The last time Chester remembers his nerves getting this wrecked was in the wake of that miserable request from the Holy Mother to spy on Brother Bill.

Chester had been creeping through the ashram on Bill's tail when suddenly, he was grabbed from behind. He tried to shriek, but a hand clamped securely over his mouth. He thrashed ineffectually, certain he had been captured by the enemies of enlightenment and was about to die.

"Ssh," Esau whispered in his ear.

Panic receded. He glanced over his shoulder to see Esau's aura, pink and protective midnight blue. Esau touched his finger to his lips, then released Chester. He turned around and strode away. Chester meekly followed.

They walked in silence until they reached the ashram's outer walls. Esau pivoted to walk alongside them, leading them in a broad circle around the edge of the grounds.

"I was afraid this was going to happen when Swamini-ji mentioned you were spying for her," he said, a muddy orange swirling into the mix—embarrassment on Chester's behalf.

"Yeah," Chester said meekly. "I guess I'm just as bad a spy as I am everything else."

Esau said nothing for a moment, stewing in rose pink.

"Chess," he finally said. "What am I feeling?"

"Disappointment."

"Exactly." Esau's color shifted to a prickly pink irritation. "Because this should be an absolute slam-dunk for you. So stop your self-pity party. Do you have any idea how much any other spy would sacrifice to be able to answer that question so easily?"

"Uh," Chester said, suddenly uncertain where Esau was going with this. Most of what Chet Land did in the novels was sip shaken martinis in glamorous casinos, get into improbable vehicle chases, and swing through plate-glass windows after getting caught infiltrating highly secured buildings. "No? I was just playing pretend like I always do, Saw, except now she wants me to do it for real and I can't even sneak after people right." His voice ratcheted up. "And then she's gonna disavow knowledge of my existence and I'll die in a dungeon in the place she banished me to."

"Chess." The muddy orange returned. "The Holy Mother got super excited when you got interested in spying because you're already a natural."

"Maybe for some things, but someday I'll need to shoot evil minions in a supervillain's lair and my stomach goes in knots just thinking about guns—"

"Chet Land is fake, Chess. That's not what spies do." Esau shifted to a pastel red exasperation. "A spy's entire job is to learn things. Stop sneaking around after Brother Bill and just… listen. Think. Do what you already do. Why are you trying to shadow him, when you already see him dozens of times every day and pick up more than anybody else ever could just by standing in the same room? You're trying way too hard, and everyone's starting to wonder."

Chester shook his head numbly. "But she wants me to be Chet Land and I can't—"

Esau stepped in front of Chester, turned around, and clenched Chester's shoulders hard, making him wince. "Chess," he brown-said. "What did she specifically ask you to do?"

Chester swallowed, forcing himself to calm down. That drab brown, their shared resolve of the Soldier Incident, was Esau's cue for him to focus. "She…" He licked his lips as he recalled the conversation. "Said to find out why Brother Bill was acting strangely."

"Right." Esau let go, but stayed facing him. "Not to follow him inside a cardboard box, or whatever it is you were trying to do at lunchtime. I know you already know most of the answer to her question, because you can see him the same way I do. Why aren't you just doing that?"

"Because this is my spy audition," Chester immediately said, voice ratcheting back up. "I've got to do it the right way. Color-sight is cheating—"

"What?" Esau interrupted, creamsicle. "No it's not. Who told you that?"

"I, uh." Chester stifled his fear.

The Holy Mother had, kind of, once upon a time. He thought back to that moment of disgust. But she had also ordered him never to speak of it—and even now, almost a decade later, even with Esau, he had kept that secret. He didn't want to think of the consequences of violating her trust.

"Chess. That is the 'right way'. That's exactly what she wants you to do." Esau's colors had gone a swirling mixture of pink, light violet, and dark blue—the typical muddled mess of sorting through conflicting emotions, except this time the components were each fairly distinctive.

Chester found himself wrestling with a similar conflict. If it had been anyone else, he wouldn't have dared consider the heresy that the Holy Mother was encouraging him to use a power so transgressive. But Esau had lately been spending so much time with her that the information might as well have been firsthand.

"I," Chester stammered. "What if, maybe, I had a reason to think that wasn't the case?"

Esau motioned for them to start walking again, a brown resolve sweeping away his color mixture. "Then you're just gonna have to trust me that that's wrong," he said, glancing around and lowering his voice. "Listen. She's…" Esau's voice went orange. "… had me do a couple missions like this, too." Chester realized immediately Esau was telling him something he absolutely should not have known. "I'm okay at it, but I don't have the patience you do, and I don't connect with people like you do. Sometimes all I can give her is getting close enough to someone to confirm their feelings. Even that is huge. And you? If you sit down with someone, say whatever it takes to get them to trust you, get them talking…" Esau waved a hand, shading into a blue-green encouragement, though not without a tiny undertone of light amber envy. "You can wrap them around your finger."

"But I'm a creampuff," Chester protested. "I just want everyone to get along."

"That's what makes you perfect," Esau said, fixing Chester with a blue-green stare. "The best spy isn't the one they can't see coming, Chess. It's the one they never suspect."

"Well?" the Holy Mother said as Chester let himself into her audience chamber and closed the door behind him. She was uncharacteristically purple as she sprawled on her wicker chair and read. It was a Bittish tabloid this time instead of last week's magazine; the large and lurid newsprint sprawled against her upraised knees.

Chester approached to a respectful distance, knelt, and bowed. He'd taken Esau's pep talk to heart, but he was still a nervous wreck. If she did lecture him on using his color-sight… he'd been too terrified to think of a defense, and he had no idea how far mere groveling would get him.

So he leapt straight into his findings. "Brother Bill hired a private investigator to look into Sister Mandy's departure, Swamini-ji."

The Holy Mother froze mid-page-flip, colors spiking into a blazing peach.

"I see," she said with a tone far too casual for her color. She set down the newspaper and sat up, now a tightly restrained orange. "Who? And why would he do that?"

"The recently arrived Brother John, Swamini-ji. They believe she may have disappeared here rather than left the ashram."

Chester reached inside his robes and pulled out several pages of handwritten notes. Even given the advantage of his color-sight, he was proud of that. He had noticed a connection from the way Bill and John felt around each other, even though they never directly talked; had struck up a conversation with John and gotten suspicious of his calculated guardedness; and then had searched John's bed in the dormitory when neither of them were around. That had felt more like detective-novel work than spy-novel work, but the violet glow from the Holy Mother upon seeing his discovery immediately told him it had been the right move.

The Holy Mother wordlessly took the papers and skimmed through them, blazing through a succession of colors. Fear, suspicion, anger, relief. Chester watched in silence. Part of him was still in detective mode—the thrill of discovery, and now the thrill of surpassing the Holy Mother's expectations, were intoxicating—but now that detective voice was starting to whisper treacherous thoughts. Like: as transcendent as she was, those emotions were certainly making her look suspicious.

Finally, the Holy Mother set aside her reading, closing her eyes to focus. And her aura did something… odd. It was a restrained orange, intense as usual for her—but a second layer of color started building up on top of the orange, without displacing it or mixing with it in the messy way that emotions normally shifted into each other. The shimmering cyan of a siddhi he'd only ever seen once before.

She stood up and walked over to Chester, reaching out for his shoulder. The cyan glow around her hand intensified. The underlying orange around her body diminished.

She touched him, and the world fell away.

Chester's breath caught. His heart thudded in his chest; his cheeks flushed; the weight of its sins released its grip on his body. The entire world had been blasted away into sublime cyan, and he was submerged in liquid bliss. Drowned in rapture, holiest of holies, and it was her, all her, nothing but her, and merely witnessing her existence was the highest goal to which he could ever aspire.

"Bill has fallen," the Holy Mother said, and her voice was celestial harmony, and tears gathered in Chester's eyes. "He's making up lies to turn students of enlightenment from the path. You know that, don't you?"

Chester did—without question, without possibility of question. In this moment of radiance, basking in its source, there was only her truth. He threw himself to the ground at her transcendental feet, nodding wordlessly.

"Did you tell anyone else of your findings?" she asked.

Scandal and horror at the very idea shook Chester's core. To desecrate her perfection with the lies of a lost soul? "No, Swamini-ji!" he said, grateful beyond words that that was true. He bowed deeper, forehead touching the floor. "Please, let me help keep it that way. Simply tell me how to deal with the heretic and it will be done."

"No," the Holy Mother said, and twitched one perfect foot at the side of his vision, motioning him back to his feet. "You've done well today. I don't mind saying you have far surpassed my expectations." That much was already clear from the magnitude of her reward. "But this is no longer your concern."

"Of course, Swamini-ji."

"Go take the afternoon off. You've earned it—for once. I'll let you know when I need you again."

She stepped back, lowering herself unsteadily into her black wicker chair. And Chester noticed, with alarm: Her body sagged with exhaustion, and her skin was unhealthily pale. Her color had shifted from orange to indigo relief, but it was muted and indistinct, even compared to an average person's—and a candle against her usual sun.

Chester's instincts screamed to aid her—bring extra cushions, get a bottle of water, anything—but even that kindness was unthinkable, in the face of her direct order.

He bowed low again, backing away. "I live to serve you, Swamini-ji," he said, and retreated back into the fallen world and its rainbow of lesser colors.

* * *

Off-key singing draws Chester's attention back to the present.

It's not a pleasant place. It's where he nearly got shot just now—again—instead of basking in the Holy Mother's light of bliss and perfection. Everything had been so much simpler then. His current doubts would have been literally unthinkable.

… Not all of them had stayed buried, though. There was nothing particularly transcendent about cyan—that was just the color of love, and he'd seen it in any number of other devotees, and even in random strangers when he had joined older devotees for airport duty. He had known that the Holy Mother was capable of transcendental colors others weren't—the gold he had by then seen twice. So why had she given him the gift of transcendental truth by using a base color anyone could use?

Back then, he had silently struggled with those thoughts for a few days, and come to a few conclusions. One: Since the Holy Mother was an enlightened master of love, that was the color she used to give glimpses of the divine to people who weren't capable of transcendence. Two: Since she had gone to great effort to share one of her siddhis—despite her ongoing insistence that they were reserved for pupils at much higher levels of enlightenment—Esau had been correct that their color-sight couldn't be inherently evil. Three: Sister Mandy's unexpected disappearance had had a perfectly rational explanation. Chester had once seen her turn other people that exact same shade of cyan. The day after young Chester's uncomfortable color-draining memory, Mandy had clearly showed her power to the Holy Mother, discovered that the Holy Mother could turn the world blue, and run away from the ashram in humiliation upon discovering how much she still had left to learn.

Chester has a feeling there's more to sort through there, now that he's looking at the memories with fresh eyes. But Anton's singing is getting really distracting.

Reluctantly, he pauses his thoughts and looks around. They're now driving down the highway, somewhere between Canter Creek and the capital. Anton has the radio cranked up. Chester recognizes the song—"Foalsome Prison Blues". Anton's belting out the line about shooting a man in Preeno just to watch him die.

That focuses him, cold and hard. Chester eyes the bullet hole in the floor again. No more brooding over memories—he needs help. And not the vague chance of Holds-the-Fire maybe tracking him down.

Chester takes one final breath to steady himself, then gathers his thoughts. He doesn't have line of sight to see Ember's colors, and he has no idea whether he can actually connect with her telepathy without it, but… well, that idea requires a lot less blind hope than most of his plans today. Once again, he draws together all the sensations he remembers feeling when the werewolves were talking at him, reaches into those sensations, and pushes back out.

Ember? he broadcasts toward her approximate position behind him.

Something peach tickles at the back of his mind. It's muted, but definitely setting off his color-sight. Chester focuses on it, and the contours of Ember's thoughts start pressing back at him.

Here we go, she says, the peach shading into pale yellow resignation. You again.

Chester inwardly sighs. Okay, we've clearly got plenty to talk about, but right now the only topic that matters is the homicidal maniac driving the truck.

I agree, Ember says, pink stirring up. But only because he's my only lead to Celestia and Sunset. I don't give a flying fewmet what his beef with you is.

There goes the faint hope that Ember had second thoughts and jumped on the truck to save him.

As much as he needs her help regardless, Chester feels his irritation spike—and finds himself uncharacteristically uninclined to hold back, after what happened in the forest. Maybe you SHOULD start caring. Because that's TWICE now that I've protected you and nearly gotten shot for it. When I covered for you sneaking onto the truck, Anton almost blasted my foot off.

Did you teach him to shoot, too? The barb is raw, accusatory, streaked rage and pain.

Part of Chester marvels that he's not wilting, trying to deflect and appease, given those emotions being directed straight at him. But he is beyond done with Ember right now—for Holds-the-Fire's sake. She doesn't deserve Ember's red, and never did. And if Ember hadn't blown everything up, Chester would be out buying lighter fluid for her right now instead of being kidnapped and near-murdered.

You know what? Chester snaps back. I am going to own that. Yes, I taught her how to shoot a gun. Because that's what she needs to hunt. She's trying to provide for the wolves she cares about, trying so hard, and on the verge of failing.

Then she should have asked for help! Ember red-says. Sunset would have—

Chester sweeps through the waves of inbound red, focusing his own emotions and jabbing back precisely. No! I'm talking, you listen! he interrupts. (Holds-the-Fire was right, kind of—as uncomfortable as confrontation is, it feels good to be able to stand up for her.) You keep talking about her like she's a villain. Well, you know what? If she is—then I am too. Because you have NO idea what it felt like to lose her when I saved you from her. And I'm starting to regret that decision. So here's the deal—you call her evil one more time, and I'll tell Anton you're there, so that he can finish the job she started.

Ember's emotions blossom into vivid peach. You wouldn't.

Good me knows how stupid that is, Chester says, still bristling and jabbing spiky thoughts at her. But evil me doesn't have anything left to lose.

Ember wrestles with red, which quickly muddies into outrage, joined by a muddy yellow indignation.

Chester lets her simmer.

Then she speaks back up again, the mud settling into a tawny resentment: Fine. You've made your point. You had very good reasons for what you did. There's no sincerity in the sentiment; it's pure placation. Now let's focus on saving the ponies.

Chester holds his ground. I don't think I have made my point, no. And this isn't about me being good. It's about her.

Ember's muddy red outrage flares again, and unintelligible thoughts press in as she does the mental equivalent of sputtering. Did you miss the part where she invaded my world, mind-controlled my people, and nearly started a reign of worldwide terror?

Yeah? And what did you do? Chester asks.

Sacrificed my scepter to stop her, then returned her here out of a misguided attempt at mercy! We've been over this!

Not what I meant, Chester says. What Sunset said is that people who are villains in this world are copies of villains in yours. So what's your crime?

Nothing! Ember says, shifting back into muddy yellow. Literally nothing! The ponies helped me learn about friendship when Spike and I won my scepter in the Gauntlet of Fire! My dad wouldn't ever let me do anything beforehand, and all I've done since is try to teach friendship to my dragons!

Now that she mentions dragons, Chester can kinda see Ember as one: irascible, ferocious, treasure-hoarding. (He briefly wonders how many exotic races the unicorn dimension has.) An image takes hold for a moment, of tiny wolf Ember atop an enormous, sprawling treasure hoard—and that reminds him of something Holds-the-Fire said.

So you didn't come here to steal her crown? Chester asks, halfway between a question and a challenge.

She shouldn't have had it in the first place, Ember pink-says.

Meaning: You did. He doesn't bother to hide the challenge in that one.

Ember's words shade into brown with little prickles of pink: the irritated determination of someone believing themselves justified. Because it was dangerous and shouldn't have ever been here. I don't need to listen to a lecture from some brat who knows nothing about Equestrian magic.

You're trying to talk me out of being evil, remember? Chester says, trying to strike a balance between earnestness and menace. So help me understand. Or would you rather justify yourself to Anton?

Ember goes quiet for a moment. And when she speaks up again, she's more controlled, a guarded gray—but some tawny resentment still seeps through.

Okay, fine, she says. Here's your context. The Bloodstone Crown and Scepter were part of a set, long ago—

Wait, Chester interrupts, alarmed. YOUR scepter—it's a bloodstone, too?

Uh, yes? Ember creamsicle-says. Before it broke, anyway. And?

Sweet stars, that explains so much. She is bloodstone-poisoned. They each have a little chunk of Wrong in their heads.

Chester holds off on that discussion, though—better to learn what he can first. Sorry. Go on.

Okay, Ember says, settling back into gray. They had powerful domination magic. The scepter controlled and enhanced intellect, and the crown controlled and enhanced instinct. Together, their power was absolute.

Chester can't help but interrupt again. The crown's not the thinky one? Don't those seem backwards?

I… Ember flares peach briefly, as if she's never quite considered that before, followed by a spike of pink. Not the point. An evil sorceress enslaved dragonkind with them and used us to terrorize Equestria. Then a dragon—the first Dragon Lord—managed to steal the scepter and break her control. The sorceress fled with the crown and was never seen again—until we discovered she had ended up here in the human world.

So if they're part of the same set, what makes the crown more evil than the scepter? Chester asks.

Nothing! That's what I'm saying! Ember pink-says.

Chester struggles to follow her logic. They're both evil?

They're both POWERFUL, and the way Sunset tells it, your world has an ongoing problem with powerful magic items falling into the wrong hands. Ember's pink darkens and turns inward. Not that our track record is any better. Listen—strength is everything to dragons. The scepter marks you as Dragon Lord because it means you were ALREADY the most powerful. Friendship is considered a weakness. I'm only the second Dragon Lord ever to use the scepter's power to try to help them see a better way. Ember's words suddenly tinge orange and cream—a wholly self-directed fear and shame. The first got overthrown and humiliated when his scepter got stolen. And now I'm equally boned! The dragons are still following my orders because they don't know the scepter doesn't work any more, but they're getting more restless by the day. Even if we can stop your Ember, she's probably ended my reign for good.

Chester digests that, but steers the discussion back toward the villain point. I don't know how to put this delicately, but… it sounds like you were planning on using the unstoppable power of the reunited set?

It's not like that! Ember spikes pink again. The ponies wanted the artifacts in good hands, responsible hands! Her frustration wavers, and orange and black start seeping in. I HAVE to use their power, or someone much worse takes over. And Princess Twilight is working with me directly on this. (Well, there's name number four, the back of Chester's brain notes.) She's the Princess of Friendship. She'd have told me if I was doing anything wrong.

Bingo.

Chester softens his tone, adds some sympathy. From her doubt, she just beat him to the armor-piercing question. He doesn't have to ask it, he just has to bring it into the open.

So, he says, since you and Holds-the-Fire are both the same person… can that person, with the help of friends, be trusted with a dangerous tool?

Ember's colors fade as she retreats from the link.

Chester's worries start to twitch. And when she speaks up—the red-tinted white of self-loathing—they don't improve.

You're right, Ember says. I really can't.

Wrong lesson. Wrong lesson! Chester stuffs down his panic, trying to keep his own projections controlled and uplifting.

I think you're wrong, he says. I believe in Holds-the-Fire. Which means I believe in you, too.

A welcome flicker of dark green stirs up in Ember to contest that white, but it wavers and dissipates as vivid orange pours in.

I… like that about you, Thorax, she says, struggling to get a flicker of blue out through that suffocating orange. The words sound almost coached despite their sincerity; she clearly is terrified by the idea of opening herself up to express feelings, perhaps because of that self-loathing Chester just caught a glimpse of. (No wonder her default is pink: that frustration is a way to vent her anger on safer targets.)

Chester prepares to take advantage of the moment of connection, but Ember cages the orange behind a wall of gray and swiftly changes the subject. Doesn't matter, though, considering how screwed up everything has gotten.

No! He's not going to let her get away with that, not when they're so close to a breakthrough—

"Son," Anton's gruff maroon voice cuts in. "What're ya up to back there?"

Crap. Hang on, Chester panic-broadcasts, and snaps his attention back to the truck cab. Anton is eyeing him in the rear-view mirror. At least both hands are still on the wheel, and the gun is still in his lap.

"Sir?" he says.

"You've gone awful quiet." Anton's eyes narrow, and his suspicion intensifies. "And your face is squinchin' up a lot."

Shit! He's been caught. Anton saw him reacting to his telepathic conversation.

The dam holding back Chester's panic bursts. His mind goes blank. He's already whiffed on one explanation—which used up his warning shot—and there is literally no excuse he can give which won't sound even more suspicious. He's dead.

"S-sir, I…" he stammers, and can't finish the sentence.

Anton's maroon whirls and blurs. Frozen by terror, Chester waits for it to resolve into his red doom. But then—miraculously—it's overtaken by magenta.

"Really, boy?" Anton brays out a hearty laugh. "You tryin' some of that enlightenment magic on me?"

That mood shift is a gift straight from heaven, and Chester still has no idea what to say. Will agreeing get him shot? Will denying it get Anton angry, and then get him shot? He stammers incoherently while his brain reboots.

Anton guffaws again, the schadenfreude lingering. "It's downright hilarious watchin' a parasite like you get so desperate." His sadistic glee finally recedes enough for maroon to reappear, though it has ratcheted down considerably. "Still, just in case you do manage to grow any powers, you ain't going to try that again."

Chester's panic ratchets down just enough to unlock his brain. As he starts breathing again, that wording catches his attention.

Fact: Despite the Holy Mother explicitly warning Anton about Chester and the unicorns—and directing Anton to treat him like a dangerous traitor—she specifically omitted mention of Chester's color-sight.

That has to be the case, if Anton considers him incapable of enlightenment magic—a conclusion backed up both by his words and by his total lack of precautions. He can maybe see why Chryssy might have done that, if her cover story was that Chester was nothing but a con man taking advantage of them both. But it's a major incongruity, considering how intensely she primed Anton for paranoia.

Still, Chester can't do much more than note it and focus on keeping Anton placated. "Sir, yes sir," he says, and swallows. "I… may I lean against the side of the cab, and look out the window?" He gestures with his chin to the passenger side. "There, where you can keep an eye on me. Is that okay?"

Anton rolls the request around in his head. The maroon shifts around in hue, but its intensity remains low.

"Fine," he growls. "But the first sign of you going for that door, and you catch a case of lead poisoning."

"Understood, sir."

Chester wriggles his trussed-up body sideways on the bench seat, keeping his motions slow and non-threatening. He settles in against the side of the cab, eyes locked with Anton's, and then puts on his best rigidly neutral expression and shifts his eyes to stare at the passing countryside. His life depends on his poker face now.

He takes a slow breath through his nose, calming down, and then refocuses back on the mental conversation.

Sorry, Chester thinks toward the truck bed. Close call there. You okay?

Ember immediately re-establishes the link, a guarded gray with only hints of that earlier fear and despair. The delay seems to have given her an opening to wrestle her emotions back under control.

I guess that means we're past your stupid threat to turn me in? she gray-asks.

It takes Chester a moment to recall where he was originally going with that. Almost, he says. Humor me for a moment and then we can work together. I promise.

Great, Ember says with a complete lack of violet enthusiasm. Fine. Get it over with.

I just need you to say something nice about Holds-the-Fire, Chester says, aware that his desperation is likely leaking through. At this point, even if he were willing to actually do it, betraying Ember to Anton just gets him shot too… but if she calls his bluff and he can't get even this tiny concession, his chances of untangling the stupid little bloodstone drama plummet to zero. Just one genuine compliment. Show me you're capable of thinking of her as something besides history's greatest monster.

Seriously? Ember says, shading into pink.

Please, Chester says.

Ember thinks something at him that comes across as a sigh. But it bleeds that pink off into pale yellow resignation.

You're really going to make me do this, she thinks, though the color has already signaled this discussion's outcome. Fine. But only because the other you is Thorax. Don't make me regret trusting this version of you. AGAIN.

Likewise, Chester replies. We've… both gotten each other in a lot of trouble today. But I think it's time to start fixing it.

Ember goes silent on him.

Ember? he asks after several seconds.

… Sorry, she says, a strained yellow that's very nearly bleeding off the mental image, with spiky orange fear vibrating in the background. Some part of him pictures the wolf breathing heavily and sweating, working herself up to a feat more formidable than lifting a boulder. (It's… kind of adorable in the sheer depth of its awkwardness.)

Your Ember is… Ember starts, and Chester braces himself for some generic platitude he can thank her profusely for and hurry the conversation past. And then she completes the thought:

… the better version of me.

I'm sorry, Chester says, struggling to keep his face from twitching. What?

She beat me when we fought! Ember says—ah, and there's the dam of that faded yellow bursting, the true wound beneath the old scars he glimpsed in that first trip into the woods. Sacrificing the scepter to blow up the crown was a desperation plan and I got lucky. The yellow gets thicker, fresher. She's not even a dragon, and she's the dragon I'll never be. Her control was flawless. She's a born leader. That's more than enough to satisfy Chester's request, but the words are tumbling out in a deluge now. I never even beat the Gauntlet of Fire. I teamed up with Spike because he saved me from drowning, and he's the one who claimed the scepter at the end. He gave it to me so he could go back to Ponyville with Twilight.

Ember, Chester edges in, I—

She barrels on. I'm a fraud. Twilight asked me to help round up this world's dangerous artifacts and all I could think was, maybe if I managed to get the Bloodstone Crown back, I'd finally have a chance to be the Dragon Lord my people deserve. Her pain wavers and plummets into white. All the ponies think I'm a visionary, the first dragon in millennia to understand the magic of friendship. But the truth is I believe in friendship because I've never actually accomplished anything on my own.

She finally goes silent, orange-white despair bleeding all over Chester's color vision.

Sweet stars, Chester thinks to himself. That dragon-wolf needs a hug.

He settles for projecting gentle sympathy toward her hiding place. I don't know how you can think that, he says. You're the fiercest person I've ever met. It's obvious you care deeply about your friends and your people. You tried to protect me in the forest—even if it kind of blew things up a little, your heart was in the right place. And just now, when you talked about the artifact? The only urge you felt was being a good leader. (It's true. A few fragile green threads among the pain and despair; no hint of gold.) So give yourself some credit.

When she speaks again, the pep talk seems to have rallied her. Thank you, Ember says in a weak pastel blue—and even if that gratitude doesn't last past the end of the sentence, at least it lets her fend off the black until her colors shift into a brown resolve. But let's hold off on that credit until we save the ponies.

Chester nearly yields to the subject change. It's good to see her feeling better, and that is an important topic. But he's got one slightly more pressing.

Can we talk about the bloodstones first? he asks.

Ember shades back into a pink-hued creamsicle. We… just did?

That was background. Now the problem. Chester braces, reminding himself to keep his face neutral. You and Holds-the-Fire still have little remnants of the bloodstones stuck inside you.

Chester was expecting denial, or anger, or surprise—but Ember's creamsicle doesn't waver. Yes? she says. How did you think we were talking?

I, he says, um.

Chester keeps his expression still with an effort. How can she take that so casually? Doesn't she feel any Wrong inside her? How could she not? It's so inherently horrifying that the mere hint of its presence sets Chester's skin to crawling. But if she accepts the bloodstone, even misses its powers—and if she finds his horror confusing—then how can it feel so Wrong to him? Is he thinking about this the wrong way?

Her question nags at Chester until another realization bubbles to the surface. Ember's right: both Sunset and Holds-the-Fire had identified the bloodstones as the telepathy's source. But if that's the case, why hasn't he felt the Wrong—not once, not for a single moment—when telepathically talking to Ember or Holds-the-Fire? The Wrong's definitely still inside them; that frozen moment in the fight made that clear.

Maybe the Wrong is the bloodstones reawakening their power, and using their powers while they're still broken is okay?

That's a grotesque solution—implausibly splitting hairs. But there's no ambiguity to what the bloodstones almost made them do, and he needs something to explain the danger with, a reason for Ember to engage her brain and not fall back into instinct.

Wait. Wait, no, that's backward. The Bloodstone Crown once used to suppress Holds-the-Fire's mind. (No—the instinct-enhancing crown, he reminds himself. Same principle, though.) But that means the Bloodstone Scepter used to enhance Ember's mind, and she would have to go more feral to avoid it. Except going feral is demonstrably the problem! They were about to murder each other until he got them talking to him.

Does Ember need more bloodstone influence to get better? But then two equally broken artifacts, both of which were begging to be fixed, would be acting in exactly opposite ways which would require one of them to not want to be fixed and arrrgggh.

Chester is still rock-solid certain that he can't let the bloodstones wake up—the close call with the murder duel makes that perfectly clear—but now this new fact doesn't fit with his mental model, and it is thoroughly melting his brain.

Chester? Ember prods, blue-and-yellow concern overtaking her confusion.

Okay. Okay. Work backwards.

He can't let them fight. That means he needs them both thinking instead of instinct-murdering. That means he did the right thing with Holds-the-Fire, giving her tools and pushing her away from the remnant of the instinct-enhancing crown. But that also means the strategy of pushing Ember away from the remnant of the mind-enhancing scepter is wrong. So he's better off shutting up than warning her of its dangers.

… Nope. He doesn't hate his conclusion any less from this angle. But if there's a hole in that logic, it isn't immediately apparent, and right now thinking too hard is putting him at risk of getting shot.

Sorry, he says. I… never mind. You're right, let's focus on saving the others.

Ember's silent for long moments, then yields, shifting into a focused brown. Alright. What do you know about what happened to them?

Only that they're alive, Chester says. You?

The… uh, car… that Sunset borrowed from local Celestia is parked at the ranch. But as far as I can tell, neither of them is there. So I jumped on Scorpan's car hoping he'd take me to them.

Chester refocuses on the physical world and lets his eyes wander around the landscape. They turned off the main highway some time ago. He's not familiar with the back roads out here, but they're definitely headed toward the looming basalt towers of Blackrock Spires.

He just might, Chester says. Anton's working with Chryssa-swamini, and we're headed toward the ashram. If they're not at his ranch, he probably took them there.

Okay. How do we find them? Ember asks.

I don't think I'll be in a position to find anyone. Chester considers for a moment. But you might be able to sneak around, if you jump out before we reach the gate. Circle around to the rise overlooking the gardens. There's some cabins there that she sometimes locks people in as punishment. And stay out of sight—there will be devotees all over the grounds.

Alright, Ember says, orange and brown warring. I can do this.

You can! (Chester definitely hopes she can. He tries to project confidence he doesn't feel.) There's a basalt outcropping not far from there which is a good hiding spot, as long as nobody gets close. If I do somehow get free, I'll meet you there.

Ember's color war continues for a few moments, and then is interrupted by a spike of blue and yellow. …Yeah. About that. Are you going to be okay?

I've had a lot of practice with the Holy Mother being mad at me, Chester deflects, grateful that they've patched things up enough for him to rate that concern. And you'll need a distraction, right?

There's an unfocused response of pastel blue gratitude. Then lilac words coalesce: I'm going to pretend that means you've learned how to turn into a bear.

He mentally chuckles back, fighting to keep his lips from twitching into a smile. Still working on that one.

Then forget the distraction, Ember blue-says. But I'll take working alongside a friend.

Chester takes it, too. And despite everything still left to fix, it feels pretty good.

Author's Note

Chester's empathy has gotten him into a lot of trouble. It's good to see him racking up a win with it. Now he just has all the rest of his problems to deal with...

Chapter 13, "Love Bombed," posts Wednesday, Sept. 4!