Babs Seed was in darkness, formless and empty. She moved over the face of the darkness, or at least she thought she did, because without reference points it was rather hard to tell. All in all she was feeling rather confused. In the distance she finally saw something, a platform floating in space, containing a comfy couch, a low table full of snacks, and some sort of big flat panel arrangement that reminded her of a cinema screen.
She suddenly found herself standing on the edge of the platform, and a voice, a stallions by the sound of it, spoke. "Sit down, sit down! We have a lot of time and not much to do. No, wait, reverse that. Anyway just sit."
Somewhat gingerly she sat in the middle of the sofa, which was very comfortable. "Where… where am I? Who are you? What's going on?"
The voice sighed. "It would have been nice if your questions had been at least slightly original. I despise the ordinary. However, in order, you're dreaming, someone who wants to talk to you, and more things than your little pony mind could comprehend. However, in terms directly relevant to you, Miss Barbara Seed Cortland, this is an intervention of sorts."
"Intervention? I don't understand." At least Babs could feel relieved that she was dreaming. Things didn't have to make sense when you were dreaming.
"No, very few ponies do. To be more specific, it concerns your trip to Ponyville tomorrow to stay with your cousins."
"You… know about that?" The chance to get away from the bullies who'd been teasing her and worse about her cutie-mark had been a Princess-sent opportunity.
"My dear Miss Babs, I know everything. Well, almost everything, which is why I'm here. I intend to mix things up, see what happens, upset a few apple carts, or possibly not upset a pumpkin cart. We won't know until we try, and there's the fun of it!"
"Who are you?" Babs asked again.
The screen in front of her lit up like a cinema screen, though she couldn't see a projector anywhere. On it was a mishmash creature, a dragon with a snaky body and mismatched limbs.
"My name is Discord! It's short for Discord, maybe you've heard of me?"
Babs didn't know how she'd gotten there, but now she was hiding behind the sofa. She peeked over the edge. "But you can't be here! The Elements of Harmony defeated you and turned you to stone!"
The figure on the screen had gone, but a voice behind her right ear said, "Indeed they did, but not forever."
She jumped twice her own height and landed back on the sofa, on her back. Discord was looking over the seat back at her, chuckling.
"You need not fear, I've turned over a new tree. I now use my vast powers for good… mostly." The last word was sotto voce.
"Now that the first shock had worn off, her curiosity kicked in. "Don't you mean a new leaf?"
"Why turn over the leaf when you can turn over the entire tree? Besides, turning over the leaf without the tree will twist it off. I'm very fond of trees, one tree in particular."
The couch turned into a psychiatrist's couch, with her lying back on it, and Discord beside her with spectacles and a notepad.
"Zo tell me, vhen did you start feeling der morbid hatred of trees?"
"I didn't… I mean… that's not… " Babs huffed. "I never said anything about wanting to hurt trees! I just wanted…"
"Hold, villain!" A new figure appeared; a navy blue alicorn in the regalia of a princess. "Cease thy torment of that poor filly… with a counselling session?"
Princess Luna had come in using her full Canterlot Voice, but it rather stuttered to a halt as she saw what was going on. A pulse of magic shot from her horn, and enveloped them all, and she recoiled in shock.
"You are no mere unquiet shade, no simple nightmare! Discord, how have you escaped your bondage?" Her horn started to glow. "Thou hast made a grave mistake, in the living world your powers may overshadow mine, but here, I am the final arbiter of reality!"
Discord vanished with a white flash and reappeared, half wrapped under her with his head by hers. He placed a cork on the alicorn's horn and chided her, "Luna, Luna, Luna, I wondered when you'd show up. You're the one pony who's less able to take a joke than Celly. I suppose that's why you're so much fun to tease."
Flashing away again, he reappeared between them and the screen, wearing a set of royal regalia made of purple metal and modified for a draconequus, with bracers replacing horse-shoes and a screw and ball symbol emblazed on the brassard. He looked down at it and made a face. "How do you wear this thing all the time?"
He flashed again, and the regalia was replaced by a Wonderbolts uniform with a golden wing commander insignia. "Much better."
Luna popped her cork, which flew off into the darkness. "What are you doing here?!"
"Nothing Equestria shaking, just a minor experiment of sorts. In the future your sister, the princess, decided I could be redeemed, and got the Elements to free me. Surprisingly enough, she was right. I am a new draconequus, committed to doing good, or at least funny. All I intend to do is show little Miss Babs over there a vision of her immediate future, and see what happens when she wakes up."
"A minor experiment?" Luna looked aghast. "You might change the whole future of Equestria!"
"Actually, the space-time continuum is rather more robust than that. I should know, I tried to stop my original petrifaction the same way, but nothing I could do would alter those events. That was before my current reformation, of course. It's like that delightful time-travel spell that Twilight used to try and warn herself not to worry about someone coming back in time to warn her against something."
He grinned, delighted at the humour of the situation. "If an action were capable of affecting anything more than the most superficial changes, it wouldn't work, even with my powers. To do that you'd have to somehow harness a power that already controls destiny... All this will do is change the immediate future of a handful of ponies. The greater scheme of Equestrian history will continue on without a bobble, except that a few ponies may be happier for it. I even have your sister's official seal of approval."
He brought out a scroll with a seal on it made of golden wax in the shape of Celestia's cutie-mark.
Luna frowned, opening the scroll. "How do I know that this document is authentic?"
"As you say, you are the ultimate arbiter of reality here. Use your power to determine its authenticity."
Luna touched her horn to the seal and it glowed with refulgent rays of golden light. "You speak the truth. I suppose there is a first time for anything."
Discord put an expression of wide eyed astonishment. "I'm shocked, shocked that you would think such a thing! I have never lied. Misled, confused, even misrepresented, but I have never lied. I've never needed to; the wonderful contradictions in even the most ordered pony mind give me everything I need to further my plans."
"Uh…" Babs had sat still and quiet as the two immensely powerful beings argued over her fate, but as Luna seemed to be coming around to Discord's point of view, she felt she had to say something. "Don't I get a say in this? It is my life."
Discord turned to face her, rising to his full height, drawing the full aura of his power around him. "A matter discussed by Princesses and Powers of Chaos, and you want to know whether the wishes of one little filly will make a difference?"
The last was almost a voice of thunder, and Babs quailed, nearly jumped behind the sofa again, but she screwed up all her courage and said, "yes?"
"That's the right answer!" Discord was suddenly in a double breasted suit jacket and shirt, beaming at her. "Tell our contestant what she's won, Luna!"
"An all expenses paid chance to decide her own destiny!" Luna was suddenly wearing a sparkly outfit and was all smiles.
Then she looked down at herself, poofed the outfit back into her regalia, and shot a death glare at Discord, who was suddenly examining the infinite black nothingness that passed for a ceiling with great intensity and whistling discordantly. Of course, being Discord, the whistles kept changing into random sounds such as an elephant's trumpet, the sound of a jackhammer, and a duck call.
He looked back down at Babs and continued, "What kind of spirit of mischief and chaos would I be if I set only one possible path, if I imposed a rigid order on things? So, Babs Seed, you have a choice. Decide not to take part, and you will wake up with only this lovely parting gift."
A fancifully decorated hair comb appeared, floating in the air beside him.
"Or you can choose to see your own destiny, and possibly alter it for the better, or the worse. So do you play it safe or take a chance?"
A yellow box with a big red question mark appeared, floating in the air beside the comb.
Now she had the choice, Babs wasn't sure what to do with it. She glanced over to Luna, who shook her head slightly. "It is not my place to interfere in this, or even offer advice. All I can say for sure is that this offer is genuine. However, this is your choice to make, young filly."
After another moment of indecision, she reached out, and pointed at the box. "I choose to see my future!"
The box unfolded, and a peculiar object floated over from it to her hoof. It was a small, black device made of Bakelite or something similar, and it had raised buttons with odd symbols on. Discord plopped down beside her on the sofa, scooped up a handful of popcorn and said, "Press the button with a right facing triangle, yes, that one."
With some trepidation, she complied. The button was small, too small for a pony to use easily, but she managed to do so with the edge of her hoof. The screen lit up once more, and music started playing. Two earth-ponies appeared on the screen, inside a bedroom. One, a blank flank filly with red hair, was rooting through a dresser.
'What to wear, what to wear? Oh, what to wear?!'
The other pony, older and with a triple apple cutie-mark replied, 'Scoot your boot, Apple Bloom. it's not like it's the Harvest Day Parade! We're just goin' to the train station!'
If that was her cousin Apple Bloom, which meant the older pony must be Applejack. As the scene unfolded, it became clear they were about to come and meet her at the train station, and when Apple Bloom found out Babs didn't have her cutie-mark, it was very important for some reason, and she needed to tell her friends.
For a second Babs wondered if this was the start of more bullying, but she didn't have a cutie-mark herself, so surely that couldn't be it, could it? A title music sequence began, like the start of a movie, but showing six ponies she didn't recognise, apart from her cousin, singing about friendship and ending with a small dragon somehow burning up a letter containing a photo which went to Princess Celestia. The title card for this movie was apparently 'My Little Pony – Friendship is Magic'.
"What manner of clairvoyance spell is this?" Luna asked, equally puzzled.
Discord reached down and pressed another button, with two vertical lines on it, and the images froze. "It's not a spell, it's a television program."
"Is that something like a movie?" Babs asked.
"Yes, after a fashion. Think of it as a film delivered to your own personal screen, and controlled by you. In a dimension inhabited by humans, this is a very popular form of entertainment."
"I thought humans were just myths!" Luna exclaimed.
"They are around here, but there are humans in other dimensions. Even without my assistance they're so wonderfully chaotic that I found it very easy to observe them." Discord smirked. "What, you thought I spent the time I was encased in stone looking out at the Royal Gardens? I may have been immobilised, but I could still send my awareness out to observe, even if I couldn't affect anything."
He gave a frown, and nibbled on a soft drink. "Unfortunately, I didn't find that particular dimension until after I was stoned for a second time. The problem with infinity is that there's a lot of it, and I can't be everywhere at once. Well, I suppose I could, but it would get so _messy_."
"So this is some show about our world?" Babs asked, "About me? How do they know?"
"I never asked." Discord shrugged. "The stories focus on Twilight Sparkle, Celestia's favourite student, and the other Elements of Harmony, those other ponies in the title. It starts with the return of Nightmare Moon, and ends… well, that you'll have to wait and see! Your elder cousin is one of the Elements, and quite a few stories focus on your younger cousin and her friends and their quest for cutie-marks… But maybe it's easier to just watch."
He pressed the arrow button again, and the program restarted.
Her cousin and her friends were overenthusiastic, and it did cushion the shock when she saw herself. After being pretty much ostracised by the bullies who'd also made sure no-pony else in her class wanted anything to do with her, she could just imagine herself reacting the way she was portrayed on screen. She wasn't used to ponies her own age wanting her to be around, much less wanting to impress her.
She upped the rating from over-enthusiastic to nuts as the story went on, but at one remove, it wasn't as cringe worthy as it was for her screen double. In fact it was pretty funny, and having seen how they'd acted when she wasn't around, it was no doubt that they genuinely wanted to be her friends. Why should she possibly want to change this? They were practically offering her the keys to the kingdom, or their float at least.
Then it all started to go wrong. It seemed that there were bullies in Ponyville too, and depressingly unoriginal ones at that. From the instant she saw them, the pair put her back up, and when they started to rag her cousin and her friends about the float, Babs started to bristle. Okay, this would be where she'd tell the pair of them where to go… No! That couldn't be happening!
Her on-screen self was siding with the bullies? Turning and insulting Apple Bloom and her friends? She felt sick, and dizzy as she saw herself playing up to the bullies, but when her counterpart wrecked the float it was too much.
"NO! I wouldn't! I couldn't!" Babs rounded on the draconequus. "This is one of your mean tricks isn't it? I've been bullied myself, that's why I'm going away to my cousin's in the first place! I'd never side with bullies against ponies who were trying to be my friends! Never!"
Discord just raised one eyebrow, and she recoiled back with an 'eep!' as she realised she was basically calling out a being who could give even the Princesses pause. He pressed the pausing button on the control box and replied. "My, such fire! However, for once I am completely innocent."
A halo appeared over his head, and he plucked it from there and dipped it in an outsize mug of chocolate milk and took a bite out of it.
"Those are the events as they happen. You will turn your back on the Cutie-mark Crusaders and join up with their tormentors. Indeed, the episode is called 'One Bad Apple'."
With tears in her eyes, Babs turned to Princess Luna, pleading with her. "You believe me, don't you? That was one of the worst things I've ever seen any-pony do, and I'm not a bad pony."
"Maybe not, but you might make a bad decision. If any-pony knows how fear or anger can make you do things you normally never would, it would be I. I saw how uncomfortable you were at your reception. If you had not yet formed a bond of friendship with the Crusaders, and those bullies had started tormenting them, but excluding you, are you so sure you would not do anything to escape being included in their attack?"
Luna's eyes seemed to be staring deep into her soul, and following her gaze, she found she didn't like what she saw. At least the Lunar Princess's words were questioning, not judging. "I… I… don't know, okay, maybe, but at least the worst is over…"
Discord chuckled, "Oh, it hasn't even begun!"
While she'd been talking, he'd reset the pictures to where she'd started, and now the movie started running again. She winced as her on-screen self emotionally blackmailed them into not telling Applejack. She'd had this technique used on her, and after the first few times where she'd tried; only to have neither her parents, or her teachers, want to listen and have to take action, she'd given up, especially as it only made things worse.
The song that followed was possibly the worst two minutes of her life. Some of the visuals were surreal, but the message was clear. Having 'gone over to the dark side' she not only embraced it, but tried to find new and worse ways to terrorise and show her contempt for the trio, while Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon watched and laughed.
Right at that moment, she wanted more than anything to reach into the screen, haul out her other self and beat that monster so hard that she'd feel it herself when she woke up in the morning. Seeing herself steal the Crusaders club-house and make Sweetie Belle cry was the last straw.
"Please, at least tell me that thing on the screen gets her come-upance?" she growled.
"That _is_ your future self." Luna reminded her.
"No! That thing shares a name and a face with me, nothing else! If I ever become that creature, you can do what you like to me, because I won't be anything worth saving. She's not even just playing along, she's going out of her way to invent new ways to be nasty!"
"Maybe, having chosen your side, you are simply going all out to prove yourself to your new friends."
The three ponies in the tree-house had done a team chant. A very small part of her admitted that being part of a group like that looked to be fun, but the greater part of her just saw it as proof that her future self was being played for a fool. Like those two would stick up for her for one second when the consequences came home to roost.
She willed the Crusaders to talk to some-pony adult about it; surely their families' wouldn't be as indifferent as her own parents. Still, when they said they were going to fight back, she got interested again, though she was as confused as the ponies on screen about how Apple Bloom's scheme would work. She enjoyed the whole construction sequence, and revised her earlier crazy assessment to crazy awesome.
If she'd stuck with the Crusaders, as all decency and common sense told her too, she could have been a part of that. They had everything planned out, and her screen double went for it like a starving rabbit at a bed of lettuce. She was a bit disgusted that any version of her could so easily fall for a trap like that, but most of her was eager to see what happened.
She'd already determined that this whole sequence of events was not going to happen; that was what this whole dream was about, after all. So she was looking forward to seeing the wrong version of herself get hit by whatever the Crusaders had planned. Then Applejack explained about her past, and things changed again.
The trio immediately jumped on the explanation Luna had given, and decided that what they were doing qualified as bullying too. Babs herself considered it simple justice, but clearly her cousin and friends were far nicer ponies than she was, or just more innocent. They rescued her, and ended up in the mud in her place. Then the on-screen Babs finally seemed to get a clue. She couldn't believe it, just saying sorry made up for all the hurt she'd put the Crusaders through? That's all it took to get a clean slate and to join the Crusaders?
The final scene suggested a way towards solving her problems. She hadn't considered talking to her sister because she'd moved out and was making a successful career of her own. Babs idolised her quite a bit and had been ashamed to let her know the full extent of the bullying, and that she couldn't cope on her own.
Seeing on-screen Babs rip a chunk out of the two stuck-up pony pseudo-princesses was at least something, but nowhere near enough for her. If she'd had the courage to do that at the start, all the rotten things she'd done could have been avoided. Well, Discord had given her a second bite at the apple, and this time she was going to make it come out right.
The closing credits started, and she breathed a sigh of relief. "I'm glad that's over!"
Discord chuckled. "You don't sound very grateful, after all the effort I've gone to changing time and space on your behalf."
"Oh I am!" Babs said sincerely as she turned to face him. "It wasn't fun to watch myself being that mean, but I am grateful that you've given me a chance to change it."
Luna interjected. "I begin to see why you thought you could modify this without any larger repercussions, Discord. The preferred ending is already in place, but it would be best to find some path that did not cause such grief."
"Well now I know what went wrong, I can do it right this time." Babs stated with feeling, and grabbed a hoof-full of popcorn. "Those stuck up brats are not going to get me on their side this time. If they want to get to my cousin, they'll have to go through me first!"
"Take care that in protecting your friends, you do not go too far the other way." Luna admonished her. "I admit that those others are not the best examples of pony-kind, and I will be checking to see that their inconsiderate actions are not adding to my workload, but even they are ponies."
Babs bowed her head. "I got that, 'Don't become a bully yourself in stopping others bullying'. I won't bother them if they don't come after me and mine, but if they try to hurt anyone, I will stop them. And tell Applejack, and their parents, it looks like they might be willing to do something about it."
"Well, there is one slight problem." Discord stated. "This is a dream. You will not have perfect recall of it, any more than you have of a normal dream."
"What?" Babs looked shocked. "I could forget all this and still mess up?"
"It's my nature, no matter what plans you make, there's always a chance that they won't come out the way you expect."
Babs looked over at Luna, pleadingly. "Please, I have to know this. I can't let what I just saw happen!"
"I am sorry young Babs, while I can control what happens within this realm, what you take from it is up to you. My advice is remember only the key things you want to know, as briefly as possible and focus on them. The pony I have seen here, not that one that was shown us, I believe you will know to do the right thing. Do not tarry, for I sense your dream is coming to an end…"
Babs started furiously chanting in her head, again and again. "Stay and protect the Crusaders, don't join the bullies…"
Things got all blurry and she felt herself unable to move, and then she woke up in her own room.
"… join the bullies…" she found herself whispering. Something had happened in the dream she just had, something she had to remember but couldn't. There had been blackness, and pictures and… popcorn? Some sort of movie had showed her something important. She shook off her sleepiness and hauled herself out of bed, dismissing the weird images.
Why would she want to join some bullies? No, there was more to it than that, she was sure. However, she had to get ready to go. Hopefully she wouldn't have to deal with any bullies when she went to her cousins' place. She hoped Apple Bloom would be someone she could get on with. It would be nice to have friends again.
&&&
Babs Seed was a little dizzy. She felt like she'd been scooped up by some tornado and carried along whether she wanted to or not. Her young cousin and friends were the source of the confusion. Why were they going to so much trouble, and why was it necessary to show her the place where they thought of ideas or ate in their clubhouse?
While it would be really wonderful to be part of a group again, even one as wacky as they were, she couldn't get rid of a deep suspicion that it was all too good to be true. The fact that they went into a huddle to discuss her was suspicious. Maybe the whole over-acting thing was just a way of seeing how desperate she was, or a way of making fun of her. The problem was that she _was_ desperate.
If Apple Bloom knew why she'd come here in the first place, she'd be able to guess that Babs would be willing to take any scrap of friendship she was offered. Despite her fear, she was weakening, but she hadn't given in yet. The fear of being led on and then turned upon was still too strong. Plus, if it happened and she went to Applejack about it, she knew who'd be believed.
Then they showed her the float they'd been building, and she was almost ready to cry. Getting a chance to play with something like that would be cool, if it wasn't a trap. She laughed nervously as the Pegasus, Scootaloo, offered her the chance.
"As a member of the Cutie mark Crusaders, you'd be able to ride on it with us! It'd be totally fun!"
Then a snotty voice spoke from the doorway. "More like funny… looking!"
The last word was spoken in chorus with another. Two fillies stood there, one in a diamond tiara and the other with glasses. Babs had never seen them before, but her hackles went up as she felt an instant dislike for the pair. This was quickly confirmed by the way they started insulting the float. Then they got on to her. Apple Bloom introduced her, and that seemed to impress them slightly. At least they didn't group her with the others.
"Suppose you're gonna join their little club? What's it called? The Cutie Mark Crusaders?" The grey coated filly asked mockingly.
Babs felt sick. So even here she couldn't escape the bullies! The way they'd said 'blank flanks' showed they were exactly the same as her tormentors in Manehatten. In an instant she started remembering all the horrible things that had happened. But there was a way out, they hadn't grouped her with the other blank flanks yet, if she agreed with them, maybe she could escape…
The sickness turned to anger, herself for being so weak, her cousin, for putting her in this situation, those two bullies for existing… She'd be becoming what she hated most, and abandoning ponies who'd wanted her to be their friend without any strings, or at least had said they did. But she couldn't go through what happened to her in Manehatten again, and the Crusaders hadn't defended themselves, or her.
The mix of hate and anger and fear and suffering focussed down into a single sharp point, and pierced her confusion. This was what her dream had been about, and she knew what she had to do, the only thing she could. She gave a deep sigh.
"More like Cutie-mark Crybabies!" She gave a derisive chuckle as her cousin gasped.
Diamond Tiara grinned as she approached with a smirk on her own face. "Oooo, heh, big city attitude! I like it!"
"Oh yeah? Well there's more where that came from." Babs snarked. Now nearly face to face with the pair she added, "Your mommas dress you funny, and I think you stepped in something crossing the yard… oh, no that's just your natural aroma. Phew!"
Watching the smile slip off the pink pony's face was so much fun. "What? But…"
"Oh, you thought I was talking about my cousin and her friends? Forget about it! You must think I'm as stupid as you are! I know your sort, we have them in Manehatten too, parading their butt-tattoos around like they were the be all and end all of creation! Cutie-mark crybabies is the perfect term for ponies like you, bragging about your cutie-marks because you've got nothing else to be proud of!"
"You can't talk to be like that!" Diamond Tiara spluttered out. "My daddy is the richest pony in Ponyville!"
"Heh!" It felt so _good_ to unload, and while she had no intention of following their actions, the insults and comments that the bullies in Manehatten had used on her, and the retorts she'd only thought of too late gave her a wonderful reserve of ammunition.
"Big hairy deal! I'm from Manehatten, remember? I know a dozen ponies who could buy your dad and everything he owns with their weekly allowance! Speaking of which, Apple Bloom, does her daddy own Sweet Apple Acres?"
The stunned farm filly finally found her voice and replied, "No, the Apple family has owned it since Ponyville was founded."
"So when did you invite these two prissy pony princesses to come visit?"
"Invite them? No, never have…"
"Never would, more like!" called out Scootaloo.
"That means these two are trespassing." She gave a distinctly sinister grin, and the two fancy ponies took a step back.
"Well, not exactly, everyone's welcome here." Apple Bloom admitted.
"Well, I guess they've worn out their welcome then." Babs suggested.
"You can't do this!" Diamond Tiara finally managed to splutter.
"Do what? I'm just asking Apple Bloom a harmless question. If I was doing something, you'd know about it." She gave another evil smile. "Yeah, you'd definitely know about it."
The two fancy ponies took several more steps back, and then Diamond Tiara managed to get some of her composure back. "Huh, it's not like there's anything in this stinky old yard that's worth our time anyway!"
"Yeah, like what-ever!" Silver Spoon chipped in.
They started to leave at just short of a run; then Diamond Tiara stepped on a shovel that had somehow fallen across their path, snapping it. She face planted in the mud, and the broken end flew up in the air, arcing over and in through the hay-loft entrance into the barn. It bounced off a beam, and knocked a sealed paint tin off a shelf, which in turn toppled a stack of boxes, one of which tumbled off the loft level and crashed down on the front wheel assembly of the float.
It crunched enthusiastically, snapping off, and the whole float tipped over and started to roll. Babs jumped out of the way as it went through the barn doorway. Silver Spoon had jsut helped Diamond Tiara up out of the mud; they both did a wild take before taking to their hooves and running for it, pursued by the rolling float like the hero in a bad movie knock off of Daring Doo.
They dived across the gateway of Sweet Apple Acres a dozen steps ahead of the pumpkin, and Diamond Tiara even had to scoop up her fallen tiara to stop it from being flattened. The float rolled off into a ditch, where it crumpled up in a pile of splinters and torn orange wallpaper. Babs had stood where she'd ended up, watching with open mouthed horror at the wreckage.
She was pretty sure that if the pair had been run down, they'd have just been flattened momentarily (the high natural background magic of Equestria sometimes protected ponies in odd ways) but she was just as glad she didn't have to find out. However, she'd only intended to scare them off, and she most definitely hadn't meant to get the float damaged.
Her shoulders slumped, she'd made the right choice, she was certain of that, but then she'd ruined it. Her cousin and her friends were never going to forgive her for destroying all their hard work, even by accident. She turned around to face the music. What she got was a triumphal pean.
"Woah! That was amazing!" Apple Bloom was wide eyed.
Scootaloo was so energised she was practically hovering, "Yeah! Totally awesome!"
Sweetie Belle added. "I've never seen any-pony take on those two like that!"
"uh…" The Manehattan filly was rather nonplussed. "What about your float? I didn't mean to get it wrecked! I just wanted to see those two gone as fast as possible."
"C'mon, anypony can see that was some crazy accident. Besides, we can build another float." Apple Bloom dismissed it with a wave of a hoof. "Especially if we had another member of the Cutie Mark Crusaders to help us?"
She held out a hoof, and Babs felt a wave of relief. She blew her fringe away from her face and put her own hoof out to touch her cousin's. The other two ponies added theirs, and the three fillies, joined a second later by their newest member, yelled out, "Cutie mark Crusaders, HO!"
&&&
Discord had a smirk that was even bigger than usual as he paused the image. "Well?"
Princess Luna turned towards him, from where she was sitting on the couch. "Very well, I admit it, your actions improved the futures of those ponies."
"Ha!" A line of mini-Discords in cheer leader outfits appeared, dancing along the back of the couch, complete with a brass band marching theme. "And you doubted my skills! Now uphold your end of our agreement."
Luna found her own costume had changed to match the cheer-leaders', and switched it back to her default regalia with a flick of her horn and a sigh. "Very well, I shall allow you free access to the dream realm to pursue similar modifications, and provide you with proof to show my earlier selves."
The midnight blue alicorn frowned. "One thing though, the float still getting wrecked…"
"What, you suspect I gave it some assistance?" Discord put on a 'butter wouldn't melt in my mouth' expression, and just to prove it, made a stick of butter appear and held it between his teeth. It immediately developed icicles.
"Ptooie!" He spat it off into the darkness that surrounded the comfy couch. "That shovel falling into her path was merely caused by a vagrant gust of wind, that in turn was caused by a microscopic variation in the evaporation of water from a tree in the Everfree forest, due to a para-sprite flapping its wings a few seconds earlier than it did in the original timeline. What could have startled it? Who knows?"
He smirked. "It does mean we still get to see the build sequence. I did rather enjoy watching that, and listening to the background music."
"Actually, I found it rather catchy too." Luna admitted. "I am indeed interested to see what else this 'television program' can show us. Humans appear to be ingenious creatures."
"Wait until I show you their video games." Discord gave a chuckle, and started the program again.