Eclipse hiccupped mid-drink, spilling a small amount of cider on the table.

“Urg. Damn it. I think I’ve had a bit too mush.” He slurred out, the gray fur on his cheeks having turned red some time ago.

Rainbow Dash smirked. “Hah! What a lightweight! Only three ciders in and he’s already going to forget all about this in the morning.”

Feather Duster slid Eclipse’s glass away before he could refill it, ignoring his own comment in favor of making Rainbow Dash’s prediction come true. “This is the first time I’ve seen him touch anything with alcohol in it.” She said while fending off Eclipse’s attempts to claim his cirrhosis. “I’m actually more surprised it took him this long.”

Rarity’s faux smile gained a genuine edge when she heard that bit of information. Until that point, most of Eclipse’s personality -- especially his disdain for etiquette, which had actually made Rainbow Dash and Applejack warm up to him much more quickly -- had been consistent with everything she did not aspire to be. “Well, every pony has a good side. In the right light, that is.” She expertly avoided the side glance Eclipse gave her while trying to liberate his glass from Feather Duster. Drunk or not, he knew when he had been slighted in some manner.

With a bat of her eyes, Rarity continued speaking. “I must admit, I’m curious: what about him makes you stay in your relationship? Forgive me for sounding rude, but Eclipse doesn’t seem to be the most… romantically inclined.”

“Oh, Eclipse can be a sweetheart when he tries, honest.” Feather Duster responded, scooting Eclipse’s mug further away as the stallion strained to reach past her. By now, he was half lying on the table and his head was even with her torso, but she still kept his mug out of his reach. “He’s just not very good at trying.”

“S’not my fault.” Eclipse said, his face flushed with a mix of alcohol and effort. “The restaurant was top notchsh. Shtupid robot sky pirates.”

Rainbow leaned in, ‘robot sky pirates’ having caught her attention.

Rarity chuckled. “I take it something went wrong? Perhaps something a bit more realistic, though?”

“Oh, no. He remembers it perfectly.” Feather Duster said as Eclipse returned to his seat, brooding. “We call it date zero, though it was technically our first. Some crazy unicorn made robots and airships and went on a crime spree. Instead of a bank, he picked a restaurant. Three guesses as to which one.”

“Le Restaurant de Fantaisie?” Rarity guessed. “A wonderful choice for first dates, I hear.”

Eclipse burst out laughing. Feather Duster snickered as well. “That place over on the northwest side of Canterlot? By that big hotel? No way!” She said, waving a hoof. “Something Eclipse and I share is a hate for places like that. I’d go crazy in minutes, though he’d probably only last a few seconds. It was actually that small diner down on Quagga Avenue. The one by the ice cream shop with thirty-seven flavors.”

“You mean the Sesame Foyer?” Rainbow said, almost jumping out of her seat. “And Deluxe Cones? I love those places!”

“You would.” Rarity mumbled, disappointment visible on her features.

Feather Duster glanced up to see Eclipse’s mug slowly drifting through the air to its owner, though it froze when Eclipse realized she had seen it. It slowly drifted back to where she had placed it, while Eclipse tried to put on the most innocent looking smile he could.

The sound of quill on paper signaled the return of Twilight’s note-taking. The newly minted princess had been devoutly studying every example of Eclipse using his magic that she could, ever since she had been introduced to the stallion. In fact, if it weren’t for her, he’d probably only be halfway through his first glass of cider.

Eclipse looked around, hoping to find something to use as a distraction to get away from the group he was with -- or just Twilight, really -- or a new mug, seeing as his other one was out of reach.

There wasn’t much, to be honest.

The ‘party’ was of the noble sort, taking place in the royal palace just a scant few hours after Twilight’s coronation. The sun was starting to set outside, and Fluttershy had quickly left the room in an attempt to tread the castle’s gardens.

As mean-spirited as it may seem, Eclipse was praying she wasn’t having much luck with the animals. Nothing against her, it was just the only other groups in the building that were worth hanging out with were nowhere to be seen.

Celestia had made the absolutely brilliant decision to try to introduce Thorn to Shining Armor and Cadance. It was quiet now, but there had been several flashes of light, loud booms and at least one scream so incredibly feminine that Eclipse didn’t have the heart to tell Twilight that it had probably belonged to her brother.

Elsewhere, Aranna was getting to know Dust Demon and Sagebrush, as well as Sagebrush’s daughter, Cactus Star. Last Eclipse knew, Applejack and Pinkie Pie had gone with them. It was a wonder that Rainbow had stuck around with Eclipse, Rarity, Feather Duster and Twilight, rather than going with the previous group. Eclipse was only here because he had hoped to drown his senses, seeing as how Twilight would have probably followed him wherever he went.

At least Discord wasn’t around to make it worse.

Celestia had hired Eclipse to get rid of the draconequiis just before the coronation. It had been accomplished by showing the god of chaos a double pendulum, and the wonderfully chaotic movements it made. After that, Eclipse showed Discord an equation that explained the movements of the double pendulum using math. The chaos of the device’s movement being explained in a logical manner had sent Discord into an existential crisis, and he left to take an “incredibly long shower.”

Eclipse giggled at the memory, drawing a few glances from the mares around him.

Princess Luna was… somewhere. Eclipse honestly had no clue where she went, other than that she, Celestia and a royal guard had whispered with each other for a few minutes before she disappeared. This was immediately before Celestia had taken Thorn to be introduced, and Luna had disappeared not long after that. As for the guard…

Eclipse looked around at the guards in the area. Sometimes they would shift positions or switch to another room, but they were indistinguishable from each other. Eclipse couldn’t even remember if the guard that had spoken to the princesses had been gray or white, not that that would have made it any easier to find him.

The only other character of any import in the area was Spike, but Eclipse doubted that he’d be of any assistance, especially seeing as he was --

“Right here, Twilight!” The small, purple dragon announced, dropping off another stack of parchment, quills and ink. Twilight took very detailed notes.

So he clearly wasn’t going to be helpful to Eclipse.

Casting one more forlorn gaze about the room as Rarity and Rainbow Dash began arguing over which restaurants were best (even though the Equestrian House of Pancakes was clearly number one, as Feather Duster was repeatedly voicing) Eclipse was beginning to consider just knocking himself unconscious when a loud bang echoed through the room, causing a hush to fall over the crowd.

“What in the hay was that?” Rainbow asked.

Before Rarity reprimanded her friend for language, another bang cut her off.

“Oh, dear.” Rarity said, nervousness in her voice. “Rainbow, you don’t think it could be…”

Bang.

“No way!” Rainbow declared. “She’d never do that twice!”

Bang.

“I don’t think thash Fluttershy…” Eclipse said, slowly rising from his seat.

Rarity gave him a suspicious look. “How do you know about that?”

Rainbow rolled her eyes. “What, you think that there was a newspaper that didn’t have a headline about that?”

“Fair point, dear.”

BANG.

Eclipse whipped his head towards the door, which was now showing visible signs of strain. He didn’t even try to suppress his grin. “Thish gone be good.” Several objects in the room either lifted into the air or bent into various shapes as Eclipse’s chaos magic began to spike.

Twilight’s instant return to note taking almost snapped him out of his good mood.

Almost.

With a loud crash, the door burst inwards, bits of it blasting out from the force of the spell that had blown it open. Two guards fell into the room, alive but clearly in need of medical attention.

‘ECLIIIIIIPSE!” Came the enraged cry, the voice of a mare that sparked some forgotten memory in Eclipse’s slightly intoxicated mind.

She stepped through the opening, into the room of terrified nobles and it was then that Eclipse realized that he was completely, totally, utterly screwed.

Ray Beam practically bounced through the door that Short Circuit had opened, cheerily singing that “Someone’s gonna get it! Someone’s gonna get it!”

Short Circuit flared her nostrils, quickly finding her target. “You LOST it!?” She bellowed, the anger in her voice rattling the very stones the palace rested on. “I labored for years, perfecting that device!” She marched up to Eclipse, jabbing a hoof into his chest. “Do you know how hard it was, layering all the spells needed for that thing to work, without them interfering with each other? I had to design a brand-bucking new spell, no, three brand-bucking new spells, just to get that thing to work without blowing up and taking the user’s face along with it!”

Short Circuit backed up several paces, just to come back and place the tip of her horn right between Eclipse’s eyes. “That HUD unit was supposed to be the crowning achievement of my life. There were countless applications for it, from civilian to military! And you lose it? So, tell me this: What do you have to say for yourself, and you had better not suggest just building another unit, or you’re a dead stallion walking.”

“Uh…” Eclipse stared, mind completely blanking on him.

Ray beam stopped in her tracks, observing the scene, but Short Circuit never moved her horn even an inch further away from Eclipse, who managed a nervous chuckle.

Short Circuit’s nostrils flared a bit, before she noticed the scent on his breath. Breathing in again, she realized that Eclipse was somewhat mentally hindered at the moment. She withdrew her head and, for a moment, just returned the surprised stare Eclipse was giving her.

After a moment, she sighed, and leaned her head forward until it was resting on a very confused Eclipse’s shoulder.

“Because of course you are.” Short Circuit mumbled to herself. “Ray Beam, do you still have that antidote you were working on?”

“But I haven’t worked out the last few kinks, yet.” Ray beam warned, though she handed over a small vial, filled with a slightly greenish liquid.

“That’ll be fine.” Short Circuit replied, taking the vial in her magical grasp and levitating it towards Eclipse. “Drink.” She said, though her voice sounded more tired than demanding.

Eclipse glanced towards the others sitting at his table, but the only two who gave responses were Rainbow Dash and Feather Duster, and the pair of them simply shrugged.

Taking a deep breath, Eclipse opened the vial and chugged the contents. Surprisingly, it tasted like cherries. Taking a moment to ponder if it broke any laws of nature to have delicious tasting medicine, he soon became aware of a slight burning sensation in the pit of his stomach. The sensation quickly spread, as if racing along with every pump of his heart, as well as increasing in ferocity until it almost felt like he were sitting next to a huge, roaring flame, just barely not catching fire himself.

Closing his eyes and gritting his teeth, he suffered this near burning sensation for nearly a full minute before it faded, leaving him sweaty, out of breath and laying on the ground.

Ray Beam was looking down at him with stars in her eyes. “He didn’t scream, so it must be getting better!”

“Getting better?” Eclipse said, quickly climbing to his hooves and raising his voice. “What, did everyone who tried it before spontaneously combust? If this is ‘getting better’ what the hell would I have gone through if it had been…” He stopped aware that he was not slurring and that the world was not slightly blurred.

“I’m sober.” He realized. “I’m sober!’ he repeated, enthusiastically slamming his hoof into the ground. Several sparks flew as his hoof hit the ground, followed by the scrit-scratching of quill on parchment. “God damnit, I’m sober.” He said for a third time, lowering his head.

He looked up, remembering the two scientists in from of him. “Oh, yeah, you two. look, I’m sorry about the HUD unit, okay? I kind of had a moment where I got captured by the bad changeling hive, the one that was fighting both the good hive and the town of pegasi and griffons, and maybe ended up being mind-controlled a little. I’m sorry. Believe me, it was not intentional and that incident has been resolved.” He scratched his chin, mistaking the surprised stares from everyone around him as a sign for more of an apology.

“If it’s any consolation, I loved the HUD unit. It’s just, more than one person commented on how friggin ugly those things were, so if you two could fix that, I swear it’s shelf ready, okay?”

Rainbow Dash leaned over the table to Feather Duster. “Did he just say he was mind-controlled by evil changelings?”

“Maybe? I don’t really know.” Whispered Feather Duster. "What's this about good and evil changeling hives?"

"Explains that Thorn guy." Dash muttered.

“He is being truthful.” The group of mares, plus Spike, at the table jumped as Thorn appeared, not disguised. “I am not completely certain of all the details, but I can confirm that he is no longer under outside control.”

“Well, that’s a story I’d like to hear.” Cadance added as she and Celestia trotted up to the table as well. “What do you think Shiny?”

Shining Armor, face green with something other than envy, could only continue his rapid breathing into a brown paper bag.

Eclipse trotted over to the broken door and the pair of guards Short Circuit had decimated in her entrance. “I promise, the device worked like a charm, though I didn’t really pay much attention to it.” The door reassembled itself and closed, though it was now a single large door that rotated around a central point, but fixing things with chaos magic was a science where you took what you can get. “If I had some more practice, I could come to use it more actively. But beyond being easy to ignore, which is not a flaw, I swear, I couldn’t really say anything that wasn’t exactly how its supposed to work.” He looked at the guards on the ground, blinking a few times. “Is anyone a doctor?”

“I am.” Said one mare as she raised a hoof.

“Well, what are you waiting for, an invitation? Get over here!” Eclipse shouted, prompting a quick response from the mare, who dashed over. “The last time I healed someone I accidentally made her kidneys perform mitosis. Lucky for me she had actually been a kidney donor, so the docs just needed to move one of the extra left ones to the right. First time they’d ever seen a green kidney, though.”

“Anatomy doesn’t work like that…” Twilight began.

“Welcome to my life!”

Rainbow dash grinned. “I’m liking this guy more and more. It’s like if Discord worked for Celestia and didn’t try to take over the world.”

“I never understood that.” Eclipse muttered. “Taking over the world is too much work. And if you want to destroy it, just wait a bit and let petty differences incite wars.”

Everyone in the room stared at him.

“What? It works like that where I’m from.”

Several minutes of awkward silence followed until Luna reappeared.

“Eclipse,” She began. “we have something to--“

Eclipse cut her off. “No forays to the crystal empire until one week after whatever diplomatic shenanigans that happen there are resolved. Discord shot me a warning about that when I got him to stay away from this party.”

“Actually, several groups that swept through the remains of the Nexus changeling hive found this.” She produced the HUD unit. “Apparently, it had been thrown in a wastebin and were only recovered thanks to an order to look for an item matching their description.”

Ray Beam and Short Circuit snatched the unit and fled the scene.

“What insolence! Those two should be--“

“Inventors.” Eclipse interjected.

“--admired for their proud protection of such hard work and dedication.”

Luna waited for several moments as a few ponies in the room coughed lightly.

“There is also the slight matter of Canterbury’s excellent development rate, but I’m sure you’ll see that in a few days.”

“What’s Canterbury?”

“Sweet mother of Celestia!” Eclipse blurted after the minute long silence it took him to process what he was seeing.

“Hah! He has finally taken my sister’s name in vain.” Luna cheered. “This is a momentous occasion!”

“I find it hard to be surprised.” Thorn said. “It makes logical sense. After the discovery that Nexus had several other hives under his control and the fact that there are none in their right mind who would willingly live in any Nexus hives, all the excess changelings had to go somewhere.”

“What about that hive you said you were from!? Couldn’t you stick them in that and Blackreach and dig more tunnels? And I thought Vangar was your friend now.”

“All valid points, were it not for the sheer bulk of the changelings in question.” Thorn replied, not missing a beat. “Besides, the threat of them being discovered prematurely is diminished by not using the crystal mines. I understand that they have become something of a tourist destination.”

“Canterlot. The city that was attacked, almost taken over, in fact, and is still filled to the brim with ponies who are terrified of your kind.”

“Hence the precautions against discovery by placing the entrance at the base of the opposite side of the mountain.”

Eclipse pointed to Shining Armor and Cadence. The first was sitting next to a pool of his own bile and struggling to breathe, while Cadence had been completely paralyzed in shock.

Luna pondered the two for a moment. “Hm. Perhaps it was best to give them time to get used to Thorn, then bring this up.”

Thorn rubbed his head. “Do they not control the Crystal Empire? Blackreach had records of an offshoot of changelings that lives in the northern wastes. Their exoskeleton has evolved to become white, from what I can recall. They likely still live there.”

Shining Armor started retching again. Cadence was still motionless.

Eclipse turned back to the mass of changelings before him. Most were busy digging, some were exploring a cave network they had busted into, checking for stability and size, but a small group of younger changelings was returning the surprised stares from the visitors.

“This is going to end in disaster.”

Luna grinned at him. “Only if you stay here too long, Eclipse.”

“Everyone still thinks Chrysalis represents the whole changeling race.”

“Part of why this is so important.” Luna pressed. “It will be quite a long time until they may be revealed publicly, but it will come eventually.”

“There will be rumors. People will come to investigate.”

“Hah! Rumors. Few will put enough stock in them to come so far out of the way.”

"The ones that do?"

"Meh."

“What about those guards Celestia had with her when she went to Vangar?”

“Rumors of changelings that aren’t evil?” Luna pondered the thought, tapping her chin with a hoof. “Yes. That could be somewhat troublesome.”

“Take this seriously, would you!” Shouting at her now, Eclipse barely noticed that Luna’s tail was currently soaking up the attentions of several of the young changelings.

“Perhaps you should be more calm.” Came the inevitable reply, as Luna shooed a few of the changelings away. “You are the chaos mage in the room, after all.”

Eclipse angrily pointed a hoof at her before hanging his head in defeat. “I’m done. That’s it, I’m out. Come get me when you want to destroy one of Equestria’s smaller neighbors.” He turned and left the cave. “I’ll be in my room until then.”