Chester has never been able to see his own colors, but he knows he's venting orange as he walks into the ashram's inner temple.

Even if he had wanted to hide his fear—the Holy Mother gets so upset when he looks like he has something to hide—he knows he's too rattled to pull it off. And he knows she'll react poorly to him arriving in that mood, even though he's delivering good news. But what can he do?

The Holy Mother is purple, a rare good humor, when he arrives. (It complements her shimmering golden robe, a reminder of the plateau of enlightenment she alone has reached.) But all it takes is one look at him, and as expected, her mood plummets.

"What went wrong," she says, the bright rose pink of her all-too-common disappointment. Her lips press into a thin crease, and their corners twitch.

That didn't have the inflection of a question, but nevertheless he scrambles into prostration and lunges for the opening to explain himself. "Absolutely nothing, Swamini-ji," Chester hurriedly says. "Our prospect is excited to meet with you, exactly as planned."

It's the whole and earnest truth, but by her shift into maroon suspicion, he called it: he's too rattled for the Holy Mother to buy it. And it breaks Chester's heart to see her reduced to such base emotions. It's his fault for not living up to her divine example. He tries. He tries so hard, but how can ordinary humans be anything but an impediment to her transcendence?

"Brother Esau overstated his enlightenment potential," she maroon-says.

"No!" Chester protests. "His colors are vivid far beyond normal."

"Then what? He's broke? He's under police surveillance?"

That last question comes out of nowhere and throws Chester utterly. "Uh," he says, "not that I saw…?"

The Holy Mother shifts into an irritated pink with threatening stirrings of red. "You're wasting my time, Brother Chester. What's the problem?"

Chester cringes. Here it comes. "There was, ah, a minor unrelated incident, which need not concern you—"

"I'll be the judge of that," the Holy Mother snaps, pink and maroon, and gestures for him to continue.

Chester swallows through a dry throat. "Master Anton had an… ah, an altercation with, um, one of his neighbors. I was there. I hid when he started shooting. I'm sorry."

To Chester's shock, the Holy Mother seems to warm to the situation—her aura spiking into the violet of a pleasant surprise. He's struggling to understand this when she waves her hand to dismiss his apology. "Tell me more."

Chester blinks and sits back up. "Um." He has absolutely no context for why his moment of cowardice should improve the Holy Mother's mood, but he can even see sparkles of transcendent gold starting to stir, and that's no small thing. He decides not to question his good fortune. "Well, you see, there was this girl, about my age, and this pack of wolves that have been spooking Anton's cattle—"

"Ches-ter," she pink-says, in that specific inflection which means she's too enlightened to tell him he's a worthless idiot.

"…Swamini-ji?"

"You got yourself onto a first-name basis with our prospect," she violet-says before shifting back to impatient pink. "And he is as violent as the rumors said. I could care less about his freakshow neighbors." The threads of gold strengthen. "Tell me about Anton."

It's impossible to ignore the combination of that color with those words, but with a mighty effort, Chester cages his traitorous thoughts before they can break free. There's a perfectly rational explanation. From what Esau had said, the Holy Mother had been personally invested in this prospect even before being told about the strength of Anton's colors; she must already have had some idea of how unbalanced he was, and now she has confirmation. Therefore, she must have sent Chester to bring her a challenge worthy of her station. After all, doesn't true, pure love tame even the wildest beast?

She wasn't there, though, a different traitorous voice whispers. As much potential as Anton has, that hair-trigger temper will inevitably get in the way of even the purest desire. Chester has seen repeatedly how badly it ends when recruits come in without the strength to walk their path. And if Anton turns his anger on the Holy Mother…

…No. Chester stifles that voice, too. The Holy Mother's enlightened judgment far surpasses any of theirs. He's too mired in transgressions for his reservations about Anton to have any merit.

So he summarizes his encounter—first the shootout with the wolf-girl, then everything back to his impromptu cover story. The Holy Mother's transcendent gold has been strengthening bit by bit, but at that detail she drops back out of it again.

"You told him you graduated from the school he funds?" the Holy Mother says, flaring disappointed rose pink. She sighs loudly. "Of all the… Do you understand how quickly he's going to try to look you up? Do you realize the complication you've created?"

"I'm sorry, Swamini-ji," Chester mumbles, deflated.

"You should be," she says, but there's little pink in it. His transgression was not severe, or she has more important things on her mind than correcting Chester's faults. "I should have sent Esau. Just…" She makes a shooing motion with her hand, her attention already elsewhere, her aura back to shining gold. "Go clean up, and tomorrow, go to the airport. I'll deal with you later."

Before Chester's time, the Canterlot International Airport had let the Holy Mother's devotees freely interact with travelers at their gates, where many prospects had nothing better to do than strike up conversations while waiting for flights. But after that unpleasant business in Manehattan, most airports had kicked non-travelers out entirely. Even the Holy Mother's considerable pull had only extended so far as to let her devotees mingle with visitors curbside at Departures and Arrivals.

As such, all of Chester's experiences with airport proselytization have been grueling, hot, demoralizing work—a test of new recruits' resolve, or a punishment. It means being on his feet outdoors all day, sweltering inside thick saffron robes with a smile plastered on his face, and interrupting a steady stream of frazzled travelers who are rushing toward check-in or impatiently searching for their Hoovr driver. Even knowing the color of the total strangers he approaches merely lowers the odds of a rude brush-off. And color-sight is a mixed blessing: every time someone with promising-looking hues turns frustrated pink and walks away, the knowledge that he's responsible for souring their mood twists in Chester's gut.

After a morning of uninterrupted failure, he is dead on his feet. He slips inside, slinks toward the hilariously overpriced concession stands, and buys a 16-bit sandwich with a 20-bit bill. The man behind the counter—apparently the owner—is bright amber, with an appearance to match: poorly aged, poorly shaven, and scowling.

Chester reflexively unfolds the wadded bills he's handed back and counts them. Three bits.

He stares dully at the money in his hand, inwardly sighs, and debates whether to do something about it or just walk back outside.

"I believe this young man didn't get his full change," a melodious voice behind him dark-blue-says.

Chester reflexively turns his head toward the voice's owner for additional color context. And whoah—her intensity is off the charts.

He blinks, but it's no optical illusion. Anton's colors had been vibrant enough to devote a special recruitment mission to, and this woman puts him to shame. She's on the same tier as the Holy Mother. More enlightenment potential than the rest of the airport combined.

The striking midnight shade of her aura is equally notable. He sees it rarely enough that it takes him a moment to place it: protectiveness.

Chester needs to learn everything about this woman he can possibly discover.

He turns, staring openly. She's tall and thin and intensely leggy, fair-skinned, with waist-length hair whose physical hue is a swirling rainbow of pastels (gratitude, saudade, and, incongruously, frustration). He would call her older, but she's aged very gracefully—the sort of grace that carries over even to clothing. By her luggage tag, she's just stepped off an international flight from Tambelon, but her pristine white blouse and purple slacks are as crisp as if she'd donned them off the rack. And there's something naggingly familiar about her face, but it's not immediately coming to mind.

Meanwhile, the conversation has charged on without him—a circular argument over the three bits in Chester's hand. The concessionaire's voice has gone muddy yellow (the indignant shame of being called out, not the guilt of having done anything wrong). The woman's made no headway, but where most people would turn a justified pink at the deadlock, she has shaded into a muddy green—confidently rising to the challenge. She's already won the argument, even if she hasn't quite figured out how yet.

"Change is correct," the concessionaire repeats, muddy yellow intensifying. "Sandwich is seventeen." He points at a tiny price list on the wall behind the counter, hidden behind a rack of potato chips.

The woman glances back at the stand's shelves, and the sixteen-bit price clearly marked there in large print. Her confidence shifts into a light caramel brown.

"I see," she says, grabbing a sandwich and setting it on the counter. Her words take on a smug muddy-purple sheen and her smile turns predatory. "I think I'll buy one for my dear friend the captain. Seventeen bits, correct? Could I please get a receipt?"

That last word hangs in the air between them for a moment, and they lock eyes. The concessionaire's expression doesn't change, but his colors waver, then plummet into bright orange.

He breaks the stare, and makes a show of running a chubby finger down the list on the wall. "I read prices wrong," he orange-says, then forces his colors to the chocolate brown of bravado in an approximate substitute for dignity. "Am sorry, miss." He slams a bit bill on the counter and shoves it roughly at Chester, not looking at him.

Chester pockets the bill and turns to confront his benefactor—but the woman is already several steps away and in brisk motion, as though she were a guardian angel, put there to do him a kindness and then vanish again. Chester starts, jogs after her, doubles back for the sandwich, and then sprints toward the baggage claim, catching up to her just shy of the sliding doors to curbside pickup.

"Thank you, ma'am," he gasps, and then a memory tugs loose from his hindbrain as she turns back to grace him with a gentle blue smile. "Hey, I recognize you."

There's an incongruous ripple of orange, brief enough he has to question whether he might just be seeing things in the shifting hues of her hair. Uncertain what to make of that, he presses on: "You're Celestia. That principal from… Canterlot High, right? I saw that press conference about the explosion at your school."

(Her expression is steadily, unwaveringly bland—but a few moments after he said her name, a flood of indigo coalesced behind it. Relief?… What's going on?)

She laughs, gentle and blue, her sudden relaxation even working its way into a visible loosening of her posture. "I see my reputation precedes me, even when I'm just on an inconsequential business trip. I don't believe I caught your name, by the way?"

"Chester, ma'am," he says. "Seriously, thank you."

"It's nothing I wouldn't do for anyone," she says in a gentle periwinkle, and Chester believes it. "I'm glad I can get something positive out of this trip, anyhow. What about you, Chester? What are you doing at the, ah, airport?"

As much as Chester yearns to dig into this strange woman's mysteries, he literally cannot ignore this opening.

"Oh," he says, and tries to force enthusiasm into his voice. "I'm here to spread the good news of the Holy Mother, of course!"

"The, I'm sorry, who?" Celestia says, peach creeping in.

"The, ah," Chester says, thrown yet again. "I assure you that for some people, when their reputation precedes them, you need to ignore the fear and negativity and get to know the real them."

"Well then," Celestia says—shifting through as many colors as her hair, dominated by a light violet curiosity—"by all means, tell me about the real her."

Every rational thought in Chester's brain is telling him not to look this gift horse in the mouth. There's the color intensity, of course. And although she's not a slam-dunk prospect, she's been directly kind to him; is giving him the benefit of the doubt; and he's been catching subtle green threads around her edges that he knows he can coax to life. Moreover, Celestia's at least famous enough for him to recognize, and given the publicity effect of celebrity, a single high-profile recruit is worth their weight in diamonds. The Holy Mother is going to burst a blood vessel if he fumbles this pitch.

And yet… and yet. There's something hidden beneath Celestia's surface. His entire life, he's been able to read people's hearts on their sleeves. And when he finds someone whose emotions don't make sense—someone with a secret—it's like an itch he needs to scratch, or a pit in his stomach which no amount of food can fill. Celestia's reactions are weird, and he knows that's significant, and he can feel desperation start to gnaw at his insides.

He flails for a way to split the difference. "Well, the Holy Mother rose from humble beginnings to enlightenment," he says. "Born a simple money-lender's daughter, she now is recognized as an unparalleled spiritual authority, a consultant to queens and princesses worldwide." Chester offers a probing smile. "Which I imagine must feel somewhat familiar, given that you're a school principal taking business trips across the globe."

Celestia meets his gaze with an equal smile—and, oh dear, she's a professional. Now that they've both found their footing, she's masking her emotions and staring at him with a gentle, fixed smile. He's met maybe one person in a hundred who has that level of self-control, but all of them put up walls of gray when they're holding back. She's perfectly, evenly, impossibly periwinkle.

"Oh, you'd be surprised," she says lightly, and Chester doubts he'll be getting any more colors out of her—only the maternal love of her periwinkle, which he would swear was genuine, even knowing its artifice. "But I've certainly found that truth can come from surprising places. It sounds like your Holy Mother has, too."

Chester is, like a chess player with a threatened monarch, obligated to respond. "She certainly did. She spent her early adulthood studying under several renowned masters of Tantra, but those revelations merely left her wanting more. And so, at the age of thirty-two, she walked into the jungles of Elytra to meditate for four years—"

"Tantra?" Celestia interrupts.

"It's, ah," Chester fumbles. Everyone makes assumptions about that, and it's never not awkward—especially talking to someone who could be his mother. "The term just means an esoteric yogic tradition, a systematic study weaving together a comprehensive doctrine, but yes, the Holy Mother indeed focuses upon the study of," he waffles, "passion. That was her road to enlightenment. She attained the siddhis of prakamya, vashitva, and"—he catches himself getting into the weeds and skips to the summary—"well, she gained supernatural capabilities from her transcendence which prove her the world's foremost expert on love."

That, if only for a moment, breaks Celestia's wall of periwinkle. "Magical powers?" she peach-says. "Really?"

That flash of color saves Chester from putting his foot in his mouth. He was prepared for any of the three usual responses—pivot away from the subject for the amber or gray ones, and stretch the truth to get the green ones well and truly hooked. But given Celestia's shock at the idea, he figures the safest tactic is to retreat to the same fine line as the ashram's official legal boilerplate.

"You shouldn't think of them like that," he says. "Keep in mind that siddhis, although they sound extraordinary, are merely side effects of enlightenment, not always visible to those with baser motives. The most important of the Holy Mother's teachings is that the pursuit of power leads to corruption, which is why we submit ourselves to her wholly, with total humility and the purest devotion. In return, she shows us our true selves to give us the strength to follow her to enlightenment, and once we reach it, siddhis will be the afterthought to us that they are to her."

"Ah," Celestia says, a mixture of lilac and indigo, before retreating back to periwinkle. "That kind of magic."

Chester isn't a fan of Celestia's silent laughter and he's not certain how to feel about her relief, but at least they're not dangerous. "We also have numerous testimonials of her enlightenment from all those she has helped worldwide," he says listlessly.

Celestia nods. "Naturally. I'm sorry, what did you say the Holy Mother's name was again?"

And that's definitely a leading question. The trigger of a trap. But how could that question be harmful? She knows the answer already—she has to know. Does this have something to do with one of the lawsuits?

Chester feels panic start to stir, but he doesn't think he's told Celestia anything compromising, or made any legally actionable promises about the Holy Mother's offerings. After a few seconds of desperate calculation, he decides to spring whatever this is, so he has some idea of how to wriggle back out. (The only alternative is folding and running, and then he'd have to justify himself to the Holy Mother.)

"Chryssa-swamini," Chester says.

Celestia's face scrunches up, and her periwinkle shifts hue into lilac.

Chester… wasn't expecting that. "The 'swamini' means enlightened teacher?" he clarifies.

Celestia, unable to contain it any longer, throws her head back and howls with laughter. "I knew it!" she says, bright blazing lilac. "The Holy Mother! How ridiculously on the nose."

Chester stares, lost.

"Snrk. Hoo. Hah!" Celestia calms herself, wiping tears from her eyes. Then, as she recomposes herself, that light caramel color returns.

Caramel is an emotion hard to describe to anyone but Esau. Once upon a time, Chester had coined the word "spyfeel" for it, when Esau had asked about Chester's color during a mutual mission. They had worked out that it was the feeling of that moment when you had been hammering at a problem and suddenly knew exactly how to solve it. (Esau had countered with "planfeel", but Chester, freshly obsessed with Chet Land novels, had convinced Esau of the more glamorous wording.) And in Chester's experience since then, nine times out of ten, caramel has signaled someone trying to con him, get away with something sneaky, or make a move in a battle of wits.

He's already on high alert, but that color sets off every alarm in his brain. Celestia's got him in a corner he can't see.

"My apologies," she continues. "I don't intend to be rude. I'd be quite interested to meet—no, I should say, I and some friends of mine would all be quite interested in a discussion with your mother."

Terrifyingly, the sentiment shades into green. Not the intense green he kindles in the purest of prospects, but it sure seems legitimate. It's hard to fake the hope for things to be better.

This is a trap, it's a horrible idea, her caramel was plain as day, he can't possibly expose the Holy Mother to this—but Celestia is a perfect prospect, and she does want to meet Chryssa-swamini. He thinks frantically. Maybe, somehow, that's a front? Maybe someone so intense and so clearly skilled at control can lie about desire too. But even that idea quickly hits a wall. Not once since he's met Celestia has there been one hint of anger or vengeance—and while she's clearly got her secrets, he's never seen an emotion capable of covering over red, especially at her intensity. So even in a worst-case scenario, her hidden agenda isn't malicious.

Chester has no grounds to refuse. And unless he flat-out lies to the Holy Mother about the green, even begging her to be cautious would be a one-way ticket to permanent airport duty.

He still hasn't got the faintest clue what's going on. The situation is getting relentlessly more complicated. But for the moment, his least bad choice is to play along.

"I'd like nothing more!" he says with a smile.

Fact: Celestia is awful at smartphones.

Chester spends ten minutes making small talk with her out at curbside pickup, and learns basically only that. Every time he turns the topic to her, she deflects with a question about the Holy Mother or their teachings which is sufficiently genuine that he's obligated to derail himself entirely. He even tries sailing their conversation into uncharted waters—falling back on the Crystal Prep cover story that has already caused him so much trouble, and asking about the school she runs (under the guise of wanting to transfer there), but that runs straight into a wall of inquiry on his own academic interests, and he abandons it before he's forced to make up too many lies.

But Celestia can't hide how utterly foiled she is by technology. She knows how to turn the phone on, more or less, but even the concept of tapping an icon to launch an application seems foreign. There are a few specific sequences she seems to have memorized—such as pulling up the address book and making a phone call from a contact—but she doesn't seem to realize that she needs to be in the home screen to find the contacts icon, or even have any concept of a home screen.

This is beyond "helpless grandmother" level and approaching "space alien seeing a phone for the first time". It's so bad that, after spending their ten-minute conversation trying to multitask with her phone, she gives up and asks Chester for help making a call.

Fact: Celestia has a total of three contacts on her phone.

"Sunset," and then "Luna*" and "Twilight*", both complete with asterisks. That's all he can see before she takes the phone back, tapping "Sunset" and then the handset icon as if going through the motions of a rigid arcane ritual.

Chester's instincts tell him not to press her on those points, though—right now that knowledge is the one tiny scrap of information advantage he's got. She's so awful at phones that she doesn't realize how bizarre that is, and if he treats it as normal himself, Chester can fish more subtly rather than tipping her off to the fact he finally has a lead.

Fact, from Celestia's half of that phone call: "Sunset" is her ride.

Chester surreptitiously takes his own phone from his pocket, and does some web searches which quickly bear fruit: "Sunset Shimmer" was Celestia's junior-class valedictorian who was implicated in that explosive Fall Formal prank late last year. Celestia's getting a ride from one of her students?

Fact, from that same news story: "Luna" is her Canterlot High vice-principal.

But why the asterisk? Why, if Celestia has a coworker listed, does she have only one? And who is "Twilight"? She's not mentioned in that news story, and the name is so impossibly generic as to foil searches.

Chester chews on that from several angles, and then asks himself the really meaty question:

Is Celestia an impostor?

The thought starts to assemble into terrifying sensibility. Why would a school principal have three contacts on her phone, two of which were trivially publicly linked to her and one of whom was a complete cipher? That phone looks more like… a technologically-challenged spy's version of "Principal Celestia". Textbook Chet Land intrigue. Just enough context for a paper-thin cover story, and a generically codenamed handler she can panic-call if her cover is burned. The sort of cover that Chester, in her shoes, could see himself building.

More and more, he's getting the feeling he's being outplayed. But by whom?

The obvious answer is one of the Holy Mother's enemies. But Chester's brain refuses to settle into that conclusion. Every time he tries, he pictures the sincere green in Celestia's meeting request, and her complete lack of red. That similarly makes the idea of actual spies far-fetched (especially since any competent secret agent would be able to make contact with the Holy Mother directly, and more importantly, know how to use phones). Private investigators? Rival swamis? He gnaws on those ideas for a while, but they, too, founder on the rocks of the central incongruities.

… Maybe some faerie replaced Celestia as a baby, and that changeling is now wandering the world, pretending to be her but with no concept of technology and no that's just stupid.

Fact: Celestia owns a classic custom Mustang—tinted windows over sleek boxy two-door body, and meticulous wax job over cherry-red paint—egregiously beyond a school administrator's salary.

When Sunset approaches in it, at first he assumes it's hers. But Chester catches the custom plate as she pulls up to the curb: PRNCPL C. He stares at that, flailing to cram the fact into his already-wild theories, as the driver's-side door opens and the girl from the news articles steps out and waves.

Fact: Chester has stumbled into a pocket of absurd enlightenment potential.

People whose colors are notably more intense than average are rare; that's why the Holy Mother has always taken such an interest in them. Esau's chance discovery of Anton (at a local business mixer the Holy Mother had ordered him to attend) had been the find of the year. Celestia is the find of a lifetime. But when Chester gets a clear view of Sunset, blazing blue and purple, she instantly vaults to the third most intense being he's ever met. Not at Celestia and the Holy Mother's level, but the only reason she's not setting off ten-klaxon recruitment alarms is that Chester is shoulder to shoulder with the woman who goes to eleven.

He studies every detail of the new arrival. Sunset is his age, tall and spindly, but unlike Chester she's got muscle tone and confidence and moves like it. She looks like a movie director's idea of a juvenile delinquent escaped from a film set—black leather jacket, and hair striped in rage and pain. (She drives like one, too: she smoothly cut off a minivan on her swerve to the curb.) She's a valedictorian? When Chester had read that, he had assumed the real her would have coke-bottle glasses her news photos lacked.

"Sunset!" Celestia blue-says, setting down her carry-on and striding around the car for a hug. (Is it Chester's imagination, or is she oddly unsteady on heels? He's been focused on a lot of things in the last half-hour; watching her walk hasn't been one of them.) "It's so good to see you again."

"Princeiiii-pal!" Sunset says, her own blue spiking with pale orange as her eyes lock in on Chester. "How was Tambelon? And who's your friend?"

"Oh, I struck out completely," Celestia lilac-says, stepping back over to put an arm around Chester and coax him forward. "But then I met this lovely young man here in the, ah, airport! He's one of the sons of the—what was that charming term you used? 'Holy Mother'?"

It takes Sunset a moment, but she goes the same peach that Celestia did earlier. Then into swirling creamsicle as she readjusts.

"Oh," she says. Her colors separate out into a war between green and orange; she puts a friendly face on over the indecision, sticking her hand out regardless. "It's good to meet you, Chester. I'm Sunset Shimmer."

Her hand is oddly shimmery.

Chester balks. He has zero context for shimmering orange or green. He has no idea what to make of Sunset's sudden fear. And the more he can't explain, the more he can't shake the sense of being ensnared by something big enough to swallow him whole.

"Don't be shy, Chester, say hello," Celestia urges in her trademark periwinkle, and nudges him the last few steps toward Sunset's position by the open door.

That's when he sees the wolf in the back seat.

Chester instantly freezes, a breathy whimper escaping his rapidly tightening throat. Sunset blinks, left hanging. The wolf—there's no mistaking it, the thing is only the size of a border collie but it's got ice-blue fur, a broad muzzle, long lanky legs, and piercing red eyes—swings its head over to meet his gaze disinterestedly.

And it all comes together into an utterly insane and yet inescapable conclusion:

They're assassins of the wolf mafia, come to take vengeance on him.

Most of his brain is screaming at him to not be ridiculous, but everything about this is ridiculous. He clings to the chain of logic like a life raft: He was right there with Anton when the rancher tried to murder the wolfpack girl in cold blood. Then he just so happened to stumble across someone so rich, untraceable and inexplicable that every fact of her existence screams "secret agent". And now she and her delinquent hitwoman are wolf-adjacent too? He is incapable of accepting that that's sheer coincidence.

It's too much. Chester shrieks and bolts straight through traffic, into a cacophony of squealing brakes, blaring horns, and at least one collision.

"Oh, dear," he can hear Celestia murmur from behind him as he vaults over the retaining wall into the airport parking garage.

And then his wildest suspicions are confirmed as Sunset shouts: "After him!"

Author's Note

Look, if I'm going to write a story where an agent of (human) Chrysalis flees in blind panic from protagonist-coded individuals, I'm not going to accept anything less than the stupidest possible reason.

Chapter 3, "Telepathic Werewolf Mafia," will post Sunday, August 4!