Five Weeks Till Nightfall

Chapters

Five Weeks: Mark Two
Four And Three: Barren, Part 1
Four And Three: Barren, Part 2
Four And Two: Barren, Part 3
Four and Two: Portents

Five Weeks: Mark Two

“I don’t like it.”

Verde Tin dimmed her horn, letting her magic keep the wrench she was holding in place and still so it didn’t accidentally turn the bolt while she had her attention elsewhere.. “The wrench?”

“Oh, yes, I am known for my long-standing hatred of ordinary tools.” She felt the expected prod in the flank from behind and grinned. “The machine, of course. This entire project. The test. The necessity. The whole damn thing. I don’t like it.”

“You don’t have to like it, Zen,” she assured the mare, brightening her horn again and continuing to carefully rotate the pressure bolt. “In fact, I’m proud of you for not liking it. Nopony likes war and this pony certainly doesn’t like building some apple-bucking goddess-damned machine just so we don’t have entire cities vaporized. But it’s the world we live in and I, for one, am a really big supporter of not-vaporized cities.”

There was an exasperated sigh and a harder poke at her flank. “Astra when we’re in public. And that’s not the point.”

“Sorry… Zen.” Verde grinned at the annoyed sound. “So what is your point?”

“The test!”

The green unicorn sighed and carefully disengaged the wrench from the bolt before setting it down and looking back at her companion. Astraylzenika stood there with her white, red-streaked mane falling across her face, trying to glare through the curtain of hair without looking more cute than serious; Verde had to restrain herself from giggling at the zebra’s failure. At the suppressed giggle, Astra dialed the glare up a few notches and used a hoof to bat her mane out of her face.

“The test!” She repeated. “The only way to test the shield to failure is to build something that we can be sure will make it fail. And where’s that gotten us, huh? One new model of megaspell after another, more sophisticated, more efficient, more stages, more… more… ponypies! And then they’ll all get stolen again and we’ll have to run through the dance again and all the while, we…”

Verde ignored the familiar tirade, using her magic to gently grasp the grease-streaked goggles over her eyes and lift them up to rest on her brow, immediately clearing her vision and making her painfully aware that she had been transformed into a green-and-black zebra from all the streaks in her coat. She took a step back out of the innards of the machine and turned to face Astra fully. “You know it was never stolen in the first place,” she interrupted when Astra ran out of breath.

The simple observation deflated the ranting mare and she stepped close enough to nuzzle Verde. “Yes, I realize that it was never stolen in the first place,” she sighed. “I’m just so bucking sick of this already! I want to be out there, fixing it, killing something, just… doing something to make it all better or… or…” She deflated again. “…just, something. I hate being cooped up doing technical things while the war goes on. I followed you into this so I could change things and all I’m changing now is air filters.”

“Zen, you are changing things,” Verde assured her, returning the nuzzle. “This is going to change things. With a successful test, we can restore the balance, save lives, give ponies hope again.”

“Hope.” Astra pulled back from the nuzzle and chuckled bitterly. “The Mare of Peace hoofs over the framework for a weapon of mass murder to the enemy and we are still supposed to have hope. The Ministry of Morale follows the lead of a drug-addled monster and we’re supposed to have hope.”

“She’s not a monster. She’s…”

“My father being the brother-in-law to your mother is the only reason his memories aren’t being ripped out of his head by the Ministry for no crime other than being a zebra, Verde,” Astra growled before softening her tone and her eyes into something sad. “Hope is just one more casualty of the war. We should put her on one of those damn casualty lists like all the other poor souls being fed into the sausage machine.” She pointed a hoof at the machine. “Tell me honestly, Verde: can that thing protect more than one building at a time? Can it prevent the nightmare of a single sanctuary standing alone surrounded by a mass grave? Will it do a single damn thing?”

“It will.” Verde replied softly, stepping closer to nuzzle the distressed zebra again. “It will buy us time, precious time. All we need is time, and this will give us that.”

“What will time do for us?” But Astra leaned into the nuzzle, her cheek soft and warm against Verde’s own.

“For us? Nothing. For the ponies that need just a little more to give us hope again? Everything.”

Astra turned her head so they were nose-to-nose, her eyes a brilliant sapphire. “You know something.”

Verde grinned. “I always know something.”

Astra chuckled a little and leaned in, nuzzling and then stepped in more, Verde feeling the zebra’s muzzle burying in her mane. “You know secrets.”

Verde smiled and returned the favor by nuzzling into the luxurious waves of the other mare’s silk-soft mane that smelled ever so faintly of mint. “Things are about to change, Zen,” she murmured. “They’re going to change dramatically and for the best. Mare Sparkle plans to commence the first trial of her induction formula by next month. A system for pinpointing megaspells in a city, in case the zebras choose to use one of those strange stealth cloaks of theirs, is ready to go online. I even hear rumors that…”

“Stalliongrad is relieved!” Both Verde and Astra jumped a little as the charcoal-grey stallion appeared in the workshop doorway.

“Beg pardon, Major?” Verde said as she and Astra disengaged, both turning to look at him.

The stallion, facing their concentrated interest, seemed to remember himself and the excited stance melted into the dignified calm of the professional soldier that seemed to live inside Major Pale Ribbons, ready to come out at the smallest excuse. Gold-flecked steel-gray eyes looked between the unicorn and the zebra before Ribbons decided that he’d made them wait enough.

“Stalliongrad is relieved,” he repeated. “General Manestein broke through the cordon just two hours ago. Reports are that zebra forces are staggered and General Derian is expected to arrive on their flank within the next two days with the object of pinning them against the Sea of Adanac and smashing them in detail.”

Verde blinked. “He… how?”

“He’s Manestein, that’s how.” Pale’s grin made him suddenly look like the relatively young soldier colt he was under the polished veneer of a professional officer. “Drew part of the siege forces away with a supply column that was totally empty, then drove the dagger into their bellies. Rumor is that he even managed to smash a headquarters division, although that’s probably wishful thinking. If Derian succeeds…”

“…that’s a full regional force broken beyond repair.” Astra whispered, her eyes gone dinner-plate size. “That’s… I...” Her face suddenly blossomed into a joyous look. “So by this time next week, we could be looking at victory on the near horizon.”

“Or something less pleasant,” Verde commented grimly. “I don’t mean to spoil this moment for you two, but what do you think people with stealth cloaks and megaspells are going to do if backed into a corner?”

Astra deflated. “Strike. Win before we can make good on the victory.” She paused. “Do you really think they would?”

“There’s no doubt about it, Corporal,” Ribbons said grimly. “This is holy war for them, a war to save the entire world from Nightmare Moon.”

Astra shook her head. “Save the world from Nightmare Moon… every time I hear it, it sounds all the more absurd. Honestly, what do they think she’s going to do? Love them to death? It’s like their brains are stuck forty years in the past when Nightmare was just the demon on Princess Luna’s shoulder instead of the now-adult adopted daughter of one of Equestria’s most admired scholars and scientists.”

Verde chuckled. “I could easily imagine her making a noble attempt to love the zebras to death… if that wasn’t what Aunt Silver Rose’s job. Cept I’m dead sure that Nightmare can’t make chocolate chip cookies even half as good.”

“It’s like a metaphysical impossibility.” Astra agreed.

Ribbons chuckled. “I take it your aunt is really nice.”

They both turned to look at him. “Pale, Aunt Silver Rose is really nice like water is slightly moist.” Verde informed him in absolute deadpan.

“Ministry of Peace then?”

“Mare Fluttershy’s right-hoof mare.” Astra confirmed. “Although I think that’ll change soon. I can’t imagine her hoofing megaspells over to the zebras will go over well.”

Pale shook his head and sighed. “What could she have been thinking?”

“That if everyone has megaspells, no one will.” Verde suggested, lowering her goggles and reaching for a screwdriver and box of high-amperage fuses.

“That… doesn’t make sense.”

“It makes perfect sense if you’re Mare Fluttershy,” Verde told him as she turned and trotted into the cavity of the shield generator, selecting the proper fuse by feel and examining the terminals in front of her to decide the best placement. “Remember that she’s a healer, a veterinarian, compassionate and the Bearer of Kindness. She doesn’t think coldly or with the cunning that you’d expect of a soldier. Her world is simple: if there’s a wound, you unpack your first aid kit and heal it. Some wounds are worse and more complex but the solution is always the same: you heal the injury and relieve the suffering. Making it so that both sides could destroy each other, in her mind, created a situation of stalemate so that no more ponies or zebras would die or be hurt.”
She turned to look over her shoulder. “She was desperate and it was our failures, among others, that made her that way. I, personally, feel responsible for a situation where the Mare of Peace is driven to such desperation by the suffering around her that she recklessly gives Equestria’s enemies the means to destroy us.”

The silence behind her was surprised and then heavy. It wasn’t until she’d placed another three of the fuses that she felt the faint reverberations of Pale taking the first step into the generator. “I think that if we’re assigning blame, Tin, there’s a much more obvious target than soldiers like us.”

Verde sighed and put the fuse down before looking over her shoulder at the hard expression on the soldier’s face. “We can’t do anything about Morale, Pale. The only thing we have control over is our own virtues, vices, achievements and failures. Stoking the old flame of hatred isn’t going to save a single pony life.”

“Putting a noose around that manic pink neck would,” he growled, although without the heat of deadly seriousness.

“My mother will deal with Pinkie Pie in her own good time,” Verde assured him, picking up the fuse again. “When you’re dealing with a tactile precognitive, you have to play a very long game and in this case, she’s playing it for very high stakes and we’re simply one of the pieces on the chessboard.”

“Pawns?”

Verde thought. “Rooks.”

“I’m… flattered?”

Verde chuckled. “True, they can only move in a straight line but they’re one of two pairs that can corner and checkmate the archbishop.”

“And the other pair?”

“Knights.”

“And the reason we aren’t knights…?”

“We’re soldiers, Pale.” She told him as she plugged the fuse in and reached for the next. “We receive orders and carry them out in a straightforward way. The knight’s path is indirect, convoluted, and complex.”

There was a moment of silence as he mulled this over. “Like you.”

She actually dropped the fuse in surprise at the comment. “Beg pardon?”

“Like you, Verde.” He met her eyes calmly when she turned to look at him. “And Astraylzenika. No children of the Fourth Triumvirate are…”

“The… what?”

“Fourth Triumvirate,” he repeated. “It’s the informal name we simple soldier ponies invented for your mother and two aunts. The First is, of course, the Three Sisters. The Second is Twilight Sparkle, Applejack, and Pinkie Pie, the three Mares of the most powerful wartime Ministries. The Third is Rarity, Rainbow Dash, and Fluttershy.”

Verde eyed him. “Okay then. So what were you saying?”

“I was saying that no children of the Fourth Triumvirate are ordinary ponies. Astra here isn’t even a…”

“You’re one word away from me breaking my hoof off under your tail, Pale.” Astra interrupted him coldly. “I stopped being a zebra when the only family that loved me was the pony side.”

“Oh, get over yourself,” Pale snorted… and then sighed. “No, that’s cruel of me. I take it back, Astra; you’re just as pony as anypony else. I just wish you wouldn’t be so Goddess-damned sensitive about being called stripey when ya look exactly like one.”

“Appearance deceive, Major Ribbons. But coat pattern is not where the zebra sin is.” Astra intoned in her best zebra accent, although Verde knew from long experience that the solemn intonation was being accompanied by a cheeky grin. “It is from religious moderation abstaining, and being cold to a little filly that wants your love, your approval, and some practical training.”

Pale banged his head lightly against one of the generator’s walls. “Verde, can I please throttle your cousin?”

“Go right ahead,” Verde responded in her best attempt at a disinterested tone, her position in the machine masking her grin. “But when she embeds you face-first in the generator, you get to remove the dents.”

She heard him mumble unflattering and inaudible things under his breath. “Anyway, the reason I’m here, beyond bearing good news about the war, is to get a progress report and deliver the latest orders.”

“I’ll know how much progress I’ve made when I start cycling power through it,” Verde told him, levitating the fusebox cover into place and holding it there as she began replacing the screws. “I believe, however, that the replacement of ordinary high-amp fuses with slow-burn ones should solve the problem of surge blowout without unnecessarily compromising the integrity of the secondary projection circuits. The cycling implements are still grinding out shavings from rough machining but the rotary shell is spacious enough that I don’t anticipate overheat. Those are the only remaining concerns; everything else works at 135% integrity to allow for slight overload in case it has to deflect multiple strikes in the first cycle.”

“I’m assuming that all of that is… good?”

Verde laughed as she carefully stepped out of the generator and began securing the access panel. “Yes, Pale. Sorry for the technospeak-dump.”

“You’re not sorry one damn bit,” he grinned. “You get jollies out of making my head hurt and you know it.”

“Well, yes, my most favorite simple soldier colt.” Verde levitated her goggles over to the work table. “While I’m powering up, talk to me about these new orders.”

“We’re going to need a suitable testing area for the Alishield Mark Two,” he said, gesturing to the machine with a hoof as he followed her up the ramp to the control console. “As such, headquarters wants the two of you plus an unnamed ‘special representative’ to head into the Changeling Barrens to discuss the matter with Queen Chrysalis.”

Astra paused midway up the ramp, looking at him. “They want us to go out there instead of just asking her to come here?”

He shrugged. “Those are the orders.”

“Odd ones,” she responded as she joined Verde at the panel, assuming her normal position at the right side while Verde handled the left. “According to what I hear, Chrysalis is usually more than happy to get away from her kingdom and visit Canterlot.”

“The changelings only have one monarch, dear,” Verde remarked, slowly rotating a power control knob to keep the electrical feed into the generator gradual. “I imagine that as the only Queen, Chrysalis has too many responsibilities to just pick up and take a vacation whenever somepony needs to talk to her.”

“That’s why the Goddesses invented bureaucrats,” Astra grinned, moving levers to start raising blast shields around the now-glowing machine. “Both to give us hicks some flank to kick and so nice shapeshifting mares can hang out at the Apple Bay Spa instead of presiding over a thousand miles of dust.”

“How did they end up that way, anyhow?” Pale trotted over to rest on a low bench at the back of the platform, watching them work. “It’s not like there’s been any reason to keep them out of Equestria proper since, like, twenty years ago.”

Verde rolled her eyes. “C’mon, Pale… the westernmost flank of Equestria is pretty damn important and being given responsibility for protecting its entirety is enormously prestigious and an amazing gesture of trust. I’m sure the changelings were given the Barrens because of the warm relationship between Chrysalis and the Dual Thrones, not despite it.”

“So giving them a wasteland is an honor.”

The touch of skepticism made Verde turn and fix the lounging stallion with a dim look. “It’s not a wasteland, Pale, any more than the plains around Appleloosa are. Hell, can you imagine trying to fight this war without iron, tin, aluminum, copper, and the coastal rock farms?” She turned back to the controls, flipping a switch to close the first set of breakers in the circuit. “I can’t believe you’re not aware of any of this.”

“I’m a simple soldier colt, boss.” Pale pointed out, his grin audible. “You’re the brains of the operation and your cousin over there is the femme fatale.”

“What the hay is a femme fatale?” Astra demanded.

“A spook that gets her intelligence through the block and tackle of convenient stallions.” Pale was clearly trying not to laugh.

Verde heard hooves on concrete as Astra turned to stare at him. “Pale Ribbons, are you hitting on me?”

He laughed. “You kidding? Verde would dropkick me to the moon and keep my stallion bits as a trophy. I’m trying to make up for being a jerk about your stripey-ness by being flattering, ya knob.”

Astra chuckled. “Well, don’t quit your day job, soldier colt. But thanks for the effort.”

“Anytime, kid.”

“Kid?”

“I’m older than you, Astra, by a lot. Besides, you’re always gonna be the rookie, at least until we get some other over-eager patriotic zebra mare to make eyes at our commander.”

Verde sighed and closed the next set of breakers. “You sure get mouthy when you’re bored, Pale.”

“Boss, when you grow up with eight sisters, being mouthy is a form of self-defense.” He informed her merrily. “It stopped me from throwing myself in despair from the top of the silo dozens of times over.”

“Yeah, well, cut it out. We’re about to start the main feature and I want someone to gaze upon my works, mortal, and despair.” Verde closed the final set of breakers and the floor began to vibrate subtly as a low rumbling whrrrr came from the generator apparatus.

“Initial rotations are looking nice and clean,” Astra reported, examining the panel of voltmeters and other monitoring equipment. “Peaks and valleys are smoothing nicely and the stable flow from utility-feed translation into the capacitors for the projection array shows no anomalies.”

“Fantastic,” Verde smiled as she looked over her creation. Standing thrice the height of a pony and looking all the world like a trio of grain silos laying in a row on their sides, the next version of the Alishield was already looking wonderfully promising. “OK, nudge the revolutions into deflection range and let’s see how it handles that.”

“Yessir,” Astra responded instantly, reaching up and rotating a dial several clicks to the right. The rumbling whrrrrr started to gain a higher pitch when abruptly, a tolerable rumble morphed into a high-pitch whining that bore a horrible resemblance to a hoof being scraped loudly over a chalkboard. Before it could deafen them, Verde popped a quick sound bubble spell into place around them.

“That doesn’t sound good,” Pale commented.

“I tend to agree. Astra, what’s the problem?”

“I think I’ve got a vibrator—shut up, Pale—in the upper rear right side,” Astra reported. “It’s scraping against the rear generation rotator and making that Goddess-awful noise.”

“Is it impacting operation?”

“Not that I can see. At deflection rotation, the generators are still converting utility power in a stable manner and the variable frequency drivers are arresting any possible surges. Still, we can’t have a generator that’s so deafening that the operators would be incapable of hearing orders, much less obeying them.” She looked over to the controls Verde had been at. “Test the emergency cutoff?”

“Might as well.” Verde reached a hoof up and flipped open the emergency cover before mashing the red mushroom-shaped button. For an instant, the screeching whine of the braking mechanism was a solid wall of sound, the air displaced by the emergency stop actually making Verde step back, and then it ceased.

“Good.” Verde smiled. “Basic operation works well. Spins up gradually and with the exception of the loose piece, it’s solid.”

“So what now?” Pale asked. “Gonna take it apart and put it back together again?”

“Now I make repairs and check the imperatives,” Verde replied, opening all the breakers and de-powering the machine as Astra reset all the controls back to their default startup state.

“The imperatives?” He asked as she turned and trotted down the ramp, grabbing a screwdriver and her goggles as she went.

“Yeah, the part of the thing that makes it so much better than its predecessor,” she told him, slipping on the goggles as she circled her project, watching as the blast shields lowered at a command from Astra. “Obscure type of rune, really delicate to inscribe but scarily powerful when you get it right.”

As she unlocked the armored door leading to the cover, she felt the stallion staring at her. She ignored it, floating the screwdriver over to unscrew the heavy cover and exposing a half-dozen exquisitely-cut jewels glowing softly like smoldering embers with the spells they contained. She took a moment, carefully examining them for cracks or flaws that may have been caused by the first power-up, before lighting up her horn to examine the most critical part: the integrity of the imperative runes, which glowed a fierce electric green in the presence of her horn.

“How rare is being able to use these… imperatives, Verde?” He asked in a queer voice.

“Virtually unheard-of,” she replied, satisfying herself that the first jewel was safely intact. “Why else do you think I’m doing this myself instead of having one of Mare Applejack’s many engineering minions do it?”

“I’d just assumed you were obsessive,” he admitted as she focused her attention on the next jewel. “Which, by the way, you are. So what do the imperatives do?”

“I’ll tell you in a minute; this is very delicate and I need my full concentration.” There was a slight fuzzy distortion in the second iteration of the imperative on the second jewel and Verde began to gently caress it with tiny pulses of magic, carefully sharpening the inscription and restoring the tiny hook on the end that had faded too much for her liking. Satisfied, she took advantage of Pale’s obliging silence to check the last four; finding them correct, she lifted the panel back into place and began retuning the screws.

“So what do these imperatives do?” Pale asked.

“Are you familiar with rune-based magical engineering?”

“Nope.”

“OK, then the long and the short of it is that runes are a set of instructions for magical energy being channeled through a physical object,” she told him, swinging the ponderous door shut and locking it. “Normal runes cause the magic to do a particular thing every time magic is fed into it, sort of like a computer program. They do the job but are inefficient, letting much of the energy go to waste in exchange for being impossibly stable. Imperatives, on the other hand, force all of the magic to obey certain conditions and be used in certain ways, and they harness all of the magic without any waste. But they’re insanely unstable and the slightest inscription error will cause the magical energy to be focused into the object the flawed imperative is placed on, causing an explosive reaction eerily similar to that of a giant balefire bomb.”

“And you’re putting them on a shield generator?” He demanded, aghast.

“Yeah, that was Aunt Scarlet’s reaction too,” she chuckled, pulling the access panel that would let her get to the tiny flaw in the dynamo array from the generator. “But as you noted, Major, I’m one of the only ponies that can pull it off.”

“Super. I’m in a room with a mini-megaspell,” he sighed. “You’re one helluva crazy pony, Colonel Tin.”

“I’m doing work and Astra is providing moral support to family; why’re you in the room with the mini-megaspell?” Verde pointed out, using the screwdriver to check the tightness of the screws attaching the cowling to the dynamo structure.

“Macabre fascination,” he replied instantly. “If you’re going to blow up the world, I’d at least like a front-row seat.”

“Blowing up the world happens in another eight days; today is all about preventing the world from getting blown up.” She leaned out of the generator to give him a cheeky grin before ducking back in, lighting her horn to bend the cowling back into its proper shape after being rubbed against the revolving generator coils had distorted it.

“So in a week, you’re going to blow up the world.” Pale paused to absorb this. “Isn’t the Mark Ten a little weak for that?”

“Yeah, which is why I’m gonna make a Mark Twelve,” she told him as she closed the panel and started securing the bolts. “Well, that should take care of the problem. Now to test the fast-start system.”

“Like, flood the entire thing with more juice than it can handle in the hopes that it’ll power up instead of blow up?” Pale deadpanned.

“What’s the matter, Pale? Afraid of a little shrapnel?” Astra snickered.

“You kidding? With an adorable face like this? It’d be a tragic loss to the world if it got damaged.” Pale returned as Verde bolted down the main generator access and trotted up the ramp.

“Just make sure to duck and cover, most favorite simple soldier colt,” Verde grinned. “I’m not sure of how big it’ll go up if it does and it’s easier to deflect debris with a smaller shield.”

Pale eyed her. “Out of curiosity, isn’t the entire point of fuses to make sure it doesn’t blow up?”

“Are you being an idiot or just a pain in the flank?”

“If those are my options, I’ll go with… pain in your flank.”

“Astra, kick his flanks when we’re done, won’t you?”

“With pleasure.”

“Why did I let you convince me to hire her?”

“Because you were still harboring delusions that I needed a nice piece of flank in my life, and thought you could fill the role,” Verde turned so she could give him a toothy grin. “Now hush, and watch this.”

This time, the power-up procedure was much more simple, but also significantly more hazardous. Instead of a gradual, measured, filling of the individual pieces with electrical power, all the breakers were closed at once and the generator went full-power instantly. At least in theory. Verde nervously hoofed the black mushroom button on the opposite side of the panel from the emergency stop, took a breath, let it out, then pressed it.

The lights promptly went out.

“I’m watching, and I don’t see nothin’.” Pale commented brightly after a moment. “At least it didn’t blow up.”

Verde sighed. “Of course there’d be too much inrush for the main generator feed to handle. Astra, could you please...”

This time, the ground-shaking snarl of the generator spinning up actually did knock them off their feet and the entire workshop suddenly glowed with the power of the suddenly fully-spinning generator mechanism. Verde pulled herself to her hooves using the control panel as leverage. “It’s not supposed to be doing that, Astra!”

“No kidding, cousin!” Astra shouted back as she braced herself and leaned over the fine controls to examine the voltmeter. “Spikes all over the place and we just installed…”

“…slow-blow fuses,” Verde finished as the snarling took on a pulsating whining sound and a red light began blinking rapidly where the projection array activation switch was located. “…oh bollocks…”

Although she didn’t say it much louder than the sound of the shaking generator, Astra seemed to hear her just fine because she threw Verde a sharp look and followed her gaze towards the activation switch. “…tell me that’s not the projection array.”

“…it is.”

“…tell me you didn’t wire up the entire system at once.”

“…”

“…ground level.”

“What?” Pale demanded.

“Ground level!” Astra shouted. “Get to bucking ground level!”

Verde didn’t give Pale time to respond or Astra time to shout him into action, grabbing them in telekinetic bubbles and dragging them with her as she galloped down the ramp, hearing the howling build to a fever pitch just as she got below the slightly elevated apparatus and used the telekinesis to force her companions down.

There was an audible klunk as double-pull breakers as long as her foreleg all dropped at once, an automatic mechanical response to the dangerous build-up of energy in the generator, and enough hornpower to deflect any megaspell Verde Tin had ever heard of flooded the shield projection array.

Oddly enough, considering that the resulting shield was meant to blink into existence fast enough to form a solid wall of energy between a city and an incoming megaspell-tipped missile, the prismatic colors of the shield seemed to slowly sweep outwards from the crackling array that had been raised above the generator itself to make sure a complete seal was created. The solid wall, its leading edges supernaturally sharp and its force irresistible, first struck the blast shielding and sliced it away equal to the base of the generator. Then came the consoles, shoved aside into a building hoard of debris which were quickly joined by the concrete of the raised control platform, the monitoring equipment around it, the bare beams of the ceiling—and then the ceiling itself. Walls didn’t even buckle so much as they folded into the gentle curve of the shield and were propelled along with the rest of the mismatched tide. And with that wall went the gargantuan 1-gauge energy wiring that gave the entire construct its power… and just like that, the shield that had disintegrated a 2-foot thick rebar-reinforced Ministry of Wartime Technology test bunker vanished as if it had never been, leaving almost neat piles of everything that once composed that bunker—and three stunned soldiers, now being bathed in natural sunlight.

There was dead silence for several seconds before Pale turned to look at Verde. “I’m impressed, boss. But will it deflect a megaspell?”

“Buck off, Pale.”

“Bucking off, boss.”Alyosha Cartwright:

Really wordy, and the way you've phrased it means you don't get to do commas. Dialogue, sure, but how about "If it wasn't for his relation to your mother [or somesuch], my father would be [horrible terrible badness]!"

Kay Moore:

That's weird way to put it... "get to" do commas? You phrase it as if commas should be a goal of mine and a privilege to be enjoyed.

Anyway, how do you like the rephrase?

Alyosha Cartwright:

Well, the way you had it meant putting in commas to let the reader pause would make the thing grammatically incorrect. In that case, it WOULD be a goal, because letting the reader stop to think in mid-sentence would help lessen confusion.

here, it's a similar problem. Saying that lengthy "brother-in-law to your mother" makes us mentally conjure a family tree and go "wait... so... huh?" and that distracts from the more important issue - that family connections are keeping this guy away from torture.

Kay Moore:

Fine, how would YOU express this? Thus far, revising it has made it LESS clear instead of more. In both versions it's extremely clear to me, both because I know and by taking the words at face value.

Alyosha Cartwright:

Its clear to you because you authored it. It might disorient others. I gave my suggestion in the initial comment, and if you prefer your way then that's the way it should be. Never take my advice simply because I gave it. You have to actually agree with me.

Kay Moore:

Well, I did precisely what you suggested and you said that made it worse. So I'm asking you for ideas, again.

Alyosha Cartwright:

It's a touch wordy. And there's really not going to be any fixing that simply because it's your style. Which, I'm inclined to say it's fine being hopelessly wordy like this - the one change I would make now is changing "for no crime other than being" to "simply because he is."

If it makes any sense, think of all the concepts here being brought up as provisions in a legal document, establishing and excepting each other. The sentence is already weighed down with words, and then that last little bit - the audience has to think in the affirmative for the rest of the sentence, then negative for the crime, and right back, because the "other than being" creates a whole new subconstruction and holy fuck this doesn't make sense even to me.

So, uh, consider revising. And... call it done there, whichever you end up going with.

Alyosha Cartwright:

I don't know if I mentioned it before, but this is actually very, very similar to the actual Fallout timeline. Was that intentional? In Fallout, Anchorage was occupied by the Chinese from 2066 to January 2077, and then the US counterattack stormed across the Gobi and was mere miles from Beijing itself by late October. And, although I personally think Vault-Tec was responsible for the war (Chinese surrender means the Vault Experiment is a bust) it had to be tense as all hell all through that summer because... well, what would WE do if the Chinese were miles from Washington?

Kay Moore:

I know nothing about the Fallout timeline so if it matches, it's not intentional. This was actually meant as an analogy to a "what if " scenario that would have taken place shortly after he surrender of the 6th Army at Stalingrad. In short, General Erich von Manstein (General Manestein, see what I did there?) came up with a plan to draw the Red Army after the a feigned retreat while a massive force was gathered at Karkhov and when the Reds took the bait, the flanking force was to pin them against the Sea of Azoz and destroy them. Hitler refused to try it because of his unwillingness to temporarily surrender territory to win a larger victory, but here I pretend that such a plan was put into place and succeeded in the way that von Manstein hoped. It's not QUITE like the Fallout canon in that a counterattack isn't in the works and thus the Zebra capital isn't threatened, but it's a game-changer because Zebrica has a smaller population and the destruction of an entire army is crippling; the end is essentially inevitable absent another game-changer... like Equestria being obliterated by nukes/megaspells.

Alyosha Cartwright:

I think you gave a brief synopsis of that before, and I think it's great that you're using real-world strategy and war logic to write this thing. I'm kinda bummed that I've given myself a story involving the goddamn Enclave, but I can't really do anything fun with them because they're so limited in number. I can't have wars and shit. Just "let's go take that building over!" "k."

Kay Moore:

It's much harder to work in big battlefield action involving like 10 people. *sympathetic smile* But yeah... I had to invent a plausible reason for the war to suddenly go nuclear and what I came up with was the zebras being cornered by circumstances and pressing the big red button. Since I'm a what-if history junkie, especially around the era that FoE Equestria is in (developing tanks, aerial weapons, nukes, computers, etc very analogous to WW2 era), and fanon says that there's a Stalliongrad, my mind jumped to the proposal by Erich von Manestein. Because I could ponify Karkhov as "Colthav", I made that part of my headcanon too and sent Aastra and Verde there to watch General Ruby Pommel (like Erwin Rommel... I'm horrible, aren't I?) play daredevil for the win.

Alyosha Cartwright:

This is getting... long. I'll just say I really like what you're doing here, and if you'd like to talk further about the war history and your modifications to FOE canon, let's do it in a site PM.

Kay Moore:

I agree! I'd love to PM you about this because I love talking to you and we don't get to do it often enough. :) Send me a PM telling me about how life is for you and asking me to stroke your ego?

Alyosha Cartwright:

Yeah, like... is any of this crucial to the story? The story goes down a totally different road and fucks around with Changelings for awhile, so why tell us this now? I'd take this out, find a better and shorter (less informative) segue into the following conversation, and only bring it up when (if) it becomes important.

Kay Moore:

It's already important, vitally so. Nothing about the story makes sense unless it's established that A. the zebras are warring with Equestria because of Nightmare Moon and B. this is irrational because Nightmare Moon is reformed and quite friendly. Since Nightmare herself appears in the story in a chapter or two, establishing that she's a totally different pony now strikes me as something that needs to happen before she appears. Introducing her and THEN laying out that she's not the same pony as before would be very... awkward to attempt.

Alyosha Cartwright:

Oh, look, another comment that's similar. I already addressed this one in the above - how about that conversation with the zebras out in the desert? There's characters who would be inclined to actually argue over the war and convince the OTHER that their way is The Truth. The audience gets to watch. The audience is amused.

Kay Moore:

That will happen as well. But the part where the audience needs to know this comes before they meet the zebras. Where else can I put this?

Alyosha Cartwright:

I'm sorry? Where exactly in the story is it CRUCIAL for the audience to understand this? It's fanon - the readers expect the details of the world to differ slightly from their interpretation. If they don't, they're idiots. You can talk about Luna and not explain this fully, and then have the characters explain their way out of it with the zebras. That actually makes sense because you can hear the zealotry straight from the zebras' mouths. Maybe I'm forgetting something, but nothing happens between here and there that NEEDS Luna/Nightmare knowledge. It's okay for the audience to not know the entire life story of a character the minute they are talked about on-screen.

Alyosha Cartwright:

I feel like there could stand to be some kind of descriptiony bit here, about where they've ended up. Rather than just going straight to dialogue.

Kay Moore:

Since it was already stated where they ended up ("below the slightly elevated apparatus"), I didn't think of restating it.

Alyosha Cartwright:

Well, like... where are they? What's happened to THEM in the explosion? The cliche would be to be stained by dirt and dust, and the token glasses-wearing character would have them all messed up. A little description could lead to a more compelling image, but it's alright without.

Kay Moore:

Well, they're literally crouched under the rim of a tall concrete pad that the generator was placed on. The way the accidental discharge worked is that it hit everything in a hemisphere pattern... and the three of them are under the bottom of that hemisphere. Thus, they're essentially standing at one end of a military compound right next to a generator on a concrete pad, and the entire bunker scattered in every direction from them. Since the shield wave struck nothing before it swept over their heads, they're totally unharmed and not even dusty. As before, if you can suggest a way to express this, I welcome suggestions.

Alyosha Cartwright:

Well, just... details What you could do is reword the thing so that it's actiony and light on the technical stuff (more emphasis on running away, the sounds and lights and feelings of trying to run for one's life) and then have them stand up and third-person describe the scene like Verde would. She can tell from clues what's basically happened. Describe the rubble and the aftermath, and then close on the dialogue.

Kay Moore:

I'll do what I can, but there is literally no action to describe that hasn't been described.

Alyosha Cartwright:

Then it's probably fine as-is. The ending comes just a little too abruptly for my liking, but it's on you to decide how much (if any) description you want to stick in here to pad it more.

Four And Three: Barren, Part 1

“Colonel Tin?”

“Mmm?” Verde blinked sleepily at the dark blur swimming in her sleep-fogged eyes. “Erg… what the hay do you want?”

The blur, which was swiftly resolving into a pony face, showed a line of white teeth. “I just made some tea and thought you might enjoy a cup.”

Verde blinked the sleep out of her eyes and the blur finally resolved itself into the normally-placid face of one of the Canterlot Royal Guard, presumably one of Princess Luna’s, based on her silvery armor and rich, violet-blue coat. And, of course, because it was a mare and because that mare was grinning, which was more expression than Verde had ever seen from one of Celestia’s. “Oh. It’s you.”

“Yes, ma’am, I do believe it is,” the mare replied politely. “The tea is just now steeping.”

“What kind?”

“A Barrens delicacy, which is locally known simply as ‘ambrosia’.”

“Well, with a name like that, how can I refuse?” Verde rolled out of the bed and summoned a smile for the guard.

“You shan’t regret it.” The guard turned and trotted towards the rear door of the sleeper car and Verde stretched, popping a couple joints as she pushed herself towards full awareness. It was hard to believe that it’d only been a few days since the successful test of the shield generator (and total demolition of the machine bunker) and they were already hundreds of miles west, ready to meet with the changeling queen. After quickly packing a haversack, they’d arrived at the station, fully expecting to meet the ‘special representative’ but the only pony there was the solemn Guard mare who informed them that the representative of the Dual Thrones was already situated and that she, the guard, would be riding along in their car with them.

Astra, who had an understandable antipathy towards humorless authority figures--they reminded her far too much of her bloodless father--immediately responded “Hay no!” which was when they realized that the Guard wasn’t cut from stone: she’d immediately started laughing… and she had an amazingly pleasant laugh, almost lyrical. Astra had still insisted that the pegasus remain in the rear of the car but with the very ordinary response, she seemed to accept the armored pony’s presence, even if she didn’t exactly welcome it.

Verde, stuck with the Guard by default, had found that she was bizarrely gregarious for the ordinarily stoic Royal Guard. However, she gently refused to give her name, explaining that it simply wouldn’t be professional for a lowly Royal Guard to be overly familiar with a pony of Verde’s rank. This struck Verde as odd but although the other mare didn’t give her name, she was more than happy to talk about herself, her home, siblings, interests, and pretty much everything else.

“I was actually born in Ponyville,” she offered on the second day of travel, laying comfortably on the bed behind Verde’s. “Unusual, I know, for a pony of my status to come from such relatively humble circumstances but I suppose Princess Luna saw something in me that recommended me to her.”

“Is your family still there?” Verde had asked, resting her chin on the simple wooden frame and watching the other mare.

“My mother still maintains a small residence for when she can get away from her work but… Ponyville is part of my past.” Turquoise eyes had become sad. “I regret that. Ponyville was the site of so many wonderful memories. Family, dear friends, defeats and triumphs, and more Nightmare Nights than I can count. Would you believe that I actually knew the six Ministry Mares before they were given their appointments?”

“Really!” Verde eyed her. “You don’t strike me as being that old.”

The Guard laughed. “I’m grateful for the flattery, Colonel, but it really wasn’t as long ago as you’d think.”

Verde felt curiosity bubbling to the surface despite her best efforts. “So what were they like?”

“They were, and are, fully worthy of the Elements they bear. Very special ponies; if the world were just, each would have a noble title and estates to their name instead of such things being wasted on the unworthy creatures that pollute the Courts to this day.” The Guard sighed. “Far too few are like Fancy Pants and Fleur de Lis were, old-blood nobles with a proud lineage of charity, service, and personal courage.”

“Huh… I’d always heard that Fleur was more of a… well… a trophy. Shallow, not particularly intelligent, a pretty showpiece.” Verde mentioned skeptically.

“She was just shy,” the pegasus said with a shrug. “The point is, she and Fancy Pants are a prime example of the kind of noble I’ve always appreciated being around.”

“You mentioned your mother has a place that lets her get away from her work,” Verde mentioned. “What does she do that she’d travel to Ponyville to get away from it?”

“She’s… err… highly ranked in one of the Ministries,” the Guard replied, suddenly looking uncomfortable.

Verde noticed. “You look like you don’t want to discuss it. Is she one of Morale’s…?”

“No!” The mare exclaimed with sudden vehemence. “No, my mother would never associate herself with that Ministry, with what it does. She’s… she works in Arcane Sciences.”

“Ah, as one of Mare Sparkle’s researchers?”

“Um… y.. yes…” The Guard tapped her hooves together nervously.

Verde’s brow furrowed. “I’m getting the impression that if I know who your mother is, I’ll instantly know who you are.”

“Yes.”

“And you don’t want me to know that.”

“Yes.”

Verde frowned. “Why don’t you want me to know?”

“Because knowing who I am will obligate you to act differently towards me,” she replied. “Except for very dear friends, everypony sees me and instantly treats me differently no matter how much effort I put into being as normal, friendly, and approachable. I enjoy being approachable and treated as just another pony and because I can conceal my appearance this way, ponies tend to be at ease around me, and I can be one of them.”

Verde blinked at this and furrowed her brow. “That sounds like…” she began, but trailed off as Night gave her a silent, pleading look. “...that sounds like something I won’t think too deeply on. You’ve been very friendly and I wouldn’t want to ruin things for you. Is your father also off-limits?”

“No,” the Guard replied with a shake of her head. “My father, if you could even call him that, envisioned something for me that I eventually realized was not what I wanted for myself. I don’t fault him—for a very long time, he could not clearly see how wrong he was—but the fact remains that if I had fulfilled his vision of the kind of pony I should be…”

Verde waited for a polite few seconds. “Yes?” She prompted.

The other mare shook her head. “I don’t want to think about it. All the good I have done and may still do… gone, and even worse, turned to utterly evil purposes. I can safely say that I’m the pony I am because of my mother, not my father.” She smiled a little. “I suspect your companion could say much the same thing.”

“Exactly the same, actually, minus the entire ‘all the good turned to evil’ part.” Verde looked at her for a moment. “If you don’t mind my asking, what did he envision, exactly?”

“I don’t mind the question, Commander, but the mere thinking of it makes me feel tarnished, so I beg your forgiveness for refusing to answer.” She tilted her head and looked across with an expression of genuine, almost innocent, curiosity. “But what of you, Commander Tin? What do your parents wish of you?”

“My father wishes for me to be raised by and live with my mother,” Verde replied. “Not because of any lack of love for me, but because he feels that Mother needs to have her daughter near. And my mother? My mother envisions a daughter that is her confidante, peer, and a tool in her hooves to make Equestria a better, safer, happier place.” She smiled broadly. “Mother wants to make a hero of me.”

The Guard laughed softly, a laugh that was palpably happy. “Your mother sounds very much like mine, then. My mother saw immense potential in me and worked to guide me to be the kind of pony that would use that potential for good. To, as you put it, make Equestria a better, safer, happier place. I’d like to think that I’m doing so, in my own small way.”

“You seem so friendly that it’s a shame not to be able to call you by a proper name,” Verde mentioned. “And it would be a joy to meet your mother, if she’s still alive. If she’s like mine, meeting her would be a pleasure.”

“I have no doubt that if you’ve not already met her, you’ll treasure the experience when you do,” the Guard assured her.

From there, the conversation went on to other things and Verde began to regret that their journey was due to end soon. It had been fortunate to have the Guard and Astra for conversation because the Barrens were just that: they looked like little more than barren wastes. The armored train they were traveling in could roll at a very high speed for a very long time due to its fairly new gem-powered locomotive, but it would still have been agonizingly long without her companions.

A cup of tea that smelled absolutely mouth-watering brought Verde back to the present and the sound of the brakes screeching softly as the train slowed down to drift into the station. The tea turned out to be aptly-named: it was light, sweet, tasting of honey and nutmeg and other wonderful things that Verde couldn’t quite place. “Thank you,” she said to the Guard as she finished the cup.

“Always a pleasure, Colonel.” The mare replied as she accepted the empty cup and put it back next to the teapot. “I hope this isn’t inappropriate, ma’am, but I notice that you’re traveling with a zebra companion, a corporal by her rank markings.”

“You may not want to call her a zebra in her hearing,” Verde pointed out. “Why do you bring it up?”

“It strikes me as unusual for an agent of the Ministry of Morale to keep company with a zebra,” the guard pointed out. “It’s rumored that the Ministry is very… harsh towards zebras.”

“As it should be!” Astra proclaimed from where she was just putting a clean cup down and starting to pour some tea. “Bunch of religious zealots and traditionalist blockheads in stripes. I, happily, am very much a pony.”

“Weren’t you just expressing distress the other day over the fact that the only thing between your father and a memory wipe was my mom?” Verde asked.

Astra shrugged this off. “I’d do it to him myself if I could; that wasn’t the point.”

“So what was the point?” the Guard inquired, her head tilting very slightly.

“The point was that good Equestrian citizens who happen to have stripes can be dragged in and have their memories ripped out,” Astra retorted, a faint hint of irritation creeping into her voice. “Sure, I’d feel unsettled and angry if it was done to my own daddy dearest, but that’s because there’s no escape from the fact that he sired me. I have nothing but hate for him, but his half is still as much a part of me as these abominable stripes, much as I wish it was otherwise.”

“For being a zebra yourself…”

“No!” Astra abruptly slammed the tea cup down hard enough that the handle snapped off. “I am not a zebra! I’m not an ignorant, mindless, babbling religious fanatic who’s scared to death of a few fucking constellations. I’m certainly not the brand of witless thrall that’s so bone ignorant that they can’t see that Nightmare Moon is so full of hugs and nice that you could get diabetes from the sight of her.” She raised a hoof and pointed it at the guard. “They are not me. I am a pony; they are zebras. Get it right.”

The guard, by now, was looking thoroughly confused and not a little unsettled. “You look like a zebra and sound like a zebra… but aren’t a zebra. And you have a very strong antipathy towards zebras.”

“Got it in one,” Astra replied with a nod.

The guard sat with this a moment while Astra deftly downed the tea in the broken cup before walking the remains over to the nearest rubbish bin. She looked up at the striped mare. “Why?”

“Because daddy dearest is a zebra and that’s all the reason I need,” Astra responded, not looking at her. “Everything I need to know about stripes, I learned from my own fucking dad.”

The guard would clearly have asked more but Astra continued in the direction she was going, to the front of the car, a little more stomp in her step than usual. The pegasus watched her walk away for a moment before looking at Verde.

“Don’t look at me, Guard; after nearly twenty years, I’ve learned to stay miles away from the subject,” Verde told her. “I’ll just say that Uncle Zoast is pretty much every bad thing you’ve ever heard about zebras… except for the affection he shows towards his mate, my Aunt Scarlet Knife. As I understand it, open affection towards your wife isn’t regarded as proper in traditional zebra social customs.”

“I wouldn’t know; the only zebra I ever knew was female and single.” The guard mare glanced out a window. “Well, we’re about to pull into Lepi Mountain. If you’ve never met a changeling before, Colonel, you may want to brace yourself. Their natural appearance can be slightly… unsettling.”

“Is it true that they look insectoid?”

“Somewhat,” the guard admitted. “A mix between pony and insect, really. Most of the insect appearance is in their faces and wings although if you get close enough, you realize that they also have chitin instead of fur.”

“Do you have any idea of what we can expect when the doors open?” Verde inquired.

The Guard looked thoughtful. “Not really. I’ve personally always wondered if the changelings have any particular traditions or rituals for greeting visitors. I know that the Court of the Dual Thrones traditionally has delegations take the long path through the gardens so they can see representations of the Princesses and their victories, defeats, and achievements before meeting them personally. Friends of the Thrones just walk up to the doors and ask admittance; friends, naturally, know the Princesses well and need no introduction.”

“I guess we’ll see,” Verde said as the train stopped and the door onto the station platform opened. She’d been expecting to see one, maybe two people waiting for them. Her greatest hope and an irrational one, she knew, was that Chrysalis would greet them herself and they could get right down to business, preferably somewhere pleasant.

The last thing she’d expected, however, was that the platform would be filled with changelings… each one holding a weapon of one type of another and pointing it in their direction.

“OK, not what I expected.” Astra commented, going carefully still at all the guns pointed at her. “What the hay?”

“You are not welcome here!” One of the larger changelings, dressed in light armor with a badge of rank, hissed. “The Barrens are ours, not a playground for the thugs of the Ministry of Morale.”

“Thugs of the…?” Verde stared at him. “This is a joke, right?” She quickly threw a glance over at the Royal Guard, who looked strangely placid for a pony that had a host of guns pointed at her. Something told Verde this meant something but she pushed it aside, returning her focus to the changelings.

“It is no jest, Morale.” The changeling spat. “You are not meant to be here. We will have none of our foals dragged away to your torture chambers. You will not seek traitors here, as your mad Mare bids.”

Verde upgraded her stare to a gape. “Have you totally spit your bit? We’re here to discuss a military matter with her highness, Queen Chrysalis, and…”

Several changelings gasped, their eyes widening, wings twitching agitatedly. The changeling who was apparently their spokestallion upgraded his angry look to something just short of murderous. “You will not get anywhere near our queen, thug.” He hissed again. “You will not touch her, you will not even lay eyes on her. You must kill us all before we permit you to…”

“I think, Captain, that that is my decision.”

Verde knew that the resplendent white unicorn bearing a jagged crown and a stunning gown of velvety black had not been there a moment before; in the sea of black that were her changelings in their natural shape, she would have stuck out like a sore hoof. Having gotten the attention (and the stunned silence) of those around her, Queen Chrysalis let her guise melt away, revealing a slim elegant, black-coated beauty with luxurious sea-blue locks spilling over her shoulders and a long, jagged horn jutting from her forehead. She smiled at the three ponies on the train before her attention went to the changeling she’d called ‘Captain’.

“I know that you mean to protect me, Captain Droso, but these are not the agents of the Ministry.” She told him, her tone gentle but with just enough of a chiding touch to make him look ashamed of himself. “I recognize Colonel Verde Tin and Corporal Astraylzenika of Grey Brigade and they do not serve at the whim of Mare Pinkamena Diane Pie of the Ministry of Morale. They have legitimate business with me, and they are welcome in my kingdom.”

“I… do not know what to say, your Majesty. I heard that the Ministry of Morale was sending ponies out this way and I thought…”

“…that Mare Pie was ignoring the agreement we have with the Dual Thrones where we would be permitted to monitor ourselves and punish our own according to our laws and customs.” Chrysalis nodded once as the changelings around her began to disperse, looking genuinely ashamed, a few looking towards the three ponies with real contrition. “Your intent was good, Droso, but you concluded evil when you knew very little. But you have my forgiveness if you have theirs; it is they whom you offended.”

Droso hung his head before turning towards them, sheathing his weapon as he did. “I beg your forgiveness, ladies. I treated you as enemies without cause and spoke ill of you without merit.”

“It is a time of fear, Captain Droso, and of great evils hiding in the shadows,” the Guard replied before either of them could. “I will not hold your fear against you; where the Ministry is concerned, it is not irrational.”

“Um… what she said,” Astra added, looking askance at the Guard mare.

“I’m actually quite flattered that you thought you needed so much firepower to stop us if we were hostile,” Verde remarked to the captain, smiling slightly. “Being treated as a power to be reckoned with and feared can be seen as a compliment, and I’ll choose to see it that way.”

“I am pleased to see the matter resolved then.” Chrysalis smiled warmly, her attention turning from the captain as he turned and walked away. Her eyes were a vivid green, slit-pupiled with a large band of brighter green around the first iris. Verde noted that unlike the other changelings, her body didn’t appear pockmarked, as if holes had been drilled through limbs and various appendages, but had very subtle patterns of divots and indentations in her chitin that Verde had to look for to actually see. Where her subjects had one pair of wings, she had the tandem pair of a dragonfly, a pair that vibrated slightly as the Queen of the Changelings looked upon the three ponies still on the train.

“I apologize for your initial welcome, representatives,” she said. “I feel that I should make up for it by inviting you to an afternoon meal so that we may speak on more familiar and comfortable terms.”

“It wasn’t your fault, Your Majesty,” Verde assured her as she stepped off the train onto the virtually-deserted platform. “I wish I’d realized that the Ministry of Morale isn’t normally welcome, or I’d have tapped a message ahead.”

“I neglected to inform Droso, Colonel Tin, so the fault lies in me,” Chrysalis said firmly. “He is extremely protective of me, as are all my people, and while I appreciate their devotion they can allow their zeal to overwhelm their good sense. Now, how does deviled cacti with prickly pear sound to you?”

<><

“I can’t believe I thought the Barrens were composed of wastes,” Astra commented as she leaned back, patting a slightly distended belly. It turned out that the changelings used cacti and prickly pear fruit much the same way that ponies used daffodils and apples, as a staple food with seemingly endless variations. And it was possibly the most delicious fare Verde could remember.

“Like my people, the Barrens are not always what they seem to be, Corporal.” Chrysalis said pleasantly.

“You may call me Astra, Your Majesty.”

“And I would be delighted if you called me Chrysalis, Astra.” The queen looked between the three of them. “And that goes for you all; you are not my subjects and this is not a matter of state, at least not at the moment, so some informality would do no harm.”

“That’s good to know, Chrysalis,” Verde acknowledged. “And it’s nice to converse with a relative stranger who’ll let me call her by name.”

“I did explain my reasons, Colonel,” the Guard reminded her gently.

“And they were good, if thin, but don’t you think it only polite to let the Queen we’re conversing with know you by name?”

The Guard eyed her thoughtfully before smiling. “Well, I saw what I wanted to see and it was a singular joy to know one of the ponies who fights the battles of the Dual Thrones better. You’re right, Verde; being recalcitrant no longer has any purpose.” She treated Chrysalis to a broad smile. “You may call me ‘Night’, Chrysalis.”

“A pleasure to meet you then, Night,” Chrysalis responded.

“And an even greater pleasure to know you, Milady,” the pegasus replied. “The tale of your life and what you’ve overcome is well-known and greatly celebrated in the Court of the Dual Thrones. To meet you in the flesh is the highest honor and one far too long deferred.”

Chrysalis looked taken-aback at this. “My life story may be interesting, Night, but celebrated?”

“There’s ample reason,” Night returned seriously. “Even as much of a villain as she was, Nightmare Moon was still a pony, eating and drinking and living the way a pony does. Not only were you of such a character that you could be redeemed by the love of another, you had to choose to be something entirely different than you were. We regard this as cause to celebrate you and your story.”

Chrysalis looked uncertainly at the pegasus before a small, shy smile appeared on her muzzle. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome, milady Queen.” Night bowed deeply to her. “It was a singular pleasure to receive permission from Princess Luna to accompany Colonel Tin and Corporal Astraylzenika.”

“Speaking of Luna, you seem to resemble her quite a bit,” Chrysalis mentioned, looking curiously at the pegasus. “Except for the eye color and lack of a horn.”

“And believe you me, she takes full advantage of it,” Night said ruefully. “She loves to imprint a simple visual and audible illusion on me so that she can slip out and spend some time enjoying her creation instead of having to listen to the whining of pampered nobles all the time. I think it says quite a bit that the idiots don’t care enough to notice that Luna and I have very different demeanors and personalities.” She paused. “Have you met Luna? Really and truly met her?”

“I know her well, in fact,” Chrysalis replied. “We speak regularly as she has frequent need of my people.”

“Frequent need of your people?” Astra asked, scooting over so Night could join them as Verde did the same. “Why?”

Chrysalis looked amusedly at her. “Surely that’s fairly obvious, Astra.”

“Not especially.”

The queen eyed her skeptically. “Surely you’ve heard of the defining trait of changelings.”

“Sure,” Astra replied as Verde lifted a cup of prickly pear juice and sipped it. “Four-petal cooches.”

Verde promptly choked on her juice and began coughing. Chrysalis gaped at the perfectly straight-faced zebra mare before she burst out laughing. Night used a wing to bosh Astra on the head as she lightly thumped on Verde’s back. The moment Verde got her coughing under control, she kicked Astra in the flank, getting an expression of wounded innocence in response.

“Oooh… oh... oh dear…” Chrysalis responded, wiping a tear of mirth away from an eye. “Do they still tell that one?”

“Seeing as how I know it, yeah,” Astra replied, grinning. “There’s lots more, although that one’s my favorite.”

“But you actually do know what Chrysalis is referring to?” Night inquired, trying to suppress a grin.

“Of course; virtually perfect disguise.” Astra said. “It requires unusual perception or spells to see through the deception, although the better a changeling is at the skill, the harder it is to spot the imperfection. For example, Chrysalis, the only reason your white unicorn guise didn’t hide anything is that you weren’t trying to hide yourself; I’m guessing that it’s a favorite shape.”

Chrysalis’ expression, still tinged with amusement at the ‘cooches’ comment, fell. “Much more than merely a favorite shape, actually. It’s more of a second natural shape; I don’t even think a spell can penetrate it, although I’ve never asked a sufficiently talented pony to make the attempt.”

“A second natural shape?” Astra glanced over at Verde with surprise. “That wasn’t in the…”

“For a very good reason,” Verde interrupted her. “I’ll explain later, dear.”

Astra looked at her for a long moment before turning back to the subdued queen. “I take it you’re a bit different than most changelings.”

The comment drew a grin from Chrysalis. “Well, my being their queen would be an excellent example of that.”

“Chicken and egg.” Astra waved a hoof dismissively. “I meant the full dragonfly wings. The lack of pockmarks or the appearance of large holes torn through your body. The less obvious chitin and disproportionately smaller fangs. A full and, if I might say, rather luxurious mane and tail. I’m sorry for being so inquisitive, milady, but until the briefing from my cousin three days ago, I didn’t realize that the Western Reaches were a kingdom separate from Equestria under the rule of a totally different people.”

“It doesn’t bother me,” Chrysalis assured her. “The shortest answer is that I’m the… purest example of my people. The more pony-like physical appearance appears to be something that faded after my grandchildren’s generation.”

“Wait… you’re…”

“Related by blood to every changeling?” Chrysalis smiled. “Yes. Granted, the connection is extremely diluted due to the preference many have for marrying into pony families, but I’m the primogenitoress of this changeling race in addition to being their queen.”

Astra looked Verde’s way strangely and Verde chuckled. “Sorry, dear; that all changelings are related to their queen…”

“That’s not it at all,” Astra interrupted. “I’m not the brain you are, cousin, but I can do simple math. What you’re saying isn’t possible given the timing you’ve told me about. If the Thrones didn’t recognize that the changelings were no longer a danger to Equestria until twenty…”

“Excuse me?” Night interrupted.

“Verde’s briefing indicated that official recognition that the changelings were no longer a threat to Equestria came twenty years ago,” Astra replied.

“That is true but it was not due to the Thrones,” Night told her emphatically. “Celestia recognized the end of the changeling threat well over forty years ago.” Her expression grew slightly stormy. “It took twenty bucking years for the arrogant, petty, nobles that pollute our Court to pry their horns out of their hindquarters.”

“What made them…?”

“What made them extend recognition?” Night jaw tensed in controlled anger. “They decided that the passing of what they believed to be the last changeling’s husband of twenty years was the perfect time to cheerfully announce the end of the changeling threat to Equestria. Luna was furious when she learned of what drove the timing of the decision and she let the nobles hear all about it. After several minutes of them cowering before her wrath, she ended by stripping them of their titles and all but a fragment of their estates.”

Chrysalis was the first to break silence. “…wow... You’re very… passionate about this. Like it’s very personal to you.”

The anger dissipated almost as quickly as it’d appeared and Night smiled very slightly. “I’ve become rather close to Luna during my time in the Court and I admire her for being the people’s princess. She’s never been able to fake patience with the antics and pettiness of the nobles, and I must say that I deeply respect her for that lack of patience.”

“And for a time, many of my people wondered why I felt such affection for the Thrones.” Chrysalis shook her head, smiling. “Celestia came to console me in my bereavement and Luna has always shown me warmth and understanding. Nyx… I’ve always felt a sisterly kinship with.”

Night grinned. “So should I tell her that when she meets you, she can call you ‘Chryssy’?”

Chrysalis eyed her. “I… suppose. Is there any nickname that she prefers, just so we’d be on equal terms?”

“I’ve heard that she likes to be called ‘Night’ by those closest to her.” Night replied. “I think the reason I share that nickname is that the combination of my eye and coat color reminds others of Princess Nyx.”

“Night as in…?”

“Nightmare Moon, yes.” The turquoise-eyed pegasus smiled broadly. “As she’s put it, she destroyed the villain that bore it and claimed the name by right of conquest. Perhaps one day, they’ll tell little foals the story of how Nightmare Moon was turned from a very bad pony to a good pony through a mother’s love. I sincerely hope so; I can think of no other pony that could see an evil foe of Equestria in an innocent filly’s eyes and still take her in and call her daughter.”

Verde seized the segue. “Speaking of Mare Sparkle, Your Highness, our purpose in coming to the Barrens is related in part to a joint project between her Ministry and the Ministry of Wartime Technology,” she said. “I trust you’ve heard of the successful completion of the Alishield generator?”

“The defensive shield that’s slated to be installed in all the Ministry hubs?” Verde nodded. “Then yes, I’ve been informed.”

“And have you heard of the success of General Manestein breaking the cordon around Stalliongrad?”

“Yes, and of the initial success of General Derian’s campaign to pin and destroy the besieging forces.”

“Good. The situation is thus: three days ago, a significant improvement of the Alishield was powered up at the Ministry of Wartime Technology Fetlock Installation. Preliminary results indicate that it’s an order of magnitude more powerful than the first version, enough that even when full power activation only lasted two seconds, the shield was strong enough to totally demolish a heavily-reinforced concrete bunker without the ponies in the bunker being harmed at all. Now, to verify that the shield is actually as powerful as it appears to be we…”

“…need a relatively barren and lifeless section of land to conduct a live test involving the detonation of a Mark Ten at point-blank range from the fully-powered generator.” Chrysalis interrupted.

Verde was momentarily taken-aback. “You were informed of our purpose before we got here?”

“Not at all,” she replied with a small frown. “I’ve suspected your purpose since I received word that you were coming. I’ve been considering the possibilities but there are few of them. In all but a few places, the various winds and crosswinds make it so that any megaspell test will poison vast amounts of changeling lands. But those few places are completely unsuited for tests involving megaspells.”

“How so?”

“Extremely mountainous,” Chrysalis replied. “The terrain is so rough that I can’t see it offering a practical test for your shield generator.”

“I have a thought about that, actually,” Astra offered. “I remember that way back when, the changelings’ home was referred to as a ‘hive’, right?”

“Yes, we used to live in a large warren of caves. Well, more accurately, I used to, along with the others of my race; my children have never even been to the old hives.” Chrysalis looked thoughtfully at the zebra before a smile began to play at the corners of her muzzle. “You are quite the clever one, Astraylzenika. I believe I know precisely what you have in mind and… it could work. In fact, if there is a single place in all my kingdom I would more want to offer for these tests, I cannot think of it.”

“You’re eager to see your old home get vaporized?” Astra eyed her. “That… seems a little odd.”

“It’s an artifact of a different time, a different me, and a different changeling people,” Chrysalis told her. “I once used it as a symbol of where I came from and how far I’ve traveled from my origins but now…” She smiled a little. “Now that it’s just a collection of old caves with unpleasant memories; destroying it would be catharsis itself.”

“Are there any potential complications in doing so, Chrysalis?” Night asked. “I get wanting to destroy every trace of bad memories and an unpleasant past but there’s nothing to be gained from poisoning the future with the debris of the vaporized past.”

Chrysalis laughed at this. “That’s rather poetic, Night.”

“I know, pretty cool huh?” Night grinned cheekily. “But seriously… if we’re going to use your old hive, can you think of anything we might need to do to prepare the ground so irradiated dust doesn’t escape into the wind currents?”

“I haven’t been there in years; too busy living my life and being a good queen,” Chrysalis admitted. “But it’s easy enough to get fast transport in that direction.”

“How fast?” Verde asked. “I’m sure you can appreciate our fears and why we would seek this meeting, Your Majesty. With the breach of the cordon around Stalliongrad and the possibility of trapping and annihilating two entire armies, the analysis I’ve read estimates a high probability that the zebras will take drastic measures to regain the situation.”

Chrysalis laughed softly again. “Commander, I’m well aware of the analysis. Captain Droso submitted it to me for approval before sending it along, after all.”

“Oh.” Verde felt herself flush slightly, embarrassed that she hadn’t seen the obvious connection between the fact that the changelings were natural shapeshifters and the warm relationship between the Queen and the Dual Thrones. “I suddenly feel sort of foolish.”

“You needn’t, Verde. Few ponies and almost as few of my own people look at me and conclude ‘spymaster’.” She chuckled. “To most ponies, I’m simply an attractive and pleasant changeling mare. To most changelings, I’m a wise and considerate ruler. That I act as Equestria’s spymaster, answering directly to the Dual Thrones, is known to almost no one although your own mother, Viridian Rain, knows me as a colleague.”

“I’d always wondered who ‘Cee’ was…” Verde said idly. “At any rate, how fast is the transport you can arrange?”

“It’s a high-speed rail system we use to cross large stretches of arid territory,” Chrysalis replied. “I’ve heard it called a ‘bullet’ train, although the only part that resembles a bullet is the conical front. It uses gems enchanted to keep it within a certain distance of the tracks so the cars can travel much faster than your armored trains could.”

“No doubt, although armored trains are supposed to be force multipliers, not fast transport,” Verde pointed out. “I don’t know where we’d be if developing a gem-powered engine hadn’t been one of the first things the Ministry of Wartime Technology did. So many victories won by well-nigh invulnerable armored behemoths providing fire support…”

“Yes, Stalliongrad was said to be an incredible battle to behold,” Chrysalis nodded. “Speaking of the fast transport, if you’ll follow me, I remember that the train towards the coastal rock farms, which has a stop near the old hives, is scheduled to depart in thirty minutes.”

“That’s pretty impressive, remembering off-hoof when a train is departing for a particular place without even checking the time,” Astra commented as they turned and left the small café where Chrysalis had invited them for lunch.

“It’s not as impressive as you’d think,” Chrysalis admitted. “I’ve been taking the fast transport to the coastal farms thrice a week for years. I… enjoy the ocean.”

Their party lapsed into silence as they wound their way through the city of Lepi Mountain. Given that the Changeling Kingdom hadn’t even existed until thirty years ago, their second-largest city was amazing. Wide, spacious avenues combined with fountains, architectural features, green spaces (composed of a spongy, carpet-like plant instead of grass), and low walls bordering stone walks that ran alongside the myriad of shops to make it an extremely welcoming city.

Verde was surprised to see that zebras and ponies were at least as common as changelings and not one of the zebras they passed seemed to be bothered by the presence of a Royal Guard and two ponies with the clear decorations of black ops soldiers. Verde had to giggle a little at the reaction of Night to the city: she was trotting down the street looking around with childlike wonder, almost glowing with curiosity and fascination with her surroundings. Verde couldn’t help but think that the youthful Guard, who was probably older than her, looked positively adorable when she was gazing around like a filly who’d never been in a city before. Lepi Mountain wasn’t as colorful as most pony cities but it was apparent that the changelings hadn’t let any grass grow under their hooves when the Dual Thrones officially acknowledged that changelings were now Equestrians like any other pony.

“You seem to really like Lepi Mountain, Night,” Chrysalis commented, barely restraining a laugh, after several minutes of watching the pegasus’ obvious wonderment.

Night flushed slightly, shyly. “Something I inherited from my mother: I love knowing things and I’ve never seen an open-air city built by changelings. All sorts of information about a changeling hive, of course, but you’re the first queen to build cities, Chrysalis.”

“There was little choice, not that I’m at all upset about it.” Chrysalis smiled happily. “My people could find love for themselves and form the loving and deeply nourishing connection with a mate that wouldn’t be parasitic. And having found love among ponies and even among zebras, why would they want to return to dark, dank tunnels instead of relishing the sun and feeling the breeze through their manes?”

“You know, I’m starting to get the feeling that there’s more than one kind of changeling,” Astra remarked. “You mention living in a hive but say that none of your children have. You talk about your people finding love for themselves as if it was a new thing and specify that the bond wasn’t parasitic, as if it could have been otherwise. I mean, I don’t even know how being in love could be parasitic. Nights talks about you being redeemed somehow, but redemption from what, and why would the Dual Thrones ever think changelings were a threat to Equestria?”

There was a long awkward silence, Chrysalis looking conflicted, Night looking uncomfortable, and Verde worried that her cousin may have accidentally offended the queen by asking something so personal. After several seconds, Chrysalis appeared to resolve whatever conflict she had. “It’s quite a story and an equal explanation, Astra. I’ll do what I can to satisfy your curiosity when we’re settled aboard the fast transport.”

“Wonderful,” Astra smiled. “I might not be insatiable but being ignorant about something as important as dear allies of Equestria unsettles me.”

Chrysalis smiled back and Verde breathed again. “I appreciate that. Frankly, it’s probably about time that an honest history of who I am and what has passed in my life is told to a fairly ordinary pony.”

Four And Three: Barren, Part 2

“There’s a whole host of legends about where the changelings came from. One theory is that we’re some variant of a Tartarus creature called an incubus or a succubus; another is that a massive magical accident took a race of somewhat intelligent insects and uplifted them to appear to be ponies. My personal favorite is that idea that changelings are a sister race to alicorns but that we were corrupted somehow. But regardless of where we came from, the changelings were a race that could only be nourished by the subtle magical essence of love. Food and drink were a pleasure, but did nothing to keep a changeling alive. The best way to feed and thrive was to use shapeshifting to replace one partner in a loving relationship and feed off the connection for a time. We would then then restore the real pony without their beloved being any the wiser. There were occasional instances where the changeling would develop something like an addiction to the love of a particular pony and stay too long but it… ended badly, usually with the victim’s heart giving out or a suicide; the feeding was, after all, parasitic.

“I replaced my mother as Queen during a time of gradual famine and unrest. It was becoming increasingly difficult to find food as more and more ponies began living in large communities where a great number of ponies knew each other and made it too hazardous to stay with a single source for more than a few days. Younger changelings, which included myself, were also coming to resent the fact that where ponies and every other race had access to as much food as they needed, changelings had to sneak around and steal morsels. This discontent didn’t have a target at first but then, we learned of the upcoming marriage of one Princess Mi Amore Cadenza and Shining Armor of the Celestial Royal Guard. It was a perfect opportunity, I decided, to seize control of a very large source of food in a single fell swoop. Replacing Cadenza was simple enough; she was a kind, trusting soul and easily deceived. Being young, I wasn’t quite aware of the intense and narcotic nature of the love between betrothed and it was like… drinking pure energy. This, combined with the fact that I was a little bit of a spoiled royal brat, meant that a patient, soft-spoken, caring Cadence became short-tempered, petty, and mean. Fortunately for me, most ponies wrote this off as wedding stress. Unfortunately for me, the only pony who didn’t was a young, prodigiously intelligent unicorn named Twilight Sparkle.”

“Twilight has always been almost appallingly obsessed with details,” Night commented sympathetically, lounging close enough that one of her wings occasionally brushed over Chrysalis’ side. “And, as you no doubt know now, being foalsat by Cadence was one of her most treasured memories, and Princess Cadence is still well-known for her warmth and common touch.”

“I was careless,” Chrysalis acknowledged. “Like I said, young love is intense and narcotic for a race that feeds on love. Looking back, I’m still amazed that only one pony found me out; I was astonishingly reckless, acting nothing at all like the warm, kind mare I replaced. It was only Twilight that noticed something amiss and became such a problem that I thoughtlessly trapped her in the same place as Cadence. The two of them working together managed to expose me and although I made a fight of it, even overpowering Celestia herself temporarily while I was riding high on the love I’d absorbed from Shining Armor, we were expelled from Canterlot by Cadence. Her special talent was related to love and let her aim her power at the only creatures that relied on love as a food source.

“Pure chance led me to collapse, in the guise of a white unicorn, on the doorstep of a pony named Evergreen, who was a forest herbalist and a hermit who was uncomfortable being around other ponies, but was also decent and good. I was nursed back to health on his compassion but the connection was very different: he cared for me. Granted, he thought I was a white unicorn named Cee, but it was still love directed at me, not another pony I was pretending to be. Normally, the feeding we do can drain and sicken the victim over time; this time it didn’t.”

Chrysalis took a breath, her eyes getting misty. “Evergreen was salvation to me, to all changelings. His goodness initially saved my life and his love demonstrated something to me that I hadn’t known before: a connection of mutual love can be sustained. It can, in fact, allow a changeling to live out their entire lives feeding from a single pony and then, feeding from the love of her children and if she’s lucky, her grandchildren. When I discovered some of the other survivors of Cadence’s spell, I was overjoyed because I could offer my people something more than a pariah existence.”

“It sounds wonderful,” Verde smiled. “So how’d this go over with Princess Celestia?”

“It… didn’t,” Chrysalis admitted. “Not at first. By this time, Evergreen knew what I was and even who I was and joyfully, it changed nothing at all. But we both realized that changelings couldn’t come back. Ordinary ponies, and yes even the Princesses, couldn’t know that so many changelings had survived and that they were gathering around their queen practically in the heart of Equestria. So…”

“…the changelings had to die,” Astra finished with a grin. “Oh man… pulling the wool over the eyes of both Princesses at once? I can’t imagine how you managed it.”

Chrysalis grinned toothily. “I was a born actor, Astra, as are all my people. It’s a necessity, being able to appear to be someone totally different than the person you are, although in recent years it’s been much less so. That said, the charade didn’t continue very long.” She sighed. “I’d never given much thought to the implications of what I’d done to Celestia. I never understood how much my temporary victory insulted and frightened her, and how it’d frightened everyone else. While Celestia didn’t know that I’d begun gathering my changelings in numbers, she did manage to find me—and brought the six Bearers with her.”

“Uh-oh…”

Chrysalis nodded vigorously. “Precisely. Let me tell you, it took some real fast talking, and Evergreen being wonderfully stubborn about getting out of the way, to avert being disintegrated by the Elements. But whatever else Celestia and the Bearers are, they’re not stupid or ignorant; even Pie comprehended the danger of revealing the changelings, even to close friends outside the tight circle of the Princesses and the Bearers.”

“And that happened about forty years ago,” Night supplied. “That was when Celestia began pushing the nobles towards recognizing changelings as equals and full Equestrian citizens.”

“Yes, and while the nobles were squabbling and fighting and being well, nobles, I had my first child.” She beamed. “The first child born to a changeling-pony couple in longer than anypony, even Celestia, can remember. I eventually had five, all told, and… and it was glorious and heavenly. Immersed in an endless ocean of the love of my mate, my children, the friends I made, and eventually the mates of my children and then the innocent love of grandchildren. Evergreen got to see the oldest reach his fifth birthday before he passed on.”

“So that’s what you meant with all that talk about a new type of changeling and the rest.” Astra observed. “And also why there’s a close relationship between the Princesses and you, and why you’d have abandoned a cramped hive for open-air cities: now that you’d discovered the possibilities of this new way of getting love, you could afford to be out in the open, building cities, having ponies live among you.”

“Ponies and zebras,” Chrysalis corrected her. “This is the only place in Equestria where zebras are really safe from the maniacal Ministry you work for.”

“If zebras wanted to be safe, they shouldn’t have started a war then tried to murder Princess Celestia,” Astra snorted. “The Ministry is the least of what they deserve.”

Chrysalis paused in her narrative and eyed Astra. “‘They’? Not ‘we’?”

“I’m not a zebra,” Astra shrugged. “So no, no ‘we’ is involved.”

“You’re not.” Chrysalis looked her over before her eyes turned towards Verde. “Is your companion delusional, Colonel?”

“No, just…”

“I am not delusional, Chryssy,” Astra growled. “My zebra father is a miserable bastard. He just plain does not give a crap about me; hell, he’s only minimally polite towards Verde here because Aunt Viridian keeps his plot out of a mind-rape room. I mean, he’s rude and unpleasant towards Aunt Silver Rose, the most sweet-natured pony I’ve ever known. And why? Because we’re all mares, and in Zoast’s little world, mares are the inferior gender.”

“So it goes all throughout childhood,” Astra continued as Chrysalis and Night watched her with genuinely shocked expressions. “I get high marks in school, and I get a hug from my cousin and a little something special for dinner from my mom and Dad doesn’t give a shit. Some bullies give me a bloody nose, and my cousin kicks their plots and my mom gives me a hug to make it all better, and if Dad can bother to look up from his bucking paper, he asks me why I have to make him ashamed to have a weak daughter. I go join the Goddess-damned army in the middle of a war and he doesn’t even fucking say good-bye. His own daughter, off to war, maybe going to get killed, and that miserable bastard still can’t find it within him to care.”

Chrysalis gave her a look of sad sympathy. “Astra, I’m so sorry to hear that.”

“Thanks, Chrysalis, it means the world. Seriously, it does.” Astra gave her a quick smile. “But anyway, quick contrast of that with my mom. I get high marks, she practically squeals with pride. I get beat up, it’s all I can do to stop her from thrashing some bully colts. I hook up with my nominal cousin, she’s happy for me. I go off and join the army, I need a crowbar to make her stop hugging me. My mother, my pony mother, loves me and treats me like she loves me. Accordingly, no matter what I look like, no matter what I sound like, I’m a pony and am not a zebra.”

“That is a very unfortunate situation,” Night sighed. “I’m sorry to hear that your father is such a cruel and narrow stallion, Astra. I suppose it doesn’t help at all to emphasize that he’s not the only kind of zebra in Equesria.”

“After more than twenty years of suffering under his hooves, no, it really doesn’t.” Astra blew out a frustrated breath. “At any rate, Chrysalis, you were in the middle of a story and I interrupted.”

“The rest isn’t important,” Chrysalis replied. “All that matters to me and most others is that where we were once Equestria’s enemies by necessity, I’m now close to the Princesses and the changelings are full citizens of Equestria.”

“Your Majesty, both you and Droso alluded to an agreement with the Dual Thrones that the Ministry of Morale stay out, and that your people will take care of your own security,” Verde mentioned.

“There is such an agreement, yes.”

“And you just mentioned that you have a zebra population, as the rest of Equestria does.”

Chrysalis smiled. “You want to know how we manage our security. Frankly, we do it by identifying zebra agents and letting them work, albeit unknowingly, for us.”

Verde canted her ears curiously. “How?”

“Quite a bit of watching by changelings who’re very practiced in rapidly and constantly changing their disguise,” the changeling queen replied. “The same agent can follow a zebra for days without being identified because they never wear the same face twice. And so we watch. We see what interests them and determine why. We see where they go, what they do, who they talk to, what they take ‘family photos’ of, and do not interfere; spies are, after all, just looking for information and by learning what information they want, we can find out quite a bit about future zebra plans. Their infiltrators are… dealt with. Fortunately, it’s rarely been necessary to kill and never been necessary to hoof them over to Mare Pie’s unicorns.”

“Any particular trends in their spying lately?”

“Quite a bit of interest in the isolated coasts near the old hive,” Chrysalis said. “We’re still not sure why. A coastal gun battery isn’t a terribly valuable asset, nor is a tiny tapping station or some moldering caves. Since they don’t use locomotives to the extent that Equestria does and couldn’t transport them here anyway, there’s no reason for them to have any interest in that stretch.”

“A diversionary attack to take pressure off of the situation at Stalliongrad?” Astra suggested.

“We haven’t had a chance to consider that in detail yet,” Chrysalis admitted. “Stalliongrad, and the prelude in Colthav, are such recent developments that we’re still trying to figure out how they fit into the larger strategic constellation. Granted, they’ll have major effects, but we don’t know them yet.”

Verde’s brow furrowed. “I take it that means that there’re no preparations in place for an invasion?”

“None,” Chrysalis told her. “Consider the situation of my kingdom, Colonel Tin: we’re highly important as a source of resources but there’s no practical way for the zebras to make a landing anywhere near them. Our terrain is ideal for mining and rock farming but is so arid that we’ve developed high-speed trains to cross it because there’re no build-in areas between Lepi Mountain and the resources. The only feasible landing places are protected by shore batteries, but even if these fell, the zebras would require a massive over-water logistical pipeline to carry the invasion to any place of strategic value—and Equestria has attained virtually unchallenged admiralty.”

“I appreciate your confidence, Queen Chrysalis, but Stalliongrad was an unlikely target as well,” Verde pointed out. “Saint Petersbuck is on a major rail and river hub. Colthav is an extremely defensible position that gives its owner strategic command over every major transportation line in the entire region. The Dneighper presents a natural defensive barrier that acts as a permanent secure line of retreat. Stalliongrad? Big city, lies on a major albeit not critical river, some rail, some industry, but its defenders will always be able to suck entire armies into a battle embrace, and keep them there until other forces pivot into their flanks and slaughter them. Which, as it happens, is precisely the fate that befell the zebras.”

“And yet after the rush to Colthav, the zebras would have been mad not to try and seize that defensive bastion for themselves,” Chrysalis countered.

“The salient was the perfect target,” Verde snorted with disgust. “Damn fluke that we spotted the sabotage of the switches and rails before trying to rush the armored trains in; it could have been an utter disaster. As it was, Ruby Pommel’s armored divisions are out of play until Solar Forge can finish a refit.”

“Hard to believe that a gangly little unicorn mare like that would end up being so scarily good at putting tactical armored theory into practice,” Astra smiled.

“It’s a damn miracle she didn’t get herself killed.” Verde snorted but with a little grin. “Still, it goes to show that appearance isn’t the best way to judge on what somepony can do.”

“Were you two at the battle?” Chrysalis looked curiously between them.

“Yeah,” Astra replied. “We were there. See, she isn’t carrying it now but Verde here has this fantastic precision rifle and I do a pretty good job as a spotter…”

<<One Month Ago, Colthav Saliant>>

“Calling shot, officer.”

“Officer acquired.”

“Range is nine hundred twenty meters, wind is eight hour-clicks from the northwest.”

“Drop and windage dialed. Call trigger.”

Astra paused for a moment, studying the target through her field glasses. “OK, officer is turning… turning… OK, clear. Pull.”

The half-zebra mentally braced herself, canting her ears downwards in anticipation, before Verde’s 11.43 millimeter rifle barked with enough volume to be felt and in her field glasses, the zebra stallion’s chest cavity was decorating the soldiers unfortunate enough to be in the radius as hydrostatic pressure blasted bits of bone, gore, and ample blood all over them. “Shot is clean and fatal. Nice one, cuz.”

“Thanks.” Verde leaned away from her scope to rub her eyes as Astra briefly glanced away from her spotting scope to grab a bite from the rations kit she had open on the table beside her. It had been like this the last couple of days: after the initial rush and the significant mutual casualties, both sides of the battle around the Colthav salient had settled into their respective positions: the Equestrians near a natural defensive perimeter where a seasonal dry riverbed created a natural trench network, the zebras in the ruins above. Their role from the beginning had been fairly simple and conventional: find an elevated position and sow disruption with precise destruction of equipment and the command structure of the Zebrican infantry that had arrived shortly after their combat automatons to brace their position. More importantly, however, their job was to keep a close eye on zebra movements, a necessity when the zebras could get from their lines to Equestrian ones in mere minutes via an approach that was totally shielded by terrain. But getting to the approach required crossing open spaces that a certain sniper and her half-zebra marefriend could see with ease from their sniping platform.

“You’re welcome,” She leaned over and pecked Verde’s cheek. “Wish dying zebras was the only thing I was seeing through this scope.”

Verde snorted, although the quick affection drew a smile. “I know what you mean. Bucking idiot… driving into Colthav without pushing recon forward first. How bad is it?”

“Bad, and getting worse,” Astra replied as she returned to the fisheye lens spotting scope to give her a wide angle on the battlefield below. She and Verde were perched in the bell tower of a school just barely outside the city limits of Colthav—not that there was much of a city to speak of. The last two days had been filled with a fierce attempt by Equestrian artillery batteries to get at the zebra forces that were rolling through, taking full advantage of the shelter the ruined buildings offered to make for the rear supply area. Thus far, the barrages had been ineffective and far worse, the limited amount of mechanized armor the Equestrians had available was divided between the heavy ones that had been gutted by anti-machine weapons, and a group of lighter vehicles that posed no real threat to the heavy combat automatons the zebras had brought up. As a consequence, Fifteenth Light was staying away from the battlefield to conserve strength in case they needed to cover a retreat.

“So, a typical Monday,” Verde quipped. “It’s like the drill sergeant said in basic: the only easy day was yesterday.”

“No, today’s more like a Thursday,” Astra replied. “Mondays are when things are just going to Tartarus all day long out of sheer cussedness. Thursdays are when good ideas turn out badly.”

“True,” Verde agreed. “So, call another shot?”

“I don’t see any infantry worth putting a bullet into,” Astra told her. “If you’ve got some API in your saddlebag, there’s an automaton that’s unsheathing missiles on a predictable schedule.”

“I love the zebra death machines, don’t you?” Verde laughed as she floated an armor-piercing incendiary cartridge out of her small shooting satchel. “Scarily murderous when the task is straightforward enough, dumb as a sack of rocks when they’re idling.” Astra heard her pull the bolt closed and rotate it to lock position. “OK, call the shot.”

“Calling combat automaton Archer Shield.”

“Archer Shield acquired.”

“Range is twelve hundred fifty with winds…” Astra stopped as she caught a flash of cloud-dimmed light off polished metal. “Wait one, possible new call.”

“What’s the word, gorgeous?”

Astra couldn’t stop herself from giggling a little at that. “C’mon, Verde… we’re not getting our flanks kicked hard enough for inappropriate come-ons. I just saw some movement in the…” More flashes of light—quite a few more, in fact, and Astra trailed off. “…oh bollocks. Verde, I think they’re rolling into place for an assault. Drop zoom and take a look at the general store, the one that’s still got an intact wall facing us.”

“Dropping… dropping… OK, I see it.” Verde paused as she looked over the same thing Astra was seeing: first a few, then a dozen, then several dozen of the combat robots with the thick armored plate to deflect attacks rolling into place, forming a two-across line with thickly-barded zebra infantry following on. “Well, shit. Hoof me that radio, will you?”

Astra felt for the small box and slid it over to Verde as she continued to watch the assault forces assembling. One of the fascinating things about how Colthav was situated was that one faced the same problem no matter which way your assault was rolling: fairly narrow canyons that opened into very wide spaces which invited punishing crossfire. The zebras had responded by constructing robots that carried an extremely thick plate of armor in front of them that could deflect the largest high-velocity gun Equestria had; that the ‘Mace Shield’ models were designed specifically for the situation around Colthav was just one of many things that military intelligence had totally dropped the ball on. Subsequently, the only thing that had proven able to deal with the special models was arcing artillery fire from atop the cliffs close to the schoolhouse—and the extremely high-powered rifle of a certain unicorn sharpshooter in concert with her half-zebra cousin. Between their massive frontal shield and an appropriate counterbalance in back, the rest of the machine had tinfoil armor and ordinary bullets could shoot straight through it and take out the too-big-to-miss engine in the lower half.

However, previous attempts had been nothing but machines, and only in small numbers; one raided with machines but when it was time to attack for real and take land, it still came down to flesh-and-blood soldiers with their body armor and small arms. “Manticore Actual, this is Colonel Verde Tin, Special Forces, Grey Battalion,” Verde said in the clipped pronunciation she adopted when speaking over a radio. “I’m seeing a large assault force of mixed Mace Shields backed by infantry and with Archer Shields in support. Estimate that they’ll commence movement shortly based on dispositions. Do you copy?”

“Manticore Actual copies, Colonel Tin,” a stallion’s voice with a heavy Trottingham accent replied tiredly. “Tell us something we don’t know.”

“That would be wholly inappropriate, Manticore Actual,” Verde replied in as grave of voice as she could manage. “So where’s the Fifteenth? They should be standing by to help with evac when that assault line hits us.”

Astra could somehow feel the stallion roll his eyes. “Ask Scarlet Knife’s little golden filly. Bucking unicorns…”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Verde asked, a slight tightening around her eyes the only sign of her annoyance.

“General Pommel has seen fit to run off with all our armor and I don’t know where the fuck she’s gone,” he growled. “Bucking little miss know-it-all and her damn armor theories…”

“So in other words, Manticore Actual, you have such poor control of the battle that you lost your armor command adjutant?” Verde demanded sharply. “Lost her and all our bucking armor?”

“Excuse me, Colonel, but …”

“Hang the difference in our ranks, Manticore Actual!” Verde interrupted him. “You’ve just got done telling me that there’s an armored force about to break its steel boot off in our backsides and you don’t know where your own armor commander is! In what reality should I not be yelling at you?”

There was dead silence from the other end and Verde sighed. “Fucking incompetent… dammit, dammit, dammit. Alright then, is there anypony else on this channel? Preferably somepony with news that isn’t bad?”

“Don’t have news for ya, Colonel, but I’d appreciate an accurate report on the position of those incomin’ Mace Shields,” a mare’s voice replied.

Astra consulted her field glasses. “Advance elements are starting into the canyons,” she reported.

“Capital!” The mare responded when Verde passed the news along. “Do what you can with your position, Colonel, and tell Manticore Actual to buck off; I sent him at least five dispatches explaining my intent.”

“General Pommel, I presume.”

“You presume correctly, Colonel,” Pommel replied. “If they’re just starting through the canyons into assault position, we’ve got them right where we want them. Do what you can, Colonel, but if they overrun the river bed, get out of there. Copy that?”

“Copy that,” Verde agreed. She then put down the radio and leaned into her scope, her horn lighting briefly to click the zoom upwards. “Astra, whatcha got for me?”

“Same Archer Shield as before,” Astra replied. “Best target of opportunity, hell if I know why it’s still on standby.”

Verde thought a moment, eyes narrowing as she watched the Archer go through the cycle again: raise its four-cell missile tubes, uncap them, move them left to right, cap and return to position. They’d been sniping at zebra targets for the last couple of days; by now, someone had to have a rough idea of what they could see and hit… and the Archer was too vulnerable, too easy, too obvious, and had been in the open far too long for it to be anything but an invitation. Even more than that, though, the zebra infantry were skirting around it. It was subtle, she’d give them that, but their movement strongly suggested that, even if only in the back of their minds, they fully expected the Archer to explode at any moment and didn’t want to be near it when it did. “Give me something else. A target begging that hard is a target that wants me to shoot it, and I don’t like shooting things that want to be shot.”

“Alright then.” Astra scanned the field, her eye skipping over the Mace Shields rolling down the canyon with their thickest armor in between Verde and their softer bits, ignoring the Archer Shield that was being curiously eager to get shot… then she grinned as a vehicle that looked markedly like a slimmed-down turtle emerged from the city. “OK, I’ve got a tanker at eleven from the Archer Shield and running fast. This one’s acting like they very much don’t want you to shoot, thank you kindly, so I think we really want to ruin their entire day.”

“Tanker acquired.”

“Range is… thirteen hundred thirty-five meters, wind is six hour-clicks from west-northwest.”

“Drop and windage dialed. Call trigger.”

Astra paused, waiting for the lumbering vehicle to draw closer to the Archer Shield playing target dummy. I’ll bet they didn’t expect us to shoot near it, but not at it. “Pull.”

Although it was tempting to fire API into the actual fuel compartment and possibly ignite it, the proper protocol for destroying a vehicle that could be destroyed by heavy rifle fire dictated taking out the engine block first. Naturally, the cab window shattered as Verde’s first shot took out the driver. Her bolt cycled and an ordinary full-metal round punched through the fuel compartment. Another cycle, a breath, and a plume of flame bloomed from the side of the pressurized coal oil container.

“All shots clean and full-effect,” Astra reported. “You know, the engine block is the normal first target.”

“I’d say ‘bang me’ but…”

“Funny.” Astra grinned a little as she looked across the battlefield, noting the first Mace Shields emerging from the canyons and shaking out into a solid line, fruitless impacts from direct-fire guns perched on the rise near the supply dump that was the zebras’ obvious target visibly deflecting from and sometimes exploding against the impenetrable slabs. “They’re sure taking their time.”

“Why wouldn’t they?” Verde grimaced. “It’s not like we can take them out and those first few ventures probably told them that.” Astra heard her trip her radio. “General Pommel, they’re shaking out into line. Do we still have them right where we want them?”

“More than ever,” Pommel replied with a strangely cheerful tone. “Still, get your artillery barking and see if you can use airbursts to deplete the supporting infantry; at this range, nailing the Maces is too much to hope for. Also, do you have a clear look at the inside of the riverbed?”

Astra swiveled her glasses downwards. “Just barely.”

“How close are they to it?”

“I’d estimate… three hundred yards.”

“When they close to one hundred fifty, key to three point seven kilo and tell them that Ruby orders them to commence firing.”

Astra blinked at the conveyed orders from the general and examined the riverbed closer, wondering who exactly she’d be ordering to fire; she hadn’t heard about guns being moved into the natural trench. “Um, copy that.”

“I can hear your spotter’s confusion from here, Colonel,” Pommel chuckled. “As they say, if I can confuse my friends, I’m certain to confuse my enemies. See you in five.”

Verde chuckled as she floated the radio over to Astra. “You heard the mare, my dear spotter. Tell the artillery to start airbursting them and let’s see what the missing General Pommel has planned.”

“Sure, sure, pick on the pony with the field glasses.” Astra accepted the radio and keyed it to the channel for the artillery emplaced around the base of the school. “Hey there, Gunfighter. This is Corporal Astraylzenica Knife, up on the tower with Colonel Tin. I need you to start a regular barrage of airburst shells targeting the advancing line, see if we can’t take out some of their infantry.”

“I don’t got none,” the battery commander drawled in absolute deadpan.

“…you’re kidding…”

“Eeyup,” he agreed. “So, why’re we tryin’ to take out infantry ‘stead of those big heavy armored thingamabobs what’re headin’ towards our line?”

Astra shrugged. “Don’t know. General Ruby Pommel just gave me the message.”

“Well, why dincha say so?” He replied cheerfully. “For those flanks, I’d do just ‘bout anything.” There was a pause and Astra could hear him shouting orders to his gunners in the background. “Hold on to yer eardrums spotter-filly… it’s about ta get loud down there.”

True to his word, barely a moment later the entire school building trembled slightly as the large-bore artillery started firing with a series of teeth-rattling thunderclap roars. Astra watched as the shells burst over the Mace Shields, although she couldn’t tell if they’d had any effect on the infantry taking shelter behind the hulking robots, and kept an eye on the distance between the defile and the oncoming vehicles. In the back of her mind, she registered the distinctive sound of her cousin’s sniper rifle as Verde selected and eyeballed her own targets in lieu of a spotter.

“Hey Astra?”

“Yeah?”

“Check out Colthav.”

“I’m sort of busy watching the riverbed, Verde. Orders from a superior officer and all that.”

“Well, don’t look now but here comes that superior officer,” Verde gave a short laugh. “Driving like a madpony right into their plots.”

“…really?” Astra checked that the advancing shields were still fifty yards away from the line General Pommel had given her before swinging her field glasses upwards to see the town... and stared.

Above the plain where the zebra forces were currently attacking, emerging from the city that the zebras were supposedly securely dug in, the mix of machinegun-carrying scout tanks and howitzer-armed infantry support tanks that constituted Fifteenth Light were swarming like rats from a nest. Somehow, they’d circled behind the city without being stopped and rolled straight through streets that military intelligence was convinced were blockaded with guns and improvised fortifications--which proved that military intelligence was more often than not an oxymoron. The motley crew of light-skinned vehicles barreled through the space at full speed, hosing the burning tanker with fire, guns flaring as they fired at other targets Astra couldn’t see. What she couldn’t miss as the fast tanks careened into the canyons to make the transit down was the tanker being lifted off the ground by the force of its own destruction as a plume of mushrooming flame shot into the sky. Even from nearly a kilometer away, she could see the two halves of the truck flying in two different directions with a cloud of axels, wheels--and a satisfying whump of the Archer Shield bait following the tanker to the scrap heap. With the zebra forces having already set up at the bottom of the approach to the depot, the Fifteenth poured through the canyons like a flash flood, emerging at full velocity at the bottom where the stunned zebra forces were trying to pivot to meet them. Suddenly remembering Pommel’s orders, she keyed up the frequency even as she turned her scope towards the riverbed.

“Hey down there. This is Corporal Astraylzenica, Grey…”

“Do you have orders for me?” An annoyed stallion voice interrupted her.

Astra paused, momentarily miffed. “Ruby orders you to commence firing.”

“Thought so. Thanks for the starting gun, Corporal.” The Mace Armors had begun rotating their giant shields to face the threat from the rear when there was an eye-searing flash that made Astra jerk her head away from the field glasses, then another that made her turn completely away from the window.

“Argh! What the fuck?” Verde snarled.

“The zebra automatons use balefire cores for energy,” the stallion replied, having heard her through the still-live radio. “They go off really bright when you hit them and with the new ‘silver bullet’ rounds the Ministry of Wartime Technology just gave us, we can punch through their frontal armor and the tumbling round will take out the thin skin behind it. But it requires point-blank range.”

“Serious?” Astra could hear the amazement in her cousin’s voice. “All this time, Aunt Scarlet’s been working on a magic bullet to kill these things? And she succeeded? Without anyone knowing about it? I mean, that’s well over a hundred milimeters of high-strength...”

“Verde, can you geek out after you un-burn my eyes?” Astra interrupted, blinking to try and make the brightness of her burned corneas fade, wincing as the brush of her eyelids over her eyes sent a jolt of pain into her head.

“Just a sec, cuz,” Verde said and Astra felt the familiar and pleasant touch of her cousin’s magic brush over her eyes with a simple healing cantrip. “There, better?”

Astra blinked, her vision clearing. “Yeah, thanks.” She treated the emerald-furred unicorn to a peck on the cheek before returning to her spotting scope.

With the barrage of close-range anti-armor rounds from what were clearly heavy guns concealed in the riverbed, the zebra assault was shattered and the systemic obliteration of fighting power had begun. Too stunned to recover in time to stiffen their resistance against the sudden violence, flanked by highly mobile armor on one side and pinned against a trench line and heavy guns on the other, skillful artillery gunners deftly dropping airbursts in the middle of their disorganized ranks, the zebras were utterly routed. Everywhere in her sight, the casual and ordinary horror of war was in full swing. Astra had to turn her head aside when the balefire core of a Mace Shield went up and she returned to her scope to see a dozen infantry sprawled out around it, steaming as the radiation surge flash-cooked them from the inside.
An artillery shell detonated just above the ground, shrapnel shredding dozens of zebras into steaming gore like an outsized anti-personnel mine. Stray shells from a 20mm autocannon ripped the head from one zebra, and disintegrated the forelimb of another. The last in line was left writhing in the dirt, spine ripped in half; hate for zebras aside, Astra mouthed a silent thanks to her cousin as Verde noticed the suffering soldier and removed their head.
One of the heavier tanks, unable to see below the driver’s hatch on the upper glacis plate, rolled over several infantry at once, its tracks momentarily losing their grip as they churned the dirt below into bloody mud, making Astra’s stomach lurch threateningly at the pieces of zebra strewn in its path.

No less violently but with a surgical precision that somehow made it less brutal, Verde picked of officers as the widespread destruction of armored machines exposed them. Astra watched an officer trying to haul a cowering soldier up by the nape of their neck crumple as his head burst like an overripe melon. Another wearing the stripes of a one-star general was struggling as his executive officer tried to drag him out of the line of fire; a moment later, the XO’s head was decorating the general’s uniform as the hole where his heart used to be spurted blood. A captain wearing the distinct red-striped helmet and sleeves of a medic wandered into Astra’s view just barely a dozen yards from the fallen general, helping a hobbled soldier walk. Astra heard her cousin’s rifle bark but didn’t see an impact; she looked over at Verde who moved her eye away from her scope; Verde didn’t actually speak but Astra could hear the icy “no” anyway.

As in any situation where a rout was taking place, the soldiers on the wings were lucky: distance allowed them to see what had happened, realize all was lost, and begin to flee before the slaughter reached them, chased by small arms and cannon fire. In a black comedic note, the last thing Astra spotted before looking away was a vehicle commander, the tracks of his tank having slipped off their road wheels and stranded him, emptying a pistol more or less in the general direction of the fleeing forces.

“Hi Colonel, Corporal,” General Pommel’s voice came over the radio. “Told you I’d see you in five minutes. What do you think of my application of theory to the battlefield?”

“Kicked flank,” Verde replied cheerfully.

Astra leaned back from the scope, took a breath, and let it out. To an observer, it looked all the world like she was simply getting her bearings, but in that breath in and then out, a mental box opened. Into the mental box went zebras being baked from the inside out, an artillery shell shredding zebras into fragments of flesh, the treads of a tank grinding soldiers into gore-strewn mud, and the dying zebra being put out of his misery. The horrors settled in among thousands of their kind and the box was shut again by the time she let the breath out, and all that was left was the image of a medic helping a wounded soldier with no regard for his own safety. Unlike the images in that mental lockbox of horrors, that was one she could smile at a little, and she did.

“Took names,” she added, upgrading the smile to a little grin directed at the transmitter.

This drew a laugh from the mare. “Well, I think it’s safe to say that the Battle of Colthav is tied up nicely. Want a ride to the mopping-up ceremony?”

“Naw, we’re good,” Astra replied. “Got some business out near Stalliongrad. That’s some nice work, General Pommel.”

“I’d be happier if I didn’t take 45% effective losses because the damn machines broke down on the way in,” Pommel replied with a chuckle. “But yeah, I think Manticore Actual is in for a good-sized serving of fried crow. Teach him to grouch off about know-it-all unicorns…”

<<Present Day, Southbound Bullet Train, the Changeling Reaches>>

“…and the only thing that stopped General Pommel from pinning them against the Dneighper and forcing either surrender or annihilation was that they managed to get across the bridges and blow them to prevent pursuit,” Astra finished.

“Well, that explains where all of Derian’s heavy artillery batteries came from,” Chrysalis grinned. “So Scarlet Knife decided to use Colthav as a field test for a new anti-armor round, did she?”

“Mom’s like that,” Astra grinned. “She’s always said that the only practical test of a weapon is to fire it at real enemies.”

“Speaking of such, Queen Chrysalis, I believe she has you to thank for those delightfully detailed blueprints for a balefire microburst weapon,” Verde added. “Those must have been a real challenge to get your hooves on.”

“We all do our part, Colonel,” Chrysalis smiled. “You shoot things, the corporal observes things, and I manage the business of learning things that the enemy would prefer that Equestria not know.” The smile diminished a little. “Speaking of the war effort… I don’t suppose you have any newer information than I do?”

“Stalemate along the viable Dneighper fords, ghastly siege at Sanctus Petriburg.” Astra said, grimacing. “The stalemate isn’t so bad—both are so well dug-in that neither side is suffering real casualties—but it’s still locking a whole battalion in place that could be used elsewhere. Sanctus is…”

“Tartarus brought to the mortal plane,” Verde finished sadly. “If there were two words that could explain why Mare Fluttershy was so desperate to see the fighting end that she gave megaspells to the zebras, ‘Sanctus Petriburg’ would be them. We can’t route reinforcements to the siege without stripping vital soldiers from other fronts. We can’t disengage because the zebras are still in solid fighting dispositions and could turn the disengagement into a slaughter. So we’re left smashing a beautiful monument to the warm relationship that once existed between us and the zebras in the hopes that we can eventually coerce surrender. It’s pointless, senseless, horribly bloodletting for absolutely no gain but circumstances are forcing us to contest an obsolete objective just to keep a solid front with campaigns that are actually important.”

“And that is why we’re here,” Night said. “We’re hopeful that the combination of a field demonstration of the upcoming Mark Twelve, and the widespread use of the Alishield Mark Two will be enough to end the war. If not, perhaps Mare Sparkle’s potion experiments will yield something.”

“I’ve heard about those experiments.” Chrysalis looked back at them. “Is it true that she’s attempting to make alicorns?”

Verde blinked. “Make alicorns?”

“Is that even… possible?” Astra blinked as well.

“Speaking from personal experience, I’d be very wary of underestimating Twilight Sparkle,” Chrysalis shrugged. “If it’s possible to use arcane scientific means to empower a pony to even half the power of one of the Sisters or anything close to the ability of a winged unicorn like Princess Cadence, Mare Sparkle would be the one to find it.”

“She was the primary developer of the Crusader maneframes…” Verde compressed her lips thoughtfully. “Still, the concept seems a bit… hubristic. Drink a potion and voila, you’ve got the powers and appearance of one of the Princesses? Don’t mistake me, it’s a fantastic idea, but it just seems so… I don’t know. Megaspells were developed for a peaceful purpose, so that seems a perfectly good use of science for war technology. You’ve got all the things Aunt Scarlet is up to, and the development of Steel Ranger armor, and those seem fine. But making major alterations to somepony for battle advantage is… very troubling.”

“Is that because zebras regularly augment their soldiers with their alchemy?” Chrysalis asked.

“Partly,” Verde admitted. “One thing that’s always been a little unsettling is that zebras seem so bent on victory that they’re perfectly willing to take an ordinary filly or colt and feed them magic to make them into the perfect little weapon. We take ponies of all shapes and sizes and appearances and make them soldiers with training, more or less guided self-improvement by completely mundane means. So are we giving that up now? Tacitly admiting that the zebras are right about something and get into yet another kind of arms race with them?”

“No,” Night replied firmly. “There’s no reason this would turn into a slippery slope, any more than development of power armor leads inevitably into cybernetic enhancement. Any more than the development of your Mark Twelve would lead to it being deployed in every single battle fought. Weapons—and the induction formula is a weapon, I’ll grant you that—are useless unless they can be controlled. The formula wouldn’t be under development unless the Princesses were fully convinced that it could, and would, be used selectively, wisely, and appropriately.”

“If the Princesses are so concerned about keeping things controlled, explain the Ministry of Morale,” Astra snorted. “We’re saddled with a Ministry that uses its power broadly, foolishly, and ways miles beyond merely inappropriate. And yet, you’re sitting there blithely assuring us that ponies who can’t keep a major agency of the war effort under control will be very disciplined and controlled with a weapon that can turn any unicorn into the next best thing to a god with a dose of magical potion?”

“The induction formula is an object, a mere creation of pony work and knowledge,” Night retorted sharply. “The Ministries are ponies led by a ponie. We are creatures of free will, desires, and sapience. We are driven by love, by fear, by loyalty, by hate, prejudice. You can’t regulate a pony the way you can regulate an object! You can’t program a pony, tell them what to do, what to think, what to feel. You should know that, Astra; you’ve seen your Ministry treating ponies as automatons, seen it haul them in to be ‘fixed’ as if they were a machine with a worn-out part. It can’t be done; it simply doesn’t work.” She sighed. “As much as we all wish it did, sometimes. It’d make things so much easier in just this sort of situation if you could make everything better by replacing the part that doesn't work with the part that does. So much easier if what was wrong with the Ministries was simply one little gear or switch burning out and needing to be replaced.”

“What do you mean?” Verde asked, eyeing the royal guard.

“I mean that you don’t know Pinkie Pie,” the pegasus replied with a sudden fierceness. “The Pinkie Pie I knew is not the one you think you know. Insane, yes. Frustrating, yes. Dangerously impulsive, yes. But also unreservedly kind and took joy in helping ponies be happy, not to mention somewhat entertaining, when her insane was directed at somepony else that is. I can’t say I liked her precisely; you had to practically reduce her to tears before you can get at the side that made all the exasperation worth it, the side that was actually considerate and happy. And oh, did I get tired of hearing it explained as ‘it’s Pinkie Pie being Pinkie Pie’. Still, she was never anything like the head of a Ministry like the one you describe.” She hung her head. “How bad has it become?”

“You know how it’s a staple of Nightmare Night for the foals to be told that Nightmare will come eat them up?” Night nodded. “Well, now the Ministry of Morale will come kidnap them and steal their thoughts.”

Night nodded sadly. “So the Ministry that is meant to raise morale now causes fear.”

“Yes, and not the good kind of fear either,” Verde told her, softening her tone slightly. “It is good for traitors and enemies to fear, but the purpose in causing them fear is so that your own people do not. If it helps at all, not even my mother who despises Pinkie Pie thinks that Pinkie is trying to hurt ponies. Our working theory is that she isn’t thinking the consequences of her policies all the way through.”

“That’s Pinkie alright,” she observed even more sadly. “Well, I’ll see what I can do about getting the truth to the right ponies and perhaps acting on it myself, as much as I can.”

“How much can you do, though?” Asta asked. “No offense, but you’re just a guard.”

Night smiled. “And you’re just a zebra.”

Astra frowned at her before she got it. “Ah, point taken. So what can you do?”

“Have a very serious heart-to-heart with Mare Pie,” Night replied. “And if that doesn’t work, a very serious conversation with Luna.”

The pegasus seemed to realize the error she’d made about the same moment that Verde and, based on her expression, Astra did. “Um…”

“You’re not part of the Royal Guard,” Astra stated bluntly. “Who are you?”

“You mean you’ve been traveling with one of your own Princesses at your side this entire time, and you didn’t notice?” Crysalis asked before either Verde or the supposed Guard could reply.

“One of our own…” Astra stopped and Verde could see her put it together about the same moment her face seemed to get a little more pale. “...oh…”

‘Night’ sighed. “You see why I prefer not traveling with my own face, Colonel?” she asked, gesturing at the clearly-shocked Astra. “Reactions like this. Now she won’t be able to treat me as just one more traveling companion.”

“I’m sorry, Your Highness,” Verde replied with a sympathetic pat on the disguised alicorn’s shoulder. “I should have thought of a way to forewarn her that you didn’t want to be known, and why.”

“Frankly if you didn’t want to be known, Princess, you shouldn’t have practically hit everyone over the head with your identity,” Chrysalis chided. “You use a shortened form of your well-known title. You use a shape that looks very much like you. You allude to the fact that you can easily pass for Princess Luna, when everypony knows that you’re quite literally her doppelganger. Your subjects would have to be stupid not to work it out… although I gather that the colonel was being willfully ignorant out of kindness.”

“And you were being silent out of kindness as well?” Nyx Sparkle asked with a rueful smile.

“That, and because I’m your loyal subject,” Crysalis replied, smiling back. “And because you’re a living symbol of redemption, and I admire you for that. Now, since that silly guise isn’t necessary any longer…”

“Deepest apologies Your Highness, madame Royal Guard, companions, but there’s a problem ahead,” the PA interrupted. “The diversion switch seems to have been damaged so we’ll be unable to switch tracks and take you all the way in to Hive Station. We are very sorry, but it appears you’ll have to walk yourselves in.”

“Damaged switch? That’s… odd.” Chrysalis commented with a furrow of her brow.

“Why, Chryssy?” Nyx asked. “I’d have thought that switches would get damaged all the time with the occasional dust storms you get in the Reaches.”

“It’s because of those dust storms that they don’t,” Chrysalis explained as she got to her feet and walked towards the door outwards, the train audibly applying its brakes. “All switches are enclosed in armored boxes to repel the dust storms and the tracks near a switch are sheltered by rock walls to make sure the high-velocity dust doesn’t scour them. But as unlikely as it is, it has to be what happened here. The alternative requires some pretty powerful demolition explosives and you’d have to be crazy to walk over a hundred miles from anything approaching civilization to smash a switch that leads to a barely-ever-used section of track.”

“Zebras can be crazy,” Verde pointed out. “In fact, they’re well-known for their occasional crazy. For example, about ten years ago, an entire nation of them got their crazy on and decided that they needed to kill a mare who stood a very real chance of friendshipping them all to death.” She turned to look at the still-disguised Nyx, whose cheeks colored lightly at the flattery. “Because, you know, nothing says ‘we are saving the world’ quite like assassinating a princess who greets her subjects by giving them a smile of youthful joy and a big warm hug.”

Chrysalis sighed. “But even crazy zebras operate by some sort of logic and as I explained, there’s nothing to be gained from invading near the old hive. Strategic assets are too far away and with the isolation, Equestria would have an absurdly luxurious time frame in which to respond.”

“Could it be more indirect warfare?” Nyx suggested. “An invasion to apply political pressure on I and my adopted sisters?”

Chrysalis considered this. “Sensible,” she acknowledged. “With so much Equestrian territory under threat, adding even empty useless Equestrian territory would put pressure on the Thrones to remove the invaders, even at the expense of other goals. Which could diminish the effective strength of the only major regional force that’s not indispensable: General Manestein’s campaign to wipe out the Stalliongrad-area forces.”

“Which, if the zebras are thinking in the general direction we are, would make the invasion a worthwhile enterprise,” Verde concluded.

“Granted. Worthwhile, but risky.” Chrysalis laid down on a bench next to the door, resting her head on her hoof thoughtfully. “They’d need a large fleet to move a large army as well as protect it from interception and establish secure long-term supply if they make a play for the coastal rock farms.”

“If they’ve managed to bring their stealth technology to an industrial scale, that’d act as a fantastic force-multiplier and make it much easier for them to slip naval patrols and land large forces,” Verde persisted. “It’s not outside the realm of possibility, Your Majesty.”

That brought Chrysalis up short and occasioned a frown. “Not outside of the realm of possibility,” she allowed. “But where would they get that kind of energy? And how would they account for the deadly side effects? Stealth cloaks can operate with a single gem because they just have to conceal the body of a single zebra and they radiate so little energy that you’d have to be Mare Rarity to notice it. To achieve stealth for the transport fleet you’re talking about, you’d have to build a floating power station of a gargantuan size and even then, running that kind of power through inscribed gems would bake any zebra on board instantly.”

Verde blinked. “Honestly, I’d have expected something more espionage and less arcanotech.”

“Thought I became spymaster without learning the basics, did you?” Chrysalis teased.

“If advanced arcanotech is your idea of ‘basics’, Your Highness, I’m sure your idea of ‘specialized’ would be quite sobering,” Verde replied with a genuinely respectful note in her voice. “But there is a viable solution to the problem you suggest: pipe the energy through a series of very small generators with heavy anti-radiation cowlings and physically isolate them from the structure by putting them on extended booms. You wouldn’t be able to make repairs without bringing the system down, but it’d solve the problem.”

“It would,” Chrysalis acknowledged with a frown. “All I can say is that I desperately hope you’re wrong, Colonel Tin.”

“I hope I am too,” Verde replied earnestly. “We already have too much Equestrian territory threatened by the zebras. Adding more, even useless desert, would be most unwelcome.”

“I take it you’ll be coming with us, Chrysalis?” Astra asked, speaking for the first time since Princess Nyx had inadvertently revealed herself.

“Naturally.” Chrysalis moved over to the door leading out. “Do either of you have a spare weapon?”

“Sorry, Your Highness, but we went sidearms-only for the diplomatic mission,” Verde replied apologetically.

“Is there a particular type that you’re most comfortable with?” Nyx asked.

“Pistol.”

“Perfect.” From a pocket of her saddlebag, Nyx pulled out a pistol type Verde had never seen before. The barrel extended at least a hoof beyond the main body and there was a vented muzzle brake on the front with a front blade sight poking out of it. The back of the gun had a large cylindrical hammer with the back of the blade sight cut into it and what looked like a normal twelve-round single-stack magazine. Verde could just barely make out dozens of tiny magical runes cut into it before Chrysalis accepted the weapon into her telekinetic grip.

“Nice.” The changeling turned it over in her grip, looking at the various runes with interest. “What’s it called?”

“The technical name for it is Ironshod Object Twelve Special but project engineers just called it ‘Clockwork’. No idea why it has a fancy name and I naturally don’t need it to defend myself, but you asked for a pistol so here it is.”

Verde started at that and could see the same reaction in Astra. “Object” designations went to highly experimental weapons that were joint projects between the Armament R&D division of the Ministry of Wartime Technology and various subsidiary companies like Ironshod Firearms. As in, highly experimental weapons that had been created, in part or in whole, on the maneframe-driven runecraft lathe that was secured at the heart of Equestria’s primary industrial complex in Fillydelphia, called Solar Forge. Such weapons were highly unique and restricted to extremely high-level figures like Mare Applejack and the Princesses. She’d never heard of one being just hoofed it over to another pony with such a blasé air. Then again, Princess Nyx was well-known for not taking protocol too seriously.

“And… the ammunition?”

“Apparently, all those runes mean it doesn’t need any.” Nyx shrugged. “I’ve been kept fairly busy with royal duties and haven’t had a chance to study up on the intricacies of modern runecraft, so I don’t know how those runes make ammunition unnecessary. All that matters to me is that they work, and that they’ll help a loyal friend and ally of Equestria defend herself if needs be.” She gave Crysalis a little smile. “What else matters?”

“Fair enough.” Chrysalis looked back at Astra and Verde. “Is something the matter?”

“Other than my just learning that we’ve been escorting Princess Sparkle this entire time?”

“And seeing that she’s been carrying around a highly unique experimental weapon in her saddlebag and casually just hoofed it over to another pony, without hesitation?”

“And realizing that one of our Princesses is about to follow us into what could easily be a zebra ambush?”

“Yes,” Chrysalis replied with an amused look. “Other than those things.”

Astra and Verde both stared at her a moment before shaking their heads. “Um, no,” Verde managed, taken aback at how none of it seemed to be fazing the queen.

“Ready to go when you are,” Astra added with a weak smile.

“Excellent,” Chrysalis smiled. “Let’s see what’s wrong with this diversion switch.”

Four And Two: Barren, Part 3

“It’s getting dark out,” Astra noted as they trotted away from the train. “What was going to be our plan when we arrived at the hive? Stay the night?”

“Just because it’s abandoned, it isn’t uncomfortable,” Chrysalis told her. “I imagine that as soldiers, you’ve bedded down in places much less dry and secure than some old caves.”

“Shouldn’t we examine the switch to see what damaged it?” Night asked. “It might give us advanced warning if something untoward is waiting at the hives.”

“Yes, thank you for reminding me.” Chrysalis turned and began trotting back along the tracks, seeming to be entirely unhindered by the fading light. “Truth be told, it would be somewhat unusual for even soldiers to carry the sort of explosives they’d need to smash the switch. They’re typically enclosed in armored boxes to protect against heavy wind-blown debris and even balefire… wouldn’t…”

Chrysalis came to a halt, staring, and Verde quickly cast her magelight cantrip to see what the changeling was staring at. The switch was gone. In its place was a gaping crater that still smelled strongly of conventional high explosives despite the fact that it was clearly hours old.

“That… looks like a mortar shell hole,” she finally managed. “But how? No mortar is nearly this accurate.”

“Maybe because it wasn’t fired,” Astra offered. “The explosion pattern of the casing is too perfect. It looks like the improvised jobs we saw in the Colthav rail yards. Remember? The zebra sappers ran out of shaped explosives and…”

“…used heavy brass bowls and rigged artillery shells to crater the switches.” Verde nodded grimly. “I remember that too.”

Chrysalis sighed. “Of course it would be here… Droso’s been telling me for years that if invasion came, it would be here… didn’t listen, too nostalgic…”

“Is there any way to get word to your forces, Your Majesty?” Night inquired. “I know that in Equestria, there’s a fairly comprehensive tapping station network in case of dire need but I’ve not been briefed on your system.”

“Point-to-point wireless transmission system,” Chrysalis said. “The only part of it that can be accessed is each terminus.”

“How’d you manage that?”

“The towers are suspended… from…” Chrysalis chuckled ruefully as Night grinned and extended her wings. “…and we have a pegasus accompanying us. We still have the problem of you being able to access the system, though.”

“They don’t just let anypony put on the armor, Your Majesty,” Night assured her. “I’ll take care of it. What do you plan to do in the meantime?”

“The best thing I can do for my people, especially since my folly is partly responsible, is to see this invasion for myself,” Chrysalis replied. “Hopefully, we won’t encounter anything larger than a scouting force, saboteurs sent on ahead to survey the site and cripple our ability to quickly shift soldiers here.”

“I’ll be sure to relay that message, milady Queen,” Night inclined her head and extended her wings to their full impressive span before launching herself into the air with a single sweep. “Be safe, Your Highness, Verde, Astra.”

“Good luck, Night!” Astra called after her as the Guard vanished into the dimness.

“Well, this attack is very much their style,” Verde offered. “Frankly, we’re still surprised that they would spend forces so lavishly as to try a siege and investment of Stalliongrad.”

“I’m not,” Chrysalis said, turning and trotting briskly down the tracks away from the shattered switch.

Verde and Astra looked at each other before cantering after the swiftly-moving queen. “Why aren’t you?” Astra asked as they caught up.

“Because a battle for possession of a city fits perfectly with their tactical strengths,” Chrysalis replied. “Very close quarters, a relatively tiny force can hold it and bleed out an enemy, and the kind of extremely stealthy but extremely deadly zebras that are a terror in an open battlefield are practically invulnerable where they can ply their trade without needing to worry about the air. Moreover, the rush towards Colthav uncovered Stalliongrad; they would have been fools not to seize the day.”

“Hard to believe that a gangly little unicorn mare like that would end up being so scarily good at putting tactical armored theory into practice,” Astra smiled. “Did I hear right about her taking personal command of the Fifteenth Light during the attack on the main supply area?”

“It’s a damn miracle she didn’t get herself killed.” Verde snorted but with a little grin. “Still, it really shows what a skilled general can do with extremely inferior equipment. Thrashed those automatons like they were made of paper and would have pinned and annihilated all zebra forces in the area if they hadn’t gotten across the river and blown the bridges behind them.”

“Were you two at the battle?” Chrysalis looked curiously between them.

“Yeah,” Astra nodded. “We prevailed on the commanding general to let us try to develop battlefield intelligence before he moved in. Idiot started moving before we got back; we got the trains stopped just barely in time. After the preliminaries were sorted out, he needed sharpshooters and Verde needed a spotter so we both got to watch the fireworks. It was a sobering experience and a really neat one; hard to really describe what it’s like to see the moment where the battle is suddenly over while it’s still going on.”

“At Colthav, it was the moment when the Fifteenth crashed into the rear of the advancing zebras and wiped out their headquarters,” Verde related with a touch of nostalgia. “The zebras had advanced so rapidly towards the primary supply dump for the Colthav offensive that they couldn’t distinguish between their own dust clouds and the dust clouds of full-bore pursuit. Pommel made exclusive use of the light, third-tier vehicles of Fifteenth Light to achieve the advantage of velocity and crashed into their rear at the precise instant that the heavy cannon batteries she’d ordered to be dug into a slight defile shielding the supply depot opened fire with balefire proximity burst rounds. The surprise of the cannons stunned them and the unfolding massacre of their headquarters and support divisions triggered a total rout. And so it was, with vehicles that were ordinarily incapable of even denting the heavy combat automatons that the zebras have been deploying, Ruby Pommel reduced the zebra forces waiting in ambush at Colthav to a hollow, burnt-out wreck of a command.”

“But General Pommel’s forces were still put out of action?”

“A full-bore pursuit, especially through rough terrain and heavy dust, destroys machines as effectively as heavy cannon fire,” Verde replied. “And remember that the Fifteenth was a third-tier force using outdated machines since it was expected to be on light garrison duty far away from the battle. Besides, after that performance, they’re giving Ruby the firepower to match her ability and manufacturing top-tier machines takes time.”

“Of course.” There was a few more minutes of silence before Chrysalis looked back at them. “Is there any other news of the eastern front?”

“Stalemate along the Dneighper, ghastly siege at Sanctus Petriburg.” Astra said, grimacing. “The stalemate isn’t so bad—both are so well dug-in that neither side is suffering real casualties—but it’s still locking a whole battalion in place that could be used elsewhere. Sanctus is… if there were two words that could explain why zebras have megaspells, ‘Sanctus Petriburg’ would be them. We can’t route reinforcements to the siege without stripping vital soldiers from other fronts. We can’t disengage because the zebras are still in solid fighting dispositions and could turn the disengagement into a slaughter. So we’re left smashing a beautiful monument to the warm relationship that once existed between us and the zebras in the hopes that we can eventually coerce surrender. It’s pointless, senseless, horribly bloodletting for absolutely no gain but circumstances are forcing us to contest an obsolete objective just to keep a solid front with campaigns that are actually important.”

“It’d almost be better if the entire city was just… wiped away,” Verde sighed. “Murdering each other over a useless pile of rubble… this isn’t war anymore, it’s just murder. Hopefully, the combination of a field demonstration of the upcoming Mark Twelve and the widespread use of the Alishield Mark Two will be enough to end the war. If not, perhaps Mare Sparkle’s potion experiments will yield something.”

“I’ve heard about those experiments.” Chrysalis looked back at them. “Is it true that she’s attempting to make alicorns?”

Verde blinked. “Make alicorns?”

“Is that even… possible?” Astra blinked as well.

“If the Ministry of Peace hadn’t developed megaspells, I’d wonder if they were possible,” Chrysalis pointed out. “And, speaking from personal experience, I’d be very wary of underestimating Twilight Sparkle. If it’s possible to use arcane scientific means to empower a pony to even half the power of one of the Sisters or anything close to the ability of a winged unicorn like Princess Cadence, Mare Sparkle would be the one to find it.”

“She was the primary developer of the Crusader maneframes…” Verde compressed her lips thoughtfully. “It’s a really interesting thought and would be a devastating psychological blow to the zebras but it seems sort of… impractical.”

“Says somepony who’s never flown on her own wings,” Chrysalis returned. “Or, more to the point, a unicorn who’s probably always existed in a state of relative power. Few unicorns have your combination of power and precision, Verde; most are what we term ‘glass cannons’, immensely powerful at a distance but at a severe disadvantage against extremely deadly zebra hoof techniques. If Twilight Sparkle’s potion was to do what it’s rumored it will do, you would have soldiers with the raw power to fight at a distance and the ability to remain permanently out of range of melee. It would be the alchemical enhancement most zebra soldiers undergo taken to its logical conclusion: achieving the optimum soldier with a swig of potion.”

“Wait, alchemical enhancement?” Astra said. “You mean they’re not just… skilled?”

Chrysalis chuckled. “Astra, do you honestly think that zebras are composed of nothing but lithe, strong, healthy young fillies and colts with a natural liquid agility? Zebra alchemistry has always been very advanced; we rely on loyal zebra herbalists to develop healing aids and I have no doubt that Twilight Sparkle is consulting heavily with zebras to develop her induced transformation potion.”

“Heh… well what do you know? Stripes are good for something,” Astra smirked. “I would never have guessed.”

Verde sighed as the comment made Chrysalis stop again and turn to stare at Astra in blank surprise. “Forgive me, but have you seen a mirror lately?”

Astra stopped as well and returned the stare evenly. “Your Majesty, despite outward appearances, I’m a pony, not a zebra. The parent that showed me love and support is a pony. All of my friends are ponies. The two aunts who’ve always welcomed me into their homes, remembered my birthday, and treated me like family are ponies. My fillyfriend is a pony. The hoof techniques for self-defense that I was taught were pony creations. Nothing in my life, from family to friends to the regents I’m honored to be ruled by, are zebras. I only speak with a strong zebra accent because my fillyfriend insists that it makes my voice sound pleasant and sexy. For me, as with many other Equestrians, zebras are an enemy that seeks to harm a deeply beloved Princess of Equestria.”

Chrysalis looked steadily at her for several moments before turning and continuing down the tracks. “I’m very sorry to hear that, Astraylzenika,” she commented. “Where we come from is very much a part of who we are. I wouldn’t be the changeling that is trusted and warmly welcomed by the Dual Thrones without having been a changeling of a very different sort before.”

“I come from the womb of a very industrious and brave pony mare who loves me like a daughter, sired by a proud zebra soldier who was retired early in his life due to a crippling injury and who shows no signs of loving me at all,” Astra retorted. “I am who I am because I was loved by my pony family and my zebra family doesn’t care.”

“I’m certain that’s not true.”

“I’ve never seen any indication otherwise, Chrysalis,” Verde told her. “Uncle Zoast has always been very cold towards everypony but his wife and especially cold towards Astra; I don’t think I’ve even heard him call her by name once.”

“And your extended zebra family?”

“What extended zebra family?” Astra snorted. “If they exist, they’ve never once been mentioned in my hearing. Just one more thing Daddy’s little filly isn’t allowed to know about. I get the impression from the fact that Mother never speaks of them that she regards them with distaste, which says quite a bit if you know my mother.”

“I know of her, certainly, and would be delighted to know her more personally if our paths were to cross,” Chrysalis asserted. “Director of armament research and development, as I recall, and the leading advocate of giving our forces maximum mechanical mobility to supplement the armored trains and pegasus-drawn skywagons. It paid off quite handsomely at Colthav and if the war keeps going beyond Ministry attempts to force an early conclusion, I can see her initiatives being very decisive. I admit to being slightly dubious about her ‘dreadnaught’ ironclad initiative… major resource expenditure just to change a few features of an ironclad battleship.”

“It’s well worth the expense and effort,” Verde assured her. “The new turret configuration will give the new model a greatly enhanced field of fire and frees up deck space for quad-mounts that can accommodate gun directors when R&D is complete. Adjusting the angling of the hull armor and using spacing on the deck armor will give them greater resistance to fire, especially against dangerous plunging fire. Those are the really big pieces of the refit but experimentation with a pair of older vessels being used as testbeds…”

“Day, is there an engineering blueprint in the entire MWT you haven’t memorized?” Astra’s voice was full of fond exasperation. “You need a life, cousin.”

Verde treated her cousin to a cheeky grin. “What are you talking about? I go on dates all the time!”

“Those aren’t dates; they’re shooting drills disguised as dates.” Astra snorted. “When we get a breather, I swear I’m going to make you go to the Carrot Bay Spa if I have to bash you crosseyed with a frying pan and drag you there by the tail.”

“Where would you get a frying pan?”

“I keep Mother’s old cast-iron one on hoof and don’t change the subject.”

“Yes, dear,” Verde replied sweetly. “By the way, since we’re speaking of family Chrysalis, did you have any?”

“Two sisters, Cocoon and Pupa, and my parents,” Chrysalis replied. “My parents are hardly worth mentioning—parents and spawn rarely developed any sort of connection—but my sisters were nice enough, considering that we were all in bloody competition for the throne. Ultimately, I won only because Pupa was killed in an accident and Cocoon killed trying to save her.” She frowned. “Sometimes I contemplate what things may have been like under a Queen Pupa or Queen Cocoon; both were kinder than I was and Cocoon was the clear heir apparent because she was clever enough to being kinder and gentler without being weaker. As family goes, especially changeling family, they were the best sisters I could wish for.”

“Do you miss them?”

“From time to time, mainly when I’m visiting the Hives,” she admitted. “Which is why I rarely visit: it’s pleasant to remember family that’s passed on but very painful to miss them.”

“Is there a reason your parents inflicted bug names on you?” Astra asked. “I’m hardly one to talk, seeing as how I’ve got a really strange name myself, but ‘Chrysalis’, ‘Cocoon’, and ‘Pupa’ has all the creativity and charm of ‘One’, ‘Two’, and ‘Three’.”

Chrysalis snorted amusedly. “As I said, changeling parents had no particular connection to their spawn, to the point where they literally named children according to birth order, which was very…” She suddenly stopped and looked around. “…very…” She frowned and stuck her tongue, oddly forked like that of a reptile, out tentatively. “…um, very confusing.”

Verde looked sideways at Astra and then at the perplexed-looking changeling. “Is something wrong, Your Highness?”

“I’m not sure,” she replied, looking around again. “There’s a slight taste of emotion in the air that I’ve never encountered before. It’s like… love mixed with… I don’t know.”

Astra eyed Chrysalis. “Mixed with… devotion? Hate? Like, what you’d imagine religious fanaticism would taste like?”

Chrysalis blinked and turned to look at her. “Actually yes. Which means,” she grimaced, “we’re about to meet someone unfriendly and all we can do is vaguely sense their nearness.”

“Not necessarily,” Verde corrected her. “Normally this gadget isn’t much use because you normally don’t know a zebra is there until they’re killing you but with enough warning…” A monocle with a small laser light hooked to it floated out of her saddle bag and she slipped it on, the strap holding it on over her eye. “…you can see through their ponypies.”

“So you can see through zebra stealth cloaks by… looking absurd.” Chrysalis paused to consider this. “It’s creative, at least.”

Astra snickered, earning a gimlet eye from Verde. “Yes, it does look a little strange but the principle is solid. Stealth is achieved by bending light around the wearer and stilling the air so they move soundlessly. The eyepiece is enchanted to allow a wearer to see the movement of specific light, the laser in this case, and since the laser will be bent around the zebra…”

“…you can see where they are based on the bending of the laser.”

Verde smiled. “Yes, and the fact that the air directly around them is unnaturally still makes the laser unusually clear as well, which makes it easier to see them. Now then, Chrysalis, do you have an idea of which direction the taste is coming from?”

Chrysalis flicked her tongue in and out of her muzzle in a strangely snakelike way. “Fifty lengths that way,” she replied, gesturing with her head.

Verde blinked at her. “And you didn’t notice before now?”

“Still air, remember?”

Verde immediately felt sheepish. “Oh, yes, well… uh, sorry.”

“Do you think they’ll be amenable to talking it out?”

“Worth a try.” Verde trotted passed Chrysalis and turned the switch on the device with a quick spark of magic. The vision in her right eye immediately went black except for a glowing red line shooting out into the distance, her left laying the visible terrain over the blackness. She barely had to move her head before the beam visibly hopped over something about the height of a small pony. A quick back-and-forth revealed eight more of the obstacles gathered near the first and she grimaced, weighing her options. Nine zebras, at the bare minimum augmented and trained with the extremely deadly hoof techniques that zebras were well-known for, were a grave threat and it didn’t surprise Verde at all that the first plan that came to her was retreat. The nine shapes picking up the pace of their approach and spreading out to surround the three-person party pretty much eliminated that option. She was considering whether she could aim at and shoot nine targets rapidly enough to stop them from closing the distance when she became aware of Chrysalis trotting passed her towards the zebras.

“You might as well give up the pretense,” she told the hidden zebras with a tone of casual authority that abruptly reminded Verde that the friendly changeling was a monarch in her own right. “You outnumber us three to one and the element of surprise is no longer yours. There’s no further need to cling to your invisibility when all nine of you are perfectly visible to us.”

A quick survey revealed that the nine scouts had halted their progress, turning as one towards Chrysalis, their stances vague broadcasting surprise and confusion. Chrysalis, of course, didn’t have a special eyepiece so she couldn’t see it. “I suppose it doesn’t matter either way. You’re trespassing in my kingdom and you are soldiers of a nation with which Equestria is at war. You’ve already destroyed the train tracks leading to the cave network so technically, you struck the first blow.” She paused. “All of that said, I’m not keen on killing anyone, even a zebra, just to entertain myself. Get the hay out of my kingdom and I see no reason to pursue and harm you.”

If anything, this seemed to confuse the zebras more. After several moments, the one in the center threw their head back and an aged-looking stallion, the black stripes in his closely-cropped mane turned nearly white, materialized out of thin air, wearing a wary expression.

“Your kingdom, you say?” He inquired in an accent so thick that Verde could barely work out what he said. “What, have the Princesses gone wholly away?”

“They have not,” Chrysalis replied, sounding slightly contemptuous. “I am queen of my people, serving at the leave of the Dual Thrones. The Barrens are my kingdom and you are trespassing thereon.”

“It is changeling, and could easily lie,” another of the zebras commented, not bothering to keep his voice down.

“Her people are known to be cunning and sly,” a third offered.

“And yet, this one seems true,” the older replied, never taking his eyes off Chrysalis. “For it’s typical of changelings to hide from plain view.”

“You realize ‘that one’ is standing right here,” Chrysalis pointed out in a slightly irritated tone. “But all of this is immaterial. I say again, get the hay off my lands and out of my kingdom.”

“It speaks like the nightmare would,” the second zebra said, looking hard at Chrysalis. “It claims more land than a noble under Princesses should.”

Verde quietly slipped her sidearm out of its holster concealed in one of her saddlebags as she noticed a subtle shift in Chrysalis’ posture. “Excuse me?”

“The nightmare takes many shapes to trick and deceive,” the zebra retorted. “And to strike before she reveals herself is oft a vital need.”

“You plotholes wouldn’t be threatening to attack Queen Chrysalis because you’re developing the notion that she’s Princess Nyx in disguise, would you?” Astra growled.

In one of the most bizarre displays Verde had ever seen, all nine of the zebras turned as one and looked at Astra, their expressions going immediately from surprised to dumbfounded. “You are with these and unbound,” their leader said after a long moment. “And your well-being is perfectly sound.”

“Yeah, imagine that.” Astra responded dryly. “An Equestrian is welcomed in part of Equestria.”

“One of the nightmare’s…”

“Her name is Nyx,” Astra interrupted icily.

“Nightmare Moon isn’t her name?” Verde had to crane her neck a bit to see the young-looking zebra mare towards the back of their formation, where she would be protected by the rest. She was the only female that Verde could see and the only one of such a small stature, which made Verde immediately suspicious of her. The sole mare in a group of stallions and obviously less physically capable than her companions practically screamed ‘intelligence officer’.

“Like any other pony or zebra, griffin or dragon, or even diamond dog,” Chrysalis answered. “Surely your people are not so benighted that they imagined that ‘Nightmare’ is her given name.”

“It’s not too difficult to believe that a filly might be given the name ‘Night Moon’ and add ‘mare’ when she grew older,” the zebra replied calmly in a voice with only the lightest hint of a zebra accent, nudging a couple of stallions aside as she trotted up to stand beside the commander. “However, on to business. There are nine of us and three of you. Even visible, none of you are specialists in this particular situation. Queen Chrysalis offers us our lives if we leave but that is clearly a bluff; it is more appropriate that we offer you your lives if you stand aside and make no attempt to hinder us.”

“What makes you think it’s a bluff?” Chrysalis inquired with a positively vulpine smile.

The mare looked curiously at her. “Respectfully, Your Majesty, operational habits indicate that your suitability for conflict in this situation is adverse in the extreme. We have no more desire to kill you for pleasure than you do and there is no need for blood to be spilt over some train tracks and a minor intrusion. Certainly, you appreciate that bloody conflict is not germane to the much more vital business of collecting and using information for operational purposes.”

“And the vital operational need to draw our attention away from the aftermath of Stalliongrad has nothing to do with your appearance in my lands, sabotaging my people’s means for rapid deployment in response to invasion?”

The mare smiled very slightly. “Astute. Unfortunately, this creates a problem. The previous offer was predicated on the assumption of a certain degree of ignorance, an assumption that is clearly not justified by circumstances as they have developed.”

“We would have rejected it in any case,” Chrysalis said diffidently.

“Regrettable.” The officer turned away and started trotting. “Relatively undamaged, legate, if you please. The changeling queen could prove to be an invaluable source of intelligence.”

“Yes, praetus” the elderly-looking zebra acknowledged, looking away as Verde raised her scoped revolver and lined up a shot, partly shielded from view by the larger Chrysalis. She saw that Astra had turned her head to get a grip on her own sidearm to draw it quickly. In contrast, Chrysalis seemed curiously unconcerned and unprepared despite the odd-looking weapon Night had called “Clockwork” still gripped casually in her telekinetic field. The legate turned to look at them, smirking slightly. “A zebra, a unicorn, and a royal; a shame we can’t assist you in shuffling off this mortal coil.”

“That is a shame,” Chrysalis agreed. “It’s much easier to kill somepony who wants to kill me than to kill somepony who doesn’t intend to do me much harm.” She began to bring Clockwork down into firing position. “Of course with this weapon…”

The zebra reacted instantly and with the speed of a vastly younger stallion. Verde gave him points for intelligence: he didn’t bother trying to knock the gun away, going directly for Chrysalis instead. Of course, not even zebra hooves are faster than thought; by the time he’d closed the gap to strike the changeling, Chrysalis had rotated the gun’s muzzle downwards in midair and with a kerblam, the legate dropped, the bullet careening through his shoulder and side.

Partly shielded from view by Chrysalis, both Verde and Astra had been lining up their shots and at the sound of a gunshot, dropped the two zebras on either flank, shifted fire slightly, and hit the next two. The remaining three went carefully still as three gun muzzles shifted to them.

“Hey, check it out: three of us and three of them,” Astra grinned as she and Verde moved up to either side of Chrysalis. “Question is, what happens now?”

“Now, I extend the previous offer on better terms.” Chrysalis looked sternly at the three zebras. “Get the hay out of my kingdom. Now.”

The three zebras looked at one another before one of them, who Verde realized to her surprise was a mare, met Chrysalis’ stern gaze. “We… we would gather the bodies of our wounded and dead… that… that…” She bit her lip and gave up the attempt to compose a rhyme. “…will you permit us to carry away our dead, Your Highness?”

“If they didn’t want to be interred in my land, they shouldn’t have trespassed on it.” But Chrysalis look softened marginally. “However, if one of you will stay, we can make arrangements to inter them according to whatever rituals and traditions you desire.”

Another look was exchanged and the mare trotted forward. “I will stay, Your Highness, and be your prisoner.”

“Then your fellows may go.” Chrysalis’s expression turned stern again. “This is a one-time offer. Next time, I will neither take captives nor offer amnesty.”

The two stallions nodded and pulled the hoods of their stealth cloaks over their heads, vanishing and, as Verde watched with her eyepiece, trotted away quickly. The mare that was left behind pulled her stealth cloak off completely then, before any of them could react, stomped the gem with the stealth enchantment, shattering it. “I am your prisoner but I will not betray my own.” She said quietly.

“I appreciate that,” Verde replied, gesturing for Astra not to say anything. “But it was a pointless gesture; we’ve already captured one of the gems intact.”

The mare nodded. “But you didn’t capture mine.”

Verde smiled. “True.”

The smile brought forth a tiny, shy smile in reply before the zebra turned to Chrysalis. “Thank you, Your Majesty.”

“I’m certain that your people would do the same,” Chrysalis nodded to her. “Now, if you’ll direct us, this seems as good of place as any to take care of your dead before we proceed.”

Four and Two: Portents

“Our purpose here was actually to do a simple reconnaissance, to remain unseen and not undertake any sort of sabotage,” the zebra told them as they walked. It turned out that zebra burial rites were identical to those of ponies, although them having been soldiers meant that their arms and armor were to be used as their grave markers. Just as with her own cloak, the mare smashed the enchanted jewels beyond repair before draping them over the artfully-piled accruements and pinning them in place with each fallen soldier’s combat blade.

“What changed then?” Verde inquired.

“The praetus arrived with new instructions for us,” she replied. “We’d heard vague rumblings of a turnaround at Colthav and the disaster around Stalliongrad but we’ve been in-country for weeks and news was very sparse.”

“You’ve been skulking around the Barrens for weeks without being seen?” Astra looked and sounded impressed.

The zebra laughed lightly. “Don’t be overawed by the achievement. It’s not hard to survey a place where everyone smiles at you and enthusiastically suggests their favorite bit of scenery.”

“Hid in plain sight?”

“And it was so easy, a foal with half a brain could do it.” The zebra confirmed. “The Ministry of Morale does not exist here by decree of Queen Chrysalis and because the Ministry of Morale exists everywhere else, Her Highness’ subjects are very used to strange zebras.”

“I don’t know about that,” Astra commented. “You’re very pony to me.”

The comment earned her an odd look. “Is that meant as a compliment?”

“From her, it is,” Verde told her.

“Then thank you,” she smiled slightly. “But by ‘strange’, I simply meant zebras that aren’t well-known to them. But although easy, almost a vacation, the task has its challenges. As you might have noticed, my fellows have… er, had strong feelings on the subject of Nightmare Moon and a willingness to voice these feelings. There’ve been many close calls these last two months when some of our party drank too much excellent wine and spoke too freely. Nothing about our purpose—too much discipline, even drunk—but a bit too much about Nightmare.”

“Nightmare? Not the nightmare?”

“Nyx Sparkle isn’t a bad dream,” she replied dryly. “She’s a pony, with a mother named Twilight Sparkle.”

All three of them halted and turned to look at her with various degrees of surprise, causing the zebra to grin a little. “I told you, the mission of I and my companions was to gather intelligence. Why are you so surprised that I’d know who Nightmare Moon’s mother is?”

“Because it means that you’re the first non-Equestrian zebra we’ve met who isn’t completely insane!” Astra exclaimed. “You referred to her by name! You acknowledged that she has a mother! This is huge!”

The zebra frowned heavily at this, although the expression was more disturbed and pensive than angry. “It’s… rare for my people to acknowledge Nightmare Moon’s given name?”

Verde stared at her. “How can you not know that?”

“I… um,” the zebra sort of shrank a little, biting her lip, “avoid discussing the matter with my peers and they don’t talk about it amongst themselves. The nightmare may be drawn by the speaking of her name and they fear that.”

“What about you?” Chrysalis asked. “Why do you avoid discussing it with your peers?”

“I would be a heretic,” she responded quietly. “I would be right, for Princess Nyx Sparkle is no force of evil, but I would also be a heretic. The tradition of the malevolent stars is ancient, going back to a time before there were Princesses to raise and lower the Great Lights, and to doubt is anathema.”

“Why do you?”

“Because when I was a young filly, before the war, Nightmare visited my village. She wanted to meet the extended family of a zebra friend of the family, and so I got to see her with my own eyes.” She smiled. “She was… cool. Just as comfortable playing tag with children as enjoying some intellectual sparring with adults and I still remember being in awe at how smart she was.”

“She gets it from her mother.” Chrysalis smiled broadly. “Never met a more intelligent pony in my long life.”

“I’ve heard that she’s quite unique,” the zebra agreed. “Youngest child of Dusk Shine and Orion, older brother is the Captain of the Royal Guard, soon to retire. She’s unmarried, one child, close maternal-esque relationship with a young adult dragon named ‘Spike’ who’s her closest companion and assistant. Sixty-three years of age, no medical complaints, no signs of age-related dementia and it’s theorized that she has too strong of magical reserves to be at risk for a wasting disorder of that nature. Magical reserves are too plentiful to be accurately charted, ninety-ninth plus nine percentile intellect, known for a comprehensive grasp of all major and minor branches of unicorn spellcraft, insatiably intellectually curious and one report claims that she has such an advanced spell mimicry ability that she can cast any spell that’s cast in her presence even if she was not previously aware of that spell’s existence. The personal student, ward, and protégé of Princess Celestia; former minister-without-portfolio for the south-southeast province of Equestria encompassing the Everfree Forest, Night Palace, and the town of Ponyville; current Mare of the Ministry of Arcane Sciences.” She paused in her smooth, almost monotone, recitation and smiled a little. “Deeply devoted mother and beloved friend of the other five Ministry Mares, Bearer of the Element of Magic, classified into the so-called ‘Second Triumvirate’ encompassing the Mares of the three most powerful wartime Ministries.”

Verde couldn’t stop her jaw from dropping as the mare casually recited what sounded like the summary page of a vastly more comprehensive intelligence file. “Do you have those for… every pony of significance?”

“Just about,” she chuckled. “The files are our lifeblood, as important as eating and breathing, and so we’re supposed to memorize them. The one on Twilight Sparkle is especially large because of the policy of the Praetorium towards her: conduct ongoing comprehensive research on Mare Sparkle but under no circumstances is she to be targeted for assassination.”

“But the others Mares are?”

“Except for Mare Fluttershy, yes,” she nodded. “None of us know why the Praetorium is protecting Sparkle but it’s obvious why Fluttershy is off limits.”

“It is,” Verde acknowledged, almost smirking at the absurdity of anyone regarding the famously shy and kindly Mare as a threat. “I don’t mean to discourage your very helpful and chatty disposition but why are you telling us all this? You must know that the moment we have a chance, we’re going to pass all the juicy tidbits up the line.”

“I’m tired,” she replied. “I’ve been fighting these battles for the last nine years and in all that time, I’ve rarely seen home or loved ones. I could wall it off before I was assigned to infiltrate the Barrens and conduct a survey and intelligence assessment but now…” She sighed. “The Barrens are so much like home that it’s almost physically painful. Strangers are treated with basic decency and warmth. The prickly pear wine is sweet and tart in just the right way. Old stallions sit on porches in cool evenings, talking about anything and everything and nothing. The beaches are peaceful and when I walk out a little ways, I can find a welcoming stillness that washes all the troubles away in the profound silence.
“I ache for the love and safety of home, family, and familiarity; it’s a hunger you can feel in your soul. Yet here I am, fighting a war against ponies I do not hate to hurt a Princess I regard with warmth and fondness and the only way it’s going to end is a beautiful land, perhaps two, scoured by balefire. I volunteered to be your prisoner because my experience leads me to believe that Equestria holds the key to saving both zebra and pony and if I can put the tools in your hooves to do just that, I intend to.” She paused and gave Chrysalis a shy smile. “And when this is all over, I’d be honored if Queen Chrysalis would let a washed-up old zebra veteran start a family in her kingdom.”

“I’d be delighted to have you,” Chrysalis assured her with a smile. “Does your request come with a name?”

“Zaelkyra,” the mare responded. “I’m sure you’ve heard of my aunt, Zecora, although what I hear is that she isn’t very well-loved among Equestrians right now.”

“Yup,” Verde agreed with a touch of cheerfulness. “Arch traitor and all that. Stole the designs for an anti-machine rifle and gave it to the zebras. Got spirited away by other traitors at the last moment and returned to Zebrina a hero. Granted, she’s not actually a traitor, she was given those designs because they provided no tactical advantage, and she’s actually a brilliant spy but all the rest is totally true.”

Zaelkyra smirked. “Yes, Aunt Zecora told us. You can tell Mare Dash that the cover was perfect, by the way, but there’s no fooling family that knows you well.”

“She wasn’t supposed to do that,” Verde frowned. “The more that know…”

“…the more that can accidentally say something.” Zaelkyra nodded. “But we knew without being told, so being told changed nothing. Fear naught, there’s no more chance of us accidentally revealing her to the Praetors than there is of you accidentally hoofing your companion over to the Ministry of Morale for interrogation.”

Verde and Astra winced simultaneously. “Don’t even joke about something like that,” Astra told her with a shudder. “There’s a damn good reason most zebra citizens are sequestering themselves or fleeing to the Barrens. The only reason dear old Dad isn’t is that he’s got a sister in law…” Astra realized what she was revealing and stopped abruptly but she’d already said too much based on the suddenly thoughtful expression on Zaelkyra’s face.

“Which means your aunt has enough power in the Ministry to make it buck off.” She frowned. “That’s not possible; the Ministry has a reputation for being utterly implacable.” A paused. “Actually, it’s not impossible but if true, it means that your aunt is either Mare Pie—whom, last we checked, has no family married to a zebra—or…”

She facehoofed and spat an imprecation in Zebrish. “No wonder the praetus wanted to get her hooves on you! You’re a relation of the aster-damned Undermare of Morale!”

“I doubt she knew that,” Verde pointed out. “Most friends of the family aren’t aware that Viridian Rain has a zebra-looking niece.”

“I wouldn’t be too sure. I don’t know specifics but the Praetorium has developed an extremely good source in Manehattan where the biggest hub of your Ministry of Morale is located,” Zaelkyra replied. “They’ve become convinced that the Undermare of Morale is the true power behind the throne, so to speak, of the Ministry. They’re further convinced that she’s the one in control, not Pinkie Pie.”

“That’s a load of ponypies!” Astra growled. “Aunt Viridian has nothing to do with Mare Pie’s mad policies. Sure, it’s her ambition to get rid of Pinkie Pie somehow so she can stop with the rip-memories-from-heads stuff but for now, the only thing she controls is Grey Brigade.”

Zael gaped at her. “She has her own black ops unit?”

“She does,” Verde confirmed. “Started by her daughter, her niece, and a soldier colt named Pale Ribbons. It’s been a fairly successful venture so far and as Pale puts it, it’s bucking nice to do some good instead of just doing what the Ministry wants.”

“Mutually exclusive?”

“Increasingly, yes.”

Zael looked steadily at her before sighing. “Right now, I’m drinking in the bitter irony of Equestria destroying itself while its military commanders win the war.”

“As much as the Ministry of Morale causes problems…”

“I’m not just talking about them,” the zebra interrupted. “Elements of the Ministry of Wartime Technology tried to murder Mare Applejack. We wouldn’t have megaspells without the helpful assistance of the Ministry of Peace and Mare Fluttershy just hoofing over her Ministry’s research. And there’s something… wrong about Stable-Tec.”

“Wrong how?” Chrysalis inquired, glancing back over her shoulder. “And I think we need a place to set up camp soon. I don’t think any of us are exactly exhausted but I’m sure that when we get to the Hive, we’ll want to well-rested and sharp.”

“We don’t exactly have the supplies for much in the way of a camp, Chrysalis,” Verde pointed out.

“All we need is two sleeping pads and an autonomous soundproofing bubble spell,” she replied, glancing between Astra and Verde with a grin. “You know, just in case.”

Verde felt her cheeks get warm. “I don’t think the bubble would be necessary, Your Majesty.”

“It’s better than giving the two of you a kick if you get too enthusiastic,” the changeling queen grinned wider now, making her delicate fangs stand out.

Zaelkyra looked between the grinning Chrysalis and the blushing Astra and Verde. “Dare I ask?”

“It’d be great if you didn’t.”

The zebra thought about this for a moment. “Then I won’t. To answer your question about Stable-Tec, Queen Chrysalis, when a construction company puts one set of blueprints on file for public examination and sends a slightly different set to the construction site, there’s something off.”

Verde’s ears perked at that. “Are you certain?”

“I’ve seen the two myself,” she replied. “Both sets have an architect stamp from President Apple Bloom and an engineer stamp from President Scootaloo but they’re not identical. Very, very subtle differences, the hallmark of a very intelligent designer hiding his work. But there’s no way to know when they were altered, why they were altered, and who altered them; all we know is that the alterations were approved, assuming that they were even noticed.”

Her brow furrowed. “So some of the Stables could be dangerous?”

“In the way your gun is,” Zael replied. “The changes make it possible to seriously endanger ponies but whether the danger is realized is entirely in pony hooves.”

“Granted, but it doesn’t feel like a coincidence that both you and that Royal Guard mentioned that Stable-Tec is a concern.”

“Royal Guard?”

“Yeah,” Astra jumped in. “Pegasus mare, dark coloration, nice as hay. We think she’s one of Princess Luna’s personal guards because we’ve never seen any of Celestia’s laugh and smile and be friendly.”

“Are you sure she wasn’t Luna’s twin sister in disguise?” Zaelkyra inquired, smiling. “It’d be very much in keeping with Nyx’ sense of humor to pretend to be a Royal Guard just so she could surprise ponies with a Guard who’s very normal and approachable instead of a damn statue.”

“It would explain all of her unusual quirks,” Chrysalis commented thoughtfully, pulling a very neatly folded and magically-compressed ground cloth out of an internal pocket of her robes, which seemed to double as a saddlebag. “Taking implied criticism of the Thrones so personally, apparently acting as Luna’s doppelganger to give her time to enjoy the night skies, her sense of childlike wonder at seeing something new like Mount Lepi, and especially the way she just stood their with utter calm and confidence when Captain Droso’s detachment had guns pointed at you.
“Then again, Nyx is known for her gift for creating golems out of the substance of her magic that carry a fragment of her soul and a duplicate of her mind and personality. Night could just as easily be one of those golems and her confidence that she could make the transmission towers in the clouds work comes from the fact that Nyx could and, being a semi-living extension of Nyx, Nyx knows everything that she does.”

Verde nodded. “Either one would explain why she was so considerate. Taking the time to talk about home, family, hobbies, and life… brewing some of that wonderful ‘ambrosia’ tea out of sheer niceness… frankly, I’m surprised I didn’t leap to that conclusion immediately.”

“Even when you know that two of the Princesses are inclined to mix casually and easily with common ponies, it’s hard to imagine that you might be the common pony they’re mingling with,” Chrysalis smiled as she unfolded the ground cloth into two, levitating a section over to Zael and to Verde and Astra.

“Thanks, Chrysalis.” Verde spread the cloth out then pulled a sleeping pad, magically compressed like the ground cloth, from her saddlebag and unrolled it, letting it expand into a one-and-a-half pad that would very comfortably fit a couple snuggled up together. “Are you not planning to sleep?”

Chrysalis laughed. “Commander Tin, I’m a changeling. Gritty, sandy ground over hardbaked soil may be painful for a pony...” With a greenish glow from her horn, the changeling’s form flowed outwards and upwards and in moments, where a changeling had once stood, there was a black-scaled dragoness about twice the size of a pony. She was much more slender than an ordinary dragon, more lithe and almost feline than exuding the sense of overwhelming size and presence that dragons ordinarily did. Chrysalis craned her neck around and smiled, her eyes and mane the same but now decorating a slim and graceful draconic head instead of a distinctly equine one. “…but it’s quite nice for a dragon,” she finished, her voice acquiring a slightly husky purring quality. “It makes it wonderfully easy to go on vacation when I can just pick a clear spot of ground and sleep comfortably.”

“…you can transform yourself into a dragon at will.” Zaelkyra said, in a very waiting-for-the-other-shoe-to-drop tone of voice. “Is this something all changelings can do?”

“A few,” Chrysalis replied, curling up so her chin was resting on her tail facing the zebra, looking very comfortable. “But it doesn’t make us dragons, it gives us the physical shapes of dragons. I can no more fly or breathe fire in this form than I can reorder reality at will, even though it’s technically possible for this body to do both.”

“Ah,” Zael replied, looking faintly relieved.

Chrysalis laughed softly again at the zebra’s evident relief. “Come now, Zaelkyra… if changelings could become dragons at will, this war wouldn’t have lasted nearly this long. The only reason shifting among pony shapes doesn’t impair us is that we’re quite pony-like.”

“I’m impressed, Your Majesty,” Verde offered as she lay down and slipped her forelegs comfortably around Astra as the zebra-looking mare cuddled up lightly to her. “Not only are all the details right, you made significant variations.”

“Form reflects function reflects self,” Chrysalis replied, followed by a wide-mouthed and very toothy yawn. “Brute power was my way but once and I learned a painful lesson by it. So, without me consciously choosing it, I’m a lithe dragon with a light tread and touch. I wish I had the energy to maintain it for weeks at a time instead of a few days… it’s a very comfortable shape to wear.”

“You do look quite comfortable, Queen Chrysalis,” Zael commented as she lay her head down and shifted a little to find a comfortable position, not bothering with a sleeping pad.

“Not nearly as comfortable as our two companions,” Chrysalis chuckled, closing her eyes and settling her head comfortably on her tail. “Rest well, Zaelkyra.”

“Rest well, milady Queen,” the zebra replied.

Verde smiled as she looked between the zebra and the transformed changeling before burying her muzzle in Astra’s mane, still smelling faintly of mint. “A real zebra that’s normal, love,” she murmured. “Who would have thought?”

“Mmm… couldn’t all be insane, could they?” Astra replied in a relaxed, languid voice as she pressed lightly into the enfolding legs. “Well, I suppose they could but they… mmm… aren’t.”

“Not nearly as cool as having traveled with Nightmare Moon gone incognito on us, though,” Verde grinned. “Bet she’s been sitting on a cloud somewhere laughing her plot off at having fooled us. She sure dropped plenty of hints—from Ponyville, knew the Six, mom still has a home back in the town, ‘father’ wanted her to be the opposite of the mare she’s become—but still couldn’t look passed the solicitous guard with the turquoise eyes.”

Astra deftly twisted around so they were laying belly-to-belly then pressed her lips softly to Verde’s. “It’s OK, cuz… I forgive you for not being your mom.”

Verde mmm’ed happily, lingering in the kiss for a moment. “Not sure she would… she’d be all like ‘Observe, ask, deduce, act Verde. Oh-ay-dee-ay. Make sure your remember it.’ And then she’d lock me in a room with a bunch of photographs and not let me out until I had a clever observation for each one.”

Astra pulled back, blinking. “Seriously?”

Verde managed to restrain her giggle to a light snort. “No, you silly filly. You know as well as I do that she has a ‘sad puppy eyes’ weakness like none other.” She nuzzled under her fillyfriend’s chin, pausing, shifting subjects. “Do you think there’s anything to Night and Zaelkyra fretting about Stable-Tec?”

“If there is, we’re totally bucked,” Astra replied, trying with limited success to frown heavily while making a small noise of pleased contentedness at the nuzzle. “If somepony’s altering the blueprints, screwing around with the Stables, they’ve already got hundreds of thousands of pony victims in their hooves and we can’t do a bucking thing about it. I mean, what would we do? Spread the word that the most secure and thoroughly-engineered safe places in Equestria could possibly be dangerous? Make ponies afraid to take shelter in them if the worst happens?”

Verde gave her another light kiss before meeting the other mare’s beautifully sapphire eyes. “There’s a reason I got so much support for upgrading the Alishield, dear,” she told her. “I didn’t realize it until Night expressed her concern but I think Aunt Scarlet knows something that makes her reluctant to throw all her eggs in the Stable-Tec basket. Can’t imagine what it’d be… your mom’s awesome but a cunning spyfilly she ain’t.”

“But she has one for a sister,” Astra pointed out. “There’s no asset quite like family.”

“Oh yes,” Verde all but purred. “Great spyfillies, awesome pranksters, the one-mare source of the world’s chocolate chip cookies… and a nice warm mare for bracing desert nights.”

Astra was noticeably less successful at containing her giggle. “Isn’t the playful, irrelevant innuendo supposed to be my thing?”

“I stole your thing,” Verde stuck her tongue out and had to contain a groan as Astra deftly sucked the appendage into her muzzle and turned it into another, albeit deeper, kiss.

“Yes, well, you’re welcome to it,” she murmured when, after a complete minute, the kiss broke. “Good to see you break out of the obsessive analyst mold.”

“Well, I did bring my notes…”

Astra fixed her with a death-glare. “Don’t you dare, Verde Tin. I’ll totally cocoon you in duct tape and roll you around if you lay telekinesis or teeth on those damn drawings.”

“You have duct tape too?”

“A mare needs only three things in life: oil if it should move but doesn’t, duct tape if it does move but shouldn’t, and a frying pan if her fillyfriend needs enforced spa visitation,” Astra informed her in perfect deadpan. “I made sure to bring them all.”

Verde waited for a long moment then grinned widely as Astra sighed. “May I?”

Astra rolled her eyes with a touch of fondness. “Might as well get it over with.”

“Restraints and lube.” She faked a serious expression. “Is there something you want to tell me, love?” She couldn’t help but follow the question with a soft giggle.

“Oh, yuk it up cousin,” Astra nipped her lightly. “That’s the last straight line you’re getting out of me for the rest of the trip.”

“Fine with me.” Verde hugged her closer, sighing contentedly at the soft warmth of her fillyfriend’s body and a warm muzzle resting in the hollow of her throat. “Should get some sleep.”

“Eeyup,” Astra agreed, going completely relaxed. “Love ya, Day.”

“Love ya, Zen,” she murmured, letting her eyes close. “Sleep well.”

<><

“I’m pretty sure that traditionally, the monarch is the one that’s supposed to be carried around, not the subjects,” Chrysalis observed wryly.

“You’re the only who can do the dragon thing, Your Majesty,” Astra replied, grinning. “This way is much faster and besides, didn’t you say you’re really comfy as a dragon?”

“I did at that,” the changeling-turned-dragoness admitted as she returned her gaze to the path ahead. They’d been awoken by what sounded like distant explosive detonations and the harsh sun of the Barrens near noon and, unable to figure out where the detonations had come from and not hearing them repeated, they’d quickly packed up camp and started out along the tracks. After nearly an hour of having to trot at a rapid clip to keep up with Chrysalis’ expanded stride (she’d elected to keep herself in her draconic form for intimidation purposes), Verde had hit on the idea of Chrysalis slightly expanding her size and carrying the other three on her back. After much cajoling (and Chrysalis finally losing patience with having to travel so slowly so they wouldn’t fall behind), she’d agreed and it turned out that not only was Chrysalis’ form lithe like that of a feline, her hide was more like that of a pony than a dragon (proving her point that she couldn’t use the form for combat) and thus very comfortable to ride on.

“Can you give us any idea of what we’ll see when we get to the hives, Zael?” Verde asked the zebra, who’d elected to take position on Chrysalis’ shoulder.

“Zaelkyra,” she corrected her. “Zael is one of my cousins. The proper familiar shortening of my name would be ‘Kyra’ and although you have been pleasant to me, I don’t think we are quite that familiar with one another just yet. At any rate, my best guess is one of two extremes: either we’ll see nothing or we’ll see the results of a successful establishment of a beachhead.”

“And nothing in between?”

“Either they chose to stage the invasion last night when the coastal emplacements would be sight-impaired and vulnerable to being blinded by bright lights, or they held off to prepare the ground first,” Kyra replied. “The signaling station on the coast was already taken offline and the coastal batteries have no garrison, so if invasion was attempted, it will have been successful.”

“Losing the signaling station wouldn’t matter,” Verde told her. “The Royal Guard we were traveling with left to break into one of the relays and open up communications before we encountered you.”

“That would explain why we were unable to find a relay to sabotage and were forced to sabotage the station instead,” Kyra commented thoughtfully. “Ingenious to place the relays where only Equestrians can access them.”

“We thought so,” Chrysalis chuckled. “Although you’re undoubtedly right about the invasion being successful if attempted. Even if Night got a message to the military within moments of leaving us, it’ll still take days for them to arrive.”

“Except for General Dash’s forces,” Astra pointed out.

“Except for them, yes,” Chrystalis agreed. “But there’re limits to what ordinance a pegasi can carry—part of the reason I support Scarlet Knife’s initiative to add mechanical fliers to our forces—so they can only harass the beachhead and make it more difficult to quickly secure. No, the heavy equipment that we’d need to defeat the invasion moves on trains and I have no doubt that Zaelkyra and her companions were quite thorough about destroying switches.”

“Assuming it does arrive,” Verde pointed out. “If nothing else, the zebras have always been known for thoroughness. All it would take would be an extra team blowing switches far and wide and movement of heavy forces into the Barrens would get… complicated.”

“They’d still arrived eventually, though.”

“Not necessarily, Your Highness,” Astra said. “It’s quite obvious that the invasion of the Barrens is meant to try and divert forces from following up at Stalliongrad and command would be aware of that. No way in Tartarus they’d abandon you, but fighting the zebras over empty land would be low on their priority list.”

Verde felt Chrysalis tense below her. “So you think we may be on our own?”

“No, but I think that your uninvited guests aren’t going to be shown the door very soon.” Astra patted the changeling sympathetically. “One of the hazards of being one of the few places in Equestria where we can safely trade space for time.”

“So we’re traveling towards their likely invasion site… why?”

“In case we’re wrong or in case our eyewitness report convinces command that they can do major damage with a minimum investment,” Verde told her. “Sending one of the new dreadnaught refits to draw some blood, tow in a rail battery, use one of the new stutter-bombs to take out vital targets, maybe even giving some of Mare Applejack’s new power-armor soldiers a lift out here to act as Mare Dash’s heavy artillery. There’s lots of options, Chrysalis.”

The tension left and Chrysalis craned her neck around to give Verde a grateful look. “Thanks, Commander.”

“Speaking of the title, I was wondering something, Verde,” Kyra said, looking at her in a way that made it clear the curiosity was anything but casual.

“That being?”

“How did your mother get into the position of Undermare without running afoul of Mare Pie’s so-called ‘Pinkie Sense’?”

Verde sighed. “I take it that one of the things you found out about Mom is her daughter’s name.”

“Yes, and your cousin whispers quite loudly,” Kyra’s eyes twinkled. “I’m sure she does other things quite loudly as well.”

Both Verde and Astra colored at this but they were saved from having to answer by a kerthump kerthump of explosions, vastly closer this time. Chrysalis didn’t need to be prompted, pausing to gently dump her passengers before breaking into an easy feline lope; clearly, although she couldn’t fly, she had no trouble figuring out how to run effectively and she was already out of shouting distance before Verde could think to protest.

“What the hay does she think she’ll be able to do alone?” Verde demanded of no one, glaring after the retreating form of the transformed queen.

A series of kerthumps echoed in the near distance and Verde shook her head, grimacing as she started trotting in the direction they were coming from. “I guess this answers the question of whether they’ve established a beachhead,” she muttered.