The Meaning of Chrysalis

"RAUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGH!.!.!"

BAM!.!.!

A hoof slammed against Dagger's desk.

"Dagger... your blood pressure," a certain mare droned, her with a target for a cutie-mark: Dagger's bodyguard.

"DON'T REMIND ME!" he snarled. "I can't believe this shit! Well, I guess I can, cus I totally called that she she could do some damage... BUT STILL, GOD DAMN!"

"How very genius of you..." the mare sighed.

"I know, right? But it just pisses me off! I need to punch something. Tassadar, can I punch you?"

"No."

"Well buck, then..."

Tassadar lifted a steel-coated claw. "However, I would be more than willing to carry out your orders. Let me kill her, then there won't be any threat..."

Dagger took a deep breath, composing himself slightly. "Na, as pissed as I am, I wanna keep her alive. I sort of... liked tangoing with her. Especially when she gets all flustered."

"Are you saying you have some sort of... crush... on her?"

Dagger gave a bitter laugh. "Crush?! Me?!"

"You do, don't you?" Tassadar said, narrowing his eyes.

Dagger sighed.

"Fine, you got me, but only cus I just have this... need to dominate her... in every way."

"Are you saying I will not be able to have my vengeance, then?!" Tassadar hissed.

"Ugh, do I seem like that much of a hopeless romantic?!" Dagger snapped. "Of course you're still going to kill her, just not now. It'd raise too much suspicion... and I'm having too much fun."

"You are such a control freak," the black-haired mare said, rolling her eyes. "You've developed an obsession for your opponent. The only one to beat you in a long time..."

Dagger shot her a glare. "Oh just shut the buck up and get into the kitchen!"

"I'm poisoning your tea for that."

"Are you two serious right now?" Tassadar droned.

Dagger shook his head. "Na, she can't cook for shit."

"With poison that makes the target gag on their blood..."

"But anyway," Dagger continued. "Aside from antidote shopping later, I gots something else on the agenda! Something for you to do, Tassy."

"Something that isn't a waste of my time, such as sitting here?"

"Hey, don't get uppidity! If you hadn't screwed up in killing Queen Bitchilis, you wouldn't be here! You'd be merrily rounding up changelings right now!"

"Mph..."

"But no worries. I have an idea how to turn things back in our favor - in my playing field."

"And how will you do that?" the black maned mare asked.

"By being a dick, of course! But I'll need your help with this, Tassadar... and a few... assets."

"What kind of assets?"

"The best kind of assets!" he said, his sharpened grin making itself apparent. "The kind we don't need to buy!"

Tassadar lifted an eyebrow.

Dagger then turned, glancing out the window of his zeppelin hovering high about Manehattan.

"Enjoy yourself for now, Chryssy, cus in my world, anyone can win."

"Oh my god this is amazing!" Copycat beamed, chomping a hay-bacon haydog in half with one quick bite. The two stood right in the middle of Time's Square later that evening, lights from a million windows and street lamps beaming down on them. Chrysalis felt like she was literally in the center of the world. And Copycat... well, she was in her own little world.

"Dear lord... guess who's moving to Equestria after all this?"

Chrysalis gave a chuckle.

"All because they have haydogs?"

"You don't understand, my queen," she said, her eyes watering. "If love could be made into actual food, this would be it."

"You're nuts."

"You haven't even had a bite!"

She gave a grumble. "The last time I had normal foods it gave me these terrible stomach cramps..."

Copycat raised an eyebrow. "Are you sure it wasn't just because of that particular food?"

"Maybe..."

"Oh come on..."

At that, Chrysalis gave a sigh, defeated.

"Very well..."

Copycat levitated the hot dog to her mouth.

She winced, and then took a bite...

And her eyes widened.

Three different tastes touched her tongue, all magical in their essence. She felt as if liquid bliss had been poured into her.

"More..." she growled, and suddenly devoured the rest of the dog.

"Hey! Friggin' fatty!"

"Are you calling your queen fat?!" she said, while still chewing.

"No, I'm calling you a fatty!"

"Same thing..."

Copycat rolled her eyes. "Fine... sorry, but it was so good! And now we're out of bits!"

"Yeah," Chrysalis sighed. "It felt good to get into the U.N. today, but... we're probably the poorest people in this city right now." She then cracked a smile. "But you know what? It might be a good thing. We should be living like those we're going to end up helping one day. It'll help build empathy."

"Yeah but... can we go hang out in that bar after this?" Copycat said hopefully. "Cus, you know... hot tubs."

"If you want... I suppose I should start getting to know the new delegates. What did you think about them?"

Copycat tapped her chin, thinking for a moment.

"Mmmm, well Foresight, that minotaur delegate seems alright. Reasonable and intelligent, but trying to get him to back the changelings might be a task. We did hit the minotaurs hard two hundred years ago."

"I struck them when they were weakest..." Chrysalis sighed.

"But that was two hundred years ago, most of them might have forgotten it by now," Copycat smiled. "Undercurrent, that seapony seemed... bubbly, no pun intended, but that's their culture. They're a very joyful, fun-loving race. They don't interact with us land-lubbers very much, but they love messing with sailors... in a playful way, of course. However, there was a time where they became aggressively territorial and began attacking shipping. They claim it was because of some sort of corrupting force brought upon by an artifact they found, but nothing was proven. I think this was the reason why they didn't receive many votes today. Also, I think they've had a few problems with Dagger in the past as well, mainly relating to him intruding upon some of the islands that have reefs nearby they hang out in.

As for the Saddle Arabia ponies... well, they appreciate wealth and flare more than anything. Wealth earned honestly. I don't think they'll be on Dagger's side, but we're not exactly rich right now, nor have we had much contact with them in the past. And as for the Vaetir..." Copycat gave a shiver. "Every time their ambassador talked, I felt like his words were piercing my soul. I have no ideas how the their culture works or what they even want to get out of the U.N. Maybe we could talk to Twilight Soulshard about them? They exist in both the Nightmare Realm and the regular world, right? She's a little odd, but nice. Not what I'd expect out of an undead Lich."

"Yeah... I'm still getting used to this whole 'counterpart' thing. I wonder if there's a counterpart of me in the Nightmare Realm?"

Copycat gave a shrug. "I dunno, but I hope my counterpart isn't something stupid. She'd better be something cool like a vampire-zombie-werewolf or what-not. And not a stupid kind of vampire like in that book Edward Sparklehooves."

Chrysalis gave a cough. "Anyway..."

"Er, yeah. That's the basic knowledge I have on them. Anyway, want to try to talk with Soulshard?"

"Yeah, let's give it a go-ahead."

The two then bid Time's Square adoo, flying off into the night and towards the massive hotel where most of the delegates now called home.

With a bit of searching, they came upon Soulshard's room, coincidentally labelled 666. They heard voices emanating from it, and before knocking, they stopped to listen.

"My god, you're saying you actually like taking baths with water? What's wrong with blood!"

"Where am I going to find that much blood on this side of the fence?"

"I could go kill something for you..."

"That's not even funny, Deathie. And like I said, I like the water! It has a different feel!"

"Oh by the night... you're dead to me, now."

"No pun intended?"

"Haw-haw."

Copycat gave Chrysalis an odd look. "OK then... I'm starting to not want to knock. And who's Deathie?"

Chrysalis rolled her eyes. "I don't know, but come on. We didn't come all this way for nothing."

Chrysalis gave a few raps on the door.

"Huh? Visitors?!" 'Deathie' cried.

"Put your cloak on..."

"Yeah yeah..."

Copycat gave a gulp, and soon, the door swung open, revealing a curious Soulshard.

"Queen Chrysalis, this is a surprise!" she said, quirking her head slightly, with not a frown nor a smile. "Is there... something I can help you with?"

Before Chrysalis could speak, a voice emanated from behind the Lich Queen.

"Hey... wait a second..."

Suddenly, a cloaked figure, apparently 'Deathie', surged forward towards Chrysalis, her face obscured by a hood except for two black holes for eyes.

"You..." she said, a grin slowly appearing beneath the hood.

"Yeeeep... that's me," Chrysalis said, gazing at her curiously.

"Deathie... keep your job out of this," Soulshard groaned.

"What job?" Copycat asked.

"Long story," Soulshard sighed.

"I've been keeping an eye on you, Chrysalis," Deathie hissed. "For three hundred years, you've been giving me a bit of work..."

"Work?" Chrysalis said, blinking. "Three hundred year- who the heck are you?!"

"I have many names, too many to list."

"Alright..."

"And I've got to say, this change of... alignment of yours is presenting me with a bit of confusion. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with you if I'm right about my... timetables.."

Soulshard's eyes widened. "Don't scare her like that!"

"Scare me with what?! I have no idea what she's talking about," Chrysalis sighed.

"Don't worry about it," Soulshard groaned, before putting on a slight smile. "But anyway, to what do I owe the pleasure?"

"The pleasure's mine," Chrysalis smiled back. "I just need a bit of information."

"Information?" Soulshard said, raising an eyebrow. "I'm afraid you've come to the wrong ghoul, there really isn't much I know about this realm-"

"What about the Vaetir?"

Soulshard's eyes widened.

Deathie gave a growl.

And... Chrysalis gave a confused look.

"Something I said?"

"No... it's just... I was surprised as any that they showed up. I- uh... didn't want to vote against them, they are kin in a way. But... they aren't exactly honored in the Nightmare Realm."

"They aren't like the regular ghosts there," Deathie hissed. "They aren't even ghosts, actually... they're something different. Something between life and death that just... came about one day."

"Why aren't they liked, though? I thought you guys loved creepy stuff," Copycat said.

"Oh we do, but the reason that they're not very liked is because not only do they not participate in what we were born to do, but because they actually have 'territory' in your world, something that is forbidden."

"Where is their nation, though? You'd think it'd be more than myth..."

"Hidden deep in the mountains south of Equestria. They live in caves mainly, and it's there they wait for any unsuspecting victim to sneak up on them and then... sluuuuurp! They suck the life energy right out of them."

"So it's not just a legend," Chrysalis mused.

"And there's more to them than that. In addition to feeding off life energy, they can actually feed off raw hatred."

"So... they're like anti-us," Copycat blinked. "Only ghosts."

"And a bit like the Windigo," Chrysalis said, scratching her head. "Any relation?"

"I'd postulate that they're related," Soulshard nodded. "Noghoul knows where they came from originally. It's possible that when the Windigo were defeated in this dimension long ago, they fled to the Nightmare Realm. Perhaps while there they began to be twisted by its energies into something different... until coming back home to this dimension."

"Whatever they are, it doesn't matter," Deathie grunted. "If they're here, that's bad news bear. It can't be for anything good. But what they want out of the U.N...."

"Perhaps they want to increase hostilities between nations somehow? To spawn hatred?" Copycat mused.

"Or to work out a deal with someone who could get them easy life energy..." Chrysalis said, narrowing her eyes.

"Dagger?"

"Who else."

"Whatever the reason, I'm not going to be making any deals with them," Soulshard stated. "I'd suggest you do the same. They're not to be trusted."

"We won't. Is there anything else you can tell me about them?" Chrysalis asked.

"Yeah, don't sit near them too long, they feed off life-energy passively, too," Deathie said.

"A-Alright."

"Other than that, there's not much I can tell you," Soulshard said. "Anything else I can help you with?"

"No, you've been kind as to give us this much," Chrysalis nodded. "I'll leave you to your evening."

With that, her and Copycat turned to walk down the hall.

"One last thing, Queen Chrysalis," Deathie spoke up, her tone growing low.

Chrysalis halted in her treks, turning back towards her.

"Don't mess with Edeathstria," she said darkly. "Its name is more than just a pun."

A beat.

"I'll keep that in mind," Chrysalis said, before beginning to make her way from the hotel room.