The Accursed Ancestry

Celestia had sacrificed the spare forty-five minutes she had on hoof to some speedy research.

Starswirl, although blind to the magic of friendship, had been a good mentor nonetheless.

As a result, she was now extremely knowledgeable in methods of obtaining knowledge, which sounded like some variation of the circular reasoning fallacy to her logical mind, but was really just repetitive.

The Canterlot Archives were vast. It did not matter--Celestia knew them like she knew every detail of the gold ornaments she wore.

She wished Lulu was there to provide some thoughtful insight that may not have occurred to her. She was probably snoring softly in the serene enviroment of her bedroom. Her duties required her to be nocturnal, and she would seldom stay up all day, unless there happened to be an infinitely important event or emergency that demanded her presence.

Celestia spread her feathered wings and lightly flapped all the way to the very back of one of the longest rows.

On the bottom shelf, there were various bins with years inscripted on them. She glanced at a folder she was already holding with her magic and selected a bin.

Levitating it to her eye level, the ivory princess magically leafed through several faded newspapers until she found the right one.

A delighted smile lit up her face. It quickly dissolved into a thoughtful look as she laid pastel violet eyes upon the article of her interest. The headline screamed in large, bold letters.

"SCANDALOUS PONY SECRETLY MARRIES CHANGELING, COUPLE NOW GONE MISSING."

This story had come out around the date of her former employee's birth; it was likely biased, but if so, it was still bound to be fairly accurate.

As she was in the middle of investigating, a scroll, tied with red ribbon, materialized next to her in a jiffy.

Absentmindedly, Celestia wrapped her magic around this new item and placed it on the corresponding shelf, to read later, if she ever had time to get around to it.

That was how she missed Twilight Sparkle's warning, which detailed that Chrysalis had been sighted that morning.

The entire Royal Guard, it seemed, had been alerted of a lethal changeling's presence in Canterlot. They all rushed towards Chambya, spears at the ready.

She only stood stock still, a cunning smile on her fanged face.

The guards closed in.

It was on!

She kicked one in the throat with her hind legs and whirled around, feeling a sudden urge to eat. Grabbing another, she opened her mouth wide to reveal a forked red tongue and drained the love out of him in ten seconds flat. Then, she focused on taking all the others out, with a reptilian hiss.

Somehow, their spears snapped like twigs when subjected to her madness. She was enjoying the fight.

Oh, this has got to be a dream, moaned Cerise, trapped inside her head. Now she was the side who could no longer speak publicly.

"Sorry to shatter your hopes, darling, but it definitely isn't," replied the ruthless queen, while smacking another guard directly in the jaw with pleasure. She was taking advantage of her new ability to talk aloud, if it was only to fire a snarky comment at her helpless other side.

Chambya, that is enough. You must only frighten them, not cause a national disturbance! a new voice roared in her head. It was Chrysalis, communicating with her through a special type of changeling magic.

Yes, High Queen, Chambya replied, restraining herself.

In the blink of an eye, she morphed into another Guard.

Cerise would have objected, but Chrysalis was using magic to forcibly exclude her from the conversation.

Now, you shall come to my hive, to receive your next orders in private. Is that understood, my minion?

Yes, but you promised potency when I first heard you, High Queen, and full charge of a hive of my own. Cerise was intrigued to learn that Chambya had strange, seperate desires from her.

And that you shall have, in due time. A hive, feeding one, in particular, is an enormous responsibility.

Tell the false, frail mare whom you are currently unable to leave behind that I know the whereabouts of both her parents, as well as all that has happened to them.

A hope, a foolish, irrational hope flickered on in Cerise's heart. They might be alive. She might be able to see them. She might be able to run up to them and warmly embrace them, confessing her many faults. In comforting love, there would be a priceless moment of bliss and reunion.

Chambya could hear all these thoughts, like usual.

So could Queen Chrysalis, who was exhibiting a fanges grin, for the fates of Woodland Canopy and Maxilla, the rebellious lovebirds, had not been pretty ones.

Maxilla! How Chrysalis snapped at the name! She had been a treacherous little nymph to think she could disobey the High Queen's orders! Love was a food source to be utilized by changelings, not given freely by them.

Well, she had no cause to worry about the rebel anymore. It was her responsibility to maintain the hive and keep it thriving. That meant things she didn't necessarily always want to do, such as scouring the surrounding area and scraping together as much love as she and her subjects could find, and culling every quern nymph or exceedingly weak grub that hatched. She must take care of these things, or the hive would fall into utter disorder and become inefficient.

She did not mind dealing with ponies at all, but to do so to her own changelings--each one was more or less related to her.

The main objective was that the hive should run seamlessly as a whole. Any who were foolish enough to rebel would be used as an example.

Maxilla had been the first in her hive, but then, Chrysalis was the awesome High Queen of all changelings.

Why shouldn't her subjects greatly fear their ruler?

Chrysalis then contacted the leader of her hive's Changeling Patrol, Captain Pharynx. Even as a grub, he had shown superb skill and excelled in training when the time for it had come.

He possessed a dramatic but useful color mutation, which enabled him to be easily spotted amongst the colony: dark red fins and brilliant violet eyes. He was quite unlike his younger brother. His younger brother had barely been accepted into the hive, for he had almost been counted as too weak.

"Yes, Queen?" the captain replied gruffly.

Lead half the patrol to the Crystal Empire to acquire rations, she commanded.

Of course, but do we need to go there again?

The workers and drones are losing strength. I believe you do. Althoigh his main job was to protect the hive, she needed him to do what others had failed to. Fortunately, he was the most loyal of its thousands of inhabitants, for sure.

The jet queen exited her throne chamber with the intent of observing the entire hive and making an estimate of how much love would be needed.

"What is the meaning of this madness?" inquired Luna.

The graceful, regal, slightly bedraggled mare stared intimidatingly down at Chain Mail and two other guards. This was nearly as bad as the Royal Canterlot Voice.

One sheepishly managed a, "W-well, you see, Princess--"

"You have awakened me from necessary slumber, and for what cause?" Her imposing tone made all three want to look away or stamp their hooves down on the ground, but neither of these options complied with the code of conduct they had been taught, especially when conversing with a royal princess.

Chain finally spoke up, clearing his throat non-offensively.

"Your Majesty, we were forced to fight a despicable changeling--if we hadn't, she might have wounded innocent Equestrians."

"Yes, that's exactly what happened!" chorused the other two.

Luna's tone softened upon hearing these explanations.

"A changeling queen, are you absolutely certain? Has my sister been informed of this happening?"

"No, Your Majesty, as far as we know."

Luna started to pace, but not anxiously, like Twilight Sparkle, though this might well mean Equestria was on the precipice of disaster. Hers was not stressed and tense, it was beautifully light and profound, complimented by her exquisitely edged mane, the flow of which she shared with her elder sister.

The one unfortunate quirk all her other behaviors were pervious to was the habit of sticking the tip of her tongue out of her mouth when concentrating.

She obliviously exhibited thus as she paced, to such an extent that the guards (with the exception of Chain Mail) were struggling to keep respectful faces and having to bite their own tongues.

At last, she halted, coming to a conclusion.

"I would like the Royal Guard to patrol our beloved and watch it, as a hawk, to the best of their ability.

"Certainly, Princess." Chain Mail's weathered grey face grew tight with lines of worry.

"If the results are unfavorable, we may have to take a census, for matters of security. Good day, stallions."
And with that, the Princess of the Night effortlessly ascended into the azure sky, returning to her tower. Her comely mane and tail were not dimmed by the sun. Instead, it provided a new light to view them in.

"A census, eh? How long d'you think it'd take to complete that?" said the guard who had first attempted to speak aloud.

"Mayhaps a few months," Chain Mail replied, temporarily removing his helmet with the orange magic of his horn, to toss the sweat out of his rugged, pale blue mane.

"The last one that took place in Equestria was done way back, a few millenia ago."

"In the time of the king and queen?"

"Aye, Silver Spear. Now, we had better get around to executing the princess' orders." The single veteran of the entire guard replaced his helmet neatly, with one hoof, and marched off, his emerald eyes gleaming with silent pride in his duty.

The others followed, awe-struck by, well, just about anything related to him. They were both fairly new, having joined only two months ago.

The way they chased after him and trailed him was more akin to a foal's zealous scampering, even, than the expected gait of "well-trained" and intelligent guards.

"...but Canopy's whereabouts are presently unknown. He was last seen with a--" Celestia gasped. "--small, dark brown foal. It is suspected that he has fled into the infamous Everfree Forest. No one has dared to find out. Covered by Parchment Prose..."

The Princess of the Day paused when she came to the date, mouthing it concisely.

Within those mere forty minutes, she had learned a whole lot more about Cerise than she knew before, and, evidently, some the pegasus didn't even know about herself, such as the fact that she had been born with changeling eyes.

Quite fortunately, her eyes had developed pupils soon afterwards, despite having two different, unsettling eye colors.

This was helpful and truthful information, but the manner of its collection had been terribly cruel and tragic: Maxilla was attacked, captured and located in a secure but public cell with her newborn. Only the most famous newshorse of the group that gathered to see the pair each day--this "Parchment Prose"--and bombard them with camera flashes and complex interview questions meant to confuse Maxilla into giving an answer that, when documented, would generate even more hatred towards her.

But strangely enough, by trying not to stay on the newspaper's front page, they had only lenghtened the story.

Woodland Canopy had practially materialized from the shadows that night in order to free his true love and seek refuge for them both.

That was when the wicked, terrible High Queen summoned Maxilla back to her hive. The worker knew she must go back and endure a punishment that was almost certainly death. She sadly instructed her husband to take good care of the infant filly whom she would never see again, but he brokenly declared that some government-related ponies wanted their hooves on him just as fervently as the nasty Chrysalis did, with her.

There was a painful, drawn-out moment when they enacted the tragic last resort before parting. They'd made the decision to hoof their young foal to the ocean, hoping the tide would come and mercifully carry her away, to blissful and unaware final moments. The filly bobbed up and down in the water like a float and cooed softly.

They would have given anything for more time with their daughter, though there was no possible way to get out of this awful situation. The water's serene colors were wasted on their desperate countenances.

Wishing they could stay in this same place forever, but feeling the immediate urgency of their seperate races, they finally broke the loving gaze and vanished into the distance, flying and bolting, leaving their only foal to drown. They had no other choice.

Celestia returned to the present, forcing the tears brimming in her pale purple eyes to die down. As Cerise almost had.

It's amazing how much you can discover with a simplistic temporal vision spell, she thought. Once again, she was grateful for all the pure, useful knowledge Starswirl the Bearded had imparted to her as a teacher, even if he was not around now.