*A week later*

“Remind me again, what we came out here to buy?” I asked as I looked about the myriad of stalls and shops, known as the Canterlot Market.

“You might be getting used to not eating everything in sight when you open the fridge, but I still think you should eat, and I refuse to make some other changeling do my food shopping.”

“One time. I emptied the freezer one time and now you wont let me live it down!” I pointed accusingly at the disguised Queen that was currently a blue coated unicorn mare, with a rose red mane. not that my disguise was much better, being a simple white unicorn, with an orange disaster of a mane. The ethereal miasma was so much easier to maintain then this. as in, no maintenance needed at all.

“I also thought you could use some fresh air. The hive is nice, but you need some sun light.”

“True… okay, why has that guy been following, and eyeing us, for the last few minutes?”

“Ignore him, hes just a creep, I can tell he's just hoping to get a piece of flank, and not something more malicious.”

“Oh great, a cree-” Something moved in the corner of my vision, and I caught a glimpse of silvery steel as something flew past me. A scream of pain and surprise from behind me drew my attention to where it went rather than where it came from. Ribbon was hunched over clutching a knife that was embedded in her foreleg.

“What the Tartarus! Do I have a tracer on me or something!?” Ribbon quickly put a barrier around us just in time for another knife to impact the shield. Whipping my head in the direction of the projectile,I saw a dark grey unicorn stuffing something into a saddlebag, before bolting off as the crowed erupted into panic. I let myself dissolve into a cloud of miasma, and gave chase, tendril of miasma slowly extending at snapping at the pony’s heels. The unicorn hastily threw up a shield, which only briefly stopped me, as I flowed around it, seeing at I had started to fall behind, and quickly moved to catch back up. The pony ducked into an alleyway, the sharp turn causing me to fall further back, before he jumped through a window into a building.

*Two minutes ago*

“Nothing like a peaceful round of tea, wouldn't you agree?”

“Agreed, my good friend.”

“It's been awfully quiet around canterlot lately, hasn't it?”

“Qui-”

*CRASH!* A grey unicorn burst through the window, skidding across the table, before vaulting out another.

“What th-” Before the pony could finish, a billowing could of midnight black smoke billowed through the broken window, moving on is own as if chasing the unicorn.

After it left, the two ponies stared at each other. “Is it bad that I’ve gotten used to these kind of things?”

“I’m not sure.”

That unicorn could move! I was just barely gaining on him, until he rounded a corner… and faced a dead end. In the time it took him to turn around and face me, I was upon him, swirling around him like a hurricane of darkness, until I had him solidly gripped in my miasma. Once I had done so, I begun reforming, glaring at him as I solidified, the miasma holding him becoming part of my mane. The second I noticed a glow around his horn, I reared back, and socked him in the face with my hoof, knocking a tooth free in the process, before transferring the now unconscious stallion into my forelegs, and sinking into my own shadow, dragging him in with me. After depositing him, I emerged, to see several ponies gathered around, and a few guards too.

-Ribbon? How bad did he get you?-

‘I’m ok, it’s just my foreleg. Not anywhere near as bad as when I was attacked by a royal guard.’

-Good, I caught the bugger, and I’m making my way back now.- I walked past the gathered ponies, and upon stepping out of the alleyway, spread my wings, taking to the air as I flew back to Ribbon. A few pegasi rather quickly removed themselves from my flight path, having caught the rather angry look in my eyes.

Upon reaching Ribbon, I landed, pulling her into a protective embrace. Ribbon flinched as I did so. “Please don’t… I’m sore all over now.” She coughed violently, before groaning, and coughing even harder. I felt something drip onto my fur, and looking down, I tensed up as I noticed a small bit of green blood leaking from Ribbons mouth.

“Ribbon. You… just coughed up blood…” I took a moment to steady my frayed nerves. “I’m taking you to hospital, now.”

She hissed in pain as I hefted her onto my back, trying to make herself more comfortable, before I felt her really start to panic. “Chi? I’m… I’m starting to… woozy…” I felt Ribbon slump against my back, which caused me to panic.

The second I burst through the doors, ponies were already in motion, at least a few changelings amongst the hospital staff. Ribbon was quickly lifted off my back and rushed off with her and several doctors, I was about to follow when the nurse stopped me. “Please, you have to stay here so we can work, ok?” I backed away, before turning around to find a seat, several ponies scooting away from me.

After several minutes of staring into the slowing shifting mass of miasma that was my mane, I felt a hoof on my shoulder.

“Um… Excuse me, ma’am?” I spun my head to face the source of the voice, locking eyes with a guard.

“What?” I hissed out, not wanting to be talked to.

“Do you mind if we talk to you about what happened?”

I sighed. “Fine. What did you want to know?”

“We already got some basic info from Ribbon before you came back, but just to make sure everything is straightened out.” The guard pulled out a notepad, and a pencil, before looking at me expectantly. "Do you remember what he looked like?"

“Dark grey unicorn stallion, mane was slightly darker than his coat, saddle bag was covering his cutie mark, never spoke a word.” He wrote down my answer in his notepad

“We know from Ribbon that he threw two knives at the both of you, was there any other weapons on him that you could see?”

“No, but I assume he had more of those knives stashed away in that bag.”

“Ok. What happened while you were chasing him?”

“Well, he tried to lose me, even jumping through a window, but I kept on his tail until he hit a dead end…”

“How did he escape if it was a dead end, was there a group there to help him?”

Escape? he didn't escape, I punched him out, and then… dragged him… Ohhhh. “I can see why you would think he got away, and thank you for reminding me about that.”

The guard raised an eyebrow at me. “What do you mean?"

“Just give me a moment.” I scrunched my face in concentration as I reached into my shadow with my miasma to the guards shock, and felt around for… there! My miasma wrapped around him, immobilizing the would be assassin, and pulled him out. He looked a lot worse then when I put him in there, several bruises, and a few cuts, showing through his fur. “The fuck? I don’t remember him looking this bad.” I gave my shadow a rather suspicious glare.

“He wasn’t like this before?”

“All I did was deck him in the face, knocked out a tooth, that’s all I did!”

The guard waved over a the nurse behind the front desk and took his saddlebags. “Make sure his wounds are treated, we’ll need to interrogate him later.” The nurse nodded and took him to the back. I turned my attention to the saddlebag as the guard ruffled through them. “More throwing knives. and a vial of something, most likely whatever Ribbon was poisoned with. We’ll know what she has a lot sooner now that we have this.” The guard showed me the little vial of clear liquid, it was almost empty. “Thank you for you help in catching perpetrator, I’ll take this to the doctors.” The guard left through the door that they took Ribbon through.

I barely had time to sit down and wait before Luna came in looking worried. “Dear Chitsuki, I heard of what happened.”

“Through one of her changelings, right?” I flatly said as I stared into my mane.

Luna sat next to me and wraped a wing around me supportingly. “Yes, Celestia heard and sent for me. Do you wish to talk about what happened?”

“I was there. RIght there, and I wasn't able to do anything to protect her until it was too late…”

“Surely you did what could.”

“Oh I caught the bastard alright, decked him in the schnoz too. Weird part was, he looked a lot worse when I pulled him out of my shadow, then when I dragged him in there.”

“In your… shadow?”

“My shadow seems to act like a small pocket dimension.” I said, as if having having a pocket dimension in my shadow was completely normal.

“I was not aware of that. What else are you capable of with your shadow?”

“Well, I can enter it myself, and then move around as a shadow, which is probably the second most subtle way of infiltration I can do. But it still means squat...” I just let myself slump against my seat. This continued for a while, me telling Luna a bit about what I’ve learned about magic or any other ability before the topic changed back to Ribbon, than we talked about our first date, the gemstone cavern we found, and more.

We must have talked for an hour before the doctor came through the doors. “She’s stable now, we managed to stop the internal bleeding for now, we’ll have a team to keep watch over her, but the other effects are most likely going to persist until the toxins have been purged from her body. We still don’t know what her attacker used but we should know by tomorrow.”

I perked up at the good new. “C-can I see her?”

“Yes, you can go see her. We sedated her though, she won’t wake for a while. If you’ll follow me.” Both Luna and I followed the Doctor to the room Ribbon was in. The first thing I noticed was the IV drip, trailing into the crook of her right foreleg, and the second thing I noticed was that she had been strapped to the bed. “We uh… had to tie her down when she started having muscle convulsions. We’ll untie her when she wakes up.”

“I’m just glad the worst is over.” I made my way to the bed, where I rested my head on it so I would be the first thing she saw when she awoke.

The sound of Ribbon groaning in pain caused me to stir, smiling softly. “Glad you woke up.” Ribbon groaned again, limbs twitching slightly, before she managed to focus on me.

“W-why a-am I t-tied d-down?”

“You started convulsing, the doctors had to keep you down so they could work. I’ll go get him so he can untie you.”

“Don’t b-bother, guard will g-get him. W-what happened to m-me?”

“That knife was poisoned. They haven’t figured out what the poison was yet, but they at least managed to stop the bleeding.” I gently nuzzled her cheek.

The doctor walked in at that moment. “Hello hello hello, it’s good to see that you’re awake now. How are you feeling, trouble breathing? Any pain?” He took the chart at the end of the bed.

“It h-hurts a-all over.”

“I thought that might be the case, scale of one to ten? Ten being most painful.”

“Uh, five?”

“Five.” He marked it down in the chart. “Anything else?”

“I’m a l-little stiff.”

“Alright, we’ll have to keep you here for now and we’ll be coming by every so often to check and make sure you haven’t started bleeding internally again. At least ‘til we’re sure the poison has worked its way out of your system. I would greatly recommend you take anti-inflammatory medication, as your invertebrate nature means that the swelling will be rather painful with your shell leaving no room for the swollen muscle, we don’t want it to burst.” He shuddered at the thought, for that matter, so did I. “Here, let me untie these and then I’ll scan for internal bleeding and be out of your mane.”

Once Ribbon’s limbs had been untied, and the scans performed, I manipulated my mane so it draped over her like a blanket. “Oh, t-that’s cold.”

“Exactly, it should help keep the swelling down. And its not gonna heat up or melt like an ice pack.” I gave her a small smile and she hummed in delight.

“I-its c-cold, but, soft, an’ f-fluffy…”

“Just for you.”