How Two Monarchs Definitely For Sure Stole Hearthswarming (Definitely)

They say that failure is the greatest teacher.

For Chrysalis, it had taken three failures to start learning; even then, she didn’t learn fast enough.

She had barely evaded the fate of the fellow members of the Legion of Doom, through an act of quick thinking; Following three separate times her plans were foiled before, the changeling queen had felt a need for some manner of ‘insurance policy’, and crafted a statue of herself in panic. From there, it was foal’s play to swap her position with said statue, and shapeshift into an innocuous-seeming grass snake for an extremely slow getaway.

Such things were beneath her, of course. She knew that. But even the indignity of that defeat was better than a lifetime spent imprisoned in stone. She had thus far managed to evade petrification, yet her goals were now more distant seeming than ever; The Changeling hives were far outside her control, Equestria was more powerful than ever, and they had been joined by numerous foreign allies.

How had they come to fail? Chrysalis, in an unusual state of self-recrimination, had dwelled on that question for days. Surely, it could not have been something she did wrong, but must have been the fault of that lumbering oaf Tirek and precocious filly, Cozy Glow. They must have done something wrong, but Chrysalis could not fathom what it could be. The seat of Equestria’s power had been in their hooves! Even that accursed Starlight pony had been captured and- so she had thought at the time- eliminated as a threat.

But, as had happened not once, but twice before, the intercession of an unforeseen ally had halted her ambitions. At the wedding, it had been Twilight who freed Princess Cadance and urged Shining Armor to end the Changeling invasion of Canterlot. Next time, she had been ready for that pony and her accursed friends, only to have the unforeseen addition of one Starlight Glimmer, as well as her very own hive turning against her.

And then, just when the Legion of Doom had seemingly achieved perfect victory, forces from outside Equestria-including her very own brood-had arrived to put an end to her plans. Foiled at every turn.

For Sombra, the path to learning was equally slow, if not quite so complex. It was less a matter of dwelling on his failures and more a matter of multiple defeats being necessary to ram the message through his well-crafted armor of vanity, conceit, and arrogance. He was not one to accept aid from others, save as unwilling slaves; His power had to be what won him the day.

His near-death experience at the hooves of the Elements of Harmony had dispelled that notion, however. Coming back from the void not once, but twice, solely because of the intercession of another creature had a way of damping his ego, even if he would never admit it. In need of allies once more, Chrysalis had summoned him from the void, and the two had settled into an uneasy alliance; Chrysalis knew the closest she had ever come to victory had been with the aid of Tirek and Cozy Glow, even if she hated to admit it.

On another day, it would come time eventually to stage a rescue for those two, and plot Equestria’s downfall once more; But for today, there were more pressing concerns. The answer Chrysalis had settled on was simple; She needed Patience. She had eroded the bonds of trust that formed Equestria, but had not seen them truly severed. It would take more than that to disrupt that friendship-magic that kept Equestria safe from her machinations; She needed to amass more power, more followers, while destroying all of Equestria’s alliances. Only then would she be able to defeat the ponies once and for all.

And, it seemed to her, there was no better time to enact such ambitions than on the most harmonious day of all; The sickeningly-saccharine holiday of Hearthswarming.

“This plan of yours is absurd! We should be out there making the ponies grovel at our hooves, not partaking in inane pleasantries!” King Sombra spat out, glaring at Chrysalis. He might have tolerated the changeling queen as an ally, but that did not mean he was going to accept her plans without question; Quite the contrary, he was more likely to insult them simply for the fact that he wasn’t the one who had come up with them.

“Yes, go and try that! See how it works out for you.” The changeling queen retorts. “But don’t think to drag me down with you when you inevitably get the attention of their new ‘princess’. It takes a delicate touch to undermine their foundations, something that you clearly lack!” The changeling queen motions around herself at the fancy estate the two are currently the sole occupants of. “If it weren’t for my machinations, you would still be floating around in the void. Instead, we have a hoofhold in Equestria with all the room and luxury needed to sustain us while we plot their downfall! So perhaps you should cease your shortsighted prattling, and focus on the big picture.”

Sombra growls, narrowing his eyes into a glare, but something subtle about his body language shows that he was listening, leaning slightly away as he grumbles. “Fine then. If carrying out your idiotic plan is what it takes you to focus on something more important, then I will ensure the ruination of the ponies foolishness. But know that in less harmonious seasons…” Sombra’s voice is positively gushing with contempt at that word, sounding almost like he was going to gag at the thought. “It will be our time to build up our forces in preparation to invade.”

Chrysalis simply scoffs. “As if I don’t know that, you dolt. Like I said, we have all the time, room, and wealth needed to spread our influence in secret, thanks only to my efforts. What else do you think I’m keeping you around for other than assembling legions for our plans?”

Sombra lets out his characteristic maniacal laugh, rearing up and then slamming down his hooves again. “Fool! You shall see just how subtle I can be, and then you will learn to bite your tongue next time.” Without any further addendum, the shadowy once-monarch vanishes into the darkness behind the wall, presumably off to enact the duo’s nefarious scheme.

“I can only hope that buffoon does not give away our presence with his brashness…” Chrysalis scowls to herself, as the green flames of transmutation consume her body, transforming herself into the image of a well-respected businessmare; Just the image she had wielded to accumulate the wealth and resources the duo were now using. A pegasus’ body was just what the queen had ordered, as it gave her at least some semblance of the mobility of her true form.

Grumbling, Chrysalis wonders once again if she should have taken one of the alicorns identities; they certainly served as superior vessels to this lowly wretch she was impersonating. But they also had a tendency to attract too much attention, and at the moment, the entire point of this plan was to avoid such problems. The time would come for action; today was the day for subtlety, and Chrysalis prided herself on her skills in infiltration. Today spelled the beginning of the downfall of ponykind, and nopony would be ever the wiser.