The Light Within Us

An unexpected letter arrived the next day.

Dear King Thorax,

How have you been lately? I trust the hive is still prospering under your care? It’s been a while, and I didn’t want to take up too much of your time when you probably had more important things to do, but I still think about you occasionally (how couldn’t I?) and hoping to see you again at some point in the future.

I’m afraid this isn’t a social call, however. I visited a friend in Detrot the other day, and while our time together was pleasant, there was one peculiar thing she shared with me. She works in railway maintenance, and one evening while returning home from a late shift on the city outskirts, she was enjoying the night sky and saw something fly above the treeline of the nearby forest. She says it was too dark to see what exactly it was and she didn’t think much of it, except she saw it again the next night. This time it flew directly above her, and she swears the thing had holes in its legs! I questioned her at length if she’s sure they were legs rather than some object the thing was carrying, and apparently she is sure! I debated with myself and my sister whether or not I should bother you with this, and although she thinks there might be a rational explanation and has been reluctant to have us cause a ruckus, neither of us can sleep peacefully anymore, so I decided to write to you anyway, thinking you’d know what’s going on if anyone does. So, are any unreformed changelings still unaccounted for, or is this something else? (Please say it’s something else…)

Oh, almost forgot. In case it matters, Bogie Wagon isn’t sure when exactly this happened, but she thinks about a month ago.

Sorry if I’m freaking out over nothing, and thanks in advance.

Soothing Dusk

As if on cue, Pharynx dragged himself into the throne room just as I was finishing reading the letter. He looked as if something had chewed him up and spat him out, and he was yawning and rubbing his eyes.

“What happened to you?” I gasped.

“First wedding night,” he mumbled; it sounded like an attempted retort with all the energy and brazenness sapped out. “I’m beginning to realize why ponies go on a honeymoon instead of right back to work…”

“...you didn’t hold drills this morning, did you?”

“Psycho took over after two hours. Not even sure why I came here of all places…”

“Maybe you wanted to say hi to your little brother?” I grinned awkwardly. He’d probably aimed for his bedchamber and ended up here by mistake, though…

“What for? I see you all the time!” He became aware of the letter in my hooves. “What’s that?”

I glanced at the letter; I had meant to discuss it with him, but he was in no condition for it at the moment! “Uh… nothing…”

“Doesn’t sound like nothing.”

“No, really, it can wait! Why don’t you take a nap now?”

“So it is something,” he half-smirked. “Lemme see.”

“C’mon Pharynx, you’re too tired! We can discuss it later!”

“I said give!” He ripped it out of my grasp and started reading.

He looked bored with it at first, as if reading only to spite me, but about halfway through, he snapped out of the exhausted gutter and into his usual, focused, attentive, super-disciplined self as if a switch had been flipped; he glanced at me briefly but kept reading. Then, having finished, he glared at me again and shoved the paper into my chest.

“Explain to me one thing, Thorax,” he grumbled. “You’ve obviously read this, otherwise you would have said you haven’t. This something-what’s-her-name Wagon pony saw Chrysalis on the outskirts of Detrot on two separate occasions, and you claim it can wait?! Are you out of your mind?!”

“Um… we don’t know for sure it’s Chrysalis…”

“No, it was a Chrysalis-shaped balloon for little fillies,” he retorted with an eye roll. “Of course it was her! Who else would it be?”

“I don’t know, maybe some other unreformed changeling…”

“What other unreformed changeling?! She’s the last one!”

“The last one that we know of-”

“There aren’t any others! I checked the service records ages ago! Everyling is accounted for; the hivebound drones, the infiltrators, the released prisoners-”

“What about the drones presumed dead? You know some bodies haven’t been recovered; there’s a chance some of them are still alive!”

“Doubtful. They would have found a way to contact the hive and explain themselves - they would have had enough time for it even before you took command - or they would have gotten captured. I know who the unaccounted-for ones were; they were genuinely loyal enough to Chrysalis that I find it unlikely they would have abandoned the hive and their assignments to live on their own, and even if some of them were feigning loyalty in order to avoid punishment for disloyalty, treason, or however you want to call it, why not return to the hive now that the new leader is such a goodie-goodie? Face it, Thorax, they’re dead.”

“I know… it’s just, there’s always that tiny little possibility…”

“Whatever. Random drone or Chrysalis, our approach is the same.”

“Which is…?”

“We go to Detrot, find this pony, and question her. Then we commence a search.”

“Okay…”

“Well, what are we waiting for?”

“Now?”

“Chrysalis is a threat to both the hive and Equestria. This takes priority; everything else can wait until we find her or at least figure out what happened!”

The train was full of changelings.

Pharynx had originally intended to have me teleport us - meaning the two of us plus half the army - directly to Detrot, only to be left grumbling in frustration upon being told I could neither teleport everyling at once nor do it in a single jump and would probably exhaust my mana reserves about halfway through, so he’d reluctantly packed us all onto the train and very begrudgingly settled for a long ride. Despite my occasional efforts at a conversation, he hadn’t said a word since.

Now that we were almost at our destination, I tried again.

“Do you really think we’ll find her?”

“I will personally fry any soldier who fails!”

“But it’s been a month! She could be anywhere by now, maybe not even in Equestria!”

“Then we’ll find traces of her having been here.”

“Like you found traces of me after I ran from the hive?”

“You’re forgetting I didn’t want a trace of you to be found! Also we did find the biggest trace of you imaginable and you’d be long dead now if I hadn’t sabotaged the process of beating that trace to a pulp, in case you forgot.”

I hadn’t. “And in case you forgot, every hunter except you did want me found. Don’t you think they made an effort?”

“I don’t know what they did then, but now I’m going to make them succeed if it’s the last thing I do!”

A few drones shifted nervously.

“Pharynx, you of all people know how hard it is to find a changeling that doesn’t want to be found! And Chrysalis has had centuries to hone the hiding skills and is probably more cunning than all of us put together!”

“She’s also alone. Not just against us but against the whole world. She literally has no one to rely on for any kind of assistance or support, unlike for most of her life when she had the entire swarm to command into dying for her if necessary, and we can take advantage of that.”

“...but what if it’s not enough?”

“I won’t allow it to not be enough. Your life and the future of the hive depend on it, and we cannot fail!”

The train came to a halt. Our disembarking drew stares from nearby ponies, and though some of them had a hint of nervousness or concern in their auras, no panic ensued.

A group of Royal Guards approached us.

“Good afternoon, Your Highness, and welcome to Equestria,” one of them said. “I’m Lieutenant Halberd, head of the Detrot Royal Guard outpost, and these are sergeants Firm Hoof, Bravado, and Thunderstorm. Princess Celestia informed us about the situation and we’re here to offer assistance.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant-”

“You involved Celestia in this?” Pharynx interjected, frowning. “Don’t you think we can handle this ourselves?”

“If Chrysalis really is lurking somewhere in Equestria, then she’s the ponies’ problem too, not just ours, and they deserve to know what’s going on,” I told him. “Besides, it’s part of our alliance with Equestria to cooperate against threats, and didn’t you complain a while ago about not seeing how they would contribute?”

“Contribute?” he snorted. “In hunting down a changeling? They were clueless about the infiltrators right under their snouts, and you said it yourself how tricky this is going to be!”

“Pharynx,” I groaned, rubbing my forehead, “this is a matter of international security, and as you yourself said, the hive’s future. Don’t you think that’s reason enough for setting your stubborn pride aside temporarily and at least allowing the ponies a chance to help?”

“Hm.” He eyed Halberd with a scowl and gritted teeth for a moment. “If you want to help, you can start by tracking down the pony who reported the suspected sighting.”

“Bogie Wagon? She lives a few blocks from here. Shall I take you to her?”

Pharynx glanced at me. “Did you tell them her name?”

“I may have mentioned it to Celestia-”

“May have?”

“Okay, I did. She asked!”

“Remind me to never let you get tortured for information… Alright, fine. Let’s go there while our troops get in position.”

He transformed into a nondescript pegasus before heading out, and the soldiers followed suit with various disguises of their own.

“Why do we need disguises?” I asked. “The ponies aren’t afraid of us!”

“Maybe not, but do you want her to recognize us if she’s here?” he retorted. “We should have stopped looking like ourselves while still on the train!”

“...fine.” I didn’t think it would matter much now that I’d been going around in my own form for a while, especially since I had backup this time, but then again, knowing how unscrupulous Chrysalis was and what she was capable of, Pharynx’s strategy might not have been entirely senseless; even if she refrained from openly attacking us on the spot in the middle of the city, she could still cause trouble if seeing me here led her to the conclusion that the throne back home was empty and potentially reclaimable, not that I doubted Psycho’s willingness and ability to defend it, but there was no need to push our luck and get soldiers injured or killed trying to keep her away from it… so I followed Pharynx’s example and made myself a disguise.

While the three sergeants accompanied our disguised troops into the outskirts of the city where they would commence the search around the railroad, Halberd led Pharynx and me through the streets in the opposite direction until we arrived at a medium-sized building that had seen better days but was still in a somewhat alright condition. Upon checking the row of mailboxes to verify we were at the right address, he led us to the third floor, where one of the doors was marked with an image of a train car. The owner’s cutie mark, I presumed.

Pharynx looked around the hallway, and apparently satisfied with the situation, said, “Should be safe to drop the disguises.”

We did, and Halberd knocked on the door, which opened a crack after a short wait.

“Yes?” the mare on the other side asked.

“Ms Bogie Wagon?” Halberd asked, getting a nod in return. “I’m Lieutenant Halberd of the Royal Guard, accompanying King Thorax and Commander Pharynx of the Changeling Kingdom. May we come in?”

Another nod, and a moment until she undid the chain keeping the door from opening further, and we were inside; I had to keep my head low to avoid scraping my antlers across the ceiling, but downsizing myself would probably have freaked Bogie out. Thankfully, we were offered seats pretty soon.

“Can I help you?” she asked eventually.

“You’re friends with Soothing Dusk from Whinnyapolis, correct?” I began.

“Oh,” she said. “She told you about the thing I saw. I… honestly, I didn’t think anything would come of it even though she’s your acquaintance. I certainly didn’t expect you to come running this soon after I told Soothing about it!”

“Can you tell us exactly what you saw?”

“Well, it was just a shadow over the treeline the first night. It was too dark to catch much detail and I only caught it for a second or two anyway, and I wasn’t even sure I hadn’t imagined it. I probably would have left it at that and forgotten about it if something hadn’t flown right above me the next evening. This time it was a little closer and I took it for a pegasus until it flew in front of the moon and the moonlight shone through the holes in its legs.”

“Through the legs?” Pharynx inquired. “It couldn’t have been a reflection or something?”

“No, there aren’t any lights there that could reflect off something on the thing’s legs like that, and I can’t imagine what else it could be.”

“Probably a changeling, then. Did you catch any other details?”

“What do you mean? It was dark!”

“But the changeling flew in front of the moon the second night. Did you catch any particulars of the silhouette other than the leg holes? Or an estimate of body size?”

“I’m not sure…” She closed her eyes. “It just looked equine… maybe a little larger than an average pony, though it could just be my impression, what with it being dark and all, and anyway I didn’t think much of it…”

“Horn shape? Tail length? Did it have a neck fin or a mane?”

“Uh…” She opened her eyes.

“It’s important,” I encouraged her, catching on to what Pharynx was aiming at. “Anything you can tell us will help, even if you’re not sure.”

She closed her eyes again. “...it… passed in front of the moon… I would have taken it for a pegasus if not for the leg holes… but what did… hmmm. Now that I think about it, the mane and tail were pretty long-”

“You’re sure it was a mane? Not a neck fin or some kind of scarf or cloak or whatever these things are called?”

“Well, I suppose I can’t rule out a weird headdress… but I’m pretty sure it was attached to the head rather than the neck or the barrel, so probably not a scarf, and it would have been pretty tattered for a piece of cloth…”

“Did you get a side view of the silhouette or the underside view?”

“...the underside.”

“Then you wouldn’t have caught a neck fin, and maybe not the horn, either,” Pharynx mused. “Did you ever knowingly see a changeling prior to today?”

“Only in newspaper articles after the Canterlot invasion and on a couple of occasions after your queen was overthrown.”

“Was Chrysalis in any of the pictures?”

“Not that I know. All the changelings looked the same, except for King Thorax after the reformation, I mean. Why?”

Pharynx took the shape of Chrysalis. Bogie yelped.

“That could be the thing I saw! Is that her?”

“That’s what she looked like the last time we saw her,” I said as Pharynx reverted to his own form. “We assumed it was her, but some drones are unaccounted for after various assignments and presumed dead, and we had to make sure what you saw isn’t one of them so we could plan our approach better.”

“I thought Chrysalis was dead! She isn’t?!”

“No, she ran off following my ascension and hasn’t been seen since.”

“Oh my Celestia… and you’re saying she flew right over me?! How am I still alive?!”

“She may not have noticed you, or she may have been trying to keep a low profile because unexplained disappearances of ponies would have gotten noticed now that we’ve stopped hunting for prey. Another possibility is that she may have been scouting for prey that wouldn’t be missed. You didn’t see her a third time?”

“No, but repairs to that section of the railroad were completed just before the second time I saw her and I got sent elsewhere afterwards, so I wouldn’t know if she appeared again. Not there, anyway.”

“Which section are we talking about?”

“The repairs were being done between the second and third milestone south of the station, and I sighted her… I dunno, halfway home? I’m not even sure if it was roughly the same spot both times.”

“Within two miles south of the station, then. Not that she would have had a reason to limit herself to that particular area, but it’s a start.”

“If you say so… gee, I can’t believe I might have narrowly dodged a cocoon…”

“I can assign a few Royal Guards to protect you until this is resolved,” Halberd offered.

“You think I’m still in danger?”

“We can’t rule it out at this point. Have you noticed any unexplained ponies lately, or had anything weird happen?”

“...no, I don’t think so.”

“Anypony you know mention something of the kind?”

“No…”

“Lieutenant,” I interjected, “has anypony gone missing around here lately?”

“None that I can remember personally, but I’ve got people searching our records ever since we got word of what was happening. We’ll know soon.”

“It might not be enough,” Pharynx stated. “She’s smart enough to target ponies who wouldn’t be missed, so it’s not unlikely that ponies are missing but nopony reported it.”

“Can you search for them too, if it’s not too much to ask?” Halberd asked us.

“Looking for captured prey is part of our standard search protocol for missing changelings.”

“Good! Thanks.”

“Ms Wagon, I know all this wasn’t easy to hear,” I said. “Do you have anyone who can stay with you?”

“My husband is at work at the moment but should be home soon, and I’m sure Soothing would come running at the first sign of something not being right. Heck, I barely managed to convince her to go home after she found out I’d seen a changeling! I thought it was a random leftover unreformed drone… never thought the queen might be lurking…” She shuddered.

“We’ll sort it out,” I told her. “I promise.”

“I know… Soothing said so much good about you… I think I can trust you.”

There wasn’t much more to be found out so we said our goodbyes just as Bogie’s husband came home. Halberd made a detour to the Royal Guard outpost to organize protection for Bogie and check on progress of the missing ponies reports, and Pharynx and I flew to reunite with the soldiers, who had in the meantime set up a command center in an abandoned shack on the north-eastern outskirts of the city, one that had previously been used as the base camp for one of the teams sent after me a couple of years ago. A tactical panel had already been arranged on one of the walls, complete with a detailed map of the area and a roster of teams assigned to each sector, and several drones were guarding the perimeter.

“Report,” Pharynx demanded of the one guarding the shack entrance.

“No movement in sight, Sir,” she said. “The teams deployed for a preliminary sweep ten minutes ago, so it’s too early to know anything. Is the presumed target correct?”

“Yes. Come here, Thorax.”

I followed him inside, and he opened a crate that sat in a corner and passed me the pieces of my armor.

I flinched. “Why do I need that?!”

“Because I’m not just gonna sit on my rump waiting for someling to get lucky when we know where the sighting took place, and I have no intention of letting you out of my sight either with her on the prowl, which means you’re coming with me, and since you’re no good at fighting, you’ll need at least some level of protection that doesn’t entirely depend on me or any soldiers who may be in the same area as us.”

“Can’t I just sit here with the guards?”

“Thorax, you’re my brother and the king of the hive. I’m not leaving you and worrying what became of you while I was away, and I don’t care how skilled these guards are! Now put that thing on already!”

I did, reluctantly and with a good amount of help on his part. At least he didn’t insist on giving me any weapons… then again, he must have assumed I’d sooner injure myself with one than use it on an enemy with any level of success, and he was probably right.

Days passed with no luck finding Chrysalis, her lair, or any trace of her presence in Detrot and its surroundings, no matter how hard our teams looked, even after Pharynx had reorganized the team rosters to have both day and night covered. He even pulled more teams from hivebound security to expand the search into Foal Mountain and Everfree Forest; he would have done the same for the areas north and west of Detrot, but the smaller army compared to the one of our old era meant that would have left the hive almost defenseless, so in spite of his misgivings, he relented into leaving that area to the Royal Guards upon giving Halberd, Firm Hoof, Bravado, and Thunderstorm a crash course on what to look for. My attempts to remind him it was for the good of the hive were consistently failing to make him less grumpy about it, but at least he never tried to dispute me. He probably knew all that himself, but it went against everything that used to be vital in the old days, and old habits were notorious for dying hard.

At least Bogie was safe and recovering from the shock of finding out who she’d seen, and Halberd had only found two reports of missing ponies since Chrysalis’ deposal, both of whom had been found alive and well within hours of going missing, and both instances had been the case of innocently wandering off. He’d even used some of our changeling revealer ointment to verify that the two ponies hadn’t been replaced, with favorable results.

Either way, in spite of both our and the Royal Guards’ best efforts, the searches were coming up empty everywhere. We were considering giving up and returning home when Pharynx and I stumbled upon a clearing in the forest northeast of Detrot, just outside of the territory we’d had searched thoroughly multiple times. It was a peculiar area: absolutely no vegetation anywhere save for one dead tree with its trunk split open, hints of a rotten aura everywhere, and massive doors embedded into a stone cliff on one end.

“What is this place?” I whispered.

“Must be Tartarus,” Pharynx mused. “Chrysalis never sent changelings here because there was no point. No prey to hunt, no information to steal… Wait a minute.”

Something in his tone made me shudder. “What’s wrong?”

“That tale Starswirl told you… he said changelings came from a cursed tree in a cursed swamp that used to be a cursed graveyard, right?”

“Yes, and the swamp was later drained and the skeletons removed- Oh my goodness… He said the nearby caves were turned into Tartarus… I think we found our place of origin, Pharynx…”

“Quiet,” he hissed. After a few moments of intense listening to the silence in which nothing jumped us, he continued in a hushed voice, “Chrysalis was alive back then; she’s one of the changelings who emerged from that tree. Has to be. I doubt it was an ancestor; she never mentioned having one and no records or legends, either our own or of ponies, say otherwise. If she has some kind of homing instinct unlike the rest of us, it could have reawakened when she went into hiding and led her here. Even if she doesn’t have a homing instinct, she could have remembered this place and decided to come here knowing ponies hardly ever drop by, and the lingering rotten aura of the cursed graveyard would help mask her own aura from any changelings trying to hunt her down. I should have thought of it and sent the army here sooner, darn it!”

“So what should we do?”

“We call for reinforcements. There’s a set of communicators embedded into your chestplate.”

“Huh…” They were in a hidden compartment that I hadn’t noticed before, but at least it explained why the chestplate seemed bulkier than the first time I’d tried it on. Pharynx must have added it in the meantime and forgotten to tell me!

Pharynx contacted our command center and ordered all teams to converge on our location without delay, and I decided to inform Celestia about our suspicions. This was one of the highest-security areas in her country, after all, and if it was compromised…

I expected at least a few hours’ wait, but Celestia and Luna teleported over within seconds. They needed little explanation; instead, they both got right on to searching the area with us, and when the changeling teams started arriving, the two princesses unsealed the gates of Tartarus and went inside on the off-chance that the runaway queen had found a way to crawl inside to hide. Several squads of Royal Guards joined them later, and our own teams swarmed the clearing and the forest all around it, but even our best efforts produced nothing suspicious.

Nothing until one of the changeling teams uncovered a burrow under the dead tree that had given birth to our species.

It had a narrow entrance, almost like a mouse hole, which it may have been at some point, and a root concealed it from view except from one specific angle. The soldiers reported the tunnel leading some distance almost straight down and opening into a cavern that Pharynx, the princesses, and I then teleported into. The cavern was about twice the size of my bedchamber, or about the size Chrysalis’ bedchamber had been before I’d built a wall through the middle, and empty save for runes carved into each wall.

“Looks like dark magic,” Celestia mused, looking them over, “though my knowledge of runes is rusty. Can you make more sense of it, Luna?”

“Nay, sister. Perhaps it would be wise to employ Starswirl’s assistance?”

“I was thinking the same thing. Thorax, what do you plan with this room?”

“We’ll leave a squad of changelings to maintain surveillance of the area,” Pharynx answered in my stead. “There’s nowhere to hide in here and nothing to disguise as without causing suspicion, so they’ll have to remain topside. Your wizard won’t be disturbed while he works unless Chrysalis comes back and our soldiers fail to stop her.”

“It should be of no consequence,” Luna said. “The great Starswirl can undoubtedly hold his own against the villainess.”

“As long as he survives to tell us what’s written on the walls and what to do about it, I’m fine with that,” Pharynx agreed.

“Can’t you send at least some of the soldiers inside after her?” I asked.

“After they inform the hive of her return, yes, but one or two should stay outside to follow her if she kills everyone in the pit and gets out. We need to be able to track her movement if we want to capture her.”

“Do you want Royal Guard assistance?” Celestia asked.

“Not here; they can’t disguise themselves and will only make it obvious that the area is being watched. I won’t complain if they nab her someplace where no changelings are deployed, though. Just try to keep her alive to face punishment if possible.”

“Or until we convince her to reform,” I added.

“You can’t seriously think that’ll work, Thorax!”

“We can at least give her a chance!”

“She’s had plenty of chances! She could have come back begging for mercy or forgiveness or whatever any day since you ascended if she wanted to!”

“...one last chance, then? I don’t think I can bring myself to just punish her without trying…”

He rolled his eyes and snorted. “One chance, since you insist so much. But keep in mind that the chance expires after twenty-four hours without a sign of her attitude improving or the second she tries to kill you, whichever happens first.”

“I’ll have our wizards recommence their research on how to neutralize changeling magic,” Celestia said. “I’ll also inform you on Starswirl’s findings as soon as he has them. If you need anything else, you know where to find us.”

With that, we said our goodbyes and teleported out, and Pharynx issued orders to the drones who would be staying behind while the rest of us prepared to return to the hive.