“Are you going to be alright?” Twilight asked the mare she was holding, even as she watched the pale blue mare’s nosebleed finally trickle to a stop.

“The Great and Powerful Trixie… “ began Beatrix, before stopping to put a hoof to her head with a wince of pain. “I’ll be okay, just can’t push it right now.”

“I’d say that’s probably a very good plan,” Twilight replied, trying and failing to pick up the knife Beatrix had used to free her with her magic. “Why can’t I use my magic?”

“Drugged,” succinctly explained the former 143. “In what they were feeding you. Should wear off in twelve hours. Antidote in Starlight’s old lab. Want me to go get it?”

“You’ve done enough for right now, just take it easy for a bit,” Twilight ordered, pushing Beatrix back down as she made to rise up from the floor. “I may not have my magic right now, but I’m more than just my magic.”

Making sure that Beatrix was reasonably comfortable, Twilight staggered her way back onto her hooves as muscles and balance systems that hadn’t been used in days found themselves called on again. It took Twilight more than a couple of attempts, but eventually she was able to pick up the sharp kitchen knife in one forehoof and use it to slash open the suction sealed membranes that had been holding Trixie and Dashiel in long bondage on either side of Twilight.

Both mares had similar reactions to what Twilight had, groaning and shuddering with mixed pain and pleasure as various tubes were pulled from sensitive parts of their bodies. Trixie’s eyes were wild as her head emerged from its encompassing latex sheathe, searching for her sister, and was already taking a step towards the recumbent unicorn when Twilight stopped her.

“Trixie, I need you to get those antidote potions from Starlight’s old lab, right now. There will be time for a reunion later,” Twilight commanded. She knew how worried Trixie must be for her sister, but right now Trixie’s liege lady needed her knight obeying her commands, and not fussing over a family member who at the moment appeared to be safe and sound.

“Dashiel,” Twilight said, her voice fully set in “Princess Twilight” mode, “I need you to find where the Twilight Guard is and get them here.”

“Barracks,” Beatrix supplied, with the same clipped off sort of sentence she had been using. “They’re all stuck in suits. Ambushed.”

A semi-articulate growl came from the alicorn’s throat as she felt a warm coal of anger begin to burn in her breast. These were her ponies, Celestia damn it. Beatrix and Trixie were hers. Dashiel was hers. The Guard was hers! All of them were hers. Her responsibility, extensions of her will, and only she had the right to punish or praise them!

Twilight swept a hoof to her chest, breathing in deeply. Her hoof swept back out. Exhale, repeat. A few repetitions of the breathing exercise found a calmer Twilight whose mind was already flashing to solutions.

“Right, in that case Dashiel I need you to take the Guard to my lab in the basement,” Twilight began, amending her order. “At the back of the lab there’s an arch made out of a black mineral. Lead my ponies through that, drag them if you have to, but get them through it.”

“Understood,” Dashiel replied, snapping a salute and half turning to obey before pausing to ask, “Why?”

“The arch is made from a mineral that cancels out all pony magic. It took me awhile to figure out what killed the suits we were wearing in that cavern in Princess Starlight’s world, and even longer to find some of the same minerals here,” Twilight replied, the corner of her mouth twisting up in a slight smile as she saw the eyes of her three ponies widen in surprise. “The suits live on the magic of the pony they bond to. Cancel out that magic and the suit basically dies."

“Sweet Celestia,” Trixie breathed. “You mean that you…”

“Can free myself from my suit any time I want to? Yes,” Twilight stated. “I just don’t want to. But for other ponies, once I get my hooves on more of that rock from the Badlands I’ll set up stations around Equestria so that ponies can get their suits off of them if they want.”

“Not all,” Beatrix kicked in with. “Too late if you’ve had it on for a long time.”

All eyes turned to the pony on the floor, who had rolled herself to a somewhat normal laying position.

“This is my skin,” Beatrix informed the others, a latex encased hoof tapping a sealed-in shoulder. “Full integration. Same for any of us after a year. Pulling it off… be like skinned alive.”

Every pony present shuddered at the mental image of a screaming, skinless pony, begging to be put out of its misery.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Twilight replied, after a moment. The image had further cooled her anger at what had been done to those under her command, but she could still feel it percolating away, just below the surface. “Anyway, get the Guard free, and have them assemble on the training field in full gear.”

Dashiel and Trixie both dashed off to begin their respective tasks, leaving Twilight alone with Beatrix.

“Beatrix? Was that your name, or something that came to you?” Twilight asked, settling herself beside the mare.

“Best I can remember,” came the response from an azure muzzle. “Shining Armor… He and Cadance… “

“It’s okay,” Twilight assured the mare, folding a wing over her in a gesture of comfort. “You don’t have to explain.”

“You need to know. This, not really an Element,” Beatrix continued, tapping the circlet woven into her mane. “Tool they made. Rewrites mind around damage, but directed by my will. Problem was pulling together enough willpower to use it. ‘Beatrix’ probably my name, but can’t be sure.”

“Bellatrix is the first name of my knight,” Twilight said, taking care to not have two “Trixies” in the same conversation. “Considering you’re from another world, small differences make sense, so ‘Beatrix’ is probably either right or close enough. So, if that diadem has rewritten your mind, can it do that for any pony?”

“Single use,” Beatrix explained with a sad tilt of her head. “Used some good parts to fix bad parts. Why I’m talking like this.”

“Will that change?” Twilight asked, receiving a sad shrug of latex covered shoulders in response. “So what happened while I was gone?”

“Derpy opened up the box you left for her,” Beatrix replied with her clipped sentences, as if every word was part of a finite resource. “Saw she was daughter of Roam you’ve been looking for. Owned Celestia and Luna. Claimed them. Kinda went power nuts. Sisters convinced her to take trip to figure out what to do next. Went with. Left Nightmare Rarity as Regent.”

Twilight plowed her hoof into her own forehead with enough force that she saw stars for several moments. Leaving Derpy the information that she was the descendant of Decius Caballus, and thus heiress to the title of Owner of Celestia and Luna was supposed to give the wall-eyed pegasus some happiness as a reward for her service to Twilight in the past.

Not to mention it was also supposed to have helped free her friend and mentor from a perceived debt that had honestly been paid long ago, and allow Luna to put some of her violent past to rest. Things couldn’t have gotten more twisted out of shape if Discord had taken a paw in things!

“I’ve got the antidotes!” Trixie exclaimed, as she burst back into the room with several flasks held in her magic. “They work.”

“So I see,” Twilight noted, accepting one of the flasks from Trixie and after ripping off the top, downed the contents in one go.

“So, what’s the plan?” Trixie asked, stepping the rest of the way up to give her sister a loving nuzzle.

“Once the Twilight Guard is out of their suits, and I have a chance to check on the girls, I’m taking the Guard with me to Canterlot,” Twilight replied, pausing to let herself experience the euphoria of feeling her magic return as the antidote did its work. “I’m going to figure out why Derpy went power crazy and took over instead of simply enjoying her new status and freeing Celestia and Luna from their bond. I’m also going to have to have a very firm chat with our friendly neighborhood Nightmare, and find out why she and Rarity thought it was a good idea to try to permanently imprison us.”

“That’s a pretty big plan,” Trixie commented, snuggling up beside her sister.

“I know, and I need to make sure Ponyville stays safe, which is why I’m leaving you and Beatrix here to keep an eye on things, along with Pinkie Pie,” Twilight continued. “Assuming she’s still okay.”

“That mare has dodged everything so far,” Trixie commented, and Twilight could see that the former showmare was just a little bit relieved that she’d be staying behind.

“That and I want you to make sure Beatrix here is okay,” Twilight added, standing up and letting Trixie take over the hugging duties. “She’s been through a lot and she made a huge breakthrough for us all. I’m very proud of her.”

Two sets of azure faces beneath cornflower silk manes looked up at Twilight and gave her the same soft smile. It was such a living mirror image that for a second Twilight almost felt that she was suffering from double vision.

“Right, I’m going to check on Dashiel and the Guard, then I’m off to Fluttershy’s and Sweet Apple Acres,” Twilight said, shaking off the twinned Trixie’s sensation and moving toward the room’s exit. “Trixie, I’d like you to meet up with Pinkie in the next hour or two. Beatrix, you’re under orders to take the rest of the day off. Tomorrow too, if you think you need it.”

“As you command, Mistress,” Beatrix replied, worrying Twilight for a moment before the alicorn spotted the mischievous smile the suited mare was wearing.

Chuckling, Twilight left the room and headed to her labs. It took her a few minutes to make the trip and as she walked, traffic in her castle picked up rapidly, with members of the castle’s staff hustling by, some looking a little shell shocked. Though she was in a rush, Twilight took the time to speak to every pony she came across that looked concerned, worried or just off balance.

Doing so helped fill in some of the blanks. Derpy had learned of her birthright the day Twilight had left, and by the next sunset she was the uncontested Empress of Equestria. Styling herself Deripio Regina Caballus she had started with rounding up everypony who had ever bullied or harassed her, and then had them thrown into the dungeons.

That done, she had apparently next held a huge bacchanalia, leaving part way through with Celestia and Luna literally in tow on a pair of leashes, with Nightmare Rarity appointed regent under orders to, “Keep everything together until I get back.” Rarity was a latex sorceress, and with her powers amplified through her union with the Nightmare spirit, it had been child's play for her to mobilize the wandering latex symbiotes into a nearly perfect police force.

Any pony that complained or objected to the Nightmare being in charge quickly found themselves swarmed by a symbiote, encased, and then force marched either into a cell or house arrest with them literally wearing their own prison and guard. The same fate awaited anyone that tried to rebel or even do anything out of the ordinary. Twilight’s guard ponies had just been the first of a great many ponies who had found themselves bound by a living suit of latex.

Twilight’s train of thought was interrupted as Dashiel trotted up to her, snapping to attention and flashing her flesh and blood wing up in a salute.

“Ma’am, the Twilight Guard is about one-third effective. We expect to be mission capable in the next ten minutes, if you intend to deploy immediately. We’ll be fully operational in an hour,” Dashiel reported. Dashiel rarely followed military protocol, but when she did it meant that she was ready to act as the selfless soldier she had been under the Warrior Princess version of Celestia from her native Equestria.

“Take the full hour, Captain,” Twilight replied, acknowledging the salute with one of her own. “I want to check on Fluttershy and Applejack before we head to Canterlot to fix this mess.”

“Understood Ma’am,” Dashiel replied, wing snapping back to her side. “Sun Spear and Shadow Shield will meet you outside to provide security.”

“I… “ Twilight paused, several thoughts and realizations hitting at once. Justified or not, she was about to invade Canterlot with an armed force to seek redress for the wrongs done to her Guard and others.

Her ponies. Someone had hurt her ponies. Caged them. Imprisoned them. Bound them. The thoughts pounded like drumbeats.

They were HER—

“Ma’am?” Dashiel asked, the words breaking the upwards spiral of fury and vengeance within the alicorn.

“Sorry Captain, just woolgathering for a moment there,” Twilight replied, mind returning to focus on the moment. “Sun Spear and Shadow Shield, check. Thank you, Captain. That will be all.”

Dashiel looked like she wanted to say something else, but seemed to decide against it, and merely acknowledged Twilight’s command before heading off.

With her castle returning to seeming order, Twilight headed to the front door, meeting the two guards that Dashiel had mentioned. Both stallions were strikingly handsome members of their respective groups. Sun Spear’s chiseled features were set in righteous determination with a blond mane and a body composed of strong notes, forming a bass symphony of muscles that a mare could listen to all night long, through several encores.

Shadow Shield, on the other hoof, was the dark complected opposite of his fellow guard. Where Sun Spear was all drum and bass, Shadow Shield was most definitely a strings and woodwinds sort of pony whose lean features and body were very fit for long stretches of running, flying… or any other long duration activity.

An idle thought walked through Twilight’s mind, of her ordering these two ponies up to her rooms, where she would conduct a very, very thorough examination of—

“Sorry, gentlecolts,” Twilight apologized, blasting the nascent erotic daydream from her head before it had a chance to get going. “I was just deciding where we should go first.”

“No problem, Ma’am,” Sun Spear replied, his voice a basso rumble that sent interesting tingles through the alicorn. “Whenever you’re ready.”

“Let’s head to Sweet Apple Acres first,” Twilight commanded, setting off down the short road into Ponyville proper.

The brief walk helped clear Twilight’s head a bit and gave her a few minutes of introspection to chide herself over her mental wanderings. Yes, she was definitely a more sexual pony than she used to be, but it wasn’t like her to be this randy. Maybe it was some aftereffect of being vacuum sealed like a freeze dried meal for three days, maybe it was a side-effect of what she’d been fed while bound like that.

It certainly wouldn’t be the first time somepony had tried to overcharge her libido.

As Twilight entered Ponyville proper, she noted with some satisfaction that some members of her staff had started engaging in a house-to-house survey, letting ponies know that the current crisis was over, and helping ponies that needed it. Several residents rushed up to thank her as she passed by, and while she did feel some embarrassment at the deep bows and curtsies they gave her, another part felt a deep sense of fulfillment and having done well by her ponies, at least in part.

“Lyra, kneel to the Princess like a good girl,” Bon Bon ordered her unicorn partner, bowing low and pulling down on a set of reins that looked to be made from woven strings of licorice. The reins went up and around the head of the mint green unicorn, securing a ball gag made from a massive jawbreaker in her maw, from which dribbled a prodigious stream of drool.

With few other options, Lyra got to her knees and bowed her head until the tip of her horn touched the ground, allowing Twilight to see that there were no straps, buckles or obvious joins in the woven strings comprising the body of the controlling headgear.

“That’s uh… quite the… “ Twilight paused, not sure what to say.

“We only started training a couple of weeks ago,” Bon Bon supplied, still looking downwards at Twilight’s hooves. “We’ve been marefriends for years, but the other week something extra just clicked between us and she’s been on the end of my reins ever since. Are we doing this right?”

That Bon Bon and Lyra were a couple had been common knowledge in town for years, but this was several orders of magnitude beyond their usual public displays of affection.

“Lyra, are you okay with this?” Twilight asked, using her magic to grasp the red reins and lift upwards so that the unicorn had no choice but to look at her. “This is something you want?”

Twilight’s relief was profound as Lyra vigorously nodded her head.

“I had to be sure, Bon Bon,” Twilight explained to the hurt looking earth pony. “As long as both of you are okay with what you are doing, then you’re doing it right. But you might want to consider not leading Lyra around on a leash with impressionable foals around.”

“Oh, good thinking, Mistress Twilight,” Bon Bon replied, jumping up with a happy smile and pulling her pony to her feet. “I need to finish putting together the hot walker in our backyard anyway. Bye!”

“Bye!” Twilight replied, smiling as the couple trotted off at the informal dismissal with Bon Bon advising her mare to adopt a more showy, strutting gait as she moved.

“Wait… ‘Mistress Twilight’?” Twilight asked, looking at her protective detail, who shrugged in response. “And they started doing this just after I left? Weird.”

Twilight and the escorts made their way through the rest of the town, and as she did she noticed that at least half of the couples that she saw were engaged in public displays of affection, and while none of them were as charged with dominance and submission as Lyra and Bon Bon’s had been, several of them were bordering on activities usually carried out in private.

“How long has this been going on for?” Twilight asked the two ponies behind her.

“How long has what been going on for?” Shadow Shield asked back, a confused look on his face.

“This sort of… public affection,” Twilight replied, finding a usable term for what was going on in their wake.

“First time I’ve noticed anything,” the Night Guard replied, before cocking his head over to his companion. “You?”

“Nope, everything seemed normal,” replied the Solar Guard. “Mind you though we’ve been pretty much… stuck, to the castle lately.”

“Heh, good point,” Twilight chuckled, turning down the long road to Sweet Apple Acres. She strode forward confidently, setting the pace, not noticing Sun Spear giving Shadow Shield a broad wink as they trailed behind the princess.

Sweet Apple Acres looked to be in fine condition, Twilight noted, as she and her escort reached the outskirts of the orchard and began to trot along the main fenceline. All the trees seemed to be healthy, fully leafed and several were heavily laden with delicious looking fruit. There wasn’t a sign of clutter on the ground and even the boarding fence was solid looking with fresh repairs and paint.

While Twilight had regretted the necessity of dispatching her Guard to help out at Sweet Apple after Applejack’s encounter with the suit’s obedience training and mind breaking, it had obviously been the right call. Even with the workaround of Spike acting nominally as Applejack’s “Control”, Twilight’s friend just wasn’t capable of as much work as she used to.

A minute or so later, as the orchard’s main buildings hove into view, Twilight caught sight of the latex clad orange mare pulling an empty apple wagon over to some trees who were in desperate need of having at least some of their heavy fruits removed from their branches.

“Hi Applejack!” Twilight called out, as she and her escort drew close.

The ebon curves of the solidly built earth pony gleamed bright as Applejack turned to look over at her friend, and the orange mana lines of the suit did their usual fine job of outlining and highlighting the muscle groups of the pony below. Though she would never admit it out loud, Applejack was most definitely a fit and attractive pony, something her encasement maximized.

“Applejack?” Twilight asked, as the earth pony continued to simply regard her silently, with almost no discernable expression on her face.

“One second Twilight,” Spike replied, popping up from a seat on the wagon. “Just let me get Applejack unhitched.”

Twilight chided herself mentally as the drake hopped down and began to unbuckle Applejack from the wagon’s tack. When Applejack had denied her suit’s obedience training, it had responded by removing her ability to initiate actions of any sort, making her reliant on either the suit itself, or a “Control” pony to command her. Spike, citing his Dragon Code, had taken it on himself to become Applejack’s Control and be his friend’s link between her active mind and the outside world.

“Applejack, you can talk to Twilight for as long as the conversation lasts,” Spike ordered, twitching a long lead rope hooked into earth pony’s pulling harness.

“Hey Twilight, how you doin’?” Applejack asked, her face and body instantly animating with her strong personality. “What brings you over to the farm?”

“I wanted to make sure you were doing okay,” Twilight explained. “Apparently Derpy went a little crazy, and Rarity is running Equestria, because Luna and Celestia have headed off to pony knows where.”

“Things sure have gotten twistier than a ball of yarn after a cat’s gotten through with it,” Applejack admitted. “Started off just after you left. Every unattached pony in Ponyville started getting all buck happy. You’d a thought everypony had gone into heat at once, stallions too.”

“Just after I left… “ Twilight trailed off. There was definitely a pattern here. Something seemed to have started just after Twilight had left to deal with Tirek, and whatever it was was still ongoing.

“Shoot,” Applejack continued, stepping a bit closer and setting the buckles and loops on her harness jingling, “where do you think Big Mac is right now? If it weren’t for the help you sent us, I’d be way behind on mah chores. Even with Spike here helping out.”

“A dragon never abandons a friend in need,” Spike intoned, puffing up a little at the praise.

“Big Mac is… “ Twilight led, not entirely sure if she wanted the answer.

“Him and his marefried, that baker from Starlight’s town. Sugar Belle’s her name,” Applejack supplied. “The two of them are over at Fluttershy’s right now, training her up as their pet.”

“Their pet?” Twilight asked. She knew that the shy pegasus had a deep submissiveness in her. A submissiveness that the suit she wore was likely to have encouraged, even if it was one of the “wild” suits that had no control collar, and thus no taming, breaking, or controlling conditioning built into it.

“Just like she was an animal and not a pony,” Applejack confirmed, nodding her head. “With Spike’s help Ah asked her about it, and she said it’s something she’s always wanted to do, just never had the courage to ask anypony to do it to her. But that ain’t the weird part.”

Twilight’s eyebrows shot up at that.

“The weird part is that Big Mac is the one doing it, and with Sugar Belle in tow,” the earth pony mare continued. “Now, Ah don’t know her that well, but Ah do know mah brother. He’s not into the whole ‘Alpha Stallion’ thing. Never was. He’s always been a gentle pony. Always careful with his size and strength.”

“And now?” Twilight prompted, unable to help herself.

“Twi, he used an actual whip on her the other day,” Applejack fired back, ears going back over a frowning face. “Ah asked her about it later, and woudja believe she was actually happy about it? Ah tell ya, if she’d made one word o’ complaint Ah’d have kicked Mac’s butt to the moon and back. Broken brain or not, there’s just some things Ah won’t stand for.”

“We’ll get you fixed Applejack, I promise,” Twilight swore, feeling deep responsibility for what had happened to the mare. Applejack was one of her ponies. One of her closest friends.

“Ah keep telling ya, Twilight. It ain’t your fault,” Applejack assured her, resting a latex encased hoof on Twilight’s shoulder. “You did yer best, and Ah know this’ll pass in time. It’s just gettin’ from here to there that’s a pain. How we doin’ on time, Spike?”

“We’ve got about a half hour before lunch,” Spike noted, pulling out a watch and checking it. “Granny Smith said she was gonna make ruby encrusted baked apples for lunch!”

“Heh,” Applejack snorted in amusement. “Well, Ah’d better get back to it. If’n you can get those guards of yours back out here, Ah’d appreciate it. Right helpful some of those fellers. Kinda easy on the eyes too.”

“143 made a breakthrough,” Twilight blurted out, dreading the moment her vital and active friend would be shrouded under the guise of a mindless drone again. “Shining Armor made a thing that enabled her to come back. She’s ‘Beatrix’ now.”

“See, like Ah toldja, you’ll fix me up. That’s what you do. You save ponies, and yer brother is almost as good at it as you are, and Ah know you want to keep talkin’ but both of us got stuff to do,” Applejack took her hoof from Twilight and turned to Spike. “Right, break’s over, Spike.”

“You sure?” Spike asked, seeing Twilight’s reluctance.

“Ah’m sure,” Applejack confirmed. “Beside, sounds like you might be out of a job soon. May as well get in as much farm life as you can, while you can.”

“Go ahead Spike,” Twilight added, smiling at them both. “And thank you for being everypony’s number one assistant.”

“Aw shucks,” Spike replied, embarrassed for a moment or two, then recovering. “Applejack, this is Control. Back to work. Buck the apples off this tree and the next six in this row.”

All the animation and emotion drained away from Applejack’s face, replaced by the obedient and unflinching countenance of an obedient drone worker. A mere cog in the machinery of an apple farm. Wordlessly, the drone strode over to the tree and spinning, gave it a powerful buck that sent a cascade of apples into waiting baskets.

“Talk to you later?” Spike asked.

“You know it,” Twilight replied, making a decision as she watched Spike lead his drone over to the next tree, making ready to repeat the process.

“Sounds like other ponies have changed in the same sort of way Lyra and Bon Bon have,” she stated, addressing the two stallions under her command. “And neither of you noticed any of this?”

“Well, uh... ” Sun Spear replied, with a touch of embarrassment. “We were sort of tied up around the castle.”

“Right,” Twilight replied thoughtfully. “Well, it sounds like other than behaving somewhat differently Fluttershy isn’t in any danger and isn’t in the sort of prison Dashiel, Trixie and myself were in, or bound in a suit like you colts were.”

“No Ma’am,” Shadow Shield confirmed. “Your orders?”

“Back to the castle,” Twilight replied, watching Spike and Applejack continue down the orchard. “If I’m going to fix whatever happened here while I was gone, I need to go to the source. Which means finding Derpy. We know she went to Canterlot, so that’s where we’re going first. Understood?”

“Yes Ma’am!” responded both guards, in perfect lockstep.

Per usual, Twilight's return home is anything but restful...

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Until next chapter, be safe and remember not to try on any close fitting necklaces offered by attractive strangers...