Queen Chrysalis stepped through the cell door, barely waiting for her loyal guard to step out of the way after opening it. With a quick glare, she made it abundantly clear to him that she wanted to be alone in there. Receiving the message loud and clear, he shut the door behind her with a heavy clunk.

There was a cocoon in the corner of the room, much like the one that her Visage would be wrapped in by now. If only she had not tried to interfere with her harvesting of the humans, she could have led a pleasant life under the watchful eyes of those she had assigned to keep her out of trouble. Chrysalis sighed. She should have known better than to give that much freedom to one who had just so recently betrayed her.

Slowly, she approached the cocoon and came to a halt in front of it, staring silently at the creature inside. It was one of the humans from the world she had been able to find thanks to Visage. A whole new world filled with creatures that, luckily enough, could be harvested for their love.

The option of moving her entire kingdom to a new world that didn't know about them had presented itself to her, but she couldn't do it. The destructive powers these humans possessed that she had learned from Visage, and continued to hear more about from those doing research in the new world, was frightening. She'd be lucky if Visage's actions in the human world didn't lead to them being discovered soon. Even without those actions, it was only a matter of time before the humans found them. Still, as long as she kept her operations relatively small and hidden, they probably wouldn't use their more devastating technologies, but an entire hive of changelings couldn't possibly avoid detection. In an all out war, the might of her entire armies would stand even less of a chance against the humans than they would against the combined might of her own world. They'd have to disband as a nation and spread across the land to even stand a chance of survival. Even ignoring the likelihood of annihilation, she didn't think she could move her entire hive to the new world unless she absolutely had to. Regardless of how promising it may or may not be, it wasn't home.

She admitted to herself that when she had heard these creatures described, she had imagined them being quite different than they turned out to be. She had pictured them as more like the bulky minotaur from the distant country of Minoa. That which she gazed upon looked so fragile by comparison. She marvelled at how a creature like this one, so pathetic looking and devoid of magic, could become the dominant species of their planet.

However, this one wasn't just some random human she gawked at in wonder over their surprising success. This human was the mother of the one inside her precious Visage. She looked so peaceful sleeping there in her cocoon. Her emotions stirred a little as she dreamed, a feat that had initially surprised her about these humans. No creatures from this world could dream while encased in a cocoon as it cut them off from their magic, but human dreams didn't rely on magic, so they dreamed on. She suspected that without that magical element, dream walkers would be unable to slip into the dreams of humans, but she made sure every one of them had a dream warding spell cast on them to block out potential intruders, just in case.

Watching this human mother, Chrysalis couldn't help but feel envious. Chrysalis had lost her child and this woman's own had taken over the body. It wasn’t Victor’s fault that he was there, but it still hurt tremendously to see her daughter’s face and yet know that she was gone. This woman, Victor’s mother, had the reverse problem. Victor’s body was dead as could be, but his mind was as alive as possible inside Chrysalis’ own daughter. The jealousy that Chrysalis had felt was overwhelming. Back in Victor’s home, she had let that jealousy drive her actions by attacking her and dragging her in to see her child’s rotting corpse, to show to her that her child was just as dead as hers. Now, though those emotions still smoldered on inside her, a new emotion had begun to creep into her breast: guilt.

“Hello, Louise.” She greeted the slumbering form awkwardly, remembering the name that Visage had given her during their discussions before. She didn’t know if she was able to hear her in there, but she had to get some things off her chest regardless.

“I am Queen Chrysalis, but more importantly, I am a mother, just like you.”

She paused, thinking on all that had happened in the recent and not so recent past.

“I know what it is like to mourn the loss of a child. Beyond that, I know what it is like to suffer the loss of a husband. I have no family left alive in this world, and I have the responsibility for the wellbeing of an entire nation on my back. Far more of my subjects die under my guidance than I care to mention, and each one is another failure seared onto my record as a wife, mother and Queen. With every death, I wonder more and more if those I care about would be better off without me.”

She waited several seconds, stewing in her own macabre thoughts, before she remembered that the one she spoke to couldn’t answer.

“But that is really not your concern, is it? You have little reason to care about my troubles, I am the monster that holds you and your family captive. I suppose what I am trying to get at is that I understand the pain you feel over losing your own child, perhaps even more so than you could ever realize. It is that understanding that brings me here now. Out of my own spite, I inflicted upon you a traumatic experience of such magnitude that few could possibly understand. I thrust upon you the corpse of your child. Knowing how it feels, I never should have done it, and for that I am sorry.

A little over a week ago, I had thought that my own child had come back to me alive after I had believed her dead for so long. I quickly learned that this was not the case. A being paraded around inside her, unknowingly wearing her face and crushing my heart with every moment she spent near me. Despite this, I kept her around, unable to push away the image of my own child, and ever hopeful that she would somehow return to me. A few days ago, I was faced with a very cruel lesson that she was truly gone. The anger I felt over this is what caused me to act the way I did to you. I have come to be very disappointed in myself for those actions.

I don’t expect you to forgive me. Even if you can hear me, I don’t really deserve it for the pain I have inflicted on you. As I said, I am the monster that abducted you and your family, and additionally I am enslaving hundreds of your kind to fuel a war that I begin to wish I hadn’t started. Yet I know that if I don’t fight this war, more and more of my subjects will starve to death. Those who don’t will eventually be hunted down by the ponies I war against and murdered, just like they did to my husband.

I see no way out of this. I am trapped and alone, and I don’t know what else I could possibly do to get out of this mess. I fear that everything I do is the wrong thing and only further tightens the noose around my subjects’ necks.”

The image of Victor’s mother blurred in Chrysalis’ vision and she wiped the tears from her eyes with a hoof.

“Even if everything else I do is wrong, there is one thing I can do that I know is right. That being that lives inside my daughter’s body? That is your Victor. Your precious child is alive and well inside of her, and I promise that I will do all I can to ensure that they survive.”

Chrysalis sensed a stirring of emotions in her prisoner. She didn’t know if it was in response to what she had said, or if it was just another dream. Either way, Chrysalis lied down on the cold, stone floor and stayed in the company of her fellow mother long into the night.

Author's Note

Just a quick, side chapter to show Chrysalis' emotional turmoil. It's not necessary for the overall story, but I felt it would be nice to do this regardless. Chronologically speaking, this occurs very shortly after the ending of "The Best Laid Plans".