Katie relaxed in a tub full of water, with bits of melting ice cubes floating at the surface, either sailing by themselves or clinking against the crystal and each other like glass. She idly floated, head dunked in the chilled waters and mane and tail lazily dragged along by miniscule waves without a care. She hummed appreciatively, ears twitching as the cubes touched with the dullest of taps.

The bathroom she was in wasn't anything special; there was a squat crystal toilet built into the floor near the tub, with some pipes and a handle raised for flushing. Close to that was a sink with a mirror at the far end of the room, and an empty towel rack beside that. A door stood opposite all of this, closed and cutting the room off from the outside world. Katie was the only soul present. A serene silence lingered, and she opted to just let her legs dangle about in the liquid and relax face-down in the water.

Of course, she looked like she'd die remaining in such a stance, but she didn't give a hoot. That is, until she heard the door creak open after a few minutes of being nigh-entirely still, followed immediately by hooves hitting the floor. She jerked her head up to look at the source, ears standing stiff as mountain peaks, to find that Anna had trotted in. "How're you doing?" Anna asked as she came in.

"Dandy," Katie replied in a chipper voice. Anna trotted closer and peered over the rim of the tub, and right then the wraith let her hooves touch the bottom of the container. Blue mana pulsated throughout the water, resonating with the crystal and dappling along the ice cubes like a current. The archer squinted and peered a little closer into the water. Almost immediately, she saw that Katie had gone in with her horseshoes on thanks to the blue mana rippling across the wearable bits of shaped metal.

And she flinched as the temperature of the room dropped, but it didn't go low enough for her breath to start clouding in front of her face. The wraith who was bathing didn't flinch; rather, she swished her legs in the water almost like she was dog paddling. Anna's brow rose as miniscule chunks appeared in the liquid that weren't there before; had she not known better, she'd have assumed that Katie was swimming in semi-solidified gelatin that had ice cubes distributed throughout. "You do seem dandy," she remarked.

Katie responded by tucking her legs up to her chest and stomach, flapped her wings once, and performed a barrel roll in the tub. Anna flinched again as cold water and icy bits shot out as a result of said barrel roll and hit her and the floor outside the tub. To add to the icing on the cake, the wraith giggled once she managed to stop spinning seconds later, looking at her guest with nothing short of amusement—if having a carved grin upon her face counted as a legitimate expression thereof.

"That I am," she chirped.

Anna smiled. "Alright. Yodel if you need anything," she said. With that, she left the bathroom, making sure to close the door behind her. Katie sighed contently, and did some more barrel rolls in the water, sending another few sprays of droplets and melting ice chunks everywhere else. Upon stopping, she tried to flap her wings again, but rose a brow when she noticed they felt much heavier than they should've been and just refused to budge.

She looked at them, and groaned upon seeing the water freezing some more. As it froze, her wings got caught and were weighed down with some bits. So, Katie simply clambered out of the tub, and she went as slowly as she could to keep herself from accidentally tearing new holes into her wings.

She immediately slipped off of the tub's rim before landing face-first in the floor, turning into a sprawled-out heap as the rest of her hit the crystal with earnest. The resulting thud rang in her ears, despite being soft, and to add to that her ribs began aching. Katie groaned again and made to stand, but her legs slipped out when she managed to haul herself up, thus sending her back to the floor.

She tried again, but found that getting up was like trying to ice skate with roller blades—long story short, Katie fell for the third time that day. But she kept at it, slipping and falling every time she rose, until she got frustrated enough to jam the claws of her shoes into the floor. This glued her to the spot, though this time she didn't collapse on herself.

Her orbs widened, and if she could do so, she'd have frowned in agitated embarrassment. She sucked in a breath, wincing as she felt her lungs expand and push against her ribs and heart, but before she could call for help the door opened again. She heard hooves clopping on the floor, and she craned her neck in an attempt to look beyond the tub to find a tall form peering back down at her from the other side, with a white and fuzzy hoof resting on the tub's rim.

"The hell did you do?" Matt asked, sending Katie a rather amused smile.

"Kept falling, so I went 'fuck it' and jammed my claws into the floor," Katie responded in a bitter hiss. She watched as Matt let go of the tub's rim and trotted around to get a better look at the anomaly she spoke of, and he sat on his haunches as his grin fell.

"You could've asked for a towel," Matt huffed indignantly, using a hoof to gesture to the puddle the wraith was currently stranded in.

"I was about to yodel for help," Katie scoffed, eyes narrowing. "Next time, I will get a towel."

Matt sighed and shook his head, his horn glowing. A gold aura embraced the hapless wraith and lifted her up, parting her from her shoes. Then, the aura grabbed said shoes and wiggled them for a bit before easily prying them out of the floor. He stood up and trotted to the toilet, dragging her with, only to groan in annoyance when he found a lack of towels on the rack. "I guess you'll have to airdry," he murmured, and set her and the shoes down before trotting over to the tub and peering into the water.

One second went by, and it was one he didn't waste; his magic aura formed a small sphere that dunked into the water like a rock. It sunk to the bottom, and then darted around like a roach in a desert, probing the chilled liquid until it found a small metal ring jutting upright. The ring was grabbed by shimmering yellow and pulled on, and Matt grinned as he heard a small pop, followed by the tell-tale sound of water draining into a pipe thereafter.

The stallion lifted the object out of the tub with his magic, finding that it was an ordinary tub plug. He threw it in the sink and went back to Katie, who stood on wobbly legs and shook excess water off of her body like a dog. His grin widened as her wings flapped like loose book pages, before sticking to her back thanks to a trace amount of water and ice still weighing them down. He lifted her again and put her on his back, prior to making her shoes vanish in individual flashes of light and trotting out of the bathroom.

Immediately, they found a rather peculiar sight, and Katie jammed a hoof into her mouth as she began giggling. She and Matt bore witness to Armin trotting around a bedroom in a frilly black dress with a white headband on his head, and a metal ring inscribed with runes clamped on the base of his horn. In addition to this, his wings jutted out from the back of the dress, though they were tied down by a layer of chitil, and he held a feather duster in his mouth. He was dusting off a table when he noticed the two who just left the bathroom staring at him.

"Thininh anfth Flanth mafth me khashle maifth fthor ah dhay," he said through the duster.

"Th-this… is the worst Shining and Lance could do to you?" Katie asked after briefly removing her hoof from her mouth, her voice oozing with amused disbelief. She was trying to work out whether to further laugh at Armin's plight, or take pity on the bastard.

"Khamfromithe," Armin replied.

"Lance and Shining talked about it, and this was the best they could do," Matt translated, shooting Katie another amused smile.

Katie nodded, lodging her hoof back in her mouth and barely suppressing her laughter. She held on with her other hoof as Matt began trotting again, and in seconds the two were in a hall where they found Natalie and Anna next to another door chatting amiably. The two mares ceased their jabbering and turned to the stallion and wraith with straight faces, though Anna's mouth was twitching at the corners slightly.

Natalie spoke up, "I heard she was splashing around in the tub."

Matt nodded. "There was a ring of water around it, and she told me she kept slipping," he replied.

Anna's mouth curled up into a smile. "What would you expect? I've seen her barrel roll in the water."

Natalie turned to Anna, an incredulous brow raised. "Wait, so if she can barrel roll in the water…"

Katie removed her hoof from her mouth and cut Natalie off, "Don't ask me to fly. My wings are still wet."

"Fair enough," Natalie murmured under her breath.

"So, what're you two up to?" Matt asked, eyes darting between Natalie and Anna.

"Just came to check on things," Natalie replied, donning a grin herself. Anna nodded once Natalie finished speaking, as if to confirm her companion's remark.

"Alright. Have you found anything in those books yet?" Matt continued, sighing.

The mares exchanged looks, then turned back to the stallion and shook their heads. "Looking through one book to translate the other eight has given me a bit of a migraine," Anna sighed, her smile turning into a frown. "I'm on break right now, as far as books go."

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Shining waited until night fell to patrol the castle walls himself, decked out in his purple suit of armor and trotting like he had a battalion's worth of ponies in step behind him. He stalked the gleaming corridors, a stoic look set so firmly into his face it would take a herculean effort just to crack it. His hoofbeats echoed as he moved, rebounding in such a way it would have felt that the castle was abandoned had he not known any better.

Apart from his steps, the halls were silent. Deathly silent. Not even the occasional crystal guard he trotted past dared to make one noise, as if they were nothing more than lawn ornaments. Shining nodded to them, but otherwise paid them no heed, and continued on his way. The faint light of the moon bounced off the walls from whatever cracks and windows it could shine through, giving the place a dull and rather eerie shimmer of silver.

Still he marched, occasionally turning down some halls and patrolling seemingly without purpose. A spark erupted in his eyes, but he quenched it by just blinking once as he passed another guard at his post. His ears swiveled, attempting to catch noises, but all they could get were hard and armored hooves hitting crystal. When he cleared one floor, he went up to the next and trotted down all of its halls before ascending again.

As soon as he hit the third floor, his ears caught something else—two voices, faintly talking to one another. He stopped to listen, the loud echoing of his hooves being replaced by the faint, lingering echoing of the two beings who spoke.

"How in Mythos do you preen your wings?" a masculine voice asked.

"Very carefully," a hollow, feminine voice replied cryptically. "And I make sure my shoes aren't on first."

Shining let a grin creep up on his face. He knew who those voices belonged to. He began trotting again, this time making sure his hooves hit the floor as delicately as possible so that they wouldn't drown out the voices with their thuds.

A third voice, masculine and irritated, chimed in, "Flash! For Faust's sake, stop talking to that changeling!"

Shining's smile faded, and he picked up the pace. He heard Flash reply, "Zephyr, let me be blunt: no. She is my friend and our guest, so zip it."

"Start being diligent!" Zephyr hissed, his voice loud enough that Shining guessed a few of the other guards a floor below would have heard it. He started galloping, rounding a bend, a frown forming on his visage.

"Are you trying to arouse the rest of the Fantasians from their slumber? I don't want to see General Boltwing get cranky again!" Flash retorted, his voice angry with just a pinch of panicked.

"I don't give a horseshit! Stop talking to that changeling!" Zephyr roared. Shining made to gallop faster, and in less than a minute he managed to find the guest rooms, along with Zephyr Bolt and Flash Sentry sending each other glares. "Why do you…" the former began, but stopped upon noticing that his Emperor was present.

"Because I can," Flash replied simply, also turning to Shining, who then nodded to him. "So," he began again, turning to Katie who stood next to him, "what do you like to do in your spare time?"

"Take naps and piggyback," Katie replied, ears twitching as she shrugged her bony shoulders. "Even wraiths need rest."

"Sentry, don't—" Zephyr began again, but stopped when Shining trotted straight up to him and looked him square in the eye.

"Let them chat. It's not hurting anypony, least of all you," Shining hissed, garnering a nod from Zephyr. The Emperor backed off and went to the nearest door before knocking on it. It opened with the aid of a green-tinted aura, revealing Anna and Lance standing in the room with frazzled manes and bloodshot eyes. The two trotted out into the hall, staring intently at their host.

The general took a moment to glance at Flash and Katie as they went on about hobbies, before he turned back to Shining. "I was wanting to punch Zephyr in the face…" he grumbled indignantly and tiredly.

"H-hey!" Zephyr hissed, turning to Lance with a scowl. He stiffened when Shining turned to him again, and gulped when the Emperor held his gaze for a full minute.

"Wanting and doing are two different things. Relax, and zip your lip," Shining hissed, then he turned back to Lance. His gaze softened, "Do you want me to put Zephyr elsewhere?"

"Please do," Lance replied with a sluggish nod. "I can't stand hearing him yell for a minute longer." With that, he turned around and trotted back into his room, with Anna following suit. The door closed shut behind them, and Shining turned to look at Zephyr once again.

"Stay put, and don't utter a word," Shining commanded in a low tone, garnering a shaky nod and a small "yes sir" as his response. He relaxed and trotted one door over, slowly opening it with his magic to find Alexander and Maria snuggled up in bed. The two gryphs were sound asleep, and near them were two guards, with one watching the window and the other turned to the door as the Emperor poked his head inside.

"Things are going swimmingly, m'lord," the guard facing the door mouthed. Shining nodded with a small smile and closed the door, making sure not to accidentally catch his neck with it in the process before heading down another door and opening it silently. A rather amusing sight met him in this third room; Fenrir was curled up on one side of the bed, and Sarah had taken the other side with a pillow in her claws and half the damn blanket stuffed between her rear legs.

Shining wanted to chuckle at the sight, but held the desire at bay—guests or not, they still needed their sleep. He nodded to a guard stationed in the room with them, and slinked out into the hall. The Emperor went one door over and yet again poked his head inside, finding Armin in a half-chrysalis by his lonesome. The blankets and pillows that were supposed to be on the bed were with him, keeping him warm and cozy. He shrugged and went to the next room, finding Zecora and Spike asleep, with NoLegs resting on the zebra's backside.

The last room yielded Matt and Natalie snuggling together, mumbling in their slumber. In addition to this, the guard stationed in their room had a frown on his face. Shining quirked a brow, eyes glinting in askance, and the guard mouthed, "They're dreaming." The Emperor nodded and closed the door, though not before he first listened to the Fantasians' sleep-murmurs and heard something along the lines of "I didn't sin" coming from both of them.

Right as the door clicked shut behind him, he wasted no time in trotting over to Zephyr Bolt and giving him another look. "You, follow me. We're patrolling the entire castle tonight," Shining hissed in a low voice. Without waiting for him to follow, he turned around and marched down the hall, pausing to shoot a fond smile at Flash and Katie as they continued to talk about this and that. Zephyr fell in step behind him, and together the two left the hall and went up one floor in a matter of minutes.

Only the sound of their hooves hitting the floor permeated the fourth floor's halls, and once again things fell into what was otherwise a strong silence. Neither dared to speak as they patrolled throughout the fourth floor, with one going just three steps ahead of the other. Shining's face was set with a stoic expression, but Zephyr's was constantly flickering between narrowed-eyed anger, a worried frown, and a brow slanting in uncertainty.

Upon reaching the fifth floor, Shining finally spoke up, "So, Private Zephyr Bolt… what has our wraith guest done to rile you up?"

Zephyr froze, with a lump in his throat that immediately appeared and refused to go down. He made to speak, but no noise came from his lips. He may as well have been silently choking on a hunk of rock.

"Well?" Shining asked impatiently, without bothering to turn around and meet his private's gaze. He stopped marching, knowing his subordinate had already halted himself.

"F-Flash has u-ulterior motives, Your Highness!" Zephyr spluttered out, his remark causing Shining to whirl around so fast he stepped back like a hoof solidly connected with the side of his muzzle.

"'Ulterior motives?'" Shining parroted, his brow furrowing. "Do tell." He noticed that Zephyr was once again hesitating, so he egged him on, "Go on, Private Zephyr Bolt. Humor your Emperor."

"Fla-Flash… may be h-helping the Fantasians overthrow you! Maybe take Empress Cadence as their own! W-why else would th-they have changelings?" Zephyr managed, his shimmer fading as he began to sweat bullets.

Shining's eyes narrowed, and he slowly walked up to his private, looking him square in the eye when their muzzles were inches apart. "And how, exactly, were you made aware of such drivel?" he asked. Zephyr failed to articulate a response, standing frozen in place as his pores oozed out clear liquid like a spring in a grotto. After a minute passed in full silence, Shining hissed in a whisper, "You made it up, didn't you?"

What felt like an eternity passed, and Shining didn't get a smidgen of an answer for such a while that he could've sworn time had frozen. After a few minutes, Zephyr finally broke the silence, "Uh, s-sir… c-could you please, uh… forget everything I-I said?"

Shining pulled his head back, though he kept his cold glare locked on the guard. "No," he said in an eerily calm tone of voice, watching as the color all but drained from Zephyr's face. "I don't believe I can. You were committing insubordination, and for that… appropriate action must be taken."

Zephyr's rear legs buckled, and he sat on his haunches with a whimper. Shining went on, his calm voice taking on a very cold undertone, "You will undergo disciplinary classes all over again. You could have sparked a war just by instigating our guests—be excruciatingly grateful you didn't."

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The Friendship Express churned on into the night, carrying with it another batch of passengers as it wheeled on the rails going north. In one of the bed-cars, which only had seven passengers inside it, Rainbow Dash sat on a bottom bunk. She was chatting with Twilight, who sat on another bottom bunk directly opposite of her. "So, why are we going to the Crystal Empire again?" she asked.

"Because Shining took Spike with him, and I want to see how they're doing with the Fantasians," Twilight replied, frowning. Her head dropped as she added, "And… I'm also worried about Zecora. She's probably never been to the Empire before."

Applejack, who laid on the bunk directly above Dash, decided to insert her two bits, "You thinking them crystal ponies might try something?"

"Yeah… it's… last time we were there, I looked through the library and found not one record of zebras ever entering or staying in the Empire," Twilight sighed dejectedly, still frowning. She rose her head, looked at Applejack and added, "But… we didn't have all day to go through the library that time…"

"Chaotically tragic, is it not?" a masculine voice piped up, causing Twilight to turn away from Applejack and to the top bunk directly next to her. Sitting upon it was a grey unicorn stallion with a short black mane and an unusually blue horn, his red eyes framed by golden sclera staring intently at her. "But," he began, noticing that Twilight's eyes started twinkling, "you could have another go to look through it again."

Twilight nodded. "You're right. But…" she trailed off.

"'But' what?" the stallion asked with a wry grin, a brow raising.

"It's the Fantasians, ain't it?" Applejack inquired in a flat tone, garnering a slow nod of the head from Twilight as her answer. She spoke up after a minute, waving a hoof dismissively in doing so, "They're with your brother, Twi. As long as he keeps their tails in line, they ain't got nothing to worry about. I don't see what you're fussing over."

Rarity piped up from the bottom bunk next to Twilight, "Applejack, darling, they may still… misbehave, for a lack of better words. All it would take was one pony instigating them for Tartarus to break loose."

"'Spose you're right, Rares. But them crystal folk don't have a reason to egg them on—whatever Shining and Cadence says, goes. And if they told them to let the Fantasians alone, then they're pro'lly leaving them alone," Applejack countered, her brow furrowing. "'Sides, you're not much better either."

Rarity winced like a wasp had stung her on the cheek, but she chose not to retort to Applejack's statement. "Doesn't mean everypony in the Empire's going to do it. Sooner or later, Lance and his pals are gonna get themselves neck-deep in Trouble with a capital T," Rainbow argued, crossing her forelegs as Applejack peered over to look at her. "That is, if they haven't already."

Pinkie Pie, who sat next to Dash, sighed in exasperation. "I hope they're having fun at the Empire," she remarked.

"What sort of fun?" the stallion asked, taking a moment to purr. He vanished off his bed one minute, only to reappear beside Pinkie the next, though he frowned when she didn't jump in surprise. "The safe kind, or the chaotic sort?"

"The safe kind, where they just take it easy," Pinkie replied, turning to the stallion with a frown.

The stallion nodded and shared looks with Dash, Twilight, and Applejack. "Well, with the way you mares speak of the Fantasians, they seem to be a chaotic bunch of ponies," he commented.

"But not all of them are ponies," Pinkie huffed, sending the stallion another frown that came from her brow. When he rose a brow in response, she elaborated, "Only… three of them can be fully considered ponies. There are three hippogryphs, though one doesn't really look like a hippogryph, one's a full gryphon, another's a diamond dog, and the last two are changelings."

"And that's excluding their pet cat," Rarity added, causing the stallion to vanish and reappear next to her on the spot.

"Pray tell, what's so special about their cat?" the stallion asked, smiling when Rarity huffed.

"He can perform magical feats with his tail… and he's also legless," Twilight answered for Rarity, her remark causing the stallion to simply materialize right in front of her in seconds.

Said stallion's brows rose further up, all the way to his hairline. "That… sounds very chaotic, now that I dwell on it. Tell me, have you seen the cat perform magical feats?" he asked.

Twilight nodded. "Mostly levitation and teleportation," she answered. "From what I've witnessed, anyway."

The stallion rose a hoof and tapped at his chin with it, and as he did so a grey goatee that wasn't there before cropped up. In addition to this, a pointy tooth jutted out of under the left side of his lip. "Y'know, that's almost like making pigs grow wings with which to fly…" he murmured.

"Perhaps Fantasian cats have evolved different mechanisms. After all, the worlds were separated for a while, and we still don't know much about that which was recently connected to us," Twilight sighed with a shrug of her shoulders.

"True enough," the stallion agreed with a nod, setting his hoof down after tugging at his goatee with it. He flashed a toothy grin at Twilight before vanishing and reappearing on his bed. "But how should I know?" he asked, and in a flash of magic he changed from a simple-albeit-odd stallion to a chimera with mismatched limbs, a draconic tail, and the head of a goat sporting dissimilar horns. He rested his cheek on a gryphon-like claw and added, "That damned barrier was created before I came to be as I was."

"That's not very reassuring," Fluttershy remarked from a bed next to Rarity's, a frown on her face as she eyed the chimera. "Are you… sure about that, Discord?"

Discord's nostrils flared as he snorted. "Unfortunately, I am. Pity that I didn't get to see what sort of chaos Fantasia had during my brief time ruling Equestria," he replied with a frown. The frown turned into a smile as he added, "Though… if you girls went to Fantasia again and brought me with…"

"I doubt you could handle cannibalistic hippogryphs that mutilate foals' genitals!" Rarity exclaimed in one breath, her remark taking Discord completely by surprise. The chimera's eyes widened and he turned to the ivory mare, looking at her like she just finished getting shitfaced at a frat party.

"I-I… what?" Discord managed, his jaw still moving up and down even as words started eluding him.

"My point exactly," Rarity hissed, eyes narrowing at the mere thought of what she spoke of. "Your dumbstruck expression tells me all I need to know about how you feel regarding what I have just relayed to you."

Discord began scowling, processing Rarity's remark revolving around cannibalistic hippogryphs. He leaned over his bed, like a wicked serpent aroused from slumber by a foolish adventurer, and he asked in a low voice, "What… became of those hippogryphs?"

"We left them in their town—they told us they killed their mares and foals, except one we managed to get out of there," Applejack replied, wincing as Discord turned to her with nothing short of anger painting his face. "Their town was built in a frozen wasteland, one without trees or grass shoots. If they hadn't had food for the past couple of weeks at this point, I reckon they… they froze to death."

"Discord, what would you have done if you were present?" Twilight asked, watching Discord intently. For a few minutes, he didn't move an inch—not even the barest of twitches left his form.

Then, the chimera's scowl morphed into a demonic look, a wicked gleam in his eyes as his lips curled up into a ghoulish grin. "I'd have them turned into rabbits before sicking great fire-breathing dragons on them," he replied. The look faded, and he sighed. "And… what became of the one you managed to get out of that wasteland?"

"Currently with the other Fantasians. Last we seen of her, she was doing a-OK," Applejack replied, a small but genuine smile forming on her muzzle. "Zecora helped her feathers grow back, and Lance and his pals helped her gain a bit of weight by feeding her right."

Discord relaxed, and proceeded to curl up in his bed with a nod of understanding. "Remind me to summon clowns for her when we reach the Empire," he murmured, eyes closing. "Or maybe I could show her flying pigs."

"You'll have to talk to Shining about that first. After all, we're heading into a place he pretty much rules at," Twilight pointed out, proceeding to lay down herself.

"I'm pretty sure I could convince him to let me do it," Discord murmured dismissively, waving a lion's paw for emphasis.