Discord finished the last bite of his cucumber sandwich, wiping his mouth with his arm when he swallowed, leaving bits of bread in his fur. He payed no attention to it, though, as a serious topic was on his mind.
Yes, it was serious, and that's why Discord didn't particularly care to go talking about this peculiar topic, but what has to be done must be done.
He grabbed a cup, filled it with chocolate milk, and chugged it as if it were a shot of whiskey.
He truly didn't understand why he was so nervous for what he was about to talk to her about, the yellow pegasus that sat right beside him, eating a sandwich just as he was, sitting on the blanket that covered the spiky grass, just as he was, and staring off into the sunset, the same one he peered curiously at.
Okay, perhaps he did know why it bothered him so much.
That was beside the point.
His time was running out; if he didn't talk to her about it, she, along with every being that inhabited Equestria, would most likely be wondering where he vanished off to. While they could make all sorts of guesses as to where his body manifested itself, they would probably all be wrong.
It's not every day you think your friend has vanished to a different dimension.
If he hadn't already done it before, he would risk spending just a little more time within this reality, but the universe doesn't really like beings trying to bend it to their own will. All that would come of that, unfortunately, would be this reality merely closing itself and him with it.
"Closing itself" was a bit of an understatement, Discord supposed, as it was more of a simultaneous explosion and implosion, including a few reality restarts--tricky timey-whimey stuff.
He sat there, silent, staring out at the red and orange sunset, with Fluttershy right by his side.
It was such a nice moment.
A moment that was either going to never exist or one that would break her heart.
It was pretty easy to choose the latter.
Discord took a breath in. This was it, the time to tell her. He just hoped that she hadn't noticed-
"Discord," Fluttershy said, looking up at him, her eyes glinting in the sunset, "are you okay? You seem rather nervous today."
Fuck.
"Ah, yes," he responded, "of course I am." Fluttershy smiled, nodded, then looked back to the sunset.
Discord wanted to strangle himself.
"Uh, except," he started again, Fluttershy looking to him again in confusion, "uh..." Fluttershy tilted her head to one side.
She was so cute.
Discord let out all of the air he had in his lungs in defeat, a frown now adorning his face. He decided to take it a different route, one that, hopefully, wouldn't hurt her as much. "Has Twilight ever taught you or any of your friends about, like, rules of reality and things like that?"
"N-no," Fluttershy responded, startled, "why?"
Discord felt the familiar pressure of a realm's stability failing in his chest. Time was running out.
"Well," he said, treading his words cautiously, "as you know, I am a spirit of chaos, yes?"
Fluttershy nodded.
"Realities, you see, are made up of pairs of forces, each praying and acting off the other. Light and dark, pull and push, so on... Well, chaos has a pair as well, its other half being stability or sanity, whichever you prefer."
"Discord, where's this-"
"I am a spirit of chaos," Discord said, interrupting Fluttershy so as to use the rest of his time more efficiently, "or, in a way, a large stone on the scale in favor of chaos."
Fluttershy stared, confused but understanding, urging him to continue.
"LIfe, reality, is made of these scales, and in a way, these scales are all part of a pyramid; if one scale leans too far to one side, it will fall and the pyramid will fall with it." He studied her face, seeing her obvious confusion. "Do you understand?"
Fluttershy shrugged, "no, but please, continue."
He continued reluctantly. "Each scale has its own set of rules, you see, and the chaos and stability scale has its own rules. Say..." he snapped his fingers, a brass scale appearing in the air, the sunset behind it and shining on it, giving it a glowing effect, "this is the chaos and stability scale."
Fluttershy looked at the scale and nodded. She seemed to be taking it well so far. Though, whether that was because she was okay with where it was going or if she still didn't have any idea what he was talking about, he didn't know.
Honestly, he didn't care; she wasn't heartbroken yet, so he was happy.
"The left side is stability and the right is chaos."
He snapped and a large stone, equal in weight, was placed on both sides.
"These rocks represent reality and a spirit of chaos, each going on their respective sides. This is a good balance, one that will stay up. You see, though, this is where it gets tricky; reality is reality, and nothing is more stable than reality. The stability side will always have only this rock, nothing more, nothing less."
Fluttershy pursed her lips.
"The chaos side, like the stability side, will always have a spirit of chaos, but something new is added to the equation." He snapped again and a pile of sand appeared above the chaos side, slowly trickling down. "This sand represents time; the longer a spirit of chaos stays in a realm, reality, whatever you want to call it, the more chaos it succumbs to. This slowly causes an imbalance."
"Okay," Fluttershy said, nodding, "I think I understand."
"The only way to create another balance is for this spirit of chaos to be replaced by another one, one who hasn't given off their particular chaos to it. Therefore, that previous spirit can never come back once its time is up."
Fluttershy was unusually silent. He became nervous again; she understood, and she knew what he was going for, what the meaning of all of this was. She looked over to Discord.
"Your time is up, isn't it?"
Discord neither said nor did anything for a small moment, then slowly nodded.
"Once you leave, I'll never be able to see you again for fear of this reality being destroyed?"
Again, Discord nodded.
"Well," Fluttershy said, emotionless her words, "that's unfortunate."
Discord was, needless to say, startled by her response, perhaps even a little ticked. "Unfortunate? This is all unfortunate? Are you not sad to see me go?" While he could admit he was being a little selfish--very selfish--he couldn't help his emotions, especially due to how anxious he was; every second spent talking about the issue the less time there was to talk to her and enjoy their time. While he could hope for the new spirit of chaos to come early and reset the balance, giving him a little more time, he wasn't too hopeful. The only spirit he could think that would come early was... Him.
She quickly whipped her head to look at him, "No! No, nothing like that..."
"Then why is this all only 'unfortunate?'"
"You see, Discord, you said that there're other spirits of chaos. If all of them are like you then I'll just have, y'know, you, but a different you, and you'll have a different me. It'll all work out."
"Eh," Discord frowned, "not exactly."
"How so?"
"While there are an infinite number of different realities, and while there is a different reality with basically the same you," Discord looked off into the sunset, "the chance of me getting that reality is a lot less than you think. I have no control over what reality I get sent to, and I have no control over who takes over this reality, and trust me when I say," Discord started to have bad flashbacks, "not all chaos spirits are like me."
"Well," Fluttershy said, frowning as well, but then smiling again, "we can only hope for the best, right? I'm not going to get sad over something I can't change, and neither should you." She set a hoof on his leg. "It'll all work out."
"I can only hope for the best," Discord said, smiling towards his friend, the only one he will and would ever miss, the only one he will and would care about.
He felt the pressure rising.
"If your new spirit were to arrive early, I would expect it soon. My time's running low. If he isn't here around the next couple minutes, I'll have to take my leave." He wrapped his arm around her, getting one last feel of her gorgeous mane, loving ever moment of it.
"How so? Does a new spirit arriving cause it to reset?"
Discord pursed his lips in thought. "Not really, all of this is actually a lot more complicated. You wouldn't be able to understand it. Let's just say it kind of reverses the effects from before, but only a little. I'd probably have an extra hour at the most."
"Oh," Fluttershy said, comprehending his answer, "then let's just spend these last few minutes together.
They both relished these few moments, neither wanting to leave the other but accepting what may come. It stayed silent up until they both heard the familiar sound of a magical "poof" behind them.
Before Discord could turn around to greet the new spirit, its voice sent him into a world of shock.
"Well, well, well," the voice behind them said, the voice sharp, crisp, and very much sophisticated with a twinge, or, really, more like with a bucketful of pettiness between the letters in each word. "Nice realm you've got here, Discord."
Discord recognized the voice immediately.
He hated it. He hated him.
He slowly stood up, staying turned towards the sunset. "I was afraid you'd be the one to take over. Out of the infinite number of different masters of chaos, it just had to be," he paused, turning around and giving the figure in front of him a death glare, "Cthulhu."
Before Discord stood a figure roughly as tall as himself. He was beefy with shiny, moist, green skin. His head resembled that of an octopus that had been placed on top of a body, eight slimy tentacles hanging down and covering his mouth. Despite these tentacles, he still managed to keep such a clear voice. He was wearing a suit and tie, like he always did, and carried a black briefcase with him.
Cthulhu spread out his arms as if to give a hug. "Aw, someone seems angry. Not a very warm welcome, I must say."
Discord stood there, not amused. "Isn't there anyone else who could take this over?"
"Oh, come now, Discord," Cthulhu said, the sarcasm evident in his voice, "you know that you and I are the best in the industry."
He hated when he said that.
"It's not an industry, Cthulhu, it's-"
"Yeah, yeah, I know, a 'balance of effects between dimensions.' Have a little fun, would ya?"
Discord rolled his eyes. While Discord loved fun and overall serious-deprived occasions, he was surprisingly not in the mood.
Fluttershy had been watching and had caught the attention of Cthulhu.
Cthulhu gasped. "Discord! Is this..." he put a hand covering his face from Fluttershy and continued, "your girlfriend?"
Fluttershy blushed, "I can hear you-"
"No, Cthulhu, just a friend."
Even Discord could feel the blush now inhabiting his face.
"I always thought you didn't do the whole 'friend thing,'" he responded.
Discord just crossed him arms and raised an eyebrow. Fluttershy cleared her throat. "So, you two know each other, then?"
"Unfortunately-"
"Why, of course we do! We've been associates since World War II." Cthulhu wrapped his arm around Discord, proceeding to get elbowed in the abdomen. "Well then!"
"What's World War-"
"Anyways," Discord continued, realizing how much a waste of time all of this was, "this is Fluttershy." He grabbed the other spirit by the tie and yanked him, pulling him until they were face to face. He stared at him for a good long while, increasing the tension between them before he decided to talk. "I don't care if you kill the others, but you touch her and I'll find a way to kill you myself," he whispered, being sure Fluttershy never heard him.
"Okay, okay, jeez." He pulled Discords hand off and wiped down his tie with his hand, straightening it, backing up all the while. "Care to give me a tour, buddy?" His voice was now filled with a bit of aggression, but nothing Discord was afraid of. He floated into the air and spun around, examining his surroundings. "Boy, quite colorful, isn't it? I prefer more monochrome, dead, perhaps a little rot-y, but this works just as well."
Discord rolled his eyes again, snapping and transporting all of them into the center of Ponyville. Fluttershy shook her head to clear the sudden headache. She was a pegasus, not a unicorn, and teleportation was quite intensive on the brain. "This is Ponyville, where you'll be spending most of your time, I reckon."
Cthulhu chuckled a bit. "Ponyville." He placed a fist over his mouth, moving away his tentacles. "Nice name. Was 'Horsetown' already taken?" He leaned over as gasps of air escaped his nose.
"Mature, Cthulhu, real mature."
"Oh, lighten up, Mr. Edgy Draconequus, this'll all be fun." He placed a hand on Discord's shoulder, only for Discord to carry on walking towards the crystal castle that towered up before them in the distance. Cthulhu looked over at Fluttershy, who stood in place, and shrugged. "What's his deal?"
Fluttershy said nothing, instead following Discord into the distance, trotting to continue by his side. He noticed they stood awfully close to each other.
"Wow," Cthulhu said to himself, "tough crowd." He scanned the town square, a big fountain perched in the center, and started to follow the others when he heard something a little bit off. It sounded like bickering between two women. Being the lover of conflict and unjust anger that he was, the squid-faced spirit followed the paths between buildings and patches of untouched land until he reached the sound.
At a small oak wood shop stand, one that had a book plastered on the front, stood two ponies, one on either side of the shop. The first was a white one with a red mane, the other a purple one with a dark, violet mane. This one looked different from the other one; it had wings, just as... What was her name, Butterfly? Yeah... Just as Butterfly had, but this one also had a horn. As he studied it closer, he came to a realization.
This one was absolutely adorable.
The purple one set a few gold coins onto the top of the stand and slid them over to the other. The other pony, in return, brought out a book, one that he could barely make out the words "Studies of the Average Equine" written on.
As he stared in curiosity as this particularly adorable small equine, an idea came to his head; now that he was here, it was his dimension. Now that he was here, the scale had already been reset. It was the time for chaos to once again take over its righteous reign over this dimension.
It was the time for Cthulhu.
He held a smile behind all of his tentacles, and he decided that waiting to get a tour of the place meant only one thing; less time for him to destroy this world. Cthulhu had never really been one for wasting time, as evident by his stylish contour.
With a simple snap, the purple one vanished. Not with a "poof" or anything like that, just... Vanished. In its place stood a purple rat, one that the book landed on top of from where it had been in the air, completely smashing the rat under its weight. The book moved slightly for a moment, but soon stopped.
The other pony seemed confused at first, then proceeded to become scared. She started to shift uneasily, her eyes darting around frantically, hoping to see the princess casually walking down the path, to no avail, and eventually slung a sign over her stand that read "Closed" and ran down the path tripping or running into ponies along the way, leaving the book and the smashed rat underneath it in the middle of the path. Cthulhu merely laughed. These creatures were so innocent, so unbeknownst to the world of grim and darkness.
Boy, this world would be fun to ruin.
An annoyed call from Discord snapped him out of his chaos-infested trance and he left with a few more snaps. Terrified screams filled the air, causing the mad-manned spirit to smile in a demented way, though no one saw it behind his lump of extra limbs. While it didn't satisfy him as much as it did when he was younger, this was only the beginning, and more fun would arise as he got, let's say, "more comfortable."
He continued along, happy to have such a good friend like Discord, who would happily give him a realm to destroy any day.