Can you Foalsit for a Kingdom?
Shining Armor and his illustrious wife, Princess Cadence, cantered into Twilight’s thrown/map/dinning/arts and crafts room, large smiles plastered on their faces. Each had forgone the usual formal wear that was required, no, DEMANDED of those in royal status, sporting ragged Sapphire Shores popstar shirts.
“Ready for the concert?” Cadence squee’d to her husband, doing her little happy dance, which made the already cute mare that much cuter. How did he score the only girl that was perfect beyond perfect? Shining’s dad had asked him the same question as well.
“You better believe it!” Shining Armor smiled. “Royal Night OUT! WOOH!”
Before the Royal Stallion’s ‘wooh’ had died, Celestia and Luna walked into the room of many purposes.
“It sounds like we’re not the only ones excited about the concert.” Celestia giggled.
“In deed, dear sister!” Luna smiled with glee, her mane done up like Sapphires, as she wore the most authentic Sapphire Shores dress. She’d have to complement on Rarity’s ability to make it in less than twenty-four hours. Maybe she’d even give her a barrel of her finest wine she’d just received from Berry Punch? “Let us go forth and enjoy the frolickers of the night and listen to the romantic warbling of Sapphire Shores!”
“Sapphire doesn’t warble.” Celestia corrected Luna.
“Trill?”
“Guess again.”
“Belt out?” Luna suggested.
Celestia opened her mouth to speak, but then closed it, putting a hoof to her chin in thought. “Close, but not quite.”
“Serenade us with sexy sass?” Luna offered.
Celestia shrugged. “Mmmm, close enough.”
Shining leaned in close to his wife. “Serenade with sexy sass? Sounds like you last night.”
Cadence’s eyes went wide as her cheeks burned with a blush that made her pink fur look like a cherry. She turned and punched her dear husband in the shoulder, knocking him off his hooves and onto the map table, three feet away.
“Sorry!” She cried out, sprinting over to where he lay, slightly twitching. “Sorrysorrysorrysorry! I keep forgetting how strong I am now.”
Shining struggled to sit up, his world still spinning. “Still getting used to?! It’s been five years!”
“Took me almost one hundred to get use to it.” Celestia nodded sagely. “And that was before I even started to realize how much I had to hold back in-”
“NOOOOO!”
All conversation ceased as Twilight’s voice could be heard. There was much growling, and cries of frustration, and even some words that made even Celestia blanch. The purple Alicorn stomped into the room, her hooves leaving cracks in the crystal floor.
“They all canceled on me.” four sets of eyes watched her unblinkingly. Twilight sat back on her hunches and yelled up to the heavens, hooves reaching out to something unseen. “HOW CAN FORTY-FIVE BABYSITTERS, ALL WITH CLEARED SCHEDULES, ALL CANCEL THE NIGHT OF THE CONCERT?!?”
It was a rhetorical question, one that was not to be answered. That didn’t stop Luna from starting to raise a hoof to answer. Celestia caught her sister’s hoof and gently forced it down. The Princess of the Sun had only seen her star pupil in such a rage once long ago, and that was when the Librarian had told her that she couldn’t check out more than four hundred and eighty-six books at once. Needless to say, such a restriction no longer applied to the lovable bookworm after that day.
There was a loud knock on the door.
“Would you look at that?” Cadence laughed nervously. “It sounds like some pony’s at the door. Maybe on of the babysitters?”
The knock was louder, falling upon deaf ears of Twilight as she had taken to muttering under her breathe as she started to play tick tack toe upon the crystal floor, using her hoof to carve out the lines. It was a strange habit of her, but for some odd reason the taxing of a mental battle against herself in something simple seemed to help her sort out her thoughts, so long as the O’s didn’t win.
The door creaked open as the last pony anyone expected to see poked her head in.
“Had I known that my revenge was going to be this simple, I would have done this last week.” Chrysalis mused to herself. All the ponies in the room looked at her, unblinkingly, with the exception of Twilight, who was furiously battling the O’s as she made mental calculation of the odds of forty-five different ponies, all with different lives and backgrounds, could all cancel at the same time. Now if she carried the one, and subtracted the three, then maybe quadrupled the eight-
“Chrysalis.” Cadence nodded, eyes narrowing at the Changeling Queen. While her presence was a bit alarming, they all stood in a room with four princesses, and a prince, who had the collective power to keep a world running. At least they could be curious to the little bug queen.
“Oh, don’t mind me.” Chrysalis smiled at the Princess of Love. “No one came, so I let myself in.” She spied Twilight playing her little mind game on the ground. “Am I the only one seeing this?”
Luna snorted, taking a seat where she stood. “We fear that the disappointment of not having a baby sister whilst we go and enjoy the frivolities of the Sapphire Shores concert has…broke her.”
Chrysalis shrugged. “Well, that makes my job easier.” She tapped her hoof on the ground and forty-five drones buzzed into the room, armed to the teeth, and armored with the anti-magic armor. “To business.
Twilight, who was completely oblivious to all this, came to a conclusion as X’s won the round. There was one connection. The drone of forty-five sets of wings behind her solidified her theory. Right as the drones, all directed by the collective hive mind ruled by the queen, a potent magical force took hold of them and held them where they stood.
“Forty-five...” Twilight stood up slowly, her bangs covering her eyes. “Forty...five...” Slowly she turned to Chrysalis and pointed a hoof to her. “It’s your fault.”
The Changeling Queen was about to say something when she paused, turning to the first magic bound drone. She Chrysalis blinked as she realized the her drones were held captive.
"How'd you do that?!" She demanded. "That's Anti-Magic armor! You shouldn't be able to touch them!"
Twilight glared at her former adversary. "You'd be surprised how little defense that actually gives when you think of the fact that it only restricts my touch on them, however, I can solidify the air to a density of such that they can't move passed it. Because oxygen is a natural element, and holds no magic properties as I'm just squishing it together, the armor can't dispel it, because there's nothing to dispel."
Chrysalis put a hoof to her chin. "Huh. The more you know." She then realized that there were more drones than she originally anticipated accompanying her.
“How many of you are there?” She demanded.
“Forty-Five my Queen.” The nearest one answered, attempting to salute. “We all came.”
The Changeling Queen’s face fell. “I said I wanted twenty-five to attack while the rest take over the town!” All her subjects looked rather uncomfortable. “Who gave the orders?”
“It was Shadow Wing.” One said.
“No, Buzz Fang told me that Shadow Wing asked him to pass the message along-”
“I heard it was from Dorsal who got the order from Shadow Wing!”
“I told Hard Shell!” Shadow Wing spoke up.
“I got my orders from Siffer.”
“You should know better! Siffer doesn’t know his left hoof from his right!”
“I’m standing right here.” Siffer deadpanned next to the Changeling who just spoke.
“Oh, look he knows his name.”
“Look, just because you can beat me in Change Your Voice doesn’t mean that you can make fun of me!”
“Beat you? You don’t even know how to play, you twit!”
Chrysalis face-hoofed as her drones, subsequently her children, started bickering back and forth. She turned the royalties in the room. “I swear, they’re better behaved than this. Do you mind?”
“Please.” Celestia waved a hoof. “Take your time.”
The Changeling Queen turned around. “STOP IT!” She hissed at them. “You’re embarrassing me and yourselves! And you call yourselves Changelings. More like Whinings.”
All the Changelings stopped their fighting to reply with a “Sorry mom.”
“But he started it!” Siffer sniffed.
“No I didn’t!”
“Yes yo-”
“I don’t care who started it!” The Queen Mother cut off. “Now,” She turned back to see Twilight in her face.
“You owe me a baby sitter!” To Twilight’s credit, she didn’t use her newly acquired ‘Royal Voice’, but that didn’t stop the stringing mane of Chrysalis from being blown straight back as if she were in a windstorm.
Chrysalis narrowed her eyes. “I want your kingdom.”
Twilight was about to reply when Cadence stepped in. “How bout a wager then.” Both Purple Alicorn and Black Changeling Queen looked at the Pink Pony Princess of Love. “If you can care for my Flurry Heart for the night, and not burn down the castle and keep your sanity, then you get to take over without any resistance.”
Twilight, caught on in a flash and smiled. “And if you can’t then you and your Changelings will be bound to serve the Royal Families for as long as Celestia deems fit!”
“Pfff, watch over one baby for Equestria?” Chrysalis smiled a very toothy smile. “Done!”
Twilight released her hold the the Changelings and turned to her family. “Okay! We’ve wasted too much time! The concert starts in a half hour!”
In a flash they all teleported out, leaving the Queen and her drones standing confused. After a few minutes of trotting around, Chrysalis found the small baby room off the hallway that lead to the bedrooms from the multi purpose room. She looked down at the slightly pudgy Alicorn baby with a quizzical face. That was it?
“Well my little tot. This is going to be easy.”
Flurry Heart, who was sucking on a pacifier gazed up at the black bug queen.
“After tonight, I’m going to rule over Equestria. All I need you to do is stay there and stay quiet, understand? My day has come, and this castle might as well be mine.”
The baby stopped her suckling for a moment, catching the attention of the Queen. Turning her head to the side, Flurry Heart spat out the crystal pacifier.
“I think not stupid bug thing.”
The Queen of the Changelings stared stunned at the little pony. She wasn’t sure what was worse. The fact that the less than a year old foal talked or that her voice sounded like a Russian Don.
Flurry Heart smiled evilly.
“Let us play game, yes?”
As the royal family made their way back to the castle, laughing, and singing, while still waving their glittery palm palms, they looked at the castle.
“Still in one piece.” Luna observed. “Think we underestimated the Bug Queen’s abilities of Foal-sitting?”
The front door burst open as a few changelings flew as fast as they could from the castle. Something pink, and oddly looking like a tendril, caught both by the hind legs, bringing them hard to the gravely ground.
“No!” They cried, clawing at the slippery terrain. “No! No more play time! No mooooooooooo-” As fast as they tried to escape, they were dragged back in to the laughter of a baby.”
Chrysalis stood in front of the thrown like bouncer where Flurry Heart lay giggling as the changelings tried to escape her ‘play time’.
“What?! What are you?!?” The Queen’s eyes were wide as she gaped at the small infant. “You speak like a war horse, you play like a demon!” Her pupils shrunk to pin pricks as a strange odor reached her flaring nostrils. “WHAT IS THAT SMELL?!?!”
Twilight sat at the entrance of the map room, trying to keep from laughing. Cadence trotted passed her, and went for her baby, whisking her up with her magic.
“Who’s mama’s pretty baby?” She smiled. “You are! You are!” She caught a whiff of the deadly smell that left Chrysalis foaming at the mouth. “Shining, come change your daughter.”
Shining sighed, as he followed his wife, taking his daughter and going to a changing room down the hallway.
“Hey there kiddo! You have a surprise for daddy?” After a moment of silence. “Holy Horseradish! What did she give you to eat?!”
“Well, it looks like our kingdom is safe.” Celestia sighed, watching the drones buzz around the room in a panic. “What are we going to do with them? I already have a guard of incompetent colts who need me to read them a bed time story each night.”
A smile split Twilight’s face. “I have just the thing.”
“Well,” Chrysalis snorted disgustedly. “I should have seen this coming.”
Two of her drones were currently taking on the appearance of Rarity and Applejack as Twilight hoovered over a book with a maniacal grin.
“And now, they kiss!”
