tried waving her forelegs around only to feel phantoms of movements. Rainbow grunted trying to thrust her chest forward, flap her wings, simply blink, but nothing happened no matter how hard she thrashed in her head. Reality began creeping in as she realized her mind was aware, but her body was rigid and lifeless. Not even her eyes were moving, they were transfixed on that stupid spot on the wall.

‘Okay-okay-okay. Don’t panic Rainbow. You couldn’t have hit the wall that hard.’ she thought she had said to reassure herself, but no words came out of her limp mouth. ‘I mean, you crashed w-a-a-a-y harder when you broke your wing in that practice session a month or two ago. You couldn’t have hit the wall so hard that you—gulp—completely paralyzed yourself, right?’ she quavered as her breathing became more erratic, or rather, it should have as she tried panicking. Her failure to physically hyperventilate wasn’t helping.

Her terror nearly resounded throughout the abandoned halls as her scream had come out as a silent muffle. She saw she was clasping her hooves over her mouth, stifling her shriek. Upon further inspection, she realized she was airborne, having nearly jumped out of her horseshoes in fright. She lowered herself to the ground, looking up and down her body making sure things were on the up and up. Hooves clopping, ears flopping, wings flapping, eyes blinking: everything checked out as she tested her own motor control. To her amazement, she looked even better than she did after her earlier tussle with the changelings, even her mane was pristine, for once.

“Okay, that was weird,” Rainbow said aloud, “but at least everything is fine—” a fear-filled jolt ran up her back, reinstating her panic, “or not!” jumping at her newfound fear. She frantically searched her surroundings trying to find what had spooked her, only to find herself alone in the empty hallway.

“No, it’s not fine! I mean, I didn’t hurt myself, but I need to find the girls—” Rainbow started saying before another emotional wave crawled up her spine. It was an odd sensation to say the very least. There was something, a stitch hammering at the back of her head, voiceless, but completely comprehensible. As she tried to question it, another stern wave of concern washed over her.

“No, not the girls? Oh right, just Fluttershy,” Dash nodded in agreement before widening her eyes in disbelief. She found herself at a loss with her own impulses. “Wait, just Fluttershy?” she remarked incredulously. “She’d be more scared of me being scared of… whatever it is I’m scared of! What could she possibly—“

Dash felt a torrential wash of emotion flood her mind, a jumbled mix of terror and oppressive hostility forcing Rainbow Dash to comply with her own strange demands. “Alright! I get it! Just Fluttershy!” She acquiesced while gripping her throbbing head. “I need to find Fluttershy alone and… wait alone? Why alo—okay, okay alone! Sheesh!”

Rainbow found an odd pleasure with her surrendering to her own strange plans. It was like her conscience had developed a weird mind of its own, but not. Rainbow’s thoughts felt like hers, but they ran through a filter before popping out. However, anytime she tried pondering its existence, she’d forget about it before she could even try processing what was going on in her head.

Perplexed, Rainbow began to skulk uncharacteristically around the shadows, darting quickly between pillars to avoid any possible detection. She didn’t know why she was doing it, but she found it impossible to resist. Only one notion remained at the forefront of her mind, the need to stay out of sight. The very moment she considered darting at full speed, her conscience would immediately dispel the notion with controlled caution and fear. When she tried to question it, she’d forget how to ask.

After several clandestine scuttles through the corridors, her thoughts drifted back to the harrowing moment she saw Shining Armor on the altar. She remembered the void in his eyes staring off into space, his irises had glowed a sickly green from Chrysalis’s domination spell. Her furtive glances spotted a decorative mirror across the hallway. Forcing herself to look into her reflection, see saw her full-sized magenta irises shining back at her. Something felt off seeing as she was spotless from head to hoof, but questions like that could wait. Rainbow “Danger” Dash didn’t waste valuable time on stupid mirror gawking when it could be spent fighting rogue changeli—finding Fluttershy. It was a moot point anyway, she reassured herself. Rainbow knew full well that if that she was being controlled, her higher awareness would be greatly stifled to provide optimal conditions for coercion and manipulation for the domination spell.

“Wait, what?” she asked herself as a hot wash of embarrassment doused her inquiry. “Oh right, as if hayseed cereal could even come close to waffles,” she chuckled, waffles being obviously morning entree. She shook her head. Why had she been passionately debating breakfast entrees with herself for the past ten minutes when there were far more important things to do?

A few quick stealth fly-bys later, Rainbow was hovering outside grand door to the ornate wedding chamber. ‘Geez, how did I get so far from here in the first place?’ She pondered for a moment before eyeing Fluttershy on the other side of the room.

Rainbow felt a near irresistible urge to swing down and hug her most precious friend since filly-hood until a familiar regal tone brushed her ears.

“Please meet us there when you have found Rainbow Dash.” Celestia requested of her faithful student and company.

There stood the ever-shining avatar of the sun in all her regal glory. Celestia was the pinnacle of leadership having lived several lifetimes leading the way for her precious ponies. The older half of the embodiment of cosmic harmony, she was strong, courageous, fair, beautiful, and benevolent, wielding power over the daystar in the sky.

And Rainbow Dash was absolutely terrified.

“Oh horseapples!” Rainbow squeaked as she dashed into hiding. She wedged herself as far as she could into the top corner of the hallway, quickly shuffling her mane behind her head, not letting a single color-filled follicle hang loosely in the shadows.

Rainbow held her breath as entourage of royals trotted through the hallway. Her conscience was wracked with overwhelming irrational fear that Rainbow could barely contain. The gnawing at the back of her head rattled as the pain bobbed up and down like a sea of agony. Rainbow’s imagination rushed with thousands of varying horrific nightmares, each analyzing the results of Celestia catching even the faintest glimpse of her. Each scenario ended with Rainbow burning alive with the white-hot intensity of a solar flare.

As the royals rounded the corner out of sight, the migraine subsided allowing Rainbow to gather her thoughts again. She wiped away her blurred vision with her foreleg, surprised to find her face was moist. “Danger” Dash had been silently sobbing in fear. Among the myriad of emotions from her apparent brush with death, Rainbow pinged with guilt. In her heart, she knew Celestia would never do something like that to even her worst enemy.

Forcing herself past the momentary breakdown, Rainbow watched and waited as her friends began wandering the castle halls searching for the missing mare. Staying closely behind the group, she stalked Fluttershy, hoping to find a good chance to pull her aside.

As time marched on without incident, nerves began to fray as nopony had seen mane or tail of Rainbow Dash. Dash herself was surprised she hadn’t been spotted. Being a proud spectrum of color, she was never one to do much sneaking outside of the occasional practical joke. However, even during the closest of calls while trailing her friends for the last hour, they couldn’t catch the faintest glimpse of her cerulean flank. She followed in the shadows, deftly drifting between the group’s blind spots, easily avoiding detection. Rainbow couldn’t remember when she had become so adept at hiding. After all, training for the Wonderbolts never called for subtlety.

“You haven’t seen her either?” Twilight asked a passing unicorn maid. She cowered behind her broom when Twilight vented a loudly in frustration. “Where could she have gone? Somepony should have at least seen her by now!” she exclaimed furiously.

“I know! Maybe she’s waiting to prank us!” Pinkie remarked.

Applejack couldn’t help rolling her eyes. “Sugarcube,” she replied incredulously, “I know Rainbow's one for pulling our legs, but I don’t think even she’d be dumb enough to try to pull a fast one after what we’ve been through today.”

“Thanks AJ. You’re a real pal,” Rainbow bemoaned under her breath at the backhanded compliment.

“I guess you’re right. Even if Dashie was planning some super-spectacular prank, she’d probably have pulled it by now,” Pinkie reaffirmed, bouncing contently with her own explanation until her ridiculous musings stopped her dead in her tracks. “Unless pulling the plug on the prank was the real prank all along! Maybe she pranked us into pranking ourselves with an elaborate double prank!” Pinkie lauded in awe of Rainbow’s brilliance “Good one Dashie! You really had me going there!”

“Well, silly prank or not, she had better turn up quickly or I’m not going to have time to redo Cadence’s wedding dress,” Rarity pouted begrudgingly. Her friends’ scowls gave away their combined disbelief. “What? I worked hard on that commission only for it to be burned by that masquerading insect. Not only that, but she completely ruined the very idea of that ensemble for me. Honestly, if I don’t start from scratch, I’m going to have bugs on the brain the entire wedding!”

“Let’s just focus on finding Rainbow first, Rarity,” Applejack asserted, attempting to refocus the group’s effots, “then we can start sweating the small stuff. I know I got a whole lotta desserts to bake again seein’ all those tables flipped over a while back.”

“Ooo! Ooo! And I have to refill my cannon after the party we had with those changelings, otherwise we’re won’t have enough streamers for the reception,” Pinkie bubbled with an odd hint of seriousness.

“Pinkie that wasn’t a…” Twilight trailed off submitting to the futility of reasoning with Pinkie.

The day was drawing to a close as the sun began its final descent in the west. The hallowed hallways providing little results, Twilight seemed to be losing her composure more and more with the team’s lack of progress. Rainbow noted the higher influx of castle ponies trotting about. They went about the corridors and rooms fixing damages caused by the invasion as well as searching for any missing ponies. They still weren’t quite good enough to spot Dash, but she was having more difficulty dodging the vigilant eyes of the guards.

“Come on, think-think-think!” Twilight fretted, bonking her horn with her hoof as if trying to spark an idea. “We’ve searched most of the castle already. Maybe we should split up?” she inquired aloud.

“Yes-yes-yes-yes!” Rainbow silently cheered, hoof-pumping as her opportunity to grab Fluttershy had arrived. Her victory was short-lived, however, as her target quickly shook her head.

“Oh, no-no-no-no!” Fluttershy quavered, hunching down in fear. “Anypony could be a changeling, right? What if somepony is really just a changeling in disguise and they... attack.” Her eyes darted around the room catching the attention of the hall-wandering stallions and mares. Everypony began looking at each other with nervous concern at Fluttershy’s paranoid, but valid point.

“Oh come on!” Rainbow almost yelled, stifling her frustration with a quick hoof clamp around her muzzle.

“I know, I know, but we can’t start suspecting everypony of being changeling,” Twilight replied astutely making sure she was heard. “If we did, then we can’t trust anypony anywhere anymore. Even finding Rainbow Dash would be questionable since she could’ve easily been replaced while we’ve been looking for her. I’d rather assume that my brother’s and Cadence’s spell worked and sent any would-be imposters flying over the Everfree Forest.”

“Speakin’ of that,” Applejack chimed in, “even if there were any bugs left in the castle when that repo-thing hit, seein’ how far it shot that big one, they’d probably be flatter than a mosquito flyin’ in front of the Appleloosa Express.” Fluttershy winced at the morbid imagery. Most of the castle-goers nodded with the group’s logic, but they continued their tasks with a lingering trepidation.

Rainbow was getting fed up with all this stupid stealth nonsense. Sneaking behind these girls was wearing down her patience and wings, sore from all the slow and subtle hovering. She was quick to blame most of her wing fatigue on her impactful run-in with the wall earlier. After all, there’s no way the best flier in all of Equestria would admit to being drained after following her friends at a snail’s pace.

Her attention drifted back to her friends. After a short huddle, the five mares split up. Twilight galloped away to report on their lack of progress to the princesses while Pinkie Pie and Applejack headed off to cover more ground. Rarity and Fluttershy turned their attention to retrace their steps towards the wedding chamber. It was the last place they had seen Rainbow, and the group agreed it would be a likely place for her to return to. Rainbow followed closely behind, opting to tail them on the ground. Her wings felt heavier than she cared to admit.

Rarity and Fluttershy were met with vacant hallways as they approached the wedding chamber. Most everypony had fled after Celestia was shot down by the changeling queen. Aside from their search party, nopony had any reason to look around the day’s ground zero. To their dismay upon entering the massive, ornate room, they found it still utterly deserted. Rarity climbed the small stairs of the altar to see if Rainbow was outside the window. Her wandering eyes drifted to the charred remnants of the queen’s transformation burned into the rug.

Rarity clenched her teeth, grinding her molars rather than her words for venting the frustration. Kidnapping and impersonating royalty to allow a terrifying swarm of love-eaters bent on enslaving all of Equestria was bad enough, but to ruin a beautiful altar while burning a perfectly good wedding dress on top of it all was unforgivable!

“Fluttershy?” Rarity called back to the concerned pegasus while she enveloped the circular singe in the rug with her magic. “Would you be a dear and watch the door for a minute?” she politely requested while brushing back and forth, trying to salvage the once beautiful floor covering.

“I guess…” Fluttershy squeaked back.

“I should… Gah! Only be a minute or two, really!” Rarity quickly escalated as she wrestled with the rug. Of course the mark wasn’t going to be rubbed out that easily! It took her only a few more wide strokes of magic before completely losing her composure in the maddening battle for cleanliness. “For Celestia’s sake! Just turn from brown to white you stupid, overgrown coffee stain!” she screamed waiting for a reply from the lifeless burn.

Fluttershy sat under the ornate door frame, assuming her watch while Rarity waged total war against grime. Her eyes caught a terrace resting outside a westward set of windows. Her birds had nested there just before the chaos erupted at the wedding. Her worries drifted to Pietro, her soprano mockingbird, who earlier had pulled his wing on the flight to the castle gardens from Ponyville. He might’ve strained it further during the sudden commotion earlier and she really, really hoped he was okay. Fluttershy hadn’t spoken to her birdies or any of the animals since she’d been busy searching for Dash, but she knew they could handle themselves until they found the lost pegasus, probably.

She shook off her momentary fears to refocus her watch down the long hallway. Not a peep or pony was heard as she kept on high alert. It was quiet, but not too quiet. Though, either tier of silence was enough to prompt the dreading mare to nervously pull on her flowing bangs.

Fearing the empty hallway, she had almost given up on her guard duty to assist Rarity when she felt a sudden tug around her neck. Before she could eep out her best terrified yelp, she found her mouth clamped shut as she was pulled behind a pillar. She puttered a series of smothered mphf’s and mhmm’s as her abductor swiftly swung her around the corner. Her eyes watered as she prepared herself for the worst.

“Shh! Quiet Flutters! It’s me!” a familiar raspy voice silently husked at the panicking pegasus.

Fluttershy beamed with excitement with a wide smile plastered across her face. Her joyous reunion quickly faded into horror upon getting a look at her friend’s condition.

“I know, I’m sorry I freaked you out, but—“

“Rainbow Dash! What in Equestria happened to you?!” Fluttershy shrieked, slumping to her flank in disbelief and fear of the sight.

“Keep it down, Fluttershy! Do you want to wake up the whole…” Rainbow paused, trailing off for a moment, “wait what do you mean what happened to me? I feel fine.” Rainbow stated confidently, running a hoof through her perfectly combed mane.

Fluttershy could barely utter a word at the mere sight of the battered pegasus who, outside of being dead, could not have looked worse. Rainbow’s entire body was badly bruised, covered in scratches from head to hoof as if she’d lost a fight with a pack of manticores. Fluttershy inspected Rainbow’s flank, noticing her weight shifting off a broken hind leg. Judging from Rainbow’s shallow breathing, she might have a pierced lung on top of her broken nose. The dark circles of fatigue under Dash’s eyes didn’t help convince Fluttershy that her friend was feeling fine. How could she with her left wing hanging listlessly off to the side, seemingly shattered from some harrowing accident? Better yet, how was she standing at all?!

“Fluttershy? You’re kinda freaking me out,” Rainbow whispered, leaning in to her frightened friend.

“Freaking you out?! We need to get you to a hospital, now! Oh dear, you must be in so much pain. Wait here, I’ll go get the girls!” Fluttershy shouted, nearly speeding off faster than a Wonderbolt until Rainbow pulled her back down to earth with her last good hoof.

“No! No girls, no hospitals!” Rainbow implored. Fluttershy tried to raise an objection, but her retort was cut off. “I need you to just sit down and listen, okay? I’ve been following you around for the past couple of hours because I need to—“

“You were following us in your condition?” Fluttershy squeaked before Rainbow, again, clamped her mouth shut.

“I’m sorry, but just shut up, alright?” Rainbow pleaded as Fluttershy nodded, barely maintain her own composure. “I know it’s crazy, and I wanted to fly down and tell you, I really did! But I was… scared for some reason. I don’t know why, but I was scared, okay? Especially when Celestia…” Rainbow trailed off, shivering having nearly brought back nightmares.

Fluttershy muffled her cries with her hooves as Rainbow somehow started pacing back and forth nervously, seemingly unaware of her grave injuries. “Anyway, I was flying around the hallways waiting for you to be alone, because I needed to tell you something. Something very important. And only to you. Nopony else! … Right?” Rainbow paused, glancing around as if waiting for an answer. Before the confused Fluttershy could offer a reply, Dash answered, “Yeah that sounds about right.”

“Now listen closely, very closely.” Rainbow leaned towards her silently sobbing friend, tears flowing from her unflinching gaze at the battered mare. “I’m awake.”

Fluttershy nodded furiously in agreement, unsure how Rainbow was still conscious, but she was definitely awake. Rainbow paused curiously as if waiting for some kind of big moment that never came.

“Wait, that was it?” Rainbow exclaimed pausing briefly. Fluttershy tilted her head slightly in confusion causing the back of Rainbow’s head to throb in disbelief. “No way! You don’t get it?! But, I said it right, ‘I’m awake Fluttershy!’ You’re supposed to know what that means!” Rainbow pointed indignantly down at her horrified friend as she took to the air on a mangled wing. “Maybe I should’ve told Rarity—no? Oh come on, I don’t even know why I’m telling you all this in the first place! Please, you’ve gotta know Fluttershy!” Fluttershy could only muster a slow disagreeing headshake, silently pleading for Rainbow to land.

Rainbow gritted her teeth while stamping the ground in frustration. Fluttershy’s muzzle was starting to fall asleep from the force of pressing her own mouth closed. Her thoughts raced a million miles a minute desperately trying to come to terms with what she was witnessing. Rainbow Dash clearly wasn’t in the right state of mind from whatever had happened to her. Not knowing what to do, Fluttershy’s eyes darted around the hall trying to find some way to calm the mare on death’s door down.

Rainbow’s stern hoof on Fluttershy’s shoulder caught the panicking mare’s attention once again. She couldn’t have forgotten, no. It was impossible for her to forget this. It was far too important for her to have forgotten about it, whatever it was. She stared into the Fluttershy’s eye’s with a power rivaling Flutter’s own.

“Look, I’m only going to say this one more time, so you gotta promise to pay super-close attention!” Rainbow demanded.

Before she could repeat her mysterious message, Rainbow felt the room suddenly spin out of control. The lights blurred as millions of sharp pains coursed through her entire body. In an instant, Rainbow felt like she’d be run through the entirety of a Cloudsdale cloud factory three times over. Overwhelmed by the intensity, Rainbow Dash blacked out.

Fluttershy waited for her friend to repeat herself. Each second dotted a shallow breath from Dash. Fluttershy reached out to touch the nearly dead mare when suddenly Rainbow forced her eyes open. Glaring upon Fluttershy with ferocious intensity, Rainbow’s irises flared to a burning deep scarlet. She punctuated sternly in a powerful, distorted voice.

“I. Am. Awake!”

Chapter 03: Silver Tongue Secrets

Machines beeped and hummed with unwavering tempos as the medical staff bustled around their ever mysterious patient. For all their efforts, test after test yielded confounding results less sensible than Pinkie Pie attempting to describe the taste of blue to a potted plant. Magical or otherwise, every method to ascertain Rainbow Dash’s condition had utterly failed. All things considered, despite looking like she’d been to Tartarus and back, she seemed to be responding well to what little they could do. Dash had been a model patient: no rejection of treatments, sporadic heartbeats, violent shakings, or anything to raise the red flag of urgency beyond the current state of emergency everypony had maintained for several frantic hours. She remained perfectly stable, but as to how they could help the poor mare, Rainbow offered no answers from her silent slumber.

As the eleventh hour struck, everypony stayed to give Dash their unwavering loving support. Even Princess Celestia refused to go to sleep, drawing a clear authoritative line in the sand between her and Triage despite his attempts to pull the physician card to prescribe her some much needed rest. After a mildly heated, one-sided debate, the two settled upon her retiring at midnight if there was no change in Rainbow’s condition.

Twilight pressed onward with her fruitless searching for different results, even though she had exhausted every conventional option. Rarity kept herself occupied with the same scans her lavender friend was producing again and again. With a nervous twitch, Twilight produced the fifty-seventh broken wing image for Rarity’s fatigued eyes to examine.

“Twilight, perhaps we should try a different approach,” Rarity offered to her frazzled friend.

“Different? They’ve all been different!” Twilight protested scattering her useless notes into the air. “Every last scan was taken at a different angle, by different ponies, a different resonance, I even moved the wing into a different position! No matter what I do, it always comes out the exact same!”

“Don’t be like that, everypony knows you’re trying your best, we all are.”

“Darn tootin’!” Applejack added proudly while passing out water to the team. “I dunno nothin’ about any of these fancy magical who-zi-whats-its you’re doin’ over there, but even so, we’re all gotta do our best to help Rainbow, ain’t that right Pinkie?”

Applejack motioned to the gallery which Pinkie had transformed into a “Help Dashie Get Well Soon” party room with the princess’s permission. With the farmer’s assistance, the two catered refreshments for the fatigued medical staff and onlookers, keeping their spirits up and alert through the night. Even behind the wall of glass and slight bustling of the party, Pinkie nodded hearing AJ loud and clear.

“Yeah! Even if this party isn’t the funderfullest one I’ve ever thrown, I can’t wait for phase two when Rainbow joins in. Then we’ll have a real reason to par-tay!” Pinkie loudly bubbled as she busily bobbed between blazing Bunsen burners being used to bring the busybodies a bountiful breakfast.

AJ headed to the bedside where Fluttershy was straining her tired voice trying to reach Rainbow. She’d been talking to her nonstop since she sat down with all the love she could muster.

“Here ya go, Sugarcube. Clean and crisp to keep those tales of yours a’ tellin’,” Applejack said setting a cup down next to Fluttershy.

Fluttershy only nodded as she kept her hoof wrapped around Rainbow’s, never leaving her side for a second as she tried rousing a response from her friend. She recalled stories of their past outings and adventures they both had shared with their friends. There were many pauses and corrections as Fluttershy stumbled through the memories, trying to recall every step of the way and apologizing when remembering something incorrectly. It was the only thing they could do as they all waited for a breakthrough. She only took a moment to take a quick gulp to keep her voice fresh from talking so much, something unheard of for the usually timid pegasus.

Meanwhile in the gallery party hosted by Pinkie Pie, Doctor Triage finished his most recent inspection of Princess Celestia’s horn before taking a bite out of his oat and onion omelet.

“Well, despite your best efforts to re-injure yourself, you didn’t strain your horn enough to cause any major damage. However, you’re going to need to keep it under wraps for the next few days. Now promise me, no more magic out of you until you’ve had a good night’s rest.”

The princess beamed a small smile as Triage slowly grew more accustomed to his medical authority over her highness. She thanked him for expertly handling the situation as Nurse Heartthrob wrapped new bandages around the royal horn. Celestia reached out for her cup of…

“That includes levitation, your highness,” Triage added tepidly.

… took the cup of tea with her hooves before turning her attention back into the emergency room facing her favorite frayed student fiddling with her sixty-fourth scan.

“Twilight, would you please join me for some tea?” she requested through the gallery speakers.

“But princess,” the dumbstruck mare replied carefully dousing her incredulous tone, “I still have two hundred more frequencies to try to get a better reading! I’m sure I can figure this out if I just—”

“If Rainbow Dash’s stability is any indication, she will still be there after we have finished. Now, please join me before your tea gets cold,” Celestia offered, kindly ordering Twilight to take a break.

Twilight nearly objected until Rarity politely coughed for attention to point out the wall covered in numerous copies of the same broken wing pinned to makeshift backlights. Twilight’s ears flopped down as she looked over her own scrawls of strange figures and conclusions arranged like a conspiracy theorist scrounging unrelated paper clips into a cohesive paranoid mess. With a nervous chuckle, she placed her latest useless image on a nearby stand and walked towards the ER’s double-doors.

She reached a hoof to push into the hallway to the gallery when a familiar midnight blur burst into ER.

“Luna?” Celestia slipped aloud.

All eyes fell upon the disgruntled Princess of the Night clutching the Element of Loyalty in her hooves. She frantically looked around the room, past the nurses and doctors until her furtive glances caught her target, Rainbow Dash.

Luna wasted no time charging to Dash’s side. Bounding over the staff, she nearly tackled Fluttershy as she firmly clasped the element around the unconscious mare’s neck. Celestia galloped in behind her, past the rows of disheveled ponies her brash sister’s entrance had left in her wake.

“Take that off of her! Rainbow Dash is in no condition to be wielding Loyalty!” she chastised Luna as she reached to take off the necklace. A familiar moonlight aura enveloped Celestia’s hooves as Luna tore her away from Rainbow Dash.

“SILENCE!” Luna hissed with her royal voice, raising a lone hoof to her elder sister and anypony else offering an objection. She knew it had been some time since Luna dared to raise her voice to her elder sister’s and hoped it threw her off enough to not question her actions. She could not afford a single interruption, not now.

She did not risk a single blink as her frenzied gaze fell upon the element’s red jewel. Luna ignored the worried stares of her sister and subjects as everypony waited for something from the Princess of the Night. Luna’s face contorted into a furious scowl as the jewel lay still in its engraving. Her suspicions nearly confirmed, she knew she must be quick before her sister could counter the spell she had planned.

Luna’s horn burst brightly, stunning those around her with radiant moonlight. She quickly formed a brilliant translucent shard which quickly coalesced under Rainbow Dash’s chin. Celestia barely managed to utter a horrified gasp as Luna readied a swift slash across Dash’s throat. Just before delivering the deadly blow, Luna stayed her hoof, hesitating upon seeing a pulsation from the gem. Soon the Element of Loyalty beamed its familiar red glow responding to the presence of its rightful bearer. It wasn’t long after a sigh of relief that Luna felt a tree-bashing buck across the face knock her to the floor.

“Oh no ya don’t!” Applejack growled as she lunged for Luna.

“Applejack!” Twilight shouted astonished at the farmer’s assault on the crown.

“And just what the hay do you think you’re doin’?!” she spat at the pinned midnight alicorn.

“Wait, dearest Applejack! I can expla—” Luna again started before interrupted by her sister.

“LUNA!” Celestia boomed in a regal authority unused in modern history, her eyes blazing with solar intensity.

“Land sakes!” Applejack yelped as the pressure of Celestia’s Canterlot voice blasted her away.

“HOW DARE YOU EVEN CONSIDER CASTING SUCH A HEINOUS SPELL!” Her words flowed with righteous anger exploding like a supernova into the ears of everypony. Not a single one was left standing, their princess’s overwhelming presence forcing all to their flanks in respect of her higher power.

“Please, you must listen to me!” Luna pleaded, gathering herself from the floor. “I fear that Rainbow Dash may be in grave danger!”

“Everypony could see that very well,” Celestia replied, lowering her glower to contempt for witnessing a savage assassination attempt.

“I-I… what we meant was that we…” Luna jumbled trying to find the right words to say that would excuse her hasty actions, but the more dwelled, she realized she had left all rational thought and replaced it with fear and anger. Her actions were reminiscent of her shameful mistake made a millennium prior.

“I did not think she was Rainbow Dash,” she responded despondently.

“Whaddya mean?” a weak voice replied from the bed.

“Rainbow?” Fluttershy quavered, peeking her head up from the floor.

The entire room fell silent as everypony slowly turned to see the groggy Rainbow Dash blink her eyes into a small squint. She grunted as if trying to move, but quickly stopped when rattled by the sharp pains of her numerous injuries.

“Try not to move, Miss Dash,” the nearby Nurse Salve softy spoke, laying a steady hoof across Rainbow’s barrel, “you’ve been through quite the ordeal today.”

Pinkie Pie squee’d in delight, plastering toothy grin from ear to ear. She bolted out towards the gallery to unleash her army party poppers for all to see. She brushed off the jubilant confetti in a safe environment before instantly bouncing back into the sterile emergency room.

Rainbow’s best friends quickly gathered for a careful impromptu group hug. She looked around noticing she had woken up lying in a hospital bed surrounded by her friends, again.

“Okay…” Dash heaved slowly catching her breath, “can somepony tell me how I wound up here?”

Luna noticed a brief look of confusion sweep across Fluttershy’s face before she retook Rainbow’s hoof. She took a step forward as Princess Celestia eyed her with a tense air of caution.

“Rainbow Dash,” Luna started with trepidation, “what is the last thing you remember?”

“I dunno. I think I was practicing my Sonic Rainboom for the wedding when...” Rainbow paused trying to recall the information. “Oh ponyfeathers! Changeling invasion, KO’d Celestia, Queen Chrysalis! What happened?!”

Rainbow roused herself a bit too much, sinking into a bitter coughing fit. Fluttershy offered her some of her water which she downed without a second thought.

“Queen Chrysalis?” Twilight asked with genuine curiosity.

“Yeah, the Mistress of Misery, the Crusher of Kingdoms, Conqueror of Queens...”

“Come again?” Applejack added with a skewed brow.

“Chrysalis! The Changeling Queen of the Badlands!” Rainbow added incredulously as she could with her battered breathing. “She only said her stupid name like a million times!”

“Nuh uh, she was too busy gloating and singing about her perfect day to bother introducing her grumpy meanie queenie-ness, Dashie,” Pinkie Pie corrected.

“No, she did! She said it right after she attacked Nightmare Moon. She told me we’d race another time before Luna— ” Rainbow eyes shrank to pinpricks as her recollection crashed, dragging her explanation to a sudden close as she fell back into her bed, unconscious.

“Rainbow!” Twilight shouted lowering horn to Rainbow’s forehead charged with soothing energy.

As suddenly as she’d fallen back, Rainbow shook herself back awake, nearly butting heads with Twilight as she perked back up off the bed. She sat up shooting panicked glances around the room.

“Wait, where am I?” Dash rasped, trying to regain her bearings, the pain in her voice suddenly gone. “What happened to Trixie?”

“Trixie?” Rarity questioned.

“Don’t you remember? That loudmouth was ranting about how she could make the best cider in Equestria during Winter Wrap Up! I was just about to tell her off, but she somehow catapulted me towards Twi’s library,” Rainbow recalled, trying to recount exactly how she had woken up in a hospital bed.

“What happened after that?!”

Luna’s eyes darted between Rainbow’s disturbed friends as the mixed up mare begged answers to questions that made entirely no sense to anypony. Rainbow’s gaze eventually met Luna’s as she pointed an indignant hoof towards the princess.

“And you! I knew I should’ve listened to Gilda, you cheating windigo!”

Before Luna could question who this Gilda was, Twilight enveloped Rainbow’s head with magic trying to get a read on Rainbow’s mental state. Rainbow quickly pressed her hooves against temples as she bit down on her tongue, negatively reacting to Twilight’s aid. Lavender sparks flickered about as the unicorn fought to get a clear reading.

A smile of success spread across Twilight’s face as she finally established a connection to Dash’s mind. It was short lived however, her ears flopping down as her eyes shrank much like Rainbow’s. Luna tried to rouse her, but Twilight’s gaze was a million miles away, lost in a shrouded void and nearly catatonic.

“What is all this?” both Twilight and Rainbow echoed in stereo. “Wait, what’s going on, why can I hear myself?”

Twilight’s head whiplashed as her magic was violently repelled back into her horn, knocking her to haunches. Alarm bells rang out of the multitude of machines connected to the batterer mare in bed. Rainbow’s pulse becoming erratic as her brain activity soared off the charts.

Rarity ran to Twilight’s side, helping her to her hooves as Twilight rubbed her horn wincing towards the mare in the bed. She blearily looked at the readings the machines were registering as the rest of the medical staff panicked from the results.

“What did you do?!” Rarity cried as Rainbow somehow stood atop her bed.

“I don’t know, I was trying to help her think straight, but then I was seeing myself in her head and I…” Twilight stopped herself before getting lost in explaining what just happened. “No, focus on what’s important.”

“This is bad. This is very, very bad,” Twilight stammered as she looked over the data that confirmed what she briefly saw in the head of the bewildered pegasus tossing around in her bed. “Rainbow’s brain is a jumbled mess! She’s shuffling through memories randomly like a deck of cards!”

“Ooo! Sounds like fun, like a million-bazillion card pick-up!” Pinkie chimed in, flourishing a poker deck before shoving it back into her mane. “Wait, is that a bad thing?”

Rainbow’s sudden ramblings descended into nonsensical outbursts putting Pinkie Pie’s off-the-wall antics to shame. She shifted madly between emotions and mannerisms, recounting and reliving incorrect memories, passionately debating breakfast foods to her pillow, and laughing at nonexistent punch lines to untold jokes.

“YES!” Twilight and Triage answered back.

By Triage’s command, the nurses scrambled to find something to something sedate her with. However, Rainbow was still somehow cognitive enough to deftly ward off the swarm of terrifying needles coming her way. Her frenzied struggle only froze briefly when catching Princess Celestia in her eyes. An unfettered panicked expression engulfed Rainbow as her pulse jolted even higher to a blistering pace.

“Ahuizotl chortled in victory over his nemesis as the forbidden amulet tightened its vice grip around her neck,” Dash began quoting aloud, her terrified gaze never faltering from the confused princess.

“What in blazes is RD doin’ now?” Applejack shouted over the story-telling pegasus, trying to restrain Dash who began enacting a strange scene from her bed.

“Daring Do looked around for something to loosen the deadly jewelry beginning to strangle the very air from her throat,” Dash choked, thrashing about, trying to remove the Element of Loyalty.

“That’s from Daring Do and the Curse of Sorrow Shoals, right after Ahuizotl forces her to wear the Amulet of Sorrows!” Twilight replied horrified that Rainbow Dash had somehow lifted herself skyward above her bed with a shattered wing.

“‘Get this infernal thing off me!’ Daring… Do—” The story was stifled with Rainbow’s breathless cry. Tears streamed down her face as she strained for a sliver of air.

Fluttershy dove to Rainbow’s rescue, snatching the Element of Loyalty from her throat. She tore the necklace from her friend with her teeth, losing her grip on the necklace which soared across the room. Rainbow’s scream shattered as she beamed light of pure silver, blinding everypony in the room in a flash Luna had seen only once before in a nightmare.

Silence followed the sudden spectacle as everypony gazed at the mare sprawled across the mattress. In Rainbow’s place, a monster had appeared.

She was equine in shape, her elongated legs slumped over the side of her bed as she now rivaled Princess Luna’s in size. She shimmered in tarnished silver as the fluorescent light bounced off the patches of miniscule hexagonal scales splotched all over her body. Past the broken edges of her natural armor, the gaps revealed black cracked chitin dotted with sickly golden gooey masses holding her splintered carapace together. Her glossy mane scattered light into a colorful prism of dancing light across her hair, her matching tail followed suit as it drooped over foot of the bed. A menacing horn protruded from her head, dwarfing the fangs set in the forefront of her mouth. Her horn was more akin to a scaled lance, a smooth cone resembling polished pristine marble ending in a lethally sharp tip ready to pierce the sturdiest of armor. However, her most remarkable features were her wings. Despite her left one being broken, the span of her wings was as strikingly elegant as Celestia’s pet Philomena’s beautiful wings. They were armored at the front and spread out into vibrant, translucent feathers which scattered light into colorful rainbows much like her brilliant mane. She lacked any of the holey features of her ilk, but there was no doubt in anypony’s mind. This creature was a changeling.

Doctor Triage was the first to notice their medical equipment had been destroyed from the magical surge, save one. The cardiograph still functioned and was registering erratic pulsations from the lifeless beast in bed. Monster or not, they still had a patient in need of saving.

“Salve, positive. Twilight, negative. Prepare Arcane Defibrillation on my mark!” Triage barked to the two. Triage caught the hesitation in Twilight’s eyes. “Irregular heartbeats are lethal to every other bird and beast on the planet. Unless you have any better ideas, start channeling, now!”

Twilight scrambled to her hooves to prepare the negative half of the paired casting.

“Mark!”

Both unicorns fired a steady bolt through the changeling’s body. The current of electrical magic wove around the area they guessed would have the heart, if changelings had them at all. There was a lingering pause as their patient gave no reaction.

“Again!”

They loosed a second discharge, hoping to rouse some response from the silver shape-shifter, but they were only met with a more erratic line across the graph with arrhythmia seemingly winning out. There was little to do though as the mares, once again, felt the magic being blocked. Twilight wondered if it was an automatic response or if their healing magic just didn’t work on changelings. Seeing Triage about to order a third attempt, they started charging a third time.

“Stay your hooves doctor,” Luna offered, having gathered her bearings from the flash. She approached the strange device with her developing her eye for modern technology. “Tell me, does this machine utilize magic or electricity for its readings?”

“Magic, your highness,” Heartthrob replied.

“I see, thank you nurse.”

Despite the machine buzzing and beeping with panicked activity, Luna calmly trotted over to the changeling’s left side. Everypony watched expectantly as she overlooked the broken wing, admiring its shimmering colors as she felt around scale armored chitin. Momentarily flourishing a smile when finding a tender spot, her face sank into a deep scowl before viciously slamming a foreleg onto her mark.

The changeling’s eyes flared open as she loosed an agonizing tri-tone screech resounding throughout the castle. Her ruse was soundly stripped away by the princess’s more direct approach. The changeling cringed as she flopped back onto the undersized mattress, biting back hot tears of pain.

“Do you have any idea how difficult you’re making my life right now, night princess?” she spat venomously through aching heaves, her scarlet irises burning with resentment. “You ponies have terrible bedside manner.”

“You are lucky you still draw breath, deceiver. Or would you rather I bury you alive myself since you seem to enjoy playing the part of a dying mare?”

“Oh, that,” the bedridden monster huffed looking over at the machine still attached, now sounding a flat lined tone. “You can’t blame a girl for trying. Here, maybe it’d help if I lightened the mood a little?”

With that, the machine buzzed to life. The changeling waived a hoof to conduct as the graph gave a strangely melodic reading.

Doctor Triage’s was one of the best medical minds Equestria could offer. Despite his inability to practice unicorn healing arts, the earth pony held the respected position of Royal Physician for the diarchy, a usually uneventful job given the alicorns’ perceived immortality. He prided himself on his quick thinking, serving as the level-headed commander flawless directing medical teams over the years. Even the worst cases in the world be it pony, griffon, or other, he’d always found a way. However, in the face of all his knowledge and experience, he found himself at a loss for words at the debacle unfurling in his emergency room.

“I’m taking requests. How about May Our Sun Shine Forever?” the unruly patient quipped to her dumbstruck audience. “Some good ol’ Equestrian patriotism for our royal audience.”

“I tire of your games, changeling,” Luna fumed with burning indignation. “Tell us what you have done with Rainbow Dash!”

“Oh? That’s strange,” the changeling looked around the room, mockingly searching for the missing pegasus, “she was right here a second ago.”

Luna boiled from the changeling’s haughty attitude. Never had she been treated with such outright disrespect. Seeing her ire growing by the second, Triage emboldened himself, recalling a nearly disastrous encounter with the minister of the griffon kingdom, to once again perform his duty as a doctor without borders.

“That is enough!” he shouted against his better judgment at the lunar princess. “Regardless of the circumstances, she is still my patient and I will not tolerate you or anypony else harming her!”

The only two astonished by Doctor Triage’s foolhardy outburst more than himself were Luna and his patient. He stood between the two powerful ponies, hoping to dissolve the tense situation before it could escalate. He wished he had a better defense prepared than throwing himself into the line of fire.

“How quaint, it seems your physician is siding with me, night princess.”

“I also agree with Doctor Triage, changeling,” Celestia finally broke her silence to address the situation before it spiraled out of control. “However, know that I will not condone your condescending tone towards my sister or her title any further.”

The shape-shifter responded with a dismissive, but capitulating eye roll.

“And Luna,” she added gazing towards Luna with authority, “we will speak of your rash actions once this is all over. It is not our place to hastily condemn those we find disagreeable. All life is sacred. You would do well to remember that.”

The tense situation successfully defused by her stern words, the kind doctor sighed with a bow, thanking Celestia for her timely interlude. Seeing both parties had backed down from their confrontation, Princess Celestia nodded before taking a more serious tone with the bedridden changeling.

“So shall we start from the beginning?”

Questioning the changeling proved to one of the most difficult diplomatic endeavors Celestia had ever attempted. It was irksome trying to get a straight answer, like solving a riddle wrapped in a lie shrouded by an enigma. Even her name was an answer she couldn’t muster for all her negotiating prowess. For the time being, Celestia settled on calling her Prisma.

The inquisition dragged on with little progress. The mere sight of the battered changeling proved too much for Rarity, having lost patience with what she called an “impudent bedazzled bug.” Pinkie Pie had finished cleaning up the party in the gallery when Rarity stormed out. Seeing how the guest of honor wouldn’t be showing up tonight, she went her merry way on a mission hoping to bring smiles to some other ponies around Canterlot, not even acknowledging the late time of night. Seeing that she wouldn’t be deterred, Celestia offered a few names of some Lunar Guards who might benefit from her cheery company. She knew under that bouncy exterior, Pinkie Pie desperately needed to bring joy to somepony’s night having failed with her friends.

With midnight a distant memory, the other medical staff had been dismissed seeing as they could do nothing for an uncooperative changeling who wasn’t allowing anypony close, despite her injuries. Of course, she could be faking it for all they knew. The others either went to bed after their long day or attended to Cadence and Shining Armor, leaving only Triage, Salve, and Heartthrob to take care of their special patient through the rest of the night.

Twilight Sparkle, Applejack, and Fluttershy remained as well to help in any way they could. Twilight busied herself trying to gather what few clues they had between them. With any luck, they would find out when Rainbow had been replaced so they could restart their search for the missing mare. Applejack stayed more out of stubbornness to hear the changeling “fess up”, but her penchant for brutal honesty didn’t resonate with shape-shifter anymore than Luna’s approach had. Fluttershy kept a safe distance from the group, not too distant, but not too close either. Something was scaring her, more than she would admit to on a deeper level. Her gaze remained fixed on the changeling, refusing to leave for a second.

Trying to get on Prisma’s good side, Celestia had offered her personal medical bed for their larger patient. To everypony’s surprise, once they had retrieved the largely unused mattress for her use, the changeling took to her wings and fluttered over to her lavish new accommodation. Celestia detected a quick flush of magic from the changeling, seeing she used wing power as well as magic to propel her forward. She landed carefully not to disturb her broken legs she refused to let anypony wrap.

“It would seem that your injuries have been greatly exaggerated,” Princess Celestia remarked warmly.

“Hardly,” Prisma scoffed, “it just takes more than a high speed collision with a brick wall to keep me grounded. Why don’t you try riding a wave of anti-changeling magic hurdling you through a solid stone palace sometime, see how you feel afterward?”

“Well if you are as bad as you claim to be, then why won’t you let us help you?” Twilight asked with irritated concern.

“It’s not that you won’t, it’s that you can’t. Or maybe it’s both," she replied cryptically.

“Doggonit! Then why doncha tell it to us straight?” AJ complained stamping a hoof down, wanting just a single grain of truth from their bedridden shape-shifter. “Honestly, what good’ll come from you keelin’ over on us?”

“Indeed,” Luna added spitefully, being unable to remain silent in royal timeout any longer. “You are in the best care a pony could ask for, casually wasting away in a bed most ponies could never even dream of sleeping in. If my sister has deemed you worth our help, than ask it of us and you shall receive it in kind.”

“I guess some water couldn’t hurt,” Prisma offered with a cough to punctuate her request.

Luna rolled her eyes, her gaze falling to Heartthrob to fetch the requested refreshment. The nurse replied with a curt nod and flew off to gather the drink for their special guest.

Prisma shuffled in bed to get more comfortable, savoring the warm embrace of the sun princess’s royal sheets.  Her eyes shifted between the ponies still populating the room who all were waiting and willing to help in hopes of finding some peaceful resolution to locating Rainbow Dash. Celestia offered a warm smile when their eyes finally met.

“You know, this wasn’t how I thought a meeting with you would pan out, though I’d have an easier time believing that little smirk of yours if you weren’t constantly shifting through emotions, Princess Celestia,” she commented nonchalantly, calling out the mental gymnastics the princess was performing to obscure her emotions. “Rather impressive control you have there, I might add.”

Celestia widened her sunny grin in reply. Slowly but surely she was chipping away at the changeling’s defenses, letting little details sink through the diced words of their bedridden invader.

“Prisma, I welcome all creatures who are willing to speak with me cordially. If any of my little ponies bear hostility towards you, I assure you that I will not allow any of them to act upon their feelings,” Celestia offered, considering the changeling’s hint to her empathic powers. “Tell me, are there any emotions that anypony here bears towards you that would make you feel otherwise?”

Unsettling glee crept across the Prisma’s face like the princess had walked into a well placed trap, a concerning reaction Celestia had not expected. The changeling sat up from her bed, carefully crawling closer to the princess with her good hooves.

“Now that is an interesting question I can get behind. How about we play a game to find out? You pick a pony and I’ll tell you what they’re feeling, cordially of course.”

The princess frowned upon the changeling’s indifference to invading the privacy of another pony’s thoughts. Disgusting as it may be, it would prove a small price to pay if a game would get their conversation finally started. She gave a quick look around the room, seeking any protests against the idea. Nopony seemed to like it, but they weren’t against the idea either with Prisma finally cooperating on some level.

“Great! Go ahead and ask away. Let’s find out if you can keep your promises while playing,” she paused for both the effect and to think of a name for the game, “Mind Your Motions!”

The mock game show began with Celestia pointing a hoof to herself. The battered host stifled a laugh pointing out the princess should already be quite aware of her own emotions. She opted instead to explain the magical method she used to cycle through various feelings both positive and negative without rhyme or reason. Round one ended with an upset reiteration from Doctor Triage, politely pleading the princess not to use her magic until after she had gotten some sleep.

Her next choice then fell to her sister Luna, a selection which the changeling found boring as her feelings were already clear enough to everypony. Moody Moony, as Prisma put it to the chagrin of the princesses, bore a level of loathing held only for the most contemptible of creatures. Normally she would quickly crush the bug under her hoof without a second thought, but a pang of guilty remorse and fear was keeping her down. Before giving too much away, the changeling moved on asking for the next pony.

The next least offended pony Celestia could think of would be the faithful Twilight Sparkle. Prisma lauded the unicorn for her unbridled curiosity. Even in the face of dread born from the uncertain whereabouts of their missing friend, she still was hungry to learn all she could about changelings while she had the opportunity to observe one. She was equally distraught with the lack of information she was gleaning from eavesdropping while working on her own surface research of changeling physiology. Finally, Twilight beamed with hot embarrassment when the invader finished poking through her egghead.

Celestia’s options had run dry. She didn’t want to pick out another pony to have their feelings exposed so fully in front of everypony. The others in the room weren’t as familiar to her as her sister and student, and she couldn’t bring herself to showcase their inner thoughts in such sickening manner. Then she remembered that playing along would hopefully open up Prisma a little more as well as find out if something was holding the changeling back. Celestia wished their guest would be more honest with her without needlessly dragging her subjects into the mess.

Her pondering was broken as Heartthrob made her way through the wary crowd that had loosely formed around the bed. She carefully placed the cup of water on Prisma’s nightstand, offering a hesitant smile to Princess Celestia, before turning to promptly to leave the rather uncomfortable exchange.

“Getting cold hooves, are we?” the game’s twisted host cooed. “Tell you what, I’ll make your next choice easy with a question of my own.”

Celestia was puzzled by her host’s interjection. Was there really somepony bothering her? She waited for Prisma’s hint while the changeling wrapped the water with a sanguine aura of magic, swishing the water back and forth watching the clear liquid. She nearly took a drink, but decided against it, instead offering the first sip to her regal contestant.

“Tell me,” Prisma started with a damning glare, “if you were in my position, would you drink from a glass of water that took ten minutes to prepare when there was already a perfectly good pitcher waiting in the corner?”

Princess Celestia crooked her head to see a fully assorted spread complete with several paper cups stacked neatly sitting by the door, practically unavoidable if one is leaving the room. Her eyes turned to the nurse who had casually resumed whatever she was preoccupying herself with to avoid going near the bed.

“Heartthrob?” Celestia uttered in disbelief, her mouth hanging ajar.

Nurse Heartthrob happily turned around to answer her ruler’s call.

“Yes, your highne…” she started before noticing the attention she’d garnered while ignoring the conversation. “What’s everypony looking at?”

“Excellent choice, your highness!” Prisma reveled in amusement. “Picking the only mare who would have objected to the game outright? What a bold move.”

“Game? What is she talking about, what game?” the slightly panicking pegasus begged for answers.

“Let’s see what we’ve got here… Oh wow! Not even Princess Luna could muster that kind of bloodlust,” the game’s host chortled with faux-excitement. “Your burning hatred for me is without a doubt beyond anypony else’s in the room. Your disdain is only matched by your shock in finding out that I’m still alive. Nothing would make you happier than to see me shrivel up and die just like—well this is a surprise—just like your former queen did! Bonus points for bringing in a vendetta to pack that extra punch.”

Princess Celestia’s heart sank seeing Heartthrob reel back in horror. The apathetic monster called out her innermost thoughts one by one, each proving, to everypony’s dismay, to be true as fear encompassed the unwitting nurse.

“Oh, but that’s just what’s written on your face. To be honest, I can’t read a single emotion off you which means…” the shape-shifter trailed off to build suspense. She grabbed a hold of the node from the cardiograph which beeped out a drum roll for the added effect.

Before anypony could make sense of what was going on, the changeling shot a fearsome sanguine bolt of magic piercing straight into Heartthrob’s forehead, destabilizing the pegasus’s magic, and sending her flying into the corner. She erupted with an orange flare, burning away the familiar nurse and leaving a mess of black and orange sailing towards the wall. She crashed into the pitcher of water, dousing any fires that would’ve been started by her impromptu switch. The creature formerly known as Heartthrob slowly raised her black hooves to her face to hide, only to see the princess through the holes in her legs.

Prisma took in a deep breath as her chest faintly glimmered with love-fueled restoration. She readied to bellow a sadistic tri-toned congratulation accompanied by a silly beeping fanfare for the royal winner of Mind Your Motions.

“SHE’S A CHANGELING!”