Read The Bridge
Knowing it would take the twin fae a moment, Lea looked away from the inspection and noticed something shimmering on the edge of the cave. Trotting over to it, she avoided the urge to reach out and grab it, instead biting her tongue and furthering her telekinesis practice. For someone used to channeling magic through her whole body, directing it to specific points was a bit of a reflex taboo. Doing so in her old body either meant a very powerful spell was being cast, or that she was about to fire out a beam of mana charged plasma out of her eyes, antenne, or chest. Successfully reminding herself that concentrated energy in horn didn’t automatically equal death beams, she picked up the half buried object and brought it closer while Twilight trotted over.
The object in question was small, about the size of a large coin, and rectangular in shape with rounded points. It’s exact color was hard to match, given the way it glimmered with an iridescent vibrancy in the sun and Tree’s light, though it most often bore a turquoise hue. Twilight recognized the shape from the biology books she’d devoured between chewing on magical tomes, namely from the microscope section.
“Looks like a butterfly scale. Oooonly much, much bigger judging from I don't need a magnifying glass to see it…. Let me guess, one of yours?”
She said, casting a glance to Lea in time to see the changeling confirm her with a nod.
“Must be one of the scales I shed during the battle with the gyaos flock. Haven’t seen one up close like this in while.”
She glanced over to her friend, noticing the sparkle in the alicorn’s eye.
“Would you like it?”
Lea chirped with a snicker, causing Twilight to blush sheepishly. Smiling, she levitated it over to Twilight and placed it onto the alicorn’s outstretched hoof. Twilight managed to forget some of her earlier stress as she nudged the scale with her nose.
“Haven’t ever seen this sort of light reaction outside of the Elements. Wow, Rarity would do a backflip if she could make a dress of these!”
Attire huh? Well maybe not a dress buuut…
Lea smirked, nudging Twilight and motioning for her to sit down. The alicorn did so, with the changeling plopping down across from her.
“I know the situation is dire, and there is no doubting it is. And with someone as kind and bright as you are, your mind is growing in worry just like mine was back at Ponyville.”
The guardian spoke whilst running the edge of her hooves across the ground to trace her symbol. Weaving her flora magic into the ground, Lea called forth an altered root she began to work towards the surface, narrowing it over its journey.
“You worry about that offering from the tree just like I did for you when Destroyah was on the loose. I thought your world was, vulnerable, not as hardened as mine and thus unable to cope with this conflict. I thought I had to protect all of you and keep you completely discluded from the chaos; that you needed to be coddled… But, I learned something from the little exhibition back in that town. Our two worlds might be cut from completely different cloth, but then again, so are most dresses.”
Twilight, still eagerly watching Lea’s work as the root emerged from the ground, snickered.
“You should tell Rarity that idiom… Sorry, go on.”
Mothra Lea snickered a bit before she sighed contently, waving her hoof around in a slow circle. On command, the root twisted and spun itself around, binding the fibers into a tight cord.
“Different as they might be, as long as we stick together in this situation and keep up the balance between rational calm and controlled fear’s readiness, pool our resources and maintain morale; I doubt there is many an issue that we can’t weave a solution from.”
She cooed in a placid voice, before motioning for the scale. Upon having it hoofed over to her, Lea plucked the root from the ground and bored the tip through the scale; before looping it around in a wide arc and tying off the tip.
“After all, you and I both know what magic can accomplish; and in this world, friendship literally is magic.”
She finished, gently easing the new necklace over Twilight’s head and under her mane. The little alicorn looked down at her new piece of jewelry with a growing grin, some of her previous tension being exhaled out with her sigh.
“Like it?”
“Tis regalia fit for royalty, Lady Lea.”
Twilight chuckled with a playful, spread wing bow before holding her hooves out. The changeling giggled and shared a hug with her friend, whispering a few last words of encouragement.
“We’ll all get through this, you’ll see.”
“Thanks Lea.”