The wind whipped mercilessly over and around the boulders and stones that formed the arid landscape.
Conditions here were inhospitable in the best of times, but these were not the best of times; the relentless icy blast of winter was distilling its frigid rage into driving sleet and snowstorms to merge with the sharp grit and dust that bedevilled the area all year round.
Not for nothing was this area called ‘The Badlands’.
Attempting vainly to protect his unnaturally large light blue eyes from the sharp dust and ice particles being blasted ceaselessly at him, a lone figure picked his way around the myriad rocks that littered the ground. He had struggled on for days against overwhelming odds, not sleeping, not eating, but driven by a subliminal calling that his very existence could not ignore.
Finally, he found himself exhausted at a large hole in the rock that marked arriving at his goal. At any other time, this entrance would have been guarded by at least two heavily armed changelings, sometimes many more, but now, the hole stood ominously unattended.
Grateful to be finally protected from the nightmarish conditions outside, Kevin took a moment to collect his senses. Something was wrong, horribly wrong. The hive was silent. The walls that used to be constantly changing, opening and closing portals between different chambers in an apparently random pattern had solidified, as the very fabric of the hive had died.
He knew where to go, but was unsure how to get there without the right portals being in place to give him access, so set about the trial and error process of navigating to the Throne Room. Many times, he encountered solid walls where he knew portals should have been, but recognised that waiting for them to open would be pointless, so backtracked and set off in a different direction once more.
The further in he progressed, the more he became swamped by the pervading sense of death all around him. He had broken with his Queen at the time of the Canterlot invasion and had since become accepted among the ponies of Equestrian society, even being invited to the wedding of Cranky Doodle Donkey, where the Princesses, his race’s sworn enemies were in attendance. However, although his allegiance was now with the ponies, the hive had been his home, and Chrysalis would forever be his Queen.
One of the side antechambers he was exploring suddenly revealed itself to have a portal, half opened, looking like an attempt had been made to force it open with magic from the other side. Believing he was now finally on to something; Kevin peered in and caught his first view of the Throne Room. The forced portal was not at floor level, so he had to climb through carefully, and even knowing that the hive was dead, he was still worried that the walls may suddenly close in over him where he was, so hurried through as quickly as he could.
Once inside, he made his way tentatively towards the throne. He knew that Chrysalis would be angry and likely seek revenge on him for his disloyalty, yet she had summoned him, and such a call could not be ignored. Nonetheless, the possibility of facing death made him cautious and he kept himself alert to danger.
As he approached the throne, he could see it was empty, but at its foot lay a pile of crumpled rags. Surely Chrysalis would have been furious to see such desecration of her throne?
Approaching carefully, he suddenly could make out a holed foreleg hanging out from the rags and stopped still to watch it, then surveyed all around for signs of a trap, but there were none.
Going closer, he thought he saw the foreleg move, just a little and stopped again to make sure he was safe.
“My Queen?” he ventured uncertainly.
The pile of rags stirred, and a tired voice rasped, “Who is it?”
“My Queen!” he exclaimed and ran forwards to the source of the fragile words, stopping in shock to see the emaciated form of Chrysalis lying on the floor, eyes closed, clutching what pitiful rags as were there close to her for warmth.
“It’s Kevin, my Queen” he said, “What has happened here?”
“The traitor” gasped Chrysalis. There was a pause while she made a sound that tried to pass itself off as a cynical laugh, but died in her throat and came out as bitter wheezing, “Oh, the irony.”
Kevin moved up close to study the once proud form of his Queen, now wrapped in many places with improvised bandages that were soaked with fetid, gangrenous blood stains that smelled as foul as they looked. Despite their differences, Kevin felt choked and an uncomfortable feeling in his eyes threatened to make him cry to see her in such a fragile condition.
“Why did you call for me, my Queen?” he asked softly, reaching down to cradle her head.
She was too weak to resist and forced herself to tolerate being touched by the traitor, unable as she was to do much about it.
“I didn’t just call for you” she wheezed contemptuously and continued slowly between breaths, “I was reaching out to all of my changelings, but it appears you are the only one left.”
“My Queen, you mean …”
“Yes” she replied, “The traitor and the dying Queen. We are the last of our kind. I was mortally injured when I was blasted out of Canterlot. All the other changelings have laid down their lives to sustain me, but now there are none left and I am as far from recovery as ever.”
"You summoned me so as I can lay down my life for you too?" asked Kevin.
"No. Although I cannot deny that you are the last changeling I should consider worthy of seeing this final act" Chrysalis lamented bitterly.
“I want you to deliver a letter to Princess Celestia” she said, still finding the venom to spit out the word ‘Princess’.
“Of course” he replied, “Where is it?”
“I will dictate” she gasped, “You will write.”
“As you wish, my Queen” he responded, as a conditioned reflex action from having lived in the hive under her rule for so long.
Kevin looked around and found a parchment written on one side, but blank on the other. He could also find a quill, but no ink.
Chrysalis mustered the effort to open an eye fractionally, and saw him flustering around trying to complete her request.
“Use the blood” she said, stopping him in his tracks.
“It’s of no use to me now” she added without any hint of emotion.
Kevin edged closer to see if he had heard correctly, and watched as her foreleg pointed feebly to the darkening puddles that had not been soaked up by the stale bandages. He felt utterly repulsed, but looking around, could see no alternative, and feared it unlikely that she would last if he made a return journey to the nearest pony city, so reluctantly dipped the tip of the quill into the coagulating puddle.
“Dear Celestia” Chrysalis dictated slowly,
“I write to concede defeat. You have won. The price for me has been high, as I have had to watch the last of my race die, and now only the traitor who bears this letter to you is here to record my final hours.
You do not know what it is like to be a mother and watch your children slowly starve, but if you did, you may understand that a mother will go to any lengths to feed them. That is why I was forced into taking what we could not get from any other means, and paid the most terrible price.
As a result, you will be able to sleep more soundly in your bed tonight, but will have denied yourself access to our heritage and our culture; mysteries that will now forever remain unknown to you. Farewell then, victorious Princess. We may be the first race you have destroyed, but I doubt we will be the last. Weep not for me, but for yourself.
Signed, Queen Chrysalis of the changelings.”
She struggled hard to recover her breath, giving Kevin a respite from her morbid dictation to feel the full weight of burgeoning grief.
Despite their differences and the fact that she would have likely killed him for his betrayal in normal times, he lay down next to his Queen and held her, ignoring the putrid smell from her wounds. They were the last of a species on the verge of extinction. Even in a zoo, such creatures were at least afforded some luxury in their dying days.
He was watching Chrysalis die, a pitiful shattered frame belying none of her greatness in life. The stinging in his eyes became stronger and slowly tears began to form, dripping onto her failing body.
Her breathing became more shallow and it was clear that she had saved the energy to dictate her last letter at the expense of her own life.
He hadn’t held her for more than a few minutes, when the breathing finally became too shallow to detect, and her chest rose no more.
It was over.
Kevin held her, keeping her warm, as if that could somehow help, and wept quietly, his stinging tears mixing with her spilled blood.
With nothing to judge the passage of time, he had no idea how long he had held her, but when his tears had stopped, he pulled away from her with utmost reverence and stood, looking down on her lifeless body, trying to find the words that he felt were deserved, but none came.
Kevin navigated his way back to the hive’s entrance more easily than he had found his way in, picking up a shovel on his route there. He stopped at the threshold, noting that the snowstorm outside had abated at long last; that at least would make his next job a little easier.
He walked out and found what would have been called a glade, had there been any vegetation to decorate the bare stones, and began to dig into the hard ground.
A while later he returned to the same spot carrying the body of his Queen on his back, and lowered it gently down into the hole he had dug, taking care to lay her out carefully with the badges of office she had wielded in life.
The snow started again, depositing a light dusting over the former Queen, before Kevin could take one last look which was neither love, nor hate, but a sense of duty. Then he filled the hole back with the spoil he had dug out and covered the site as best he could to blend it in with the surrounding topography, so it would not be found by any who would choose to either worship or desecrate her final resting place.
After one last look back at the grave and the entrance to the hive, he set off to deliver his Queen’s last letter to Princess Celestia, then get back to his life in Equestria, his debt paid, vowing never to return to this place.
