Princess Celestia looked over the shattered glass and felt her jaw clench. Through the broken window pane, she watched her guardstallions as they swept up some of the mess made in the interview room, picking up splintered remnants of the chair and table inside while a pair of unicorns scanned for traces of changeling magic. They did it again, she grumbled to herself. They attacked my city while I slept unaware! They did it again…

“Ma’am?” One of her Solar Guards trotted up and saluted, standing at attention. “We’ve finished interviewing the Lunar Guards from the attack.”

There was a moment’s pause as the Princess considered this information and switched from her own musings back to the world outside. “And?” She asked, concern playing along the edges of her voice.

“They’re beaten up pretty bad, but they’re talking, which is a good sign,” after a moment of thought, he quickly amended, “Well, one of ‘em needed his jaw wired shut, so he’s not so much talking as he is pointin’ and gruntin’, but we got the general idea from him and his comrades.”

“That’s good,” she said with a sigh of relief. At least the damage done to her sister’s newfound Lunar Guard wouldn’t be permanent. “Now, what did they say?”

“All the same story, ma’am: around midnight, they caught a changeling in the Royal Archives, searched him, and brought him here for interrogation…”

“The changeling was male?”

“You know how hard it is to tell even when they’re undisguised,” the guard snorted. “But yes, as far as we know the changeling was a stallion, or at least had changed its form to one. About halfway through the interview, one of the guards left to use the bathroom. Near as we can tell, that was when another changeling infiltrator attacked him and took his form.”

Celestia sighed. She knew the rest of the story, not even needing to listen to the guard as he went on and on about tactics, deception, and countermeasures. It was a story she knew all too well. Once again, she had been caught unaware by a changeling infiltration, and her little ponies had paid the price. Really, that was all she needed to know.

“…and that was how they took down all those guards,” he shrugged as he finished his tale. “Honestly, I’m not sure if things would’ve played out much differently if it had been a full strength platoon that confronted them, rather than a half-strength.”

“Two changelings defeated a half-strength platoon of highly-trained bat-stallions?” Celestia arched an eyebrow at this. “Impressive, as well as concerning.”

“Not truly, if you don’t mind me saying, ma’am,” the guard said. “We all know how skilled changelings are at deception and underhanded fighting techniques.”

“Still, to overwhelm such a vastly superior force that way…” she poked at a glass shard with one well-polished edge of her slipper, her eyebrows hunched in thought. “Have we any clue of their intentions?”

“None, your majesty. As I said, the Lunar Guards searched the original infiltrator they captured, but to no avail. He was totally clean.”

“Very well. Have the Royal Librarians scour the Archives anyway; they must have taken something,” she spotted her reflection in one of the shards and glowered at it. “The changelings are up to something again, and this time, we are going to remain ahead of them. We are not going to fail our ponies again.”

“Yes, ma’am,” the guard said, saluting again. “But ma’am, what do you mean by ‘again’?”

“The attack on the wedding of Princess Mi Amore Cadenza and Captain Shining Armor, of course,” she replied, her gaze still not lifting from her reflection, now regarding it with an utter lack of emotion.

“Um…Princess, with all due respect, we won there,” the guard said, his eyebrows hunching in confusion. “The changelings were completely driven out of Equestria!”

“When my city falls under the occupation of a foreign army, my niece and beloved student are imprisoned by an imponynator, and my own flank is saved only by a stroke of good fortune, I consider it a failure,” she replied before realizing how icy her demeanor had gotten. She turned to the guard sheepishly, with a tiny smile on her face. “My apologies, guard, of course we won there.”

“Y-yes, ma’am,” he replied, though he could still see the false emptiness behind that light, little smile. She was wearing it like a battered mare would wear makeup to cover a black eye, even he could tell that from just one look.

“Is that all?”

“There is one other thing, ma’am,” the guard said, shrugging off the sudden discomfort that had washed over him at the Princess’s uncharacteristically cold tone. “Your sister has been demanding to speak with you since you raised the sun.”

“Ah, I expected as much,” Celestia sighed. That Luna was up this late could only mean she had gone a solid twenty-four hours without sleep. Again. “Show her in on your way out, guard, and then return to your posting.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, finally dropping his salute and striding out the door, head high, shoulders back, chest out, as he’d been trained. Celestia watched him go, and suppressed a giggle when he reached the door and was immediately knocked off his hooves by a midnight-blue blur rushing by, completely oblivious to his presence before pausing right in front of her. Celestia blinked and found herself looking right into her sister’s bloodshot corneas.

Here we go… she sighed to herself, preparing a muffling spell to protect her eardrums.

“Whence art they!?” Luna intoned in her Royal Canterlot Voice, her words screaming off the walls. “Whence art the venomed, swag-bellied scuts responsible f'r these attacks!?”

“Sister, dearest, please remain calm,” Celestia insisted, though she knew it was futile. Talking to Luna while she was in this state was only slightly better than trying to stop an oncoming train by reasoning with it.

“We will not calm ourselves, sister! Ov'r a dozen of our guards art in the infirmary, and still we hast nay moo answers than …”

“Luna, I know you’re upset, but please,” Celestia sighed, massaging her temple. “Regular English, if you can! For pity’s sake, in your rush to have this conversation, you’ve incapacitated one of my guards!”

“What…oh,” Luna replied, turning back to the woozy stallion lying next to the door. “Oh, oh, oh, terribly sorry.” The Princess of Night rushed to the armored stallion’s side, scooping him up in her magic and laying him out over her back.

“So very sorry, sister,” she said, her eyes sunken with worry. “We forgot ourselves in our fury.”

Celestia looked her sister’s worried frame over. The blue alicorn’s mane was frizzled, barely managing to remain adrift as it naturally should have, stray locks sticking out of it at almost every angle. Then there were the bags under her eyes, the hunched-over way her frame bore the weight of the pony on her back, where Celestia knew Luna could bench greater loads in her sleep.

“No kidding,” the Solar Princess said sarcastically, quietly undoing the spell over her ear canals.

“We will take this guard to the infirmary, and in the meantime, thou might brief us on what thou hast learn'd in the few hours we hast been aroint,” Luna said, beginning the trot back out of the ruined interview room.

“No sister, have a guard carry that load, we have much to discuss,” Celestia said, placing a hoof on her sister’s shoulder to keep her from walking away. In truth, she was doing this more for the blue alicorn’s benefit than anything else. Luna was obviously exhausted from leading the search for the changeling escapees, only to come up empty-hoofed. She had only returned to Canterlot so that she could lower the moon for the new day, and for that bit of fortune Celestia was grateful. Heaven knows Luna would have turned over every corner of Equestria, and of the moon probably, if she’d been allowed. Either way, the night-blue alicorn was obviously exhausted, but knowing her pride, would have taken any attempt to say so as a challenge.

Even with Celestia’s insistence, Luna still snorted in annoyance. “Verily well,” she said, whistling once. Immediately, a pair of bat pony guards appeared in the doorway, hooves up in salute. Celestia meant to ask what they were doing still awake, when she noticed their bedraggled manes, closed eyes, and easy breathing.

No way… she mused as Luna walked up to the pair and tossed the unconscious stallion on their backs.

“Take this pony to the infirmary, if you please, and leave us be. We have royal business to discuss in this room,” Luna said.

“SNNNNRRRRKKKKKKK…” One of the guards snored in reply, still saluting. Then the pair turned and walked off, swaying peacefully as they trotted along.

“Were those guards obeying in their sleep!?” Celestia asked incredulously.

“Just one of the many benefits of being the goddess of dreams,” Luna replied just as the guard fell off the bat ponies’ backs and hit the ground with a metallic clang, the bat ponies barely stirring as they continued their sleepwalk. Luna cringed at watching the stallion smash his face against the tiled floor. “Of course, it isn’t without its drawbacks.”

“Of course,” Celestia sighed, stooping over to gingerly pick the guard up and lay him out over the bat ponies’ backs again. “Now, we need to talk about some of the things we’ve found.”

“Of course, sister.”

“As you may well know, the changeling that was broken out of captivity was initially captured in the Royal Archives,” Celestia said, trotting back into the room while closing the door behind her. “What alarms me, however, is one fact most of the guards have overlooked: that he was found near the section pertaining to our ancient records of the Crystal Empire.”

Luna arched an eyebrow in interest. “Intriguing, have we any reports of changeling activity in the north?”

“Some small raids launched against remote outposts and the occasional infiltrator mingling with the general populace, but little else,” Celestia replied. “Still, any sort of outside threat against the Empire worries me greatly. They’re still recovering from Sombra’s siege, and Shining Armor and Cadence have their hooves full just keeping the government running on a day-to-day basis!”

“Not to mention it’s an entire city suffering from culture shock,” Luna mused thoughtfully. “Believe me; I know a thing or two about the displacement that can result from a thousand years of slumber, waking up without any awareness of the changes the world has undergone.”

Celestia smiled wanly and nuzzled the smaller alicorn, grateful that Luna had at least dropped her royal tone while they talked in private. “You’re doing great, Lulu.”

“Tell that to Ponyville this past Nightmare Night,” Luna sighed, rolling her eyes. “Eight months after my freedom from Nightmare Moon’s influence and they still just saw the monster of legends when I arrived.”

“Twilight didn’t,” Celestia pointed out hopefully.

“Oh great, one pony out of the entire village didn’t cringe in fear or wonder if I was going to eat them. I guess I’ve learned the value of friendship now!” Luna replied dryly.

“Well, things worked out in the end!”

“After I nearly canceled a holiday that had been tradition for centuries and terrorized an entire village!”

“And now that same village is begging you to return for next year’s celebration!”

“Alright, one village down, a thousand more to go,” Luna sighed, massaging her eyes as a few more strands of night-blue mane popped out of place. “We’re getting off-topic here; can we get back to the Crystal Empire?”

Celestia’s eyebrows hunched in worry, but she knew better than to push the subject when her sister was so obviously exhausted already. “Of course, sister. We were just detailing the Empire’s preparedness.”

“Which is to say it’s nonexistent,” Luna said, shifting gears from personal woes to matters of state with an ease her sister quietly admired. “Their military hierarchy is outdated, its personnel is undertrained, underequipped, and inexperienced, its populace is weakened by fear and by old racial divisions that most other communities have had centuries to overcome, and its bureaucracy is massive and mired with inefficiencies. Frankly, I’m surprised Captain - sorry, that’s Prince Shining Armor now – hasn’t thrown himself from the highest parapet in the Crystal Palace!”

“Not yet, at least,” Celestia said, smiling with her little sister at the bit of dark humor. The smiles were quick to fade, unfortunately. Celestia had expected to hear as much, but still, to hear it all said out loud bought a bitter taste to her mouth. Sighing again, she walked over to the shattered pile of glass and brushed at it with her hoof. “It is as I feared, then: the Crystal Empire is completely unprepared for modern combat, especially against the changelings.”

“I’m not even sure the Empire’s aristocracy knows what a changeling is,” Luna pointed out.

“We’ll need to step up patrols in the tundra, perhaps increase the frontier garrisons,” Celestia moaned. “At least, until we can prepare it for any sort of changeling incursion, if this break-in is indeed an indication that they are in danger.”

“And at the same time, we need to accelerate the Empire’s integration,” Luna added, a hoof pressed to her chin thoughtfully. “Shining Armor and Cadence are busy enough dealing with the bureaucracy; we need ponies checking things out, evaluating weak points, hunting for the signs of something requiring modernization…”

“Yes,” suddenly, Celestia brightened up, a genuine smile lighting up her face as inspiration struck like lightning from a clear, blue sky. “Somepony who would be able to recognize those flaws, because she had needed to overcome them in herself. Somepony with an ancient eye, but experience in the modern world!”

Luna, being a rather insightful pony, caught her sister’s drift almost immediately. “Surely, thou can’t be serious!” She gasped, inadvertently reverting to her formal, Royal Canterlot tone.

“Oh, why not, Lulu?” Celestia said, practically bouncing up and down like a filly in her glee. “You’re perfect for the job!”

“But we have our duties here in Canterlot to attend to!”

“Oh, pish-posh,” Celestia waved her off with a hoof. “You know I can double up my workload for a little while. I only did it for a thousand years before your return, after all!”

“And not terribly well!” Luna barked. “The Everfree Forest had fallen into savagery and chaotic disrepair before we reclaimed our night! Dost thou realize how much work we have put into taming it again these past few months!?”

“Exactly! You’ve put in a lot of work here, think of it as a vacation!”

Luna crossed her forehooves over her chest and snorted. “As if we needed one. We’re doing just fine, sister!”

Celestia deadpanned, then scooped up one of the larger shards of glass and held it up to mirror Luna’s face. For the first time, the smaller alicorn got a full view of the bags under her eyes, the stress-induced mess her mane had become, the sag starting to creep into the skin on her face. She took one look and bit her lip. “Alright, perhaps thou has a point. A small one.”

“Thank you,” Celestia said, smiling as her sister started striking a few poses in the makeshift mirror. Though she had seen better days, Luna was still one of the most beautiful creatures in all of Canterlot, and as Celestia watched muscle ripple beneath her sister’s skin, she was reminded how she was one of the most powerful as well. Still, a vacation would do her some good. She didn’t need a repeat of the one time she had let Luna handle both the Night and the Day Courts, and had woken up the following morning to find her perched atop a pile of drained coffee pots, vibrating and twitching violently while moaning something about finding a hairless monkey somewhere to do something unspeakable to her with its “fingers.”

“But sister – the Everfree!” Luna whimpered. “We cannot lose all the progress we’ve made, and we know thou cannot handle both it and the Day Courts! Willn’t thou still needeth some help?”

“Yes, well,” Celestia smiled sheepishly. “I was hoping to enlist the aid of someone with just the sort of power to keep the Everfree tamed.”

“Oh, but who?” Luna said. “Who in Equestria might have the sheer, raw power to keep such an unruly, chaotic land under their control? There’s me, and there’s you, and the only one I could possibly think of with even a shred of that kind of power is…”

She trailed off as it hit her. The phrases “unruly” and “chaotic” kept bouncing around in her head. Her wide eyes locked with her sister’s sheepish stare. “No…”

Celestia shrugged hopelessly.

“The-there must be someone else! Anyone else!” She moaned.

“You know there isn’t.”

“But…to have him in charge of my beloved forest! Th-that total jackass…”

“Did somepony call my name?” A familiar, English-accented voice mused from above their heads. Luna felt bile rise up in her throat as a long, snake-like body coiled its way down the wall, shooting up right in front of her in the familiar form of the god of chaos himself.

“Discord,” she snorted, nostrils flaring.

“Is it?” He asked, scratching his chin in thought. “Huh, and here I thought my name was ‘total jackass,’ heaven knows you’ve used that term in my presence often enough. Well, thanks for the reminder, you get a nice party popper, Luna!” At that, he promptly stuck one end of a popper in her mouth and pulled until it exploded, covering her face in soot and spraying confetti everywhere.

“Get it? A party popper for the party pooper!” He gasped, then threw his head back and howled with laughter.

“Discord,” Celestia barked.

The draconequus turned, smiling wickedly as he swooped over to the Solar Princess, meeting her gaze with an evil grin. “Princess,” he replied.

The pair stared at one another a moment longer, the tension in the space between their eyes nearly palpable. A sudden urge to shy away washed over Luna as their glares hardened, their eyes reddening with strain, their looks darkening. Then, rather suddenly, Celestia closed the distance with her lips, pressing a light kiss on his snout while maintaining perfect eye contact.

The wicked smile becoming even broader, Discord replied with a spring-like tongue that shot out of his mouth and coiled around the Princess’s neck. “Ugh!” Luna gagged as the tongue wrapped around the Solar Princess and finally ended right by the side of her face, the tip quickly lapping along her cheek bone.

Finally, Celestia quivered and her eyes shut, letting loose a moan of pleasure. “Bastard…thought I…had you…that time…” she gasped, dropping to the ground in pleasure.

“You almost did,” he replied, trailing a claw up her spine and earning another pleasure-filled moan. “But I am the king of the staring contest, and no being is ever going to change that.”

“Ugh, get a room you two!” Luna cried, her nose wrinkling in revulsion. “It’s not enough I’m sworn to secrecy about every little thing you do, must you be so blatant about it around me?”

“Oh, we do have a room though, Lulu,” Discord replied, waggling that snake-like tongue at her. “The one right next to yours, remember? Deep into the night? When I show up and…”

A hoof stamped against his tail, and he winced, looking down at the Princess in his grasp while she glared daggers back up at him. “I’ll behave,” he promised. Smiling and nodding, Celestia released his tail, allowing him to cradle it and whimper.

“See? He can be taught,” Celestia said smartly, patting Discord lovingly on the head.

“Ughhhh,” Luna moaned, rubbing her temple again as the last few strands of her mane clinging on for dear life popped out of place. Celestia just smiled helplessly. It was obvious that Luna loved her dearly, and cherished her input beyond all others. As for her taste in mates, well, that was something they would just have to overcome together. “Look, we called you here for a reason.”

“Ooh, lovely,” Discord smiled, stretching out over the floor. Before Luna could go on, he replied: “Sure Lulu, I’ll handle the Everfree for ya, just don’t expect it to be a regular thing, alright?”

Luna let her breath out in a long, deflated, and decidedly undignified raspberry as Celestia nuzzled the spirit. “Thanks, sweetheart,” she cooed.

“I won’t be doin’ it for free, y’know,” he quickly added. “I’ll be missing out on a lot of chaos and tea parties with Flutters while I’m busy with the Everfree, so I have here a list of demands…” with a snap of his fingers, a scroll fluttered down on them from above, written on high-quality parchment paper in crayons of differing shades and colors which sometimes changed mid-sentence.

Luna took the list in hoof, gave it a perfunctory glance, found it contained such demands as “Lance Armstrong’s third ballock” and “A Tommy Wiseau gun (IT’LL TEAR YOU APART, LULU!)” and arched an eyebrow at him.

“We’ll allow thee an allowance of 500 bits a week from the royal treasury and a selection of one, and ONLY one, chocolate oatsicle from our private freezer in our room,” she replied.

“Four oatsicles,” he replied, glaring at her.

“Two.”

“Three.”

“Two,” Celestia weighed in, stepping between the pair. “And I will show up on your bed one random night a week wearing these.” Tapping her hoof, a pair of packages appeared in the air around her, one containing a horse’s bit and a set of pink, fuzzy cuffs, the other a pack of four edible gummy panties (“Try all seven sex-tastic flavors!”) and a saddle with a large, red heart stitched into the back.

Discord’s eyebrows shot up past his hairline, perched upon his horns, whistled and howled like a pair of wolves during a full moon, and landed back on his face with a loud thud. “DEAL!” He screamed, taking Luna’s hoof, shaking her violently, and taking off again. “AH’MMM GON’ GET LAID!” He screamed as he shot into the air at a speed that would have impressed Rainbow Dash.

Luna looked over at her sister, her eyes wide and sagging in horror as the white alicorn packed away the little packages. “Sister, thou aren’t seriously…”

“Sorry, Luna,” Celestia said with a saucy little smirk. “But we all have our sacrifices to make for Equestria.”

Luna shoved a hoof in her mouth, fought back the tidal wave of vomit that threatened to well up from her throat, and raised a hoof. “Okay, I’m okay…”

“Oh, shoot,” Celestia stamped a hoof. “I forgot to tell him that Fluttershy will be gone all week with the rest of the Elements of Harmony.”

Luna, thanking every god imaginable for the change in subject, cocked an eyebrow questioningly at her sister. “And why is that?”

“By coincidence, I just dispatched them to the Crystal Empire,” she shrugged. “I thought Shining and Cadence could use some help with the workload, and I knew Twilight would be able to help. And seeing to it that such a job would be somewhat long-term, I thought it would be best if her friends were there as well. For a few weeks, at least.”

“Ah, wonderful,” Luna smiled. “The Elements themselves can help us acclimate ourselves to life in the Crystal Empire!”

“Yes…” Celestia trailed off, biting her lip. “Sister, now that I think about it…is it so wise to have so many of Equestria’s assets concentrated in one location? Especially since we know that location is under threat?” It seemed the thought of both Luna and Twilight under threat was a little much for the Solar Princess to bear.

“Oh, pish-posh, sister,” Luna replied. “If anything, so many heavy-hitters in the Empire must deter a changeling threat! I mean, who would be foolish enough to attack both the Lunar Princess and the Elements of Harmony? Not to mention the royal couple who defeated them in the first place!”

“Yes, the royal couple…” Celestia replied absentmindedly. One didn’t have to be a mind-reader to know what she was thinking. Memories of the changeling attack on Canterlot, of her doubt for her own student during such a critical time, and how that doubt led her to be imprisoned in a cocoon suspended in her own throne room, played out in her eyes as plainly as television screens.

Seeing this, Luna smiled easily and went to her sister’s side, nuzzling the Princess of Day with as much loving care as she could muster. Snapping out of her fugue, Celestia returned the gesture. “This was your idea, after all,” Luna pointed out.

“Yes, and look where my ideas got us during the Canterlot wedding,” Celestia replied flatly.

“Hey! Aren’t I the one who should be mired in the mistakes of my past?” Luna growled playfully, earning a guffaw from Celestia. Luna hugged her sister tightly, wrapping her forehooves around the other alicorn’s neck and squeezing, hoping Celestia knew just a fraction of the love she felt for her. “Everything will work out this time, I promise.”

“I’m sure they will,” Celestia replied. “Still, I worry.”

“Don’t,” Luna said sharply. “I’m a big mare, Tia, I can take care of myself.”

“I’m sure you can,” Celestia smiled. “And say, I’m sure you’ll have so much free time on your hooves, you’ll finally be able to track down the stallion of your dreams!”

“Don’t get your hopes up, sister!” Luna called over her shoulder as she trotted off to pack for the trip. “The stallion of our dreams only exists in them!”

“Just be careful out there!”

“Will do! Love ya, Tia!”

“Love you too, sister,” Celestia called, quickly bowing her head back to the large, reflective glass shard. With her sister gone, she could only see one thing in the shard now: the mare whose mistakes almost cost her a kingdom, and her ponies’ their freedom. “Be careful, Lulu,” she whispered, hoping that the stupid mare looking back at her hadn’t just made yet another idiotic mistake.

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Back in the infirmary, the Solar Guardstallion remained limp as he was unceremoniously dumped on the tiled floor by the snoring bat ponies. He remained practically catatonic even as the doctors rolled their eyes, carried him to a cot, and ran through a full checkup, including an internal temperature check that required a thermometer in his ass so deep and for so long that he seriously considered buying a ring for it just to make things official.

Turning in his cot the smallest, barest amount of a micron, the guard forced a wince down as his newly-sore bottom complained. He only gave it the rubbing it desperately needed hours later, when the lights were turned off and he was sure he was alone. At that point, he opened an eye to the faintest hint of a slit, the flicker of a green shimmer passing through it as he scanned the room before closing them again.

He finally shifted in his bed, pulling some pressure off his aching rear. He grimaced, and not entirely from having his black cherry popped by six inches of cold glass. He had heard a single phrase while lying dazed (though not actually unconscious) on the bat-pony’s back, just one phrase said in the moment before the doors between him and the Princess had swung shut, and that phrase was “Crystal Empire.”

His grimace softened back to a neutral blank. This was very bad, but fortunately, he had the means with which to rectify this, and perhaps even salvage the situation. With a thought, he opened up an invisible, magical communications channel with a station setup in an unnoticeable little cave on the side of the mountain.

Sokol-One, come in Sokol-One! He whispered into the channel. This is Agent Orange, calling Sokol-One, I have an important message for the Queen…

Author's Notes:

Thought I'd forgotten about this one, eh?

Special thanks to DJK for prereading, TheNextGamer for feeding my idiocy, and lingojam for his English to Ye Olde English translator for Luna's angry parts :)