Short Hand: Trusting Chaos · 4:05am Aug 9th, 2020
One night, while Shepherd is reading at home... He hears some bells ringing, and then his walls turn purple. He sighs, and closes his eyes tightly.
Discord: "Guess who?"
Shepherd: "Not in the mood."
Discord: "Aw, why must you be so hurtful, Shepherd? After all, I am reformed! Fluttershy said so herself!"
Shepherd: "Yeah, and I'm still checking her for mind control magic or body swapping or literally anything else you may have done to her."
Discord: "Come on, come on! I wouldn't do something like that! I don't have any patience!"
Shepherd: "I'm sure you could find it in yourself if it let you stay free."
Shepherd turned the page, and Discord appeared in the book in the form of calligraphy.
Discord: "Can't you find it in your heart to trust me?"
Shepherd: "Trust is earned. Not given away."
Shepherd slams the book shut and stalks off. Discord reappears in his kitchen, now done up like a 1950s houswife.
Discord: "Must you be so violent, darling?! I said I was sorry!"
Shepherd: "Go torment a Starfleet captain or be Mothra's dildo. I don't care which."
Shepherd elbows past Discord and rummages in the fridge. Discord poked his head out of the fridge.
Discord: "Hey! Did you know the light does turn off when you close the door? I didn't!"
Shepherd: Slams the fridge closed and walks out the backdoor into the yard. Discord is there, looking over the fence.
Discord: "Come now! Aren't you even a little curious as to why I'm here?"
Shepherd: "Could it be because you're an annoying asshole?"
Discord: "If you must know, it's because Fluttershy is encouraging me to reach out! Make amends!"
Shepherd: "..." Big, bright smile "Why sure Discord! I'll totally forgive you for everything you've done to my friends, loved ones and this planet and trust you implicitly sometime around the heat death of the universe! You may want to pack a sweater, it'll probably get a bit nippy."
Discord: "Hmph! Come on! All that unpleasantness was last year, you know? You forgave Luna for Nightmare Moon!"
Shepherd: "She wasn't completely in control of her actions, you were."
Discord: "Oh, so is that it? I'm sure you've done plenty of things you weren't proud of! Made mistakes?"
Shepherd: rolls his eyes
Discord: Appears in front of Shepherd, hands on his hips "Can't you at least tell me why you don't trust me? Is it just because of my power? Because your beloved Princesses could do some pretty terrible things to this world and your loved ones. In fact, one did! So tell me: Why don't you trust me despite Fluttershy teaching me about friendship, and telling even you to give me a chance?"
Shepherd: glares up at Discord "You really want to do this, huh?"
Discord: "Yes!"
Shepherd: "You really want to get it all out, right here? Right now?"
Discord: "Absolutely! I'm all ears!" Turns into a cloud of ears
Shepherd: "You have unlimited power to do anything you think of, anything you could possibly choose to. You're a spirit of chaos, and naturally we need chaos to complement order."
Discord: "Yes! See? I'm a natural part of-"
Shepherd: Holds a finger up in front of Discord's face "I'm not finished."
Discord: scowl
Shepherd: "You could have fulfilled a vital, important role in this universe. You could have used your powers for chaos and for good things, and done incredible, truly creative things with them. But you didn't. You don't try to teach, you don't try to change things or make them more interesting, survivable, or amazing: You're just some fucking uncreative troll who gets his jollies off on jokes only he gets. At the expense of everyone else. If you win, all you'll be left with is an empty, meaningless world of shitty chaos, simply tweaking things over and over and over again to try and get the same thrill as before, and fail. Just an idiot immortal mechanic fiddling with a shitty car for the rest of eternity. Selfish and self obsessed and fine with breaking any bond of trust just for a chance to feel like the Big Chaos God again. Something you didn't earn, you were just born with. You've never had to struggle or work at it or try for it: You just were, and your recent experiment with trying to strive for more is, in my opinion, temporary."
Discord: Glares harder
Shepherd: "You could have been anything, Discord. You could have been amazing. Instead, you chose to be an asshole. And one day, you're going to slip up. You're going to go back to being selfish. And we're all going to pay for it."
He leans in, glaring back at Discord, right in his eyes
Shepherd: "So I'm going to wait for that moment. And when it happens? I'm going to be one of the ones who has to pick up the pieces. That's why I don't trust you and I will never trust you."
Discord: "... Why... You're wrong, Shepherd! I'm going to be the best friend ever! I'll change your mind! You'll see!"
Discord vanishes in a pop of magic, leaving Shepherd to shake his head.
Shepherd: "Hmph."
- - -
I would love if at Tirek's proposal
Discord Goes, shakes his hand, then remembers this moment
The 'true' moment Discord either becomes someone new or does what he does in show.
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I wrote a what if about something similar, rather happy with it.
I kinda want Discord to have Shepard experience things his way. In the sense of temporarily having near limitless PHENOMENAL COSMIC POWER and nothing to stop you. That's the kind of power that'd go to anyone's head. If only to try and see why he acts the way he does, even a little.
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That's the problem with near limitless power, you don't know what you will do.
Say you just 'Think' of something; will that have an effect on the environment around you.
Q and Discord ~circumvent~ this by giving their power a 'tell', so as to NOT do anything randomly, but by design and with rules.
IF you DON'T then every little thing you have ever want WILL come out.
Not by choice, but by desire.
In Dreams this happens all the time; we add elements with out reason, but the real world is not a dream.
With limitless power comes limitless potential for good and bad limitlessly
Uncle Ben missed a word in his famous wisdom. With great power should come great responsibility, but oh, that is far from guaranteed. Great power makes everything easy. Why should you constrain yourself by worrying what others think when you have a million, billion ideas surging through your mind every second and the ability to realize every single one of them?
And, of course, there's the "and Disharmony" part of Discord's job description. That never stopped being a thing, in spite of Fluttershy's best efforts. He isn't just a troll, he's partially composed of the very essence of trollishness. And we've seen that it's a literally vital part of his existence. Yes, there are constructive forms of disharmony, just as there are destructive forms of harmony, but Discord needed an outside perspective to appreciate them. And for that to happen, he needed to accept any perspective outside his own as valid.
I'm not saying he was ever justified in his unreigns of terror, but I can understand why his journey had so little road in the bumps.
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In my experience, power should come with responsibility, but authority must come with responsibility. If you have power but no authority to use it, you may feel morally compelled to act, but on your own head be it should you act wrongly. However, if you have the authority, you are compelled to act, and to act correctly.
Discord has power, but (until Celestia and/or Twilight get ideas into their heads and ask Discord to do something) no actual authority. Him either being a screw-up or a no-show in a crisis is just to be expected. Now, Celestia being a screw-up or a no-show on the other hand... [rant redacted]
Why this become drama now?
*Sigh* okay next
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Well you can't have comedy all the time. You gotta have dramatic breaks.
This sounds oddly similar to what the main character in The Audience says to Discord: “You were made a spirit of chaos. You chose to be a dick.”
Also, because you have never, in any way, said or done anything to suggest you actually feel regret and remorse for the monster you used to be, to the point where you explicitly and unashamedly reminisce about those times with fondness. The most I can say is that you regret that you didn't try to get any friendships before, but that's not the same as feeling remorse for what you did do.
Also also, as others have pointed out, even if you're not evil anymore... you're still a dickhead. And even if that is in some way inherent to your nature, you've shown no desire or effort to try and change it. In fact, in terms of obnoxiousness, you might even be worse than before, because now you think nobody's allowed to call you out on it because you're 'reformed'.
And finally, the very fact that you object to even one person not totally and completely trusting you without any effort or earning on your part suggests a level of self-absorbtion that makes the idea that you truly understand how and why your old ways were wrong difficult to accept. Not to mention how entitled it makes you seem; how you think that redemption is something to be handed out freely from everyone without any input from you. Refusing to allow you the opportunity to reform and truly earn trust? Yeah, I can understand you objecting to that. Refusing to simply give you trust without damn good reason? After how you were, that's not even unreasonable.
Discord smirks, "But none of it is my fault."
Shepherd, "And how do you explain that?"
Discord, "I'm not writing myself. THEY are!" Points out of the story.
Shepherd, "What are you-" Discord snaps a claw and Shepherd UNDERSTANDS. "AAAAUUGGGGGGHHH!!! I'M NOT EVEN REAL!!! NOTHING I DO MATTERS... wait... NONE OF IT'S EVEN ME?! WHAT AM I? AM I EVEN ME?!"
Deadpool pops in and wags a finger at Discord, "Nnnnnnot cool, muchacho! We DON'T break the other characters! It takes a PROPER level of insanity to handle the existential dread! Otherwise you end up with a head case like THAT!" Points to the Joker. "He can't even figure out which backstory he belongs to!"
Discord sighs, "I suppose you're right. Only Pinkie and I can deal with the delirium of knowing that we are merely clay in the hands of mad gods who mold as they see fit, smashing us to dust and remaking us over and over... a horrible mock-immortality of unlife…"
Deadpool raises an eyebrow, "Life of the party, this one. Sheesh, cut the melo Debbie Downer!"
Discord shrugs, "Hey, it's not MY fault! It's the jackass typing my lines right now!"
(I'm just trying to make a point! Sheesh! Cut me some slack!)
Deadpool, "It's funny that he doesn't realize it either."
(Wait, wut?)
Deadpool and Discord share a knowing chuckle, "Oh is he in for an unpleasant surprise!"
(What are you saying?! But I'm a REAL boy! Wait.. why did I say such a cliché line? No... NOOOOOOOOO!!! WAAUUUUUGH!!!)
*And so, Alondro ran away in terror, unable to accept the fact that he too was a creation of a mad god.... ME!!* >:}
Discord and Deadpool and Shepherd just stand there.
Shepherd, "Sooooo, we should probably..."
Deadpool, "Yeah, yeah, I got a ton of random cameos to make today. Smell you later, losers!" He does a Naruto pose and disappears in a puff of smoke.
Shepherd, "Strange fellow, but I guess I can deal with it, and you, now that I know the dismal existence to which we're all doomed."
Discord, "Wow, you got over that fast! The writers must really be bored with this topic and just skipped over all the phases of grief and went ludicrous speed into blasé acceptance! Anyway, Deadpool's an ol pal o' mine. I really like him. He should come over more often." He leans over, "Confidentially, I think he and Pinkie Pie have done the horizontal mambo more than once!"
Shepherd grits his teeth, "Aaaaand back to hating your guts for that mental image."
5332283 It does come with Great Responsibility. Most just throw it out with the manual.
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You know, there's also a Xanatos Gambit that could be made from this.... anyone interested in hearing it?