Stranded

by Time Shield

PROLOGUE: "Alone"

Well, here I am.  It’s been a long time, but it’s finally time for me to tell everypony about what happened to me.  I can only imagine what they originally thought after my sudden and abrupt disappearance, with no clues as to where I went.  It’s going to be difficult to explain; even as I sit and write this, I’m having a hard time sorting fact from imagination.  I’ll do my best to explain things as I remember them, and despite everything that’s happened, I still remember how it all started.  I’ll begin with the phrase I made sure to repeat to myself every day, so that I wouldn’t forget who I was or where I was.

My name is Fluttershy, and I’ve been stranded in the Realm of Chaos.

I was there visiting Discord, the spirit of chaos.  The two of us had become close friends over time, and just as I had watched him grow to understand the magic of friendship, he too began to teach me about the amazing potential that our world offered.  I began to understand how he thought, and I felt pride in how well he began adapting to our ways in return.  The idea that he might one day be able to live among us in harmony seemed impossible, but if he taught me anything, it’s that the impossible can always become possible.

It was all going so well, until that tea party—that awful tea party—brought it all crashing down.  He brought me for the first time to the Realm of Chaos, and I prepared myself for his usual craziness; in fact, I found myself quite looking forward to seeing what he might do.  But instead, he was making an effort to be normal, not his typical chaotic self.  It felt so wrong to see him acting this way, and this feeling became a reality when he began to fade from existence right before my eyes.  I realized that a creature of chaos such as himself couldn’t live as a normal pony would, and the normality was destroying him.

I pleaded with him to do something chaotic, to return to his former self, but he was too far gone.  I panicked, and I didn’t know what to do.  Of all the things I could have done, I did what I realize now was the worst thing to do: I just froze.  I couldn’t say anything, couldn’t think anything, and just watched as he continued to fade.  Before I could even find my voice to speak to him again, he had faded out completely.  Discord was gone.

I stared in shock at the spot where he was previously sitting, waiting for him to reappear, hoping that it was all just some sort of joke he was playing on me.  All I could think was that it wasn’t real; it couldn’t be real.  When he did not return, and it dawned on me that he was gone forever, I collapsed onto the ground and began to cry.  I cried for hours.  I cried until there was nothing left for me to cry.

Once I got a hold of myself, I tried to clear my head and understand the situation I was in.  Discord was gone, and I was still in the Realm of Chaos.  Would the Realm disappear as well?  Would I be returned home if it did, or would I disappear with it?  The thought terrified me, and I began to fly around Discord’s home in a blind panic, tapping on things and testing to see if they too were beginning to deteriorate just as Discord had.  Everything seemed solid, which was a relief, but only briefly so until the next fact struck me: I was only able to come here because of Discord’s magic, and without it, I couldn’t leave.

I was stranded here, alone.

Going to the door, I opened it and peered outside.  The endless vistas of the Realm of Chaos spread before me, a swirling vortex that seemed to extend forever.  It was like looking out from a boat onto a stormy sea, unsure if any direction would eventually take you to land.  Only this sea wasn’t flat, but went in all directions.  There was no guarantee that any direction I chose to go would lead me out, and if I left, I knew it was unlikely I would be able to find my way back.

But I couldn’t stay here.  Even if this piece of the Realm was made to be normal just for me, there wasn’t much for me to live on.  A quick search of the house turned up no food or water besides the tea and sandwiches that Discord had prepared for the tea party.  I would starve here before long… no, I would dehydrate before I starved.  Staying here would certainly be a death sentence for me.  I decided that the sooner I started out, the better chance I had of making it somewhere before my supplies ran out.

I took one of the pillowcases on the couch and put the sandwiches inside; after this, I wrapped up the teapot so that the remaining tea wouldn’t spill and put it into the pillowcase as well.  Before I left the house, I took one last glance behind me at the couch, and the place where Discord had vanished.  I didn’t want to leave; I knew I was clinging to the last shred of hope that he might reappear, that he would fix everything, that I wouldn’t be alone anymore.  But I had to ignore it, and accept that he was not coming back.  I didn’t have Discord, or my other friends, or my home.  These meager supplies were everything I had now, and my survival depended on them lasting me until I could find another source of food and water.

Whispering a final, “I’m sorry,” I flew up and away from the house, into the endless expanse of the Realm of Chaos, my sights set on one goal: finding a way back home.