Chapter 5 – Jumping Unwisely Through Dimensions
Celestia stood outside on the castle steps with a bored expression on her face. The mid-morning sun was obscured by a few clouds set up by a Pegasi weather team to keep the glare in check. The castle lawns were immaculately trimmed and watered, while the castle itself was washed until it sparkled brightly just as the pinnacle city of Equestria should.
Celestia had hosted formal dignitary visits for hundreds of years with nearly every nation currently known in the explored world, and with a few countries that no longer exist. The basic idea of formality had not changed over the centuries. Unfortunately, such formalities got old after the first four years.
The princess was surrounded by a dozen of the castle guards in full armor with Steel Shield at the forefront. Behind Celestia stood a team of six advisors to help forge the trade agreement between Equestria and the griffon nation. Servants were at the ready at the top of the castle steps to wait upon the guests of honor.
Several hoof-maidens furiously combed Celestia’s impressive multi-colored pastel mane. The princess had just been given her third fastest bath on record to get the cake batter out of her locks.
The second fastest bath on record occurred when a multi-tiered cake fell on Celestia just minutes before a dinner party with the ambassadors of Saddle Arabia.
The servants had an unwritten rule to never mention the incident behind the fastest bath on record, but suffice to say it too involved cake.
Celestia looked up and saw four winged creatures approach from the southwest. They were the two griffon dignitaries, accompanied by two guards of their own. The hoof-maidens quickly dressed their princess with her tiara, necklace, and other personal effects just as the colt pages began their trumpeting fanfare.
Celestia stood tall and displayed her brightest smile.
The visitors landed on the front lawn of the castle and Celestia stepped forward to greet them.
“Welcome to Canterlot,” Celestia said warmly. She extended her fore-hoof to shake with the griffons, but they only bowed in respect.
“Thank you, Princess Celestia,” one of the griffon dignitaries replied.
The griffons introduced themselves. Celestia partially tuned them out, but not on purpose. She had her ears on alert for the sound of Discord and the split attention made it difficult to hear everything clearly. Celestia heard one griffon introduced himself as Gilbert, the other… something with an M. Their guards weren’t given an introduction, as per usual protocol.
It mattered not to the princess. These dignitary visits from the griffons usually followed the same pattern. First there were introductions, then one of the representatives made a lame joke about flying, and finally the conversation ended in a request to dine before negotiations began.
“Pardon us, your highness,” Gilbert stated pleasantly, “But Merv and I flew in straight from Griffico and our guards were only saddled for coach class.” The griffons all let out a good laugh and Celestia’s entourage joined in polite revelry.
“Shall we brunch before we get right down to business?” Gilbert asked.
Just like clockwork.
“My master chef has prepared a delectable meal for us,” Celestia said with a bow.
The princess clapped her fore-hooves together. Steel Shield shouted several marching orders and his guards changed formations just as they practiced it a hundred times before. The griffons were escorted up the steps along with Celestia, while the servants held back a moment before they proceeded to follow the assembly back inside the castle.
~ ~ ~
The griffons were seated in the grand dining hall, a colossal vaulted room with an arched ceiling and chandeliers made of finely crafted steel and bronze. Celestia sat at the head of the long table and watched the servants bring out trays of salads and breads for the opening course. A small orchestra in the corner played a soft melody in the background, but the griffons were largely too focused on their meals and their chatter with Celestia’s advisors.
A conversation over current sporting events batted back and forth between the griffons to Celestia’s left and the advisors to her right. The conversation reminded the princess that she rarely watched sports due to her busy schedule running a country. Celestia made a mental note to someday schedule time to attend a Hoof Ball game next season.
It was at this moment that one of the page colts snuck up beside Celestia and whispered news to the princess that made her heart skip a beat with apprehension.
“Your majesty,” the page said, “Discord has been spotted in the throne room setting up an unusual display of flowers.”
Celestia nodded. It would seem that her patience was already put to the test. “If you will excuse me, gentle griffons,” Celestia said as she interrupted everyone at the table. “I have been asked to approve our meeting arrangements in the throne room.”
She stood up without waiting on a response and casually left the dining hall.
On her way out, Celestia met Manny’s gaze and the stallion silently lipped ‘Better not be Discord’ to her. She only returned a smile to the advisor. Once out of sight of the lunch party, Celestia exploded into a full gallop to the throne room.
“Your timing is awful, Discord,” Celestia grumbled as she reached the two gilded throne room doors. She was about to pull the doors open magically when she noticed that the two guards stationed here were missing. Celestia frowned and yanked the doors open.
The princess was hit head on with the fragrance of freshly cut roses. The throne room was filled with them; red, white, and pink roses adorned the room in large bouquets. Rose petals on the red carpet formed a trail up to the throne where Discord sat in wait. The two missing guards flanked the throne, hung from the ceiling by long lengths of rope. They were both dressed with angelic wings and halos.
The draconequus was delighted to see her. “Your majesty!” Discord happily greeted. He stood up awkwardly and beckoned Celestia to approach.
The princess was apprehensive to get too close to the draconequus. “What are you up to, Discord?” she demanded. “I have important visitors and I request that you please not interfere with our meeting.”
“Oh, I don’t care about them,” Discord replied. “I am interested in you.”
Celestia tilted her head to the left as she was now quite confused. The draconequus kneeled down on all fours before the princess and lifted her right fore-hoof. Celestia recoiled suddenly, surprised by his strange behavior. Well, stranger than the usual antics Discord was known for.
“My dear Celestia,” he said as he sat up, “I have never told you before just how beautiful you are. You are an immortal rose in a sea of desert sand. Your grace is never stained by the soiled hands of time.”
Celestia’s cheeks were quickly taking on a red blush. “Wait, you actually have romantic feelings for me?”
“I always did,” Discord admitted. “I was never able to get the nerves to tell you until today.”
“C-Can this wait?” Celestia stuttered. She glanced at the two guards, but they were helpless against Discord’s magic. She started to back up away from the romantically challenged draconequus.
“Discord, this isn’t a good time!” Celestia said apprehensively.
“Now is the perfect time!” Discord countered. “I must know if my love for you is reciprocated! I have always been there by your side, forever loyal. I would give my life for you in the line of duty, but I want to also give you my love!”
“Discord,” Celestia whispered, stunned. She was taken by his kind words, unusual as they were, but then she realized something about what he just said. ‘Give his life in the line of duty' wasn't a phrase a draconequus would say, but it was a common idiom for a soldier.
Celestia pressed a hoof against his chest and stopped the draconequus’ advance.
“You’re one of my personal guards aren’t you?” Celestia asked pointedly.
“Uh, well yes, I am,” Discord said hesitantly.
Celestia’s cheeks remained rosy, but this was due to anger that now welled up inside her. “Who are you and how did you get inside Discord’s body?”
“I shouldn’t say,” Discord said sheepishly. “It would embarrass our relationship.”
“We don’t have a relationship!” Celestia shouted back.
“Well, we could if you want one,” Discord replied.
Celestia let off a growl of frustration. “Forget this. Here, hold my tiara,” she commanded. The princess levitated her crown over to Discord’s hands.
The draconequus took hold of the tiara, but remained seated. He marveled at the beautiful amethyst gemstones set in the crown for about three seconds before Celestia’s rear hooves kicked him in the chest. Discord rolled backwards and came to a halt, unconscious, against the throne.
Celestia reclaimed her tiara and then fired two beams of light, one at each of the ropes that bound the guards. The magical bolts snapped the ropes easily. The two guards fell to the ground with a soft thud, but were unharmed by the short distance. They escaped their bonds easily now that the magic that held the knots tight was gone.
“Hold Discord here as best you can,” Celestia commanded. She turned and galloped out of the throne room without further words. The dignitaries were no longer the top priority. Celestia had to secure that trap door from whoever was using it. She continued to run down the hallways towards the basement. She ran around the servants and guards along the way and ignored calls to her attention. Celestia reached the main entrance to the castle basement in record time.
Discord was sitting there waiting for her. He held an open bottle of wine in his lap.
“I don’t have time for this,” Celestia said angrily.
The draconequus staggered forward toward the princess and fell onto the floor. “You know what I really hate about you?” Discord said scathingly. “You are just way to smothering! You’re too nice to every pony and you molly coddle your friends to the point that I feel ill!” The draconequus took a heavy swing of wine and tried to stand up. He stumbled into a stone wall and held onto it for support.
“You’re always going on about friendship this and friendship that!” Discord continued to rant. “I think you try too hard to be the perfect friend. Oh sure, some ponies say their gas doesn’t stink, but the only thing that you want to come out of your tail end are baby foxes.”
“You aren’t the guard from earlier,” Celestia said slowly as she realized some pony else now had control of Discord’s body.
“No, I’m the mare in the moon,” Discord snapped back sarcastically. He stumbled forward from the wall and landed on all fours, but in doing so he dropped his bottle of wine. The glass bottle hit the carped floor and rolled away.
Celestia darted forward at Discord. He lifted his arms and braced for the imminent body slam, but Celestia instead popped out of sight in a loud and brilliant flash of yellow-white light. Just as quickly, the princess popped back into sight, but now she was behind Discord.
“And another thing,” Discord started, “You’re a big showoff!”
Celestia kicked the crawling draconequus in his rear end. He fell forward, rolled, and then hit his head against the opposite stone wall of the hallway. Discord slumped down on his face unconscious.
“Okay, some pony working here doesn’t have enough friends,” Celestia muttered to herself. She pushed the basement door open with her magic and descended the steps speedily. In front of her the light spell returned to guide the way down into the depths of the castle.
Celestia jumped down the stairs leading to the second basement. Her magical light was overshadowed by a dozen lit lanterns that were now hung from small hooks in the ceiling. She also heard shouting from many voices all at once. Where the strange small hallways began, Celestia found a crowd of servants and guards gathered. They shoved against each other as some attempted to have a turn at being the Prince of Chaos while others tried to prevent any pony from using the trap door at all.
Twilight and Luna were here as well. The two Alicorns tried to use rope to tie several pieces of old furniture together in a vain attempt to have a blockade erected. However, the unruly crowd sabotaged the efforts put into this with their shoving.
“WHAT IS GOING ON HERE?!” Celestia angrily roared out.
The mob of ponies stopped suddenly and they collectively fell into a full bow at the presence of their very put-off princess. “What are you doing with Discord?” Celestia asked.
“What cord? You mean this cord?” Twilight asked as she held up the rope.
“What? No!” Celestia crossly answered, “I want to know why is there a mob of ponies down here trying to get into Discord’s head?”
“Sister, if I may?” Luna requested. Her sister pointed and nodded to speak. Luna cleared her throat. “Twilight and I enlisted the services of several servants to aid in the tasks you charged us with. It appears that our choices for assistance had loose lips and rumors quickly spread among the staff about this trap door.”
“I’m so sorry, your majesty,” Twilight added. “We tried to keep knowledge of this enigma as vague as possible, but it was too strange to not invoke every pony’s curiosity.”
“It also has mine,” Discord said angrily as he stepped out of the shadows behind Celestia.
Several servants let out a gasp of surprise. The guards shifted their weight and had their hooves on their spears. Celestia shook her head at how poorly this situation had snowballed into trouble.
The draconequus walked over to the half erected mound of furniture. The servants fearfully moved out of his way. Discord snapped his fingers and the fixtures parted like doors that opened to receive a noble. He then peered down the hallway at the open trap door that quietly sat at the end.
“What am I looking at?” Discord asked everyone.
“Discord, wait!” Celestia interjected. “That trap door is made of strange magic, perhaps even stranger than yourself. It somehow is connected to you, but I think you shouldn’t go near it.”
“I accept that challenge,” Discord replied without fear. The draconequus ducked his head and walked down to the end of the hall. He looked down into the darkness with great interest. It was an oddity that even Discord was unfamiliar with. He leaned in, but saw nothing other than the blackest nothingness.
Discord reached down into the trap door as he felt around for what might lie below. It was emptiness, nothing solid below the frame of the trap door.
An unseen force grabbed Discord’s arm and yanked him into the darkness. Discord fell silently and disappeared inside the blank oblivion of the trap door.
Every pony stood there stunned. Discord had fallen into a portal that led… into Discord’s head?
“Uh, is that even physically possible?” Twilight asked aloud.
~ ~ ~
Discord groaned in pain. His fall through the trap door was a long one and the ground he landed on felt of packed earth and small rocks. He slowly sat up as he rubbed his eyes. The noonday sun was quite bright today. Discord looked at his surroundings and found that he sat on the main street of Ponyville.
How did he end up here? Was this how that trap door connected with him?
Discord felt a small nose rub up softly against his back. He turned around and found Fluttershy was standing behind him. The yellow Pegasus wore a big smile on her face with a hint of concern. She carried a small basket of fruits that hung from her right wing.
“Fluttershy!” Discord happily greeted her. “It is nice to see you again. Although, I can’t say this visit was planned. In fact, I’m not sure exactly how I got here.” The draconequus stood up from the ground as he dusted himself off.
Fluttershy brushed back the bangs from her pink mane and then reached into her basket. She pulled out a drinking glass that was filled with a brown liquid. “Chocolate milk?” she offered.
Discord took the glass in hand. “Thank you, Fluttershy. I can always count on you to be honest with me.” He drank the ‘glass’ portion of the drink, leaving a cylinder of chocolate milk in his hand.
“Ah! That hit the spot,” Discord happily stated.
The draconequus recognized a group of three mare ponies that walked past him. He didn’t quite remember their names, but he was sure they would know his. Discord waved to them. “Afternoon, ladies.”
“Chocolate milk!” the aquamarine Unicorn shouted back with a friendly smile.
“Um, no thanks,” Discord replied. “I already have a drink.” He showed her the can-shaped blob of liquid still in his hand. Discord returned his attention to Fluttershy.
“I would love to stay and chat more,” he said, “But there’s a commotion over a strange door back at the castle and I need to go deal with that right now.”
Fluttershy nodded. “Chocolate milk.”
“Okay, now I’m concerned,” Discord said with a confused expression. He saw several more ponies walk by and they waved at him with a friendly welcome.
“Chocolate milk!” shouted an orange stallion.
“Chocolate milk!” greeted a white Pegasus.
Discord started to put a little more distance between himself and the strangely behaving ponies. Either everyone in Ponyville declared today a ‘Prank the Draconequus’ holiday and they failed to invite him in for the joke, or he wasn’t in the Ponyville that he knew.
“Chocolate milk!” another mare greeted.
Discord increased his reverse movement to a slow walk. No, scratch that, it was a jog to get away from these strange ponies. He passed a candy store where a group of foals were sitting around holding cupcakes. The children unscrewed the tops of the cupcakes as if they were jar lids.
Inside each of the hollow cupcakes was a glass filled with chocolate milk.
“Chocolate milk!” the children all shouted together happily.
Discord jumped back at their synchronized cheer. The foals all got up and began to run around Discord, as if they wanted to play a game.
“Chocolate milk?” a little pink filly asked.
“Chocolate milk!”
More ponies began to crowd around Discord. They all had the same big, bright smile upon their faces. Very few things frightened the draconnequus, but this was quickly becoming one of those things.
“Chocolate milk?” Fluttershy asked again.
Discord snapped his fingers to teleport away from everyone. However, nothing happened. He then attempted to fly off into the clouds above him. Still nothing happened. His magical powers were not there.
“Chocolate milk, chocolate milk,” two stallions commented.
“Chocolate milk?” a colt asked.
Discord tried to push past the gathered crowd, but the ponies continued to mob him with their friendly greetings and affections for chocolate milk. The overly friendly ponies began to pile upon the draconequus.
“Gah, get away from me you dumb horses!” Discord shouted.
“Chocolate milk!” another Pegasus replied happily.
Discord was being smothered by Earth ponies, Unicorns, and chocolate milk. He struggled against the cheerful mob of chocolate milk, but it was chocolate milk to keep struggling. All he could do was chocolate milk against the growing chocolate milk of chocolate milk. Chocolate milk continued to chocolate milk around chocolate milk.
Chocolate milk and chocolate milk pressed against Discord, then chocolate milk. “Chocolate milk?” Chocolate milk, chocolate milk!
Chocolate milk, chocolate milk, but then Discord’s chocolate milk.
“Chocolate milk,” chocolate milk, and chocolate milk.
Chocolate milk, chocolate milk? Chocolate milk.
Chocolate milk!!
And then the cylindrical brown drink in Discord’s hand exploded.
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DA FUK!?
Chocolate milk?
Chocolate milk!
Chocolate milk?!
I don't think the universe is going to take this very well.
I prefer Death By Chocolate cake...
Ummm....wow.
I think Discord may have just accidentally the everything.
Cake is Celestia's nemesis. Of course, it's cake. Honestly, cake will kill her - oh, cake then death!
Chocolate Milk?
Lemon Curry?
2414062 Don't worry, Digo gets this way every now and then IRL.
How else could we have fought 5 of the Mane 6 (plus Spike) in a D&D campaign and never knew it until much later?
Or was that like Fight Club, and we don't talk about it?
Milk Chocolate!
What's going on? Man, that's a noodle scratcher. I like noodles
What else would be in Discord's head but Fluttershy and Chocolate Milk?