Author's Notes:

So very much not my usual fare. I hate angst and gloom with a passion. But this was something I felt strongly about. The lack of any proper apology for everyone's actions in A Canterlot Wedding has long since been a sore point with me. Especially Celestia. Jeeze mare, pony up for once and admit you were wrong!

There have been some excellent stories dealing with that, 'What have you done?' being one of my favourites. Far better than this one as a matter of fact. But all of them have Twilight acting rather OOC. She's not the sort of pony to turn on her friends, or give up on friendships over what happened. It took her friends being literally turned into their evil twins to make her give up, and that was only because in her own words, 'they weren't her friends anymore'.

So I've tried to write the reactions of the Twilight from Lesson Zero and Return of Harmony. The one who'd do anything to protect her friends, who would walk waist high through boiling lava for Princess Celestia.

As Twilight ran through the crystal caves under Canterlot, she mentally berated herself. Cadence’s heart-song about how she loved Shining Armour and might lose him to another was another poinard of failure through a heart that already felt like a pincushion. She was impressed that the half-starved alicorn could maintain a full vocal accompaniment while at a dead run; though she put that down to the power of the heart-song or innate alicorn vitality.

However, even wondering about that couldn’t distract her for long from the central cause of her heart-ache. She’d failed; her friends, her sister-in-law to be, her brother, Princess Celestia, indeed all of Equestria. She’d had one chance to stop this mess, and she’d blown it by running around like a mad-mare yelling ‘Cadence is evil!’

It was no wonder they’d all thought she was crazy. Hindsight in this case wasn’t just 20:20, it was using a magic mirror with a microscope attachment. She could have gone to Celestia privately and told her of the things she’d observed calmly, like a rational mare. Now she thought about it, Cadence’s horn-glow was normally pink, the green aura the fake had displayed was a dead giveaway that she wasn’t the same pony. But who was the fake Cadence? She should have done some research into what spells could produce such a perfect duplicate…

She would have face-hooved if all her hooves hadn’t been otherwise occupied with running. “Cadence, do you know anything about the pony who replaced you?”

Moments later she knew quite a bit about the Changeling, Queen Chrysalis, who had taken Cadence’s place; including the fact that they were capable of mind control, though that was because she and Cadence were facing three of her mind controlled minions. She briefly considered manifesting a bouquet of flowers and throwing it to distract them (they were bridesmaids, after all), but letting them jump around in a cave filled with sharp crystal edges might get them hurt in their current state, so she simply hauled them off the ground with her telekinesis and used a sticking spell to fix them to the nearest flat wall.

“Let’s go!”

Cadence followed her, but gave a brief glance backwards. “Will they be okay?”

“The spell will only last a few minutes, less if they think to cast a counter-spell. Twinkleshine was at Celestia’s school with me, she can show the others how to do it. But by then we’ll be long gone. The last thing I want to do is get anyone else hurt through my mistakes.”

“What do you…” Cadence started to ask, but then they arrived at the rubble pile that lead up to the cavern entrance, and needed all their breath for climbing.

&&&

Twilight sighed with relief. They’d arrived just before Celestia finalised the vows, and pulled the big reveal. She felt some joy at being shown to be right, but mostly relief that now she could reconnect with her friends and mentor, not to mention her brother. She could set things right, she’d fixed her failure, at least as much as she could...

Chrysalis was boasting about how she was going to win anyway. “Soon, my changeling army will break through. First, we take Canterlot. And then, all of Equestria!”

“No. You won't. You may have made it impossible for Shining Armor to perform his spell, but now that you have so foolishly revealed your true self, I can protect my subjects from you!”

That brought a smile to Twilight’s lips. Princess Celestia was going to finish the job and fix the whole mess. Her horn beam crashed against Chrysalis’s, and bore down… Wait, it was being pushed back? That was not how things were supposed to work! Princess Celestia was supposed to win! This just wasn’t fair!

Looking at Chrysalis’s smug face as she started to drive the Princess back, Twilight’s feelings of failure came back along with the same fury that had possessed her down in the Crystal Caverns when Chrysalis had taunted her, but increased tenfold. Unconsciously, she pawed at the ground. That bug was the cause of her friends abandoning her, her childhood friend being imprisoned and starved, her brother becoming a mind controlled slave, and the possible destruction of Canterlot, even Equestria if she could overpower Celestia. However, it was Twilight who’d failed to stop her in time…

Twilight barely noticed her coat turn white and her mane and tail burst into flames, not the red and yellow of rage, but a cold blue and purple to match her mood. Chrysalis would not win! Twilight would stop her, whatever it took! She put her glowing horn down and charged, just as she had Nightmare Moon so long ago.

Chrysalis clearly noticed her, but couldn’t really do anything about her. An attempt to move her head, presumably to target Twilight, had Celestia’s beam gain back several hooves of distance. Green fire started to swirl around the changeling queen’s hooves, her legs tensing for a magically enhanced front kick, but she never got the chance. There was a white flash, and Twilight reappeared a few hooves from the Changeling Queen’s chest, still travelling at a full magically enhanced gallop.

Changelings weren’t true insects, or true anything, and the tegument on their torso area was hardened skin, not chitin. It still made for pretty tough armour, able to turn light blows or even sword slashes. The amount of magic Chrysalis was channelling through her body formed a natural structural integrity field, making her skin even tougher. There was very little that could harm it… Unfortunately, a piercing attack by a unicorn horn reinforced by the rage enhanced magic of one of the most powerful unicorns since Starswirl the Bearded was one of those things.

Chrysalis had just enough time for an almost comical look of surprise as the horn sunk in; then there was an intense explosion which sent her rag-dolling backwards. She sailed through the air and ended her trajectory by smashing against a pillar with a sickening crunch. She slid down, leaving a trail of green ichor on the white marble and flopped forward off it at the base. Of Twilight there was no sign.

Celestia’s beam turned the stonework molten where it touched the ground, an instant before it winked out. The rest of the chamber was silent as the ponies in it recovered from the sudden turn of events. Then the yelling began. There were screams, cries, Cadence rushing over to Shining Armour as he sagged to the ground, the green glow of Changeling mind control fading from his eyes. Various ponies started rushing around, trying to make sense of things. They weren’t having much luck.

“Silence!” Celestia’s command voice cut through the hubbub. She continued more gently. “My little ponies, I know this has been a shock, but the best way to resolve it is to remain calm and help one another. We must find Twilight, and prepare to face the army that that creature summoned. ”

Rainbow Dash shot across to hover in front of the fallen Chrysalis. “I bet she knows where Twilight is! Hey bozo! What did you do with Twilight?”

The crumpled figure of Chrysalis stirred, her wing buzzing spasmodically like a dying insect’s, and her eyes opened slowly. Her head rolled slightly as she looked towards the polychromatic Pegasus and a sneer grew on her face. She rasped, “What did _I_ do to _her_? She’s the one who punched her horn through my chest! Right into my primary philogastric sac too.”

“What the hey is a filly-ghastly whatever? WHERE IS SHE?” Rainbow got right into the Changeling Queen’s face as she finished the last word, and the creature gave a crackling chuckle. “You’re probably breathing her!”

Rainbow reeled back in shock, and her distress seemed to energise Chrysalis. Her voice strengthened. “My philogastric sac is where I convert the love energy I drain into magic and store it. When she ruptured it, there was enough magic in it to empower an entire changeling army and duel Sun-butt over there to a standstill at the same time!”

Her eyes were having difficulty focussing on the Pegasus, but she continued her speech. “When your little purple pain in the posterior stuck her horn through it, I got hit by the backlash and got half fried, not to mention getting slammed into a pillar. She must have gotten the rest channelled right into her through her horn, and been instantly vapourised. She may have beaten me, but at least she didn’t get to enjoy her victory.”

Expressions of shock and horror were pretty much universal at Chrysalis’s callous assessment, and both Fluttershy and Rarity started crying, while Pinkie Pie just stood there, deflated. Rainbow simply got angry. “That’s horseapples! Twilight would never be defeated by some bunch of hooey hocus pocus! Call off your goons and bring Twilight back or I’ll…”

“Do what?” Chrysalis smirked, seeming to gain strength from her defiance. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m already done for. I can’t even feel or move my _own_ body, much less sense or control the hive. Just as well, if I could I’d tell them to tear this city to the ground just to see the looks on your stupid faces.”

Her head sagged forward to view the ichor leaking from her wounds, and the hole in her chest. “It’s just as well that I can’t feel anything, I suppose… this looks like it would _really_ hurt.”

Celestia had been listening to the dialogue with everyone else and was just as shocked, but she’d also been sending messages to the guards around Canterlot. She was surprised at some of the responses.

“Your changelings have stopped attacking and fled. Why?”

“Not my changelings any more, thanks to your precious protégé! I only ever allowed them enough power for the task at hand. I had no desire to risk creating a rival. Now I can no longer feed them, they’ve fled to conserve what power they have left. Curse them, and curse Twilight Sparkle!”

“You monster!” Rarity exclaimed, having finally pulled herself together enough to take part in the conversation. “Twilight was our best friend!”

Chrysalis’s response was odd, a rasping cackle that tapered off into a series of choking coughs. “Oh, that’s good, I thought the pink one was the comedian of your group. As far as Twilight was concerned, you’d all found a new pony to take her place. She still cared about you all for some reason, enough to do… this.”

Her head twitched towards the wound that marred her torso.

“I couldn’t tell what she was thinking; I’m an empath, not a telepath, or was. But I know what she was feeling. There was fury, yes, but under it a sense of loss, failure, and a desire for redemption, whatever the cost. Based on what she felt earlier during the rehearsal, it’s a pretty good guess that you were the ones she felt she’d failed. But we all know that’s not true.”

“Yeah, Twilight never failed us! She came back and kicked your butt!” Rainbow growled.

“Really? I hadn’t noticed.” Sarcasm dripped from Chrysalis’s mouth, along with drooling strands of green ichor. “What I mean is that you were the ones that failed her. At least that part of my plan worked.”

She gave a choking cough, and spat out more luminous green ichor.

“Oh yes, I knew about Twilight Sparkle, powerful mage, tireless researcher, Leader of the Elements of Harmony… and sun-butt’s favourite patsy for when she can’t be bothered to get off her cake stuffed rear and solve her own problems. Still, not the sort of pony whose attention I wanted to attract.

“While I could fob off old Sunny over there with some general platitudes, and I had Shiney-boy over there so mind zapped he wouldn’t notice if I danced on the table without my disguise, from all accounts she actually had a functioning brain. Still, from how little Shiny talked about her, I figured they’d grown apart, and she’d only remember Cadence as the pony who foal-sat her a few times. I’d just pull the generic princess routine and everything would be fine.

“Then she comes up to me and does her little dance. Waving her flanks in my face, are you sure you should be baby-sitting foals, Cadence? She managed to completely throw me off for a second. I mean, what kind of pathetic shut-in has her foal-sitter as a best friend? I should have just brushed her off gently with some ‘Aren’t we a little old for that Twilight?’, but instead I froze up, and that blew it.”

Her eyes grew unfocussed. “I could sense I’d aroused her curiosity, and if she started investigating that would quickly become suspicion. I couldn’t possibly stand up to a detailed questioning about Cadence’s history, and that would have been it. It was too late to stop her, so I chose a different path, baiting her. Fortunately, you idiots made it pathetically easy.

“I could sense her following me around, so when around you, and away from sun-butt or anyone who’d notice I deliberately acted as unpleasant as possible. I monitored her emotions, as she got more and more frantic and none of you called me on it. I’m surprised she didn’t talk to you privately about it…”

Seeing the looks on the Element Bearers’ faces, she gave another hacking cackle. “Oh my, she did! And you must have shut her down, this is too rich! You did most of my work for me!”

“I even let her see me zapping Shiny with a mind control spell, and it paid off. I could feel her frustration, her distress at being unable to do anything. Still, when she came into the rehearsal all ready to expose me, I was ready for a verbal duel, even using some of my hoarded power to influence you to my side.

“But it turns out I didn’t need any of that. I cried a few crocodile tears and all of you immediately dropped her like a drained husk. I’ve never seen such a display of shallowness in all my years. It was glorious! Her ‘loyal’ friends, even her own brother abandoning her tore up her heart, but what finished it off was sun-butt telling her off.”

By this time the element bearers were a distraught and sobbing mess. They turned their focus towards Celestia, with shock and disbelieve written all over their faces. Celestia herself seemed to be at the edge of tearing up, already expecting what Chrysalis would say next.

She couldn’t move her head anymore, but her eyes fixed on Celestia’s. “You took your most loyal subject, your treasured student, the pony who’d placed her life on the line for you again and again and protected Equestria from everything from your nutso sister to Discord, and during a time of crisis refused to listen to her, or indeed give her the level of attention you’d give some random guard warning you of a threat."

This finally broke Celestia's remaining composure. Her tears were now dripping onto the ground as she lowered her face into her left hoof. Muffled sobbing noises could be heard across the grand hall; the ancient ruler of the sun just as devastated when she sent her sister away, a thousand years ago.

Chrysalis in turn, only gave a small triumphant smirk.

“Love is sweet, but despair is spicy, and right then purple sparkle’s emotions were volcano hot sauce mixed with liquid rainbow! Then you left her there, lying on the steps sobbing what remained of her heart out. Then I made my first mistake. I had considered killing her and dumping her body in the caverns, but I was pleased that my plans had worked so well and decided she might be useful to me once I had taken control of Equestria.

“I cast her into the Crystal caverns alive, and taunted her using Cadence’s face. I should have just left her there, but it was so much fun to torment her, besides I owed her some payback for the way she'd almost wrecked my plans. I wanted to crush her utterly, ensure she was so wrecked that she wouldn't even consider returning. I even had some mind controlled ponies there to to keep her contained if she tried to escape. Clearly, that didn’t work out the way I planned…”

She looked down at her ruined body again. Her voice was weaker now.

“Still, I have at least some compensation. My killer went to her grave thinking she’d lost everything, and the rest of you will never be able to make it up to her, or escape the fact that if you’d been one whit more the ponies she’d believed you to be, she’d still be alive. She may have saved you from me, but she can’t save you from yourselves.”

She managed a sneer. “Oh, and good luck against the next threat that comes along to _eat_ your precious little land. Without nerd-pony you can’t use the Elements to defend you. I hope it consumes you all and leaves nothing but ashes…”

Her eyes glazed over and she slumped down, her shredded wings giving one more spasm before falling silent. The entire hall remained that way for some time, except for the sobbing of ponies and a shuffling of hooves.