//------------------------------// // Chapter Twelve // Story: Head Full of Cotton Candy // by TheManWithTwoNames //------------------------------//   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 was able to get a look outside the window today. The outside world was crowded with moose and beavers and trees and politeness. I think I’ve been taken to Canada. Those sick bastards. He had sumo wrestled with bull elephants, spent a week camping inside of an awake and very irate dragon’s mouth, fought a Kraken during an otherwise uneventful trip to the beach, let Luna try to cleave him with some rusty old sword, went upside-down-backwards lugeing down a craggy mountain side, insisted on getting his honey only by stealing from the largest and angriest bumblebears (he still could not figure out why his magic had such a tendency to create bear hybrids), gone skydiving without a parachute or wings, and even had Celestia blast him with flames that would make a volcano seem like the perfect place to cool off. He had endured this and more, all without the slightest frown or wince of pain. It was simply an understanding of his that he was invincible.                   But when the pony lashed out at him, swatting his snout so sharply that it brought a tear to his eye, Discord wondered if the unpredictable and surprising nature of chaos wasn’t necessarily aligned only in his favor.                   “What did I do?”                   The mare grumbled something under her breath, turned, and walked back inside her tiny house. The door was left open, so Discord saw this as an invitation to follow after her and take his well-deserved revenge. When he entered the hovel, he saw it wasn’t quite as beggared on the inside as it was on the outside. In fact, the hodgepodge interior decor was something he could appreciate. He wondered how long after Canterlot was condemned the pony started to loot from other houses to furnish her own.                   Half of the floor was covered with a collection of throw rugs arranged to make a solid carpet, and the other half was had wood barely covered with some straws of hay. From what he could interpret, the carpeted half was the living area and the other side was the kitchen and eating area. He always thought it was strange that ponies would want to keep those two halves separate. Why not eat something while reclining in bed? Or sleep on a table? There was just no understanding their devotion to making things so uncomfortable for themselves.                   On the carpeted side of the room was a bench woven from straw with two cushions of different sizes sitting on the bottom. The cushions were so covered with patches he had a difficult time trying to determine which was the original pattern. The corner of the room sported a pile of blankets wrapped around each other messily and a single goose-feather pillow on one end of the mess to serve as a meager bed.                   The kitchen area was more crowded, lined with cupboards and cabinets with transplanted doors and drawers. On the wall opposite of the front door was another door, though it was a wonderful bit of nonsense for such a small hovel to need two entrances. One wall sported a partially boarded up window with a clear view of Canterlot Castle. The window was draped with lacy curtains and clattering blinds that didn’t seem to be capable of moving. Underneath the window was a mahogany table set for two with wooden and porcelain plates and emptied jam jars for drinking glasses.                   Discord paced around the one-room cottage, looking at the deteriorated state of the place with a mixture of approval and happy bafflement. The walls were water-damaged, with yellowed wallpaper peeling off or long since torn down all over the room. A steel pot was placed in a random spot on the carpet, partially filled with pink lemonade that must have fallen in a storm that passed through the last night. He could only wonder why, with all the houses in Canterlot that were still in one piece, the pony chose some run down shack on the edge of town over the larger and more luxurious manors that filled the center of the capital.                   Because there’s simply more that needs to be done than we can do by ourselves.                   He blinked a few times. It wasn’t every day he had a memory of something he didn’t remember. It was shaping up to be an exciting day. And then he saw it. It was a silly little bauble on the pillow that had been hidden by the sheets from where he first walked in. He walked closer to take a better look. It was a little yellow and white cap with a green propeller extending from the center.                   He could swear he heard something click in the back of his skull. It was a bad click.                   “Oh. Oh this is…  I should—”                   “Sit.”                   Discord apprehensively turned over his shoulder to see Screwball walking through the kitchen door, balancing a plate of neon vegetables on her tail. She set the platter on the table and pulled a stool out for him to sit on. Without even waiting to watch what he did, she turned for the pot of lemonade and poured some into both of the glasses before taking her own seat and slowly chewing on the plants, mindless of the awkward draconequus trying to come to a decision.                   Discord’s eyes shifted from the food, to the door behind him, to the rigid absence of expression on Screwball’s face that nearly teetered on anger. For a moment he wondered if it would only be harder on him if he tried to run away and if he should just sit down and take whatever was coming to him. He felt his arms instinctively reaching for his tail and mentally slapped himself, and then physically slapped himself for good measure. He was Discord! King of Equestria and Spirit of Chaos! More powerful than any being the world had ever known! He was the ruler of everything that he could see! And he would not let himself shrink away because of the upbraiding of some silly little earth pony.                   Putting on his usual air of ostentation, Discord strutted over to the stool and transformed it into a more appropriate throne to suit his status. He leaned his elbows on the table and snapped up a few of the vegetables, effortlessly juggling them in the air while they rapidly altered color, size, and substance.                   “Not bad, eh?” he asked as he tossed a Swiss cheese tomato in the air.                 “Fix your chair, elbows off the table, stop playing with your food,” Screwball said flatly.                   “And why should I do what you say?”                   “Do you want another swat?”                   With a click of his fingers, Discord set everything back to normal and grumpily chewed on the plain old, ordinary, boring carrot on his plate. Both of them ate in a painful silence for far too long, and with each passing second, Discord was more and more tempted to just flip the table over and leave the uncomfortable situation behind him.                   ‘Why in the name of chaos did you suggest coming here?’                   ‘Are you unhappy?’                   ‘I’m not having fun, yes.’                   ‘Then there’s your answer.’                   ‘You are the worst hand ever, Swifty.’                   Finished with his tiny meal and feeling the awful creeping touch of boredom sneaking up on him, Discord looked around for something to occupy his attention. Out of the whole colorful catastrophe that lined the inside of the house, he made his pick with the beanie that caused this whole situation. He levitated the cap toward himself, letting the propeller rattle around a bit as it drifted in the air, never once noticing the spasms of pain on Screwball’s face in response to the sound. He took the hat in his paws and examined it, flicking the propeller a few times. After a few flicks, he opened his mouth to speak.                   “I am impressed. I don’t think there’s a single extra gray hair on your head.”                   “When Nana’s joints hurt her sometimes in the winter, she would joke and make me promise to never grow old. I never imagined that it would actually happen.”                   Flick, whizz. Flick, whizz. Flick, whizz.                   “Would you stop doing that?”                   “Why? Is it bothering you?”                   Screwball said nothing and returned to eating. Discord examined the beanie again, squinting as he tried to analyze it as rationally and irrationally as possible. But for all his pondering, he could not find any explanation for why the little thing agitated him.                   “Because it’s bothering me.”                   “Then put it down.”                   Flick, whiiizz.                   “I said put it down.”                   “What is wrong with this?”                   “There’s nothing wrong with it.”                   “Yes there is. Why is this thing bothering me? It isn’t magical, it isn’t powerful, and it isn’t special. So why does this bug me?”                   Flick, whiiiz.                   “That! That noise! Don’t you hear it, too?”                   Flick, whizckckc.                   “Be careful with that!” Screwball ripped the beanie from his paws and cradled it delicately in her hooves. She gently rotated the propeller and frowned sadly when she felt it wobbling side to side, knocked loose by the recklessly powerful flick.                   “You broke it,” she whispered.                   “It’s just a hat—”                   “It’s not just a hat!” Discord was taken aback by the fierceness in her tone. “It was a gift. From somepony who used to care about me very much. Somepony who actually cared about making others happy. He gave it to me out of generosity, because he thought I would like it. That’s what bothers you. The same thing about it that bothers me. It’s a reminder of everything you threw away.”                   “I’ve been alive for twenty years having the time of my life, and I spent less than a year with you,” he sneered cruelly. “What makes you think that it meant anything to me in the long run?”                 “Because it did to me!”  Screwball rose on the table, jumping so that she could look Discord in the face. And for the first time, he noticed that despite her youth, she still looked so old and weary. Her voice was so full of grief he could nearly taste it. Her entire body shivered with anger. And he was certain that the only thing stopping her from crying was that she had already ran out of tears.                   “Well...” He wasn’t sure what to say, but he would not stoop so low as to apologize to a pony. “I won't say there weren't some laughs when I wasn't being attacked by ponies and crazy animals.”                 “And the worst part of it all is I waited for you!” The words hung in the air and ripped every thought out of the draconequus’ head. Suddenly, all there was in his whole wide world of chaos was just him and the sad little pony. Her lip quivered for a few seconds and she climbed off the table and back into her chair. She closed her eyes and delicately stroked her beanie in her lap.                   “I waited for you. Every day, I waited. But you never came back. I waited for you and you never came back. And every day I still waited. Promising myself that this would be the day you would finally come to your senses. Promising myself that you would come back to me. Promising that everything would be okay again.                   “I would wake up every morning in this little house, knowing that I was still all alone again, more alone than ever in my life. I would go outside and see what new insanity had overtaken the home I loved because of the colt I… And when I couldn’t bear to see it any more, I would pick up this happy little hat, and I would spin it. And when I closed my eyes and listened to the sound… Just for a second, I could pretend that things were still okay.                   “I remember everything. I remember playing games with each other. Hopping down roads, watching you try to copy my hoofsteps. Chasing after rocks. Playing hide and seek in that lousy hotel. Riddles and your lessons. Reading you stories. Helping Mite and Dusty’s family. Going to the circus.”                   Every memory was accompanied by another rattling spin of the propeller. Discord brought a paw to his stomach, he felt like he had been poisoned. It was probably just bad food, he grumbled to himself. He swallowed two fistfuls of antacids that didn’t do a thing to help and huffed. Cradling his chin on his fist, he waited for Screwball to finish. It took him a moment to realize she had stopped talking. When he turned to look at her again, he was caught off guard by two violet eyes staring straight through him, like whatever caused her heartache was just floating an inch behind him.                   “And then one day... I woke up,” she said quietly. “And the lie sounded too hollow to believe anymore. And that was the hardest day... The day when I finally accepted the fact that you were gone. Accepting that... that you had abandoned me.                 "You left me. After everything we went through together, you left me. No words, no explanation, you just left. And you left me all alone. And I never knew why." She finally looked at him again, and he wasn’t sure if it made his stomach feel worse than when she was looking past him. Now they were looking into him, digging for some answer he didn’t have.                   “I don't remember why I did either,” he said with a shrug.                                  “You don't remember? You destroyed my life and you don't even know why?”                   “I don't remember much of anything.” It was the truth. Thoughts blurred together most times. He could fly for hours in a single direction simply because he was too busy going to remember if he wanted to go somewhere specific. It wasn’t like he tried to be. It just happened. Maybe it was because of his chaos, it affected him as much as anyone else. Besides, remembering something was basically doing it twice, and he couldn’t be caught dead repeating himself. That was it. That must have been it. It wasn’t because he was dumb like the other spirits thought, or heartless like Screwball thought, or afraid to see what he was missing. It was just chaos.                   “Your brother was right,” Screwball said with a mirthless chuckle. “You are thoughtless. ‘Head full of fluff’ is right.”                   Discord dug into the table with his nails. “I do remember some things. Like I remember you henpecking everything I did.”                   “I only did that because I wanted you to be happy!”                   “Well, congratulations. I’m plenty happy now!”                   “And that’s what I was always afraid of”                 “Afraid of what?”                 “Afraid of you!”                   Being surprised by ponies was quickly turning into a very unfun sensation. He wasn’t sure what he was feeling now. Angry? Insulted? Hurt? Love said that he could only be a slave to his emotions (oh, that he could remember) but shouldn’t that mean he could at least understand them? Stupid feelings. Stupid ponies. This was all their fault anyway. Somehow. It always was.                   “I was afraid of you. I was afraid of what I knew you could do, and what you might do, and what you would do… Do you remember when Time came and showed us that horrible future? This future? I had never been so scared in my entire life. So you promised that you would never do any of it.” Screwball’s expression sunk to become even more miserable. “You promised to not forget about me, too. But you did… Just like you vowed to be good king and help your subjects.”                   “Maybe I do know why I left. Maybe it was because I was sick of being suffocated!” His tail whipped in the air viciously. The longer he stayed in that little house, the more he could remember. All at once, those long-forgotten frustrations and feelings of futility came surging back. And he hated it.                   “I felt like I was trying to force myself into a little pony costume just so I could get along and fit in with the ponies who were too thick-headed to even want something new to help! I was only a child and every living thing I met hated the sight of me!”                   “That’s not true—”                   “It’s true enough! Everywhere we went, nopony wanted my help. They threw me out, chased me away! And no matter how hard I tried, I just could not fit in with them. Even if they wanted me to, I don’t think I could have ever lived that lie you had been crafting for me. I wanted to do good because I honestly thought that I was able to do it. I never understood why everything I tried was a catastrophe. Then my answer came in the form of a grim gray owl telling me who I am. I am disaster. I am Chaos.                   “And I thought I could control it and use it for what you wanted. I did. I thought I had figured everything out. And then Ploughmouth happened. I tried to share my power with them and they tried to kill you. That’s why.”                   “You left me… to protect me?”                   “Did you not listen to a word I said?” Discord pointed his talon square at Screwball’s face. “I left because of you! Your awful advice, your stupid plans, your terrible ideas were always about how you wanted to do things! Just face it, Screw-up, you are a terrible advisor!”                   Screwball caught Discord across the nose again, stinging him sharply enough to bring tears to his eyes. Wincing through his pain, he saw tears in hers, too.                   “I want you out of my house,” she demanded, her voice quavering. “I want you out of this place and I never want to see you again!”                   “Fine by me! I’m bored of this little shack anyway!” Discord snapped his fingers and vanished in an obnoxiously bright flash that popped with the sound of a heavy door slamming shut.                   The moment he was gone, Screwball erupted in heavy sobs. Her shoulders heaved as she wept into her arms, her beanie, and finally her pillow as she dragged herself to bed and fell asleep to the sound of her own weeping. Her tears flowed even after sleep had taken her, but her cries had subsided to only frightened whimpers as night terrors gripped her troubled mind. A breeze wafted through the creaky house and brushed over her head. The beanie on her mane spun gracefully with a comforting whizz, and the pony was granted some solace in her mind.   ----------                   Screwball was not sure how long she had slept for when she finally pulled her heavy head from the pillow. It had been many years since the heavenly bodies could be trusted to indicate time, but she still crawled over to her window to look up at the night sky. The moon was in an interesting shape that night. A waning crescent blue moon, teetering just on the western horizon. There was an equal chance of it being about to set, or just rising on the wrong side of the sky.                   Groaning, she made her bed and began her morning ritual. There would be no hope of her falling back asleep now, and she wasn’t sure if she even wanted to try to sleep at that point. She pulled out a glass bowl and poured some oats out of a bag into it. After a few mouthfuls, she felt her throat getting dry and walked toward the old rain collecting pan to see if there was still some lemonade left.                   She frowned in confusion when she looked into the pan, unsure if she was seeing things. She was still tired, and it was too dark to see properly. Her mind may have been playing tricks on her after the night she just had. Her eyes never left the pan for a moment until she finally saw it again. A light ripple spread across the surface of the lemonade. And then another. And another.                   It wasn’t long before she began to feel a tremor shake the wood floor of her kitchen. Her mind was still too groggy to register what was happening, and she walked to her front door to see what could have possibly been causing the shaking. Her eyes shrunk back into her head when she opened the door and saw an incredible and terrible sight: a purple creature with a body that shone like the night sky stomping toward Canterlot.                   Before the rest of the ponies had evacuated the city, Screwball had overheard dozens of rumors of the animals that prowled Equestria. Sometimes when she heard the stories, she imagined if one of Discord’s siblings had returned for another effort at taking him back with them, but the stories never involved the Spirit of Chaos and she assumed them to have just given up completely. At any rate, the creatures were always too bizarre and new to have ever be something other than the spawn of Discord’s imagination. Lions with dragon-like features with a single antler sticking from their forehead like a unicorn horn; oxen that floated across the sky without wings or propulsion; creatures of living stone that warred with the Diamond Wolves for control of their gem mines in search for food; impish flying insects that could fit in a hoof and eat a farm’s entire crop harvest. But most fearsome of all were the monstrous bears cut from the cloth of the midnight sky that could topple a skyscraper in a single swipe of their paws.                   And now one of those colossal beasts was marching directly for her. She did not entertain any fantasies of escaping or surviving. There was no way the Ursa Major would miss seeing her bright fur galloping down the very mountain path it was scaling. All she could do was wait for it to come.                   The Ursa Major moved quickly, stretching a hundred feet with each rumbling step. It was not on a rampage, otherwise she would have probably already been flattened. It was most likely looking for a cave or a new home to settle in. Screwball had to agree with its taste in selecting a home. She only wished the bear had waited for her to leave before making the move.                   The Ursa Major had reached the edge of the mountainside city. It would only be a few more steps until she had spanned the entire length of the capitol and reached her cottage. Judging on how the animal was meticulously stepping down on every building in sight, she did not have to worry about being skipped over. But by the time it had reached the center, it paused and lifted its nose upwards. It gave a deep rumbling growl and turned for the rugged mountain that speared skyward beyond even the height of Canterlot Castle. It lifted itself onto its hind paws and began to scale the mountain in a fervent pursuit of whatever new smell had captured its interest.                   Screwball watched the spectacle in wonder as the Ursa climbed higher and higher. It did not take long for it to make it to the peak, where it clung to the mountain as it spun its head this way and that, following the trail of some tiny thing that caught its attention. It swung an enormous paw out behind it but only caught air. Undeterred, it tried again with its other paw. After several failed grabs, the Ursa let out a mighty roar and clapped both of its front paws behind it. It realized its mistake too late, and the giant lost its grip and balance. It dropped off the mountain and bounced down the rocky slope for the city.                   The entire earth quaked as if the mountain would collapse and crumble to rubble. Screwball could not bear to watch as the titan tumbled closer. She turned from the door and said her goodbyes to her childhood home. The thundering avalanche was nearly upon her, so she closed her eyes and waited for the end. She only had one major regret in her life. She supposed that was better than most ponies met their end with.                   Glass shattered behind her and she was thrown off her hooves. Wood splintered and exploded above her. The Ursa Major howled in pain and anger, the almighty roar deafening her. The howls resonated and echoed around the mountain. Once the Ursa’s roars had faded and vanished, the only noise was that of her propeller clacking above her head, spinning in the torrent of air from the Ursa’s roar.                   With shaking hooves, she reached up to feel the hat secure in its rightful place. Screwball cracked open an eye and discovered she was floating high above the flattened and ruined Canterlot, carried by a tender lion paw and firmly tucked against a furry brown chest.                 “I missed you.”                 “I missed you, too.”