Resonance

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Written by: Oneimare

Preread and edited by: Jay Tarrant

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Arc 3 – Convergence Chapter 1 – Black Horse

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“You sure know how to make yourself a pain in the ass.”

Holding back an undignified gasp, Delight sharply turned to glare at the source of the familiar and melodic, yet insufferable voice; to her frustration, her gossamer wings refused to obey and flared out.

“Excuse me?” she all but spat at Bláthnat.

The majestic doe met the queen’s ire with deliberate boredom before languidly obliging to explain herself in the most snobbish tone possible, “Your presence is required at the city council.”

The scathing look Del shot at her bounced off the immaculate expression that crystally clearly conveyed Bláthnat’s desire to do anything else rather than acting as Stalliongrad’s messenger. The queen momentarily considered mimicking the doe in a way only a changeling could when her intuition told her otherwise.

“Check the calendar, dear—it’s only next week,” she retorted instead in a mockingly sweet tone. “Not that I planned to attend it—I have more important things now than beating a dead horse.”

Bláthnat’s muzzle hardened from an irritated slack frown into an irked glare; she straightened herself, attempting to regard Delight haughtily, but it fell flat as the changeling’s curved horn reached higher than her branching antlers; the queen smirked.

“It’s an emergency meeting,” the doe barked. “Your refusal to attend would result in your charges being made public—immediately.”

The warning came out of nowhere and bore coldness going far beyond Bláthnat’s obnoxious temper; it took Delight a few long moments to convince herself she didn’t mishear the doe.

“What’s going on?” she hollowly demanded.

At least a dozen praetors waited nearby— her changeling sense told her that. The furtive sources of worry and duty slowly converged on her location, invisible and silent—or so their mother thought.

“No need to do anything rash, Heterocera,” Bláthnat nonchalantly noted, meaningfully shaking her antlers; beads and chimes softly tinkled, masking the eerily keening whine. “We’re interested in a peaceful resolution.”

The doe could pull quite a few, often unwelcomed, tricks out of her hat; and though not enough to pose a considerable threat, the rest of Stalliograd’s Technocracy could easily compensate for that.

They weren’t there right now, so Delight practically snarled, “Then you better answer my question.”

Bláthnat thoughtfully looked at Del and dryly admitted, “You’re being accused of high treason.”

The queen’s eyes grew moon-sized; however, the doe’s reserved expression told her she already had heard more than Bláthnat’s colleagues might want her to; the deer disliked everyone in equal measure, after all.

The silent churning of Delight’s thoughts settled betwixt the two tall figures, Bláthnat cooly observing the queen’s muzzle, twisting from the intellectual strain… until she got bored.

“So, do you intend to answer those accusations?”

The changeling hesitated, wondering what would happen if she answered that question negatively—aside from what had already been promised. Her sense reached out again, but other than her Praetorian Guard, the abandoned district lived up to its fame; her horn tingled with the proximity of a magic presence, but firing it up right now would likely satiate her previous curiosity in the least favourable way.

“Well, yes…” she finally and unsurely replied. “Just let me get my advis—”

Searing radiance flooded her vision.

Bláthnat not only busied Delight with blinking away the disorienting afterimage—the doe made sure the changeling would have to stumble herself into balance; luckily for the former pegasus, the transformation hadn’t robbed her of her flier’s agility.

“Ever heard about the concept of consent?” Del acidly noted.

The curtain of blinding white thinned enough for the spacious hall and its occupants to invade the queen’s still sensitive eyes.

Whilst years and the arid dust-laden winds had taken a toll on the faces of Stalliongrad Technocracy, their cast remained unchanged—almost. With Norwood’s passing, the council’s number of wrinkles got cut in half as Desert Rose, a young donkey—a mule, actually—inherited his seat; and only her mien bore something other than grim resolution.

Despite the emergency state of things, the gathered representatives bided their time, conspicuously avoiding to look at each other or Delight. Bláthnat took her place by the long table, not taking seat, however; the doe either seemed averse to standing too close to the others or she wanted to be ready for another teleportation.

Del put an end to the unmolested reign of silence.

“I find it very funny,” she hissed, “that you let a murderous goat spawn prey upon the citizens, but it’s me who somehow gets accused of betrayal.”

Save for the mute tension thickening, a heavy sigh answered the changeling’s challenge. It left the thestral’s chapped lips and heartbeat soon her hoof removed the glasses from her sombre face—to idle with them.

As if sensing Del’s patience growing dangerously thin, Maudlin Tale cleared her throat before saying, “We don’t have much time—we’re already on borrowed.”

“You don’t say.”

Though the queen’s bitterness matched the blatant hypocrisy of that statement, her passive aggressiveness ended there, dethroned by musing—according to Machine, Stalliongrad shouldn’t be in the know yet… unless something else had come up.

The batpony once again gave an impression of being a telepath as she continued, in a deeply concerned tone, “At this moment, the setting of the Sun has been delayed by forty-six minutes.”

“So?” Delight feigned coolness as her mind tried to frantically dig her memory for the most recent report on Luna’s state. Inwardly cursing at finding none, she funnelled her frustration into a question, “What does it have to do with me being a traitor?”

Her attitude finally got through the thick skins of the council—more than one attendant glared daggers at her, Maudlin’s cat-like glower included.

“Your Swarm is spying on us—you have eyes everywhere in Hope,” the aged mare coldly stated; however she failed to absolve her following words of any emotion. “And though we haven’t managed to catch your rats where we would prefer to not have them, in one place—we succeeded. You’ve had agents shadowing Nightmare Moon.”

Delight tensed her jaws.

You’ve had agents.

Unlike the thestral, she managed to speak levelly, “I’ve been watching over the filly—a young mare—who lives with her—my friend.”

“Your other agent.”

Maudlin and her cronies, silent though they were, really seemed determined to test the limits of Delight’s patience; however inane that statement sounded, it didn’t prove enough. But Del could see where it was coming from.

“Get a hold of your paranoia—I have nothing to do with whatever is going on,” she harrumphed.

The batmare squinted at the changeling—not because of her poor eyesight. “Tin Flower had been involved in the events concerning the Machine Goddess’s ascension and we found you exiting the Citadel mere minutes ago.”

“Tin Flower is her sworn enemy,” Del tiredly commented, rolling her eyes—those fools knew nothing. Then, something caught her attention—a seat not just empty, but absent from where it used to be. “Where is she, by the way?”

“We’re unable to contact the Citadel and every equinoid has left the city streets.”

The queen froze and had to put a tremendous effort so the fury that came after wouldn’t claim her expression.

The Machine Goddess knew what was going on; suddenly, the enmity between her and Stalliongrad’s clowns that had started from day one gained a dubious quality. The head and heart of the Swarm that ‘had eyes everywhere in Hope’ found herself horrifyingly blind.

“I have nothing to do with this!”

Maudlin flicked her tufted ears and calmly replied to the outburst, carefully choosing her words, “It’s because we allow such a possibility that you are here. The Swarm possesses a device able to restore the day and night cycle—your chance to prove your innocence.”

If Delight had thought of Stalliongrad as fools before, after hearing that—she lost her ability to speak for the whole minute from the sheer stupidity of that statement.

“Are you crazy?” she finally managed to splutter. “Do you have the slightest idea how much energy it requires? Using it would put my entire Swarm at risk!”

Expressions that belonged to a portrait by an unskillful artist met her waxing despair with glassy eyes. However, they couldn’t dream of copying the apotheosis of blankness that Maudlin achieved, blemished by perpetually predatory eyes that ruined the whole impression. Only Desert Rose had her mask cracking but held together by the pressure of her peers.

“I’m afraid,” the batpony intoned, “we can’t assist—only you have that much magic stored.”

Delight’s lips quivered, struggling to cover her fangs’ desire to become exposed; even though that wasn’t a lie—either her spies failed to infiltrate Stalliongrad thoroughly enough, or...

“You knew this would happen!” she roared at the gathering—not of idiots but malicious orchestrators. “How do I know it’s not you who set Luna off?”

None flinched as the changeling queen came closer to becoming a monster from the tales with which many of Hope’s parents scared obstinate children. Beyond the thin panelling, two full squads of fabled heavy infantry waited for a signal—their eagerness for action tasted sour on the changeling’s tongue. And the Technocrats knew that she knew.

“If you refuse, we have no other choice but to let the public know you are responsible for the cataclysm,” reminded Maudlin.

The queen took a deep breath and tried to call to the reasonable side the council possessed. Not that she had any other options not bound to end in a truly catastrophic fashion.

“The changelings are not your enemy,” Del pleaded. “We feed Hope, we patrol it alongside the police, our family welfare prog—”

Whatever exactly strung Maudlin up, Delight would never know—the mare’s immaculate neutrality shattered to reveal a pony blessed and cursed by Nightmare Moon.

A venomous hatred ignited in the nocturnal horror’s citrine eyes and she hissed, baring sharp teeth, “You’re parasite turncoats that are only tolerated because you control the city’s food production and have a small army!”

Forgetting about the deadly safe measure concealed in the walls, Delight answered with her own display of monstrous features aided by a slight transformation to fit her unflattering depictions in the scare stories.

The pickelhelm-wearing soldiers appeared as if from the thin air, their shoulder-mounted guns aiming the raging changeling, ready to leap at the batpony to find out whose fangs were longer.

As if it would hide her nature, Maudlin perched her glasses back onto her scrunched nose and spat, “The quality of life in Hope has been steadily deteriorating and the city can’t afford for its survival to be interfered with by a dangerous group absorbed with their egotistical goals.

“You’ve had ten years to prove your merit to society. You have one hour more before the public announcement will be made.”

A popular rumour suggested that the changelings possessed a sort of neural link—a ‘hivemind’. Although that wasn’t true, they knew about their mother’s return home long before she stepped into the Hive’s perpetually ominous twilight.

All but her Praetorian Guard—and only the veterans—cleared the dark and dank passages in the advent of the beacon pulsing with palpable pain and fury; not many would be able to withstand it anyway.

Lamina materialised from the shadows, respectfully bowing to the deafening and searing storm of emotion. “My Quee—”

“Where is Wire?!” Delight roared.

“She’s still on the mission with—”

“Find her and bring her here. At once!”

“At your orders”

When Lamina hastily dissolved back into the darkness, another form took her place, though the queen paid it no attention—she continued to navigate the Hive, her wrath and agony growing with each step closer to her destination.

If Rainbow Dash were to decide her successor, then Teleta probably… definitely wouldn’t have been her first pick; but Heterocera appointed her as the new captain of the reformed elite force for a reason—none could ever accuse the timid mare of disloyalty.

Nor could she be called out as lacking in the smarts department—the snippets of intel from the agents that had eavesdropped on the council coincided with the course her charge undertook. That an inability to unclench her jaws resulted in tactful silence, angry stomping of her liege notwithstanding.

An explosion of emerald magic blasted the door open and with that, the maelstrom of anguish and wrath was snuffed out by a simple sight.

In the dim glow of a bioluminescent lantern, a dust-covered device resided on a simple table in a fashion innocent if not for its sharp-edges gleaming with hunger—abandoned for a decade, the amplifier knew its hour would come one day.

The hour when it would kill the Swarm.

Being just a complex system of crystal prisms and arcanium filigree, it, of course, possessed no intent, evil or not. But as Delight stared in horror at the executioner’s axe she would have to rise over her children’s necks, she couldn’t help imagining it lusting for their lymph.

Where the inferno of rage had been casting blinding waves of overwhelming emotion, a well opened—a bottomless abyss of hopelessness with an effect no less profound.

Soft at first, then growing sharper, sniffles echoed from the bony walls.

“I… I can’t do this,” the changeling queen squeezed out, slumping down but unable to tear her leaking eyes away from the artificial alicorn horn designed for a single spell.

Bowing her head, Teleta silently and slowly took off her helmet. A step behind her queen, she joined her in gazing at the tool that portended her demise, one way or another. If used, she would have to watch how the green flames eat the flesh of everyone dear to her and feel her own body turn to ashes. If left alone, in less than an hour the entire city would turn on those who’d helped it the most.

“I’m so s-sorry,” Delight sobbed. “It has always been an uphill battle and now I’ve lost. I can’t save you, I don’t know how. I’m sorry.”

A pair of metal-clad hooves wrapped around her torso and Teleta’s mane brushed against the dust-blighted coat of her mother, even though it wasn’t Heterocera involved in her coming into this world in the unique midwife-like fashion.

“We know,” she muttered into the chest of the shuddering mare. “Queen Chrysalis told us many times throughout the years that we were always on the brink of extinction. Yet we survived each time.”

Tears fell on Teleta’s head as Del sadly shook her head and spoke hollowly, “I’m not her.”

The captain of the guard tightened her embrace; not only offering support but seeking it as well. Softly she uttered, “I loved her as much as my birth-mother and still love her. She sang the softest lullabies… But you might have more chances to get us through this—you see ponies differently.”

There was more than just the physical comfort mother and daughter shared at that moment—their changeling nature let them bestow life-saving essence upon each other; the warmth spread through their limbs… until it didn’t.

“Maybe I shouldn’t,” Del’s voice came out almost inaudible, muffled by venom.

Teleta recoiled from the chitin underneath which the aching heart flared with pure darkness. She stared at the vicious snarl overtaking Delight’s mellow features and mouthed in despair, “My Queen…”

The swelling cloud of suffocating emotions dissolved, leaving behind an empty shell tinged with regret. It whispered, “I’m sorry, I just…” the quiet lament became a bitter hiss. “It’s so unfair!”

However, she didn’t let her umbrage foul the air for long—straightening herself with a cleansing sigh, she declared, even if somewhat shakily:

“And it’s not over yet.”

A small smile settled on Teleta’s lips when she snapped a salute—though the spark of hope wasn’t as strong as she wished, it was there; when it came to hope, that was all that was ever needed.

“We will stand by your side until our last breath!”

“No.”

Teleta’s expression of determination shattered for a hurt to take its place.

The queen approached the table and a green aura enveloped the ridiculously oversized tiara. It didn’t budge, however.

“One use of the amplifier is going to leave the Swarm with a week’s worth of love,” Delight sombrely informed her captain. “Pass that to everyone and then you’re relieved of your duties. All of you.”

The changeling stared at her mother as if she had turned into a living flame.

“But—”

“It’s all my fault and my responsibility alone,” Del sharply cut her off and darkly continued, “I’m either using that week to fix everything or die trying.”

She focused her attention on the device, recalling the instructions from Chrysalis and Sunset Shimmer; her lips formed a thin line—she could use Wire’s advice right now. Where was she when Delight needed her the most? Ah, yes…

Teleta lingered for a moment and reluctantly shuffled out of the room—her queen gave her an order, after all. Her heart went aflutter when Del’s call stopped her, though that elation quickly ceded to curiosity mixed with worry.

“Could you show me where you have the heavy-calibre weapons and explosives stashed? Someone owes me answers and this time when I knock, the doors will open.”

Delight didn’t know if she should chide herself or be proud—she’d successfully fooled a changeling. Though a sliver of hope suggested she might have told the truth.

Her Swarm had a week to come to terms with their perdition if only Stalliongrad would show some mercy. The Sun had set, but it would have to be risen again and there was no love left to make that happen. And since luck hadn’t been on her side lately, Delight had one night to figure out how to save her children.

She scowled at the empty place by her side, though Wire didn’t deserve a single ill thought—her aid was absent for the same reason Bláthnat caught her with horseshoes off. Nor did it help that Teleta adamantly refused to let her inside the Hive’s armoury; the queen couldn’t find it in her heart to force her captain—not with death breathing down their necks.

Little did Teleta know—whilst she had instructed her queen in basics of self-defence, Wire had also shared what she had learnt about battle spells. Crippled by the Transference Paradox, she compensated for her inability to protect her friend with the diligent search for knowledge and making sure it settled well in Del’s mind.

The want for demolishing tools came from pettiness rather than necessity.

As the changeling eyed the Citadel contemplating if she wanted to enter it through a window or a door—of her making—a soft sound made her turn, eyes already burning with loathing even before they met the Harbinger’s serene gaze or that of the Machine Goddess herself.

“No need for that,” said the arcanium alicorn. “Here’s the door.”

At her words, a portal opened behind the statuesque figure—an opening into an expanse of sand glistening silver in the moonlight. She invitingly motioned with her hoof, smiling amiably and apologetically.

“I don’t trust you,” Delight deadpanned.

The grin on the metal mask gained a mysterious quality.

“So, am I your enemy now?”

Del squinted at the unwavering and unnerving expression, searching the homogenous glow of the Machine Goddess’s (or Harbinger’s) eyes for any hint; probing the emotions of the metal equine revealed nothing as well.

She didn’t trust her—not in the slightest, not anymore. But… What was she to lose? And whatever the Machine Goddess was playing at, she’d set the board masterfully—leaving the changeling queen with only one direction still promising some hope.

“Your last chance. Fail to prove yourself—and I’m making sure not only the changelings will go extinct.”

Author's Note

If you notice any mistakes sneaked in through the editing, let me know.

Stay awesome.