Head Full of Cotton Candy

by TheManWithTwoNames

Chapter Eight

Head Full of Cotton Candy

A “My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic” fanfiction

By TheManWithTwoNames

I do not own any of the characters contained in the following work. “My Little Pony” and all subsequent properties belong to Hasbro and Lauren Faust.

I’ve spent the last days in a locked room. I think that my captors are trying to mock me by only giving me a catalogue of Old Navy’s summer shirt collection to occupy my time. They still let me keep my laptop for some reason, so I don’t think that they really accomplish much. Still miss that T-Shirt, though...

And to the best of my knowledge, everyone from Massachusetts still behaves and dresses and speaks exactly how the characteratures of pilgrims I see on television do. So I’m going to just act on that understanding for this chapter.

---

It had been nearly impossible to convince Discord to leave the circus, and it had almost as hard to convince Three Ring to let them go. If it wasn’t enough that he insisted the pair spend the night in the finest accommodations he could provide, the next morning he had offered to let them stay with the circus as they traveled around Equestria. It took all the strength the juggler had in her to not leap at the proposal; it’s not every day you’re given the chance of a lifetime. But Screwball knew that she had a responsibility to her king to help him explore his empire and reveal him to his subjects without sending all of Equestria into pure anarchy (though it was that sort of thinking that really made the ringleader’s offer so much harder to turn down). The fact of the matter was that it would be much harder to convince ponies to follow a king who spent all of his time at a circus.

Masky and Patsy had almost looked sorry to see them leave. The mare still had no idea what had possessed the crooked pair to be so friendly toward them, and supposed that she probably never would. Screwball would never admit it, but she had actually started to enjoy the traveling thieves. And by the time they said their last goodbyes, she could not even be certain if she had just fallen for their deception or if they sincerely had none of their usual dastardly tricks planned for the circus. She wondered if they would ever run into them again.

The soft whiz that occasionally came from the propeller between her ears only served as a further reminder of the old ringleader’s generosity. She had tried her hardest to give it back, or at the very least pay for it, but Three Ring had insisted she keep it as a memento of their time there. And it had made Discord happy to see her wearing it every waking moment, not that she even minded wearing the cap in the least bit. To her, it was a symbol; it was a sign that no matter how bleak things may appear, real happiness was not out of her reach. And as she once again admired the beautiful late summer afternoon she had enjoyed as Ploughmouth came into view, she believed in her heart that real happiness was closer than it ever had been before.

Screwball held onto those joyful thoughts with all she had, of all those ponies who had shown them genuine kindness, pushing them to the front of her mind to distract her from the devastation of the scarred and twisted black wasteland that surrounded her. She refused to look away from the quivering draconequus who had buried his tear-soaked face into her chest as she caressed and lied to him.

“Shh... Everything is okay now... I’m here... I’ll always be here... It’s okay... Shh...”

----------

Cotton candy. Discord couldn’t stop thinking about cotton candy. Cotton candy cotton candy. Ever since he saw it, Discord couldn’t stop thinking about cotton candy cotton candy. He didn’t want to stop thinking about it. Even during Screwball’s lessons and riddles and stories and games all he could think about was cotton candy cotton candy cotton candy. He couldn’t afford to stop thinking about it. Two words, four syllables, eleven letters: cotton candy. It wasn’t just how it tasted like sugar-coated sugar cotton candy. It wasn’t about how it was the most colorful food he had ever seen anyone other than himself eat cotton candy. It wasn’t even about how it felt like he was closing his mouth around a sticky cloud cotton candy. It was about cotton candy. It was about eleven letters, four syllables, two words. It was about how it had told him exactly what he needed to do to make his dreams come true.

That circus may have been the greatest thing to have ever happened to the Spirit of Chaos. At first, he had spread the gray because he just wanted to. Then, he liked the gray because it always appeared whenever he used his magic, and he liked using his magic. After that, it allowed him find that poor family in Manehattan and he used the gray magic to help them and they loved it. The gray had kept him warm, it chased away the cold that would sometimes creep up his toes and make his feet go numb.

Then, for a while, he thought the gray was a bad thing. It scared the ponies at Ponyville, it scared Screwball when Time took them to that wonderland, and Savoir Faire used the gray to upset Screwball all her life. He had even thought that the gray had killed her. He would have let himself freeze if the gray could hurt ponies. But then: two words, four syllables, eleven letters.

The circus was packed with gray. Ponies were laughing, screaming on rides, clown ponies were falling over; they were covering themselves with gray and they were happier for it. He had to know how they were doing it. And the answer was just eleven letters, four syllables, two words. Cotton candy.

It was all about the way it was made. Masky had said he only needed a little sugar to make a whole lot of cotton candy. And there was his answer. Discord realized he shouldn’t try to blow ponies away with everything he had to show them right away. He only needed to give the ponies a little bit of gray to start with, and then they would eventually start making their own gray. It was only after they had covered themselves would he start using his magic. By that point, they would all love it, just like the ponies at the circus. Sometimes when he thought about cotton candy cotton candy and rehearsed the plan in his head, he would consider the idea that it would be better to start them with plenty of gray to work with. But Masky had said something about using too much and making a mess. So he would start small.

He was shaken from his thoughts when Screwball started shaking him. She had been trying to get his attention and after calling his name didn’t work, she went to plan B.

“Welcome back! You’ve had your head up in the clouds for the last hour. I was starting to get worried, I’ve never seen you be so quiet for so long,” she said teasingly.

“I was just thinking about Ploughmouth.”

“I have good news, then. We’re not too far from it now.” Screwball pointed a hoof off at a few specks the distance. “You can just make it out, it’s a couple of miles away. It won’t be long now. Ploughmouth actually has a bit of a reputation for itself. It’s mostly farmland managed by earth ponies, with a fair sized little colony at the center. Ploughmouth is one of Equestria’s oldest settlements, and the ponies as a group have fought to hold onto their old-fashioned traditions and don’t...”

Discord quickly lost interest and went back to focusing on his plan. He could just squeeze himself with excitement when he thought of everything he had in store. The Spirit of Chaos gave a small nod and “uh-huh” to whatever the pony had just said to keep her satisfied and stop her from hearing the soft snap of his fingers. A stream of invisible, gray haze drifted out of the tip of his tail, lazily coiling around in the air. When it looked like it was enough to get the job started, he cut off the flow. Then, with award-worthy acting, Discord yawned and stretched his arms over his head and behind his back.

“I know it may not be interesting, but please take this seriously,” Screwball said sternly. “It is important for you to understand why the ponies...”

Discord grabbed a hold on the cloud behind him and finished his stretch by throwing his arms back forward. The cloud zipped arced high into the air, and once it passed over the colony, the gray miasma dropped like a brick. A perfect shot. It was hard to not celebrate, but he couldn’t let Screwball know yet. He wanted to impress her.

“...so we’ve to be very delicate.”

“You got it, Scroob.” Discord flashed her a convincing smile just long enough to convince her before he turned his attention back to the distant town to see if he could watch the cloud spread. Three Ring had told him that things are more fun when you share them with friends. He would share it with them, and then they would all love him, too.

----------

True to Screwball’s word, Ploughmouth Bay Colony was conspicuously antiquated. There wasn’t a soul in Equestria who could say for sure why the ponies of the colony were so dedicated to their hoary traditions and culture. Some speculated that the colony was simply proud of its history, but a brief glance at any textbook would reveal a long list of unsavory tales. There was the manipulation and betrayal of the native buffalo tribes’ generosity after the buffalo taught the early colonists how to reap their new land’s bounty. The colony was infamous for a period of hysteria when over eighty unicorns were accused of practicing witchcraft; though they were never quite certain of why their use of magic became such a sudden issue, the unicorn population fled after being faced with threats of violence, leaving the town with a nearly homogeneous population of earth ponies.

The stallions and mares of Ploughmouth were even responsible for the nightmarish—but mercifully short-lived—fashion trend of buckled hats and horseshoes.

But what the draconequus found most upsetting about the settlement was how mind-numbingly spiritless and bland it was. Not once during his march through endless farmland did he find so much as a single speck of color that wasn’t some shade of brown. For a moment he thought he saw a bright green blade of grass poke through the soil, but when he blinked the tiny plant had immediately become limp and burnt. Even the green mist of Nature’s energy that hovered over the farms felt like it was unhappy about being there. And on top of it all, the ponies tilling the stretch of farmland in the distance were just as colorless, completely unlike the vibrant colors he had seen with all his other subjects. He had to squint to be able to see anything else about them, and even then he wasn’t certain, but he thought they were looking his way. A smirk crossed his lips when he could sense a thin shroud of gray leak out of the ponies and wrap around them.

His satisfaction soon faded when he and Screwball finally reached the main body of the town. It looked more like where fun went to die than a place where ponies would ever want to live. Brown and—gasp!—tan ponies dressed in modest black and white outfits walked somberly down worn dirt roads, occasionally lifting their eyes and giving one another a slight nod in acknowledgement, but otherwise staying completely in their own private worlds. And it was like they weren’t even trying to make their town look cozy! Every building was an undecorated stack of logs and a roof, with a few windows revealing equally bare interiors; a few wooden chairs, maybe a table with a candle on it, and a wooden cot.

He was really starting to miss the circus.

Discord shook his head clear as a familiar heat started to roll towards him from every direction. The ponies had begun to break off their mechanical tracks, stopping to regard the two strangers who had just wandered in. Some of the mares whispered to each other. The stallions just deeply grumbled as they kept their eyes trained on the encroachers. When a confused filly tried to squeeze to the front of the crowd to see what was happening, her mother hissed at her to come back and pulled the foal away.

“Maybe this wasn’t the best idea,” Screwball whispered to Discord, suddenly feeling very self-conscious about her vibrant coat, blue robes, and silly hat.

“Really?” Discord asked with a coy smile, silently observing the mingling tendrils of gray creeping around and tying the ponies together. “Because I have a good feeling about this.” The draconequus instantly silenced the murmuring crowd with a snap of his fingers. They had their own gray—now it was time to add some magic. The sun dimmed and covered the world with a near darkness, other than the single beam of light that shone down on the spirit, his arms spread theatrically at his sides.

“Ponies of Ploughmouth,” he thundered in the Royal Canterlot Voice, figuring that the stick-in-the-mud ponies would probably appreciate the tradition, “it is with great pleasure that We stand before thee today! We come from Canterlot, bearing the most sensational news! We hath come to free thee from the shackles that bind thee to this unhappy life!”

“Not the best choice of words,” Screwball said urgently. The jester may have been unable to see the life forces of the planet, but she didn’t need to be a spirit to know when a crowd was growing rebellious.

Puzzled by the unwelcoming reception, Discord clicked his claws and restored the sun to its usual brightness. The ponies at the big top had gone wild when Three Ring introduced the circus like that. What was wrong with these Ploughmothians? He had given them all the gray they could have needed to get in the mood for excitement! He decided to give them a little more juice to get them going; with how boring their town was, he should have taken into consideration that they would have a harder time adjusting to fun. It was practically an entirely different culture for them.

“Strangers!” an elderly mare shouted. Her face was ravaged with loose wrinkles around her suspicious eyes, with a short gray mane tied back behind her head. She wore a white coif on her head and a white apron tied around a long black dress. “We knoweth not who thou be, but if thy intentions be twisted as thou art, fast away from this place!”

“Did you understand a word of that?” Discord asked out of the corner of his mouth.

“Bits and pieces,” Screwball mumbled back. “Please, miss, would you honor us by telling us your name?”

“Plain Living,” the mare said curtly, turning her head up at the two royals.

“Wow. Seriously? Good ponies, do not fear! We—” Screwball could say no more before the crowd began to erupt with angry cries.

“See how they hath cursed the very sun? Maketh no mistake, these two strangers be witches!”

“Thou wouldeth invade our sacred home and threaten our children’s lives and commandeth us to not fear?!”

“How dareth thee come from that hedonistic Canterlot, draped in thy gaudy and resplendent guises, and thinketh thee our masters!”

“Hark, fellows! By buckles and blueberries, these creatures seeketh our very demise!”

“I’m so sorry, Discord,” the purple pony said as she slowly retreated from the mob, “this is all my fault. We should go.”

The draconequus was positively giddy as he pressed his fingers together in anticipation. They were churning out so much gray on their own now! Now he just had to play his cards right and he’d have them eating out of his paw. And what better way to do it than by having them do just that? His fingers clicked and a concession vendor cart appeared in a flash, complete with a pink umbrella to keep him in the shade, compartments for hot dogs and fudge pops, a rack for giant pretzels, a popcorn machine, and of course, a cotton candy bin.

“Come! Join us in our merriment! Indulge in these delicacies!”

“Again! It doth weaveth black arts to ensnareth us all in its twisted web!”

“What foul fate hath fallen the foals thou hath fried for this foul feast!?”

“Curses and cranberries! My brother’s tongue hath been hexed by the letter of the beast!”

“Vile witch! Be thee awayeth to the black coven from whence ye cameth! And taketh thy fiendish monster with thee!”

---

It stood at the center of the warring armies, marveling at itself. Paws! It had paws— no, one paw, and the other was a claw! But its leg wasn’t a claw or a paw, and neither was the other one. And neither leg was like each other at all! It felt long and tall, and It laughed in pure ecstasy. It felt. It felt! It felt its bottom swish back and forth and laughed again.

“What in Equestria is that thing?” It heard a voice shout. It was interested to see this thing. It looked around, staring emptily at the strange faces of ponies looking directly its way. It looked down.

“Brown! It has brown fur!” It shouted spontaneously, patting and rubbing its legs and arms and face, delighting in the feel of hair brushing against skin. “And these! And that! And —what’s this?” It stopped and scratched its head, feeling its paw bumping against two hard things on his head. Touching them with infinite wonder, It stretched its arms as far as they could go to better understand itself.

“It has... horns! Yes! Horns! Horns like you!” It cheered, pointing at the unicorns. It had watched. It had witnessed the unicorns’ power. They used magic. They changed the world around them by wanting to. Perhaps It could do the same.

It couldn’t be bothered to think about that for long, It felt a strange sensation on its... back. Yes, between its arms. It felt like a mild burning. It clumsily reached around with its claw and scratched. It felt amazing. It noticed that it had two things curled on its back. Stretching, It was able to make the things unfurl. It flapped them. It rose off the ground without any effort and was thrilled by the experience.

“Wings!” The word came to It. “Wings like you!” This was amazing. It didn’t know what it was, or what it had before, but now it had life. And life was wonderful. Having life was a wonderful, wonderful thing! But the ponies were not happy.

“You are nothing like us!” a bold soldier shouted.

“You?” It puzzled, bringing a paw to its mouth and poking it on something. “It... is a You! I’m a You!” Its entire body trembled with each new realization. This was life! This was being! “I’m an I! I am a Me!”

“What is this creature?

“I’m a Me,” the creature intruded. “And you are a—”

“We are the Sun King Equinox! Ruler of all Equestria!” The battlefield was silent at the booming announcement.

“You’re a Me, too!” It shouted happily, clapping in enthusiasm. “You have horns! You have wings! You’re just like me!” It was confused why all the ponies started laughing when it spoke.

“Thou art nothing like us!” the black stallion declared, cutting his cruel laughter short. “We are Lord of All, and thou be nothing but a m———”

---

Discord blinked, clearing the dark visions from his mind. He was remembering things he didn’t want to remember. His eyes grew with worry when he saw a dark cloud swirling over the crowding ponies. He stood his ground in the face of the gathering storm even as Screwball stepped behind him. This wasn’t right. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be happening. They shouldn’t have been able to make that much on their that fast. He glanced down and bit his lip when he saw the tide of gray flowing out from his feet and spreading over all of Ploughmouth. He hadn’t meant to do that.

The purple mare forced her knees to stop shaking as she risked a peek around Discord’s legs to see the unhappy crowd baring down on them. She was no coward, she knew that fully well. She had seen an unsatisfied audience before; she even once had the poor luck to have failed at entertaining the late king. But there was something different about the mob—there was something something in the air that made her hair stand on end.

The ponies took a step toward them, their eyes burning with mistrust, their snouts twisted into frightening snarls. They were like a pack of timberwolves closing in for a kill, and at that moment Screwball wondered if she would feel better being cornered by the wooden hounds than by her own kind. Everyone knew about how they treated the buffalo and the unicorns, but that was still centuries ago. Ploughmouth was a virtually crime-free environment, the ponies never had or caused any trouble in recent times. Could they really still be so closed-minded that any outside contact stirred them into a frenzy? She wanted to slap herself. How could she have put them both in this situation? She had to fix this now.

“Everypony, please!” she begged as she stepped around Discord to confront the crowd. “We don’t want any trouble! We can just leave and—”

Whiff. Crack. Thud.

Everything came to a screeching halt for Discord. He had to bring a claw to his own heart to make sure it was still beating. It felt like something was trying to free itself from his chest. He could not stand to see it, but he did not dare to look away. It was a lie. It had to be a lie. There was no way it could be happening again. They were lying to him. The rock wasn’t actually there, it wasn’t wet with crimson. It couldn’t have happened too fast for him to protect her. She couldn’t have really gotten hurt. She wasn’t on her knees. Her eye wasn’t really bleeding. She was lying, too. It was just part of a joke. They would start laughing and then they would all have fun together like he wanted.

“The witch still lives! Never send a woman to do a man’s job!” A large stallion kicked his hoof forward and a heavy, black horseshoe spun forward and caught the struggling mare in the temple. She dropped again and shut her eyes tight. This wasn’t fun.

A terrible coldness gripped the hearts of every pony in the colony and a frigid gale nearly threw the colonists off their hooves as the Spirit of Chaos screamed. His body twisted and thrashed this way and that as if falling under the blows of some unseen attacker, throwing himself over backwards and stumbling back and forth. The Ploughmothians felt another blast of wind rush them from behind, the air cutting them like hooks, tearing something out of them. And then the beast roared again.

He had his claws clenched around his horns, pulling at them as though he was trying to split his skull in half. He cried out again and again, each scream more wild than the last, filling their veins with ice and terror. The draconequus clawed at his eyes and stabbed at his ears with nails like butcher knives. He cracked his reptilian tail against the ground over and over, each strike echoing with the hideous snap of bones breaking; every time he lifted the tail, it was bent into more and more grotesque shapes.

The ponies had no way to react to this horror. Parents watched with the same fear as their unprotected children, not a one among them bold enough to listen to the voice in their head begging them to flee for their lives. Their minds were reeling and their thoughts were cloudy, as if they had stepped out of a dream and this nightmare had chased after them. What had happened? What was this creature? Some of the older ponies remembered when a chimera attacked years ago, but this barely resembled the other beast. Terror seized them again as he howled again, and watched in confusion as the color drained from his feet.

‘ScREWball No tHey kilLeD I

CAN still hElp no heLP foR

THEm cHoCOlAtE mIL k dO noT wAnt

to Her

tO HURT thEm’

Discord gnashed his fangs together as wave after wave of pure agony ricocheted inside him from tip to tail. His entire body was burning up, every muscle and joint snapping and stretching his skin to its limits. It felt as if hundreds of flaming hooks had dug into him and were tearing him apart from every direction. But worse than the pain were the piercing screams that would stab into his mind and scatter his thoughts faster than he could collect them. He had to focus, he had to think, he had to remember!

‘s S s loYaltyBURNinG s C sc s c POsItivItY

St R iFe

SCr ScR SCR MAgiC USE IT

sCr E ScRe

s
c
R

e’

A scream destroyed him again. What were they?! What were the other ones?! He couldn’t remember!! What were they?! He would lose everything! Everything he ever had! Unless he could make the words come and make the pain stop! Lightning split across his mind, threatening to explode his brain inside his skull. He would never survive unless he hurried and found the words. But there was something else working with the screams. There was a second voice. There was a voice in his head that was not his, with its own words. But he did not know which one it was.

‘I CAn ’T mAKe ThEm pa

y

shE

would not

Be TR ayED YoU

coTToN

mAkE MORE

can

HURT

D

CHAOS

y

THEY DID THIS

SO WHY

FIGHT?

Discord forced open an eye and was immediately stung by salty water. He fought to see through the blinding screen of tears, though he was barely able to see anything among the world of brown that surrounded. The only thing to be blessed with a unique color was an eagle claw in front of his face. It was his own claw. And it was gray. His talons trembled as they pressed themselves together, ready to spark the inferno that would burn his world to ashes. He struggled with every last drop of strength he had left, but he could not force his fingers to part any more than he could move his own legs.

The spirit twisted his neck down in and looked on in dread to see his body nearly entirely stained the same lifeless gray. The invading tinct creeped along his fur and seeped into his skin, burying the natural tones and hiding them away as the scorching heat burned hotter. He could feel the fiery noose constrict around his neck, numbing him to everything.

He growled and strained as he fought to keep the destructive energy at bay, but every effort proved useless as the gray continued its climb. He didn’t know what was happening to him. He didn’t know what would happen to the town. He didn’t know what he was going to do. He didn’t know what was going to happen to Screwball. He had never wanted this. He only ever wanted to make things right for once. He didn’t want all this anger and pain. He never wanted to hurt anyone. The faintest sensation drew his attention to his paw, where the last traces of yellow still clung to his fingertips.

Discord poured every ounce of energy he had into bringing his paw together, as he screaming every recitation of the two voices warring inside his head.

“DON’T BE SO GLUM. AFTER ALL, THIS IS WHAT CHAOS IS!”

“It can’t be...”

“LET IT GO!”

“Screwball...

“TAKE EVERYTHING!”

“...I’m...”

“EMBRACE YOURSELF!”

“...scared...”

The Spirit of Chaos took one last breath before he snapped his fingers and disappeared.

----------

The ground rumbled with the pounding of galloping hooves. Ponies screamed in alarm, calling out for their sons and daughters and fathers and mothers. Dust filled the air, kicked up by the Ploughmothians in their state of panic, making it difficult to even breathe. Her head painfully throbbed in sync with every heartbeat, and her left eyelid was swollen shut. The sky was pitch dark, like a midnight storm, and the air was heavy wtih the smell of coming rain. Screwball had little trouble ranking this as one of the worse mornings she ever had. Something didn’t sit right with her.

In a few seconds she was wide awake again, and her memory returned just as quickly. Screwball seized a jittery stallion by the collar of his jacket and stared him dead in the eyes. The pony petrified almost immediately, his past worries completely forgotten in the face of this new, grievous danger.

“Where is Discord.”

“I-I-I d-d I-I d-don’t kn-now wh-wh-who—” The stallion choked back a mousy little squeak before it could escape his mouth when the terrifying purple pony jerked his head closer to hers, forcing him to stare into her eyes.

“The draconequus who was with me.” Every word hung in the air like a weight preparing to crush the quivering pony.

“P-p-please, st-tranger, I-I don’t know—”

“You listen to me, you dirt-farming, mule-cuddling, buckle-wearing son of a bitch. Unless the next words that tumble out of your mouth point me to where my Discord is, I’m going to buck your ass so hard your ancestors will feel it. And I swear by the sun and the moon, if I find out that you Harvest Day parade rejects laid even a hoof on him, your worthless forefathers’ genocide of the buffalo will look like a Hearth’s Warming Eve pageant after I’m through. Do you understand me? Then talk!”

The terrified colonist returned the Canterlot pony’s stare for as long as he was able before giving one sad croak and fainting in her hooves. Screwball cursed under her breath and dropped him gently on the ground before stepping out to face the crowd of frantic ponies and find her charge. Something had gone wrong, that much was a given, and now it was time to grab Discord and run away for the next town.

‘Great job back there. We really let that jerk have it, huh? I can’t tell you how nice it is to hear you say something I want you to say for once.’

‘If you aren’t going to help me, I don’t want to hear a word from you.’

A deafening blast terminated the mare’s internal squabble, and the ensuing shock wave nearly threw her and every pony in Ploughmouth off their hooves. Bells rang inside of Screwball’s already sore head, and she clutched her ears in pain until it finally subsided. Doing her best to throw off her shock, she snapped her head around to find the source of the explosion, knowing she was close to finding the one responsible for it. She pushed her way through the crowd of shrieking ponies until she finally broke free at the edge of the settlement.

She had no idea how long her heart stopped beating when she finally found what she was searching for. An enormous, swirling maelstrom of dark gray clouds and stolen chunks of earth loomed a short distance away, casting off an ominous energy for miles around. Screwball did not need to be a unicorn to know that the shell was brimming with untamed, dangerous magical energy. She didn’t need to be a pegasus to know that trying to navigate inside of that brutal twister was suicide. She didn’t need to be an earth pony to know that she would never last ten seconds in that hell.

She didn’t need to know any of that because none of it mattered. All she needed to be was a mother who knew her child needed her. Because that was all that mattered. Screwball dashed to the vortex and dove in without a second’s hesitation.

The force of the whirlwind was greater than she could have ever imagined, but it was still not enough to stop her. Screwball firmly anchored her hooves in the earth and crouched low to the ground to protect as much of her body as possible as she forced her legs what she prayed would be the eye of the storm. She nearly lost her footing on more than one occasion when the barren dirt beneath her would spontaneously transform into thick mud that glued her hooves to the ground or scorching hot sand that slipped out of her grasp as she fought to stay grounded. The howling of the wind was ghastly enough for her to wonder if she would discover a string of Windigoes racing over her head among all the debris. The pony ducked just in time to avoid being staked through her good eye by a splintered tree branch carried on the wind. Her eyes flared when she saw the ground beneath her flash into quicksand, leaving her with only moments before she would be buried up to her shoulders—or worse. Crying out for fate to carry her, she shut her eye and jumped into the air.

In less than a second, a rotted tree trunk slammed into her stomach and winded her. Screwball wrapped her legs around the bark for all dear life, keeping her head down as the tree was carried higher and higher into the storm. Thunder flashed and lightning boomed all around her. The force of the hurricane nearly shook the ground apart, as earthquakes rattled her in the air. She rode through a storm of blistering hail pouring over a chilling inferno beneath her. A black and craggy volcano rose from the earth and spewed out a tidal wave that came close to swallowing up Screwball and her impromptu chariot. And the longer she flew through the chaos, the greater her fear grew. Not for herself, but for the draconequus behind all the turmoil.

Gone were any traces of Discord’s colorful and sugar-coated mischief. There were no cottage cheese bowling pins, or cupcakes with mashed potato frosting, or a squirrel marching band to liven up their walks. There was no soda rain, or puddles of fudge, or cookie dough logs. Everything he had created here was purely designed for malicious destruction and harm that even the spirit was not exempt from.

Discord floated lifelessly on the winds, entirely unresponsive to the stones and lightning battering him. Screwball swallowed her immediate terror and tried to take control of the tree’s path, aiming it for the draconequus’s flight path. Once she was close enough, she performed one final leap of faith and dove at him, dragging him out of the air channels suspending him and pulling them both to the ground. Unsure of what else she could possibly do as she realized the short-sightedness of her plan, Screwball pulled open Discord’s wings and forced them to flap until he caught a draft, paying no mind to the knowledge that the only thing consistent in that abyss was the unpredictable wind currents or the fact that she knew nothing about flying.

The two crashed to the ground, the collision tossing Screwball off of Discord’s back and sending her somersaulting a few times before landing flat on her stomach. Ignoring the soreness that covered her from head to tail, she briefly inspected herself for any major harm, finding nothing but a few cuts and bruises. It was nothing short of a miracle that her propeller beanie was still with her. Satisfied, she spun around to nurse any wounds Discord might have taken, only to shrink in fear as her charge wildly lunged toward her.

The Spirit of Chaos howled like an animal, thick curtains of drool pouring from his mouth as he snapped at the scent in the air. It reeked of misery and confusion. He had to have it. Dirty yellow, pupiless eyes swiveled around until finally discovering the new source of fuel. He pounced in the air and pinned the thing to the ground, savoring the intoxicating aroma of disarray radiating from it. It made a noise when his saliva dripped onto her cheek, but he ignored it. It was only becoming more fearful, more satisfying. He almost could hear its thoughts, screaming for its body to move and flee for its life. Unable to wait a moment longer, he held its neck to the ground with his talon and lifted his paw, his bared claws leaving no confusion about his intent.

He watched its eyes shift from his paw to his face and watched in pure ecstasy as its face shifted into a mask of absolute terror. But something had happened. He could not bring down his claw for that final strike. He glared at the thing, hating it for whatever trick it had placed upon him, but the longer he stared, the number his body felt. He saw things that weren’t there. He saw a wolf and a castle in a dark forest. A torn robe. And then finally that very same pony wearing that very same look of fear and betrayal that turned his insides to ice. That look that he never wanted to see again. The fire inside him was doused as more memories returned, of stories and games and sunny summer days, of pranks and candy, of circuses and happy gray, of loving every moment he spent with Screwball.

Discord released his grip and fell onto his knees as he felt the last flickers of heat leave his body and the pandemonium around immediately died. He kept his eyes on the ground, unable to look Screwball in the eye. He felt her hooves tenderly wrap around his neck and he buried his face in her chest, having given up all attempts to hold back his tears. He only wanted to help. He only wanted to make everything like the circus. He only wanted things to be like cotton candy. But instead...

“Screwball,” Discord choked, “I think I made a mess.”

“Shh... Everything is okay now... I’m here... I’ll always be here... It’s okay... Shh...”

Comments

[TheManWithTwoNames]

Dang FiM always trying to fight me every step of the way with the paragraph indentations... Dropping out lines of text... It's like it's trying to get on my nerves at this point. Ah well.

[acsinclair]

Another awesome chapter ye of the two names and adorable Cicero avatar. After re-reading some of the past few chapters of this story and finally reading The Elements of Larceny, I again have to conclude that you are just a badass writer. Thanks a lot for taking the time to create things like this for us.

[CTVulpin]

So, how much of the Ploughmothian's hostility was from their natural insularity and how much was Discord's well-intentioned blanket of chaos magic?
What Discord needs to learn from this: There's good Chaos and bad Chaos.

[TheManWithTwoNames]

494088
It's really up to the reader on how they want to see it. Or based on how the reader views people from Massachusetts.

Personally, I imagine that they just wouldn't have been friendly to the pair just because, you know, Discord is a bit frightening to look at. But the dash of chaos Discord added agitated their distrust of foreign culture to the point of violence.

[CTVulpin]

494131
Yeah, that's what I was thinking myself.

[Bishieluver01]

This chapter was sad... Sad in the way that it reminds you just what Discord is, and what inevitable future may happen, which I REALLY hope won't happen.

[Charles Rocketboy]

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.

And now we're into full-on tragedy and bleakness, with a quite terrifying breakdown on Discy's part (the paragraphs and font in total disarray is a nice touch) and a really sad ending. It's only going to get worse, isn't it?

[Sharon Lougheed]

There must be a happy way to end this! There must! Or at least not completely depressing!

And yes, I made an account just to comment on this fic. :P I can't wait for another chapter! Seriously, I can't. I've been checking back every day since I found this. This is incredibly good.

[TheManWithTwoNames]

617738

i.imgur.com/BvSYc.png
oh my god my heart is full of rainbows thank you so much

And no promises about a happy or unhappy ending. I like to make surprises~

Though I'm hoping to get the next chapter up by next Tuesday, so stick around!

[Sharon Lougheed]

You always seem to write exactly what fits. So I'm confident it'll be awesome regardless how it goes. And surprises are the best!

Oh, and YESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYESYES!!! ANOTHER CHAPTER SOON!!!