“She is the most precious little thing!” fawned Discord as he picked up the dark blue foal.
Celestia rolled her eyes. “Yeah. ‘Precious’ is the word you’re looking for,” she mumbled. It had been exactly two months since she and Discord had first met, and life had since returned to normal. Well, as close as it could ever get to normal with the little brat around. Every day she attended her morning lessons with Athena, went out to the hedge maze to play with Discord, as it had become his home since her parents returned, and then hurriedly rushed back to the castle to spend her quality time with the king and queen.
However, their QT (as her father liked to call it) had been growing shorter and shorter in the recent days. Just as they would start settling in to talk, the baby would start to cry, and just like that they would be gone. Vanished in a blur of black and yellow to attend the infant’s needs, as if they, the king and queen of all the land, were her personal slaves! They were always feeding her, burping her, putting her to sleep, or some other silly thing. They even took it into their own hooves to complete her early education (something they had never done for Celestia, by the way.) And when they couldn’t take care of the foal due to business? They sent Celestia to the nursery to do whatever the “little princess” needed.
As if the fact that she loathed the foal wasn’t enough, she hated the nursery even more. It used to be the castle star observatory, and its ceiling was made completely up of glass, allowing the light of the stars and moon shine in during the night. That was the only light that ever got in, however. The foal didn’t like a lot of light, so they never had any lights turned on, day or night. The walls of the circular room were completely lined with images of playful looking Ursa Majors and Minors that, despite their mirthful expressions, still made Celestia uncomfortable.
Discord continued to hug the little filly as you might hug a beloved stuffed doll you had from birth. “Does she have a name yet?”
Celestia rolled her eyes yet again and apathetically groaned out, “Luna.”
He giggled like a schoolfilly before gently placing her down in her crib. “Well then! Have I got a supwise for you wittle Woona! Yes I do! Yes I do!” As he continued to entertain Luna with his baby talk, he tore an image of a newborn Ursa Minor clean off the wall (He replaced it with another before Celestia could berate him for it) Luna looked on in wide eyed fascination. He crushed the paper in between his hands, and when he parted them, it was gone: It was replaced with a large, stuffed Ursa Minor teddy bear.
The tiny filly clapped her hooves together in joy and jumped up and down as Discord lowered the bear into her crib. It was a comical sight, since the doll was still significantly bigger than her. That fact didn’t stop her from hugging it, though. Celestia, despite having known Discord for quite some time by this point, was still consistently amused by his antics, and tried her best to hide a smile and look angry. She failed, however, and began to head for the door, but Discord was already blocking her way.
“Oh, why the long face, sourpuss?” he asked, lifting her chin up.
She donned a face of sarcastic surprise. “Oh I’m sorry, Dizzy. I thought you were talking to Luna. Seems to be the only thing anypony is interested in nowadays anyhow….”
Discord folded his arms and jovially glared at her. “Tia. You know you’ll always be my number one, don’t you?”
She hesitated, by eventually nodded.
He grinned. “Good, good. Now, as for why it seems everypony loves Luna so much, we all just want to make sure she’s alright. She’s still just a baby, after all, and she can’t do anything for herself. She has a looooooong life ahead of her, and we just want to make sure that she starts it on the right hoof. Does that make any sense to you?”
She nodded again.
“Your parents, although I’ve never met them, love you very much, Tia. And Luna’s arrival hasn’t changed a thing about it. So can you accept her now? After all, if there’s one thing you can be sure of, it’s that she’ll be with you forever.”
She turned her head to look back. By now, the sun had set, and the brilliant light of the moon was shining down on the now sleeping Luna, who was curled up in a ball next to her newfound toy. Celestia knew that everything Discord had said had been true. She walked over to her, stuck her head into the crib, and kissed her little sister lightly on the forehead. When she turned back around to talk to Discord again, he was gone.
She awoke the next morning as happy as a clam. Her parents had taken Luna to get her magic levels assessed, so she was free to play with Discord all day long. She smiled at the thought of spending a day with him again, just like when they first met. Halfway through her usual routine, it dawned on her that she still had to go to her lessons. Her hope for an entire day with her friend was crushed.
When she went to walk through her bedroom door, she discovered a poorly written note on it. It appeared to be from Athena, but the penmanship was so awful she couldn’t tell. It read:
Deer Prinses Selestia,
Tooday I woke up with a buket of bloo flowrs dumped all over meee. When i tryed to uuse my magik, my horn din’t work rite, and now i 4got all what I used too no. This iz wierd cuz i usual have such smartness. No classes 2day;
Athena.
“That’s kind of sad,” Celestia thought out loud. “I’ll have to send her a get well card. She walked over to her desk to write a note to herself, only to find that there was nothing on the desk at all. Nothing, barring one solitary note in the center of it. The sheet read:
My little pony, it’s your friend, Discord;
We’re playing a game so we won’t get bored. (Flip)
She followed the instruction and flipped the paper to its opposite side.
With this sheet of paper, our game has begun;
And it’ll continue through the setting of the sun. (Flip)
She was puzzled by the instruction, but nevertheless flipped the sheet over again: the text written on it had changed.
Even though it is the first place you would look;
Why don’t you try picking up a book?
“I hate it when he does this,” she thought. “He can’t speak like everypony else, he’s got to use these silly riddles all the time.” She knew immediately he meant for her to visit the library, so after a very quick breakfast, she was off.
It was a short half hour before she found Discord’s next clue hidden in a book right under the sign that read “The Princess Celestia Wing.”
Oh joy! You’ve found my clue!
And I had thought that I was smarter than you.
But it’s not just yet that I should gloat;
You’ll find your next clue on a good note.
“Notebook, obviously,” she thought. She flew off the balcony and landed in the middle of two ponies studying at their two oak desks. She frantically tore through their papers looking for Discord’s next riddle. She ripped out every page in the confused ponies notebooks until only the covers remained. She blushed when she realized there was no clue.
“Heh, heh. Sorry for that,” she said to the two of them, who, despite their obvious anger, simply made a poor attempt at a grin and bent over to pick up their papers that lay scattered upon the library floor. Celestia walked away from the pair disheartened, and proceeded to sulk around the castle halls with a bruised ego.
As she brooded, she noticed that she had begun to tap her hooves to a beat. There was a song playing somewhere in the castle that was the most pleasant song she had ever heard in her life. She chased the sweet melody into room after room until she arrived at its source: a four string quartet playing on its own. The cello, viola, and the two violins were all floating mystically in the air, surrounded by a dull gray glow, playing themselves. Now she was transfixed both by the melody, and the eerie peculiarity of the sight. After a while of the ethereal sounds of the instruments, the cello suddenly stopped playing and belched (literally) out another one of Discord’s clues.
It seems to me that you’ve settled the score;
Even though there’s only but one clue more.
Twists and turns of my little plan;
Find the next clue back where we began.
“Back where we began? What could that mean?” she pondered. He obviously meant the start of their friendship, but he already had her go to the library. Could he have meant something else? What if he had- her train of thought was interrupted. It happened quickly but all she heard was Discord’s sigh, a snap, and a large explosion outside. She looked out of the window and another mushroom cloud formed at the center of the hedge maze.
She flew out to the source of the blast, and in the center of a large, blackened crater, she found a partially singed note.
This seem familiar? It probably should;
I gave you all the help I possibly could.
Now where can you find this draconequus pup?
All you have to do is simply look up.
She did. She looked up to the left: nothing. She looked up to the right, at the mountain that Canterlot is built off of, and she saw what he was talking about: towards the top of the mountain, on a rocky ledge, emanated a warm glow of a campfire.
She flew up to find Discord roasting hotdogs on the open flame. Beneath him lay a checkerboard picnic cloth. “You finally made it I see. I hope the riddles weren’t too hard for you, Tia.”
She smiled. “Not a chance, Dizzy. I solved them all with time to spare.” It was odd, she usually disliked his riddles, but this time was pretty fun.
Discord chuckled. “Only because I wanted you to. Here, have a seat,” he snapped his fingers together and a large picnic basket filled to the brim with gemstones and flowers appeared in front of them. “I’ve prepared dinner.”
They ate in relative silence which Celestia thought was strange, especially for Discord. Although more than a few times, he looked like he wanted to say something to her, but he quickly closed his mouth and pretended like nothing happened. As the sun started to set, she confronted him about it.
“Dizzy? Do you have something you want to tell me?” she asked him gently.
He sighed and stared at the ground for a few minutes, apparently trying to gather his words. He finally looked up at her and said, “Have you ever wondered why you found me in a crater that day Tia? Have you ever wondered why there is no mentioned of other draconequus in any of your books? Have you ever wondered where I came from?”
She thought about it for a moment. No, she really hadn’t. Was she curious? Yes, now that he brought it up. She felt kind of selfish for not ever questioning Discord about himself.
“Well, I guess I should start off with my parents. My mother is a beautiful unicorn mare. Golden mane, grey coat, and a magnificent golden apple for a cutie mark. Eris, is her name, and let me tell you one thing, she’s a saint. When I asked her why I looked so different than everybody else she would always respond to me ‘Because honey, you’re mommy’s little miracle.’ My father, on the other hand, is an entirely different story.”
“He is a very young crimson dragon named Cronus. He is the ruler of a large dragon settlement out west, far past Stalliongrad. And he couldn’t be more different from my mother. He is cruel, loud, crude, arrogant, and all too often has many of his friends (who are just as bad as him) over the cave to ‘discuss business.’ Sometimes, I wonder how they ever even got married. I once asked him why I looked different than all the other hatchlings. Do you know what his response was? He told me, ‘Because you’re mother and I were two stupid young kids who broke the natural order of things, and we got stuck with….whatever you are.’ Needless to say, I spent most of my time with my mother.”
Celestia blurted out interrupting him, “But what about the other dragon hatchlings? What did they think of you?”
He looked at her solemnly. “Didn’t you hear me? My father was ashamed of me. Do you really expect for him, the ruler of a sizeable colony of dragons, to let other dragons know that I’m his son? He’d be a laughing stock. I spent most of my time growing up in my room reading whatever I could get my hands on. Although I doubt I’d ever have the chance to make many friends if I could’ve gone out. My father rules his colony with an iron talon, and has every single dragon in the colony under a strict time regiment. Wake up, clean your scales, eat your gemstones, go to school and or work, come home, eat sleep, and then repeat. No time for anything but his rules. It’s all so boring! It’s all so organized! It’s all too orderly!”
As he described the organized day-to-day life at the colony, Celestia noticed something strange happen to her friend. His eyes began twitching, his voice grew erratically loud, and his fists clenched. He had to take a moment to calm himself down.
“But at least there was always my mother to make things bearable. That is, until one day about three months ago. On that morning, I woke up, and she was gone. Vanished, poof, sayonara, arrivederci, gone. I asked my father where she had gone and he told me that she said she was tired of living there and ran away from them. I just wasn’t going to stay behind while my mother enjoyed her freedom, so I left. I flew and I flew for days on end, looking for her. I tried all the major unicorn cities, with nothing to show for my efforts. Eventually, the only place I had left to search was Canterlot. I flew for days to reach your city, but one morning, I couldn’t keep going, and out of sheer exhaustion, I fell. Right into your hedge maze. I just like it here so much I decided not to leave. Don’t you see Tia? Other than my mother, you’re my only friend in the world.”
He finished his story. Celestia was shell-shocked. She didn’t know what to do except but to hug him. So she did. They hugged tightly and she whispered into his ear, “We’ll find her, Dizzy. I promise.” He directed her head out towards the night sky: it was ablaze with comets. They were flying every which way, almost colliding with each other and the stars themselves. As the two friends watched the shower, she again spoke to him. “Dizzy?”
“Yeah, Tia?”
“You’re my only friend too.”
“Dizzy?”
“Yes, Tia?”
“Will we be friends forever?”
He hesitated. “Sure we will, Tia. Sure we will.”