Twilight couldn’t move. She was caught in the grips of a green glow, the changelings’ magic keeping her frozen mere feet away from the vault of the elements of harmony.

Earlier, when she and her friends had first entered the palace, a group of changelings assaulted the front gates. The Royal Guards stayed back to cover them, and they were able to reach the top of the towering stairwell without running into any trouble.

When they reached the decorated chamber of the elements, Twilight tried to get the vault open but, with its complex locks, both magic and manual, the process took time. However, just as she was about to unlock the last bolt, the stained glass all around the chamber burst inwards, and twenty changelings ambushed them.

They were all knocked to the ground before they could get to the elements of harmony, and Twilight had felt herself being lifted from the cold floor, the characteristic tingling sensation of magic permeating her skin.

These changelings were different; they wore thick, dull metal armor and were much larger than the other changelings. Their fangs were bigger, more like tusks, their wings had six lobes instead of the regular four, and their eyes and fins were red instead of the common blue. Twilight recognized them from her readings. They were evolved forms of changelings, higher on the hierarchy than the drones but just below the queen; the warrior class.

Two of them, though it took all their focus just to contain her magic, held Twilight in invisible chains as she was suspended in a verdant glow. The other eighteen tried to subdue the others, but none of them quite submitted.
One of the creatures straddled the ground-stricken Rainbow Dash, but she didn’t give up.

She refused to be dominated, and she lashed up at the changeling’s chin with a vicious kick. It connected with a sharp crack, and the creature staggered back off of her and spat out blood from his bit tongue. This prompted Rarity, Applejack and Pinkie to struggle back, but Fluttershy still cowered beneath her captor in terror.

Rarity dragged her assailant off of her, her horn aglow. As the creature levitated above her, she flung it away, but it regained its balance before striking the ivory wall. Applejack and Rainbow Dash kept kicking and thrashing at their attackers until their numbers overpowered them. Several changelings piled onto them, but still, they struggled to evade capture even though they were already practically immobilized.

Rarity gripped another creature in telekinetic waves as Pinkie bit down on the leg of her attacker. Just as the unicorn was about to slam her writhing foe into the ceiling, an authoritative voice interrupted the brawl.

“Enough!” bellowed the entity from the front of the room, and the mares lost focus on the fight just long enough for multiple changelings to seize each of them in tight holds.

The mares looked up after recovering from being brutally slammed into the floor. Their necks strained, but they were able to make out the source of the voice; Queen Chrysalis.

Her gnarled black horn matched the rest of her grotesque body. She was the hue of night from head to hoof, excepting her grimy silver mane. Her body filled with dry holes, and her eyes burned in a fierce shade of green.

The queen of the hive strutted forward, a forked tongue darting in and out of her glistening fangs.

“Well, if it isn’t the elements themselves,” she mused, her tone changing drastically from the powerful voice she held moments before, “How convenient.”

“What do you want?” growled Dash.

The changeling detaining her brought up a warped hoof and stomped on her head. She winced and let out a faint whimper.

“You will address the queen with respect, pony!” it rumbled in a deep, raspy voice.

Dash glared up at her assailant, blood oozing forth from a gash in her brow. The warrior returned the look, growling through bared teeth as its fins fluttered threateningly.

“What I want,” chimed Chrysalis, “is Equestria.”

“You’ll never have it,” said Rarity angrily, a bit of blood from a shard of glass coming from her temple creeping down her face, “you could never defeat Celestia in the first place, let alone the army.”

“I may not be able to defeat Celestia alone,” explained the dark queen, “at least, not without the nourishment of love, but with the combined strength of myself and my children, we overpowered her spell protecting Equestria. My armies are slaughtering yours as we speak, and my children will overpower the last of your forces in moments. It’s only a matter of time before your beloved princess is no more. We are strong, and we will grow even stronger on the love of this land, and there is nothing you can do to stop us.”

The changelings in the room howled triumphantly, so sure of their imminent victory. Twilight was unable to speak the magic securing her was so tight, but she could still hear and see, especially the battle going on through the broken window. The Equestrians were indeed losing, and the changeling swarm was only getting bigger and bigger as reinforcements from the wastelands arrived. She tried to move, tried to use her magic, but couldn’t while suspended in the green glow, and despair set in.

Dash, bloodied but defiant, actually began laughing condescendingly at the queen.

“You still think you can win? We have the elements of harmony. As long as those are around, you’ll never take Equestria.”

Her captor raised a hoof to strike her for her insolence a second time, but Chrysalis shook her head, stopping him.

“You’re right,” agreed the queen sardonically, “The elements are all that stands between myself and victory, which is why they must be destroyed.”

She strode to the vault confidently, and blasted the door with a spell of raw force.

It didn’t budge.

She tried again and again, but the vault didn’t give an inch. She tried fire, spewing forth a stream of orange flames like a flamethrower from her horn. Next was ice, but the shards failed to weaken the vault door in the slightest. With each failed spell the queen grew angrier and angrier, until her wrathful roars were interrupted.

“It’s no use,” a weak voice from the other side of the room whispered.

Chrysalis turned to the speaker, a unicorn held aloft in magic. Twilight gritted her teeth against the mounting pressure on her ribs as the changeling’s tightened their telekinetic grip.

Chrysalis strode up to her, motioning for her warriors to loosen the invisible bonds holding the captive.

Twilight, barely able to speak through her compressing windpipe, explained.

“Celestia’s put a spell on that vault to keep evil like you from harming the elements. You’ll never break that spell, and you’ll never rule Equestria.”

As she finished, the bond tightened and she found herself struggling to breathe once more.
The queen looked away, dejected and angry, until her eyes fell on the mares being contained by her children. She noticed their injuries, their blood, and the queen realized something.

With her back to Twilight, she eerily cooed, “I can’t open the vault, but you can, unicorn. You will open it for me.”

“Not…a…chance,” Twilight managed to whisper though she felt her ribs were about to snap, “I’d rather die.”

“If I can’t destroy them now, then they will have to be destroyed later, after we kill Celestia. With her passing, the spell will fade, and the elements will be vulnerable. Until then, I can’t have anything using those elements, and you six are the only ones that can. The elements may be invulnerable, but their bearers are not.”

Horror spread across the face of every pony in the room while evil grins of anticipation came to be on the chins of the hive-members.

“Kill them,” the queen ordered coldly.

The mares cried out as the changelings prepared them for slaughter. Two changelings per mare, three in the case of Dash, held them still, pulling their heads back to expose their throats, while another stood like an executioner in front. Twilight was pulled in different directions by the bonds of magic, and she struggled to look beyond the changeling brandishing his horn in front of her to see her friends.

Dash was still struggling, thrashing her legs and flapping her wings, but she was held still by the warriors. She leaned away from the changeling in front of her. Her breathing was fast and exasperated, and her eyes were wide in fear as she struggled against the changelings on her flanks and back, trying to escape, but their grip was a vice. The creature before her smiled down murderously, licking his chapped lips with a forked tongue.

Rarity was being gripped by her forelimbs by two changelings on either side, and she held herself upright on her knees. She was crying, her jaw quivering, but she didn’t sob or tremble. She looked up into the soulless eyes of the killer before her defiantly, not even her bitter tears breaking her gaze.

Pinkie Pie was struggling back and forth, trying to loosen the strong grips of the changelings securing her, but they easily pinned her to the floor, and the to-be killer looked down at her blankly with a cocked head as she began to repeat the word ‘no’.

Fluttershy was weeping, tears pouring down her face and onto the ivory floor. She didn’t sob either, much like her purple-maned friend, but the characteristic soft whimpers of the bearer of the element of kindness carried through the room. The pegasus closed her eyes and weakly tried to pull free as the executioner stepped in front of her, turning away in fear, trying and hide from the ominous inevitability of the horn’s piercing of her heart.

Applejack was being held like Rarity, drawn apart at the limbs and pushed to her knees. The farm pony didn’t cry, didn’t shy away, didn’t even blink when the red-finned warrior stepped before her. She only glared, flicked her hat farther back on her head, and spat on the ground at the creature’s feet.

Twilight’s attention was brought back to herself when the warrior stepped closer to her, drawing an X in the air in front of her chest with his horn. She breathed out once, a long exhale, and closed her eyes while she decided what to do.

“Wait,” she said, much to the surprise of Chrysalis.

Twilight could face her own death as repercussion for her defiance, but not her friends’.

“If I open the vault, will you let them live?”

“I suppose,” sang the queen, as the grip on the unicorn began to diminish.

The bonds faded and she stood in between the warriors and Chrysalis, nervously looking back and forth.

“Hurry up!” growled the changeling on her right as it prodded her rear with a razor-like horn.

She jumped forward, and slowly walked through the gauntlet formed by her imprisoned friends and their changeling captors towards the closed vault. They looked at her sadly, knowing that the cost of their lives was the doom of Equestria, and wondering if it was worth it.

She reached the vault, and began telepathically dropping the tumblers.

Chrysalis stood behind her, flanked by warriors whose armor softly jingled every time they shifted their weight.

The last tumbler fell with a click. It sounded like thunder in the otherwise silent room; nothing else spoke.

Chrysalis leaned forward anxiously as the vault began to swing open. She pushed past a depressed Twilight, the warriors taking the unicorn in their grips again. Twilight looked back at her friends, her sad eyes matching theirs as they watched the queen’s horn beginning to glow green in the vault’s entrance.

“I agreed to let you live,” began Chrysalis over her shoulder, “and live you shall, as changelings.”

Their faces contorted in looks of disgust and fear, but eventually, all turned to sorrow again.

“You have shown dedication, and it will be put to good use in the hives. After all, every empire needs slaves.”

Twilight met eyes with each of her friends, and bitter tears began to flow down her face. She could only think of one thing to say.

“I’m sorry.”

She bowed her head, and prepared for the sound of the elements’ shattering.

Suddenly, the tingling sensation of static electricity touched her skin, and the vault door slam shut.