Chapter 15: the great divide, part two

Dinky came back with a fresh bowl of popcorn and some sodas.

Sweetie Belle rolled her eyes, "If there are no further interruptions."

Sweetie pressed play. The scene changed to a moonlit desert, in the middle of which was what looked like a giant cross between a castle and beehive. The camera zoomed in then it cut to inside, one of the black walls of the holy(but dum tsh) structure began to morph, and opening forming, what walked through was a black changeling with a midnight blue mane, and piercing green, cat-like eyes. He appeared the same size as Celestia, and had long, dragonfly-like wings dragging behind him, on his head a crown made of black metal with green jewels sat snuggly behind his long, jagged horn. close behind him were two other changelings that appeared as copies of each other.

"Your majesty, are you certain that you wouldn't want to join the world leaders summit?" one asked.

"Yes, your highness, it would be rude to refuse Princess Celestia's offer for peace… a third time," the other asked with a grim expression.

The three entered a spacious room with a giant stone throne, carved to appear like half of a cacoon. The largest changeling flew up to the throne and slouched down on it, he snarled and said with a distorted voice, "no, I refuse to submit myself to that wannabe nation 'Equestria.' they are nothing but a thorn in my swarm's side."

"King Arachnix, the hive mind has pulled the results, the vast majority of the hive does not think constantly blowing off Equestria is a wise ," the first changeling said.

The king move to face another wall as it shifted to reveal the horizon, at the edge of it, the Everfree forest could be seen.

He grinned exposing his fangs, "then it's a good thing we won't be doing that. Look at that my subjects, the Everfree, all of that land use to be ours, all of it, then those ponies come in and 'discovered it,' then added insult to injury by trying to negotiate the land that was already ours. Well, no longer, I plan to do what my predecessors should have done the moment those ponies arrived! Tomorrow, we shall prepare our hive… for war!"

The two changelings looked at each other then one said, "your highness, is that really the wisest course of action?"

"Yes," the other replied, "they would see it as treason!"

"Treason?" the changeling king laughed, "this is Justice!" he turned back at the horizon, a shooting star coming into view, "see, even the heavens agree with me."

The star seemed to change direction, seemingly becoming larger. The smirk on Arachnix's face faded and became an expression of confusion. The star became bright, until it became close enough to be seen as a burning ball of… something. The king's expression changed to shock as the ball flew through the hole in the wall, he jumped out of the way, the other two changelings not being as lucky. There was a loud crashing sound leaving a ringing in the king's ears.

He stumbled up to to see what exactly had almost killed him. The projectile had left a huge skid mark, which he followed to a crater in the middle of his throne room, in the middle of it was a huge chunk of a shiny material, partially covered in green goo and dirt.

The walls began to open as changeling guards flooded the room.

"Your majesty, what happened?" a guard shouted.

Arachnix ignored this and jumped into the crater, he rub his hoof on the fallen star wiping the blood and dirt off, revealing a shiny, white glow. It was some kind of metal, not like iron or silver, it appeared as some kind of white gold. He looked back at where it had come from, the wall was now closing, the last thing that could be seen before it did, was the cresent moon.

"Very interesting," he said to himself.

The next morning in canterlot, luna with a tired face begrudingly lowered the moon, another uneventful night come and gone, no one had come to see her, she was the only one even awake.

The sun rose and celestia enter the room with a warm smile, "good morning, Luna."

"Good morning, Tia, how did thou sleep?" Luna said with a yawn.

"Wonderfully," the older alicorn said with smile, as the other world leaders began to leave their rooms. They were approached by the hippogriff queen, who said, "um princess if we could begin?"

"Oh yes, sorry luna," Celestia said, but at that moment a guard burst in, "King Arachnix is here your majesties!"

Celestia smirked for a moment, "I guess he decided to come afterall, just a moment while I greet him, come sister."

The two alicorns were lead to the front gate by the guard, there waited the changeling king and a few of his guards, for of them pulling a covered cart. Celestia bowed and said, "your highness, we are very glad you could join us for the summit."

After a few seconds she lightly tapped luna to bow in respect, which she did.

The king narrowed his eyes, "yes, yes, sure, which one of you is luna?"

The two princesses stood up, celestia with a bit of a confused face. The younger princess stepped forward and bowed again saying, "that would be us."

"Us?" the changeling narrowed his eyes.

"Uh- it is customary for pony royalty to use the royal 'we' when speaking," luna said rising, to be honest the older monarch intimidated her.

"Thats idiotic," the king said, "but regardless I seek audience with you."

"Oh of course, Just allow us to-" celestia began before Arachnix said, "allow me to rephrase, I seek audience with Princess Luna, alone."

"Um, of course," celestia said with a fake smile, "t-thou can use the throne room for now, wewill be speaking with the other world leaders in the courtroom, thou can join us after ward."

"We'll see, if you are ready princess?" the king said.

"Of course," Luna said semi-nervously. The king signaled his guards to follow and the began taking a crate from the cart, following the two monarchs, after a bit of walking, the group arrived.

"Why does thou require our pressance?" Luna asked eyeing him.

"Would you quit with the royal we? It makes things much simplier," the king said looking at the mural of discord's defeat.

"Fine, why do you want to talk to me? My sister covers most of the diplomatic things, I mostly just haddle anything that happens while she sleeps," luna stated.

"Ah, so if it happens at nigth it's your doing, good to know, so can you explain this?" the changeling guards opened the crate revealing a ball of white metal, "last night, this fell from the sky, your sky specifically, killed two changelings, nearly killed me, I was just hoping you could shead some light on the subject."

Luna went over and examined the metal, the shine was familiar, in fact, this was a metal she had known very well, "Platinum?"

"I take it you know this metal?" the king said, as his guards prepared to draw their weapons.

"U-uh, yes, it was… my mother's favorite, it used to be called white gold but, was eventually renamed," Luna said. The metal brought back memories of before she and her sister were orphaned, she didn't remember much, but some things shown through like her mother's love for things that would shimmer and shine, "although, even my mother's jewelry collection didn't have nearly as much as this? Where did it come from?"

"Wait, that wasn't an attack?" Arachnix demanded.

"No, I didn't attack, and if I was going to I wouldn't use platinum! It's too rare and my mother loved it!" luna defended herself, "it be the equivalent of loading a catapult with bits!"

"Then… it truly did fall from the sky?" Arachnix concluded.

Luna was just as puzzled, true she didn't know what the stars she arranged at night really were, but she never imagined they could be made of platinum, "well, truth be told I know not much about the stars, it's entirely possible this could be one."

"You're the princess of the night, yet you don't know anything about the stars?" the changeling asked face-hoofing.

"Well, it's not like I can just fly up there and see!" Luna said, but then her temper was cooled by curiosity, "but this makes me wonder, Platinum is a rare metal, but a useful one, could there be more?"

This also piqued Arachnix's interest, "yes, what if we were to find a way to extract it… alright, I want to make a deal!"

"Elaborate," Luna replied bluntly.

"I will agree to…*bleh,* peace, if you allow my changelings to study your stars," Arachnix said.

Luna could tell from the look on his face he wanted something else, "and?"

"And access to the everfree at all times," the king finished.

The princess of the night paused, then said, "I only have the power to grant you access at night."

"I take what I can get, deal?" Arachnix held out his hoof.

"Deal," the two shook. That moment, that single moment had been the first in a series of events that would lead to the crippling of a country, and the founding of ano- "hey guys!"

The movie was interrupted by Rainbow dash bursting in.

"The fireworks are starting!" she said.

"Fireworks!" Ocellus said with a smile.

"We'll finish the movie later," sweetie said as she paused the movie. Scootaloo walked up to her, "I wonder what happened next."

"Believe me, if history class has told me anything, it's going to get nuts," Ocellus answered her as they left the room.