It was a queer thing when Rainbow Dash wasn't in the mood for flying.
This was one of those times, a moment that drifted past her icily, like the blacker-than-black windows and doors to ancient stone buildings. Peering in, she could scarcely make out the bodies of Dihmer equines lounging within. Every pony was propped up, sitting, or standing—and she always saw them with their eyes open. Vacant gazes stared off into the granite malaise with no hint of emotion or whimsy. The Dihmers looked in many ways more sterile and lifeless than the stone around them.
Rainbow Dash wondered if they were even capable of sleep... or if perhaps they had somehow trained themselves to avoid unconsciousness—as if they'd somehow suffer more feelings under the threat of dreaming than they would when awake and in full control of their faculties.
There was no past and no future for the Dihmers. It was only now... and even that they couldn't afford to enjoy... to live.
Someway, somehow, the goblins had managed to bleed money from such a civilization. The bitter irony was not lost to Rainbow Dash, and she found herself trotting wide circles to avoid the various imp establishments.
There was a break between metalworking shifts. As a result, the smokestacks and steam vents fitted to the Smelt-Blooders' foundry had momentarily stopped billowing soot and sediment into the sky. The faint veil of twilight peeked through. For the entirety of her journey through the Dark Side, the sunless sky had been an intolerably bleak sight to Rainbow Dash. Now—as the ethereal curtain to this dismal domain—it shone as warm and inviting as a spring sky in Equestria. Gazing up, Rainbow—and Fluttershy—could see swirling bands of cosmic dust dancing with an intergalactic sparkle.
Rainbow wondered if there were other places—other pieces of huge and important things—where wayward automatons of sapient life clung to existence... even if they gave themselves nothing to cling to at all. Back on the Light Side, Rainbow imagined that Scootaloo was assisting Spike in his workshop while Luna paid her meditative older sister a visit. Zecora was cooking up potions for the sick; Mayor Mare was preparing a new speech for that year's Winter-Wrap up. Cheerilee and her schoolfoals were taking care of the local animals in Fluttershy's stead and the Wonderbolts were off being awesome, performing tricks to enchant and dazzle the innocent denizens of Equestria.
That world—with all of its colors and thoughts and souls—was no less real than the nihilistic domain that Rainbow was currently navigating. It was no less special than Luxmare or Val Roa or Rohbredden or Durandana or Kihutaja or Xona or the recovering populace of Silvadel. And yet—with its lifeless citizens lost in thousand-mile gazes, being preyed on by nefarious armies and leeched by selfish goblins—Blobstain was no less important... no less unique... no less special. It was more than a practical truth that Rainbow Dash had to tell herself. She had to see it... find it... if only for the briefest of moments.
It would make everything worth it... everything beyond the edge of the Light.
And yet, everywhere she looked, she saw decay. Withering. Wilting. Pretending to live... or perhaps something else in between... something that was wordless—for the Dihmers had eliminated all the words to describe it. That way, they didn't have to do anything. They didn't have to care.
Rainbow Dash cared. Rainbow Dash cared a lot. That's what brought her across the world and over the side of nothingness. Chaperoned by the Herald or illuminated by her half-resurrected friends, it made no difference. None of them had made the decision for Rainbow Dash to spread her wings in the first place. Nopony but herself had foaled the impetus to challenge the sunrise.
Now—in a world with no mornings—she still felt the insatiable need to move forward. Only this time, it would seem, going forward would require flying in reverse for a spell.
She shuffled past an open courtyard. The air smelled of iron and sour moisture. Rainbow and her friend looked towards the side. Fluttershy instantly winced.
Dihmers sat in rows, saturated in their own blood and in the blood of those who squatted there before them. Barbs, thorns, and serrated crowns of metal rested on their foreheads. They were the authors of the scars that lined the shaved ponies' scalps... among other things. Arranged in crimson lines, the denizens of the ancient, crumbling town repeated the same mantra over and over again, releasing all semblance of pain into the blackness between the stars above.
Fluttershy couldn't help but sniffle. Her ghostly eyes moistened, and she raised a hoof to dry them. Rainbow was helpless to pacify her, so she merely stood closer—in a gesture that loosely resembled a nuzzle... or a hug.
Rainbow's expression was almost as neutral as the ascetic figures before her. She gazed from face to face—observing every muzzle and neck and body. There was a oneness—a uniformity to the Dihmers in their self-punishment. Perhaps, in a way, that reduced themselves to a number that was easy to erase in their minds.
Rainbow Dash remembered the first day she flew east. The only number she cared about was five... and it had already been erased from her life. From that point on—as much as she played it off with casual grace and a devil-may-care grin—she only cared about zero.
A full circle. Broken. Weeping silently to be restored.
She dwelt on this, and it was almost enough to purge the problem that was plaguing her, but not quite. She trotted listlessly down the streets and past more and more vacant-faced Dihmers. At some point, she passed by a junkyard of sorts. There, the air filled with chattering, bickering voices. Rainbow and Fluttershy had stumbled upon a trade center of sorts for the goblins. The imps gathered in the thickest droves Rainbow had seen yet. Their pendants flickered with countless shades of gray—the crimson etchings forming a mosaic of random images and emblems that danced amidst the haggling crowd. In sharp contrast to the Dihmers, the creatures here were passionate, amiable, irascible, curious, caustic and confrontational. They fought and squabbled for the most inane pieces of junk, attributing numbers to the detritus of untold necrotic civilizations.
Rainbow shuffled closer towards the group—even as her vision rippled with the onset of multiple dizzy spells. She teetered a bit in her trot, and Fluttershy noticed it—among other things.
“Rainbow...?” Fluttershy fidgeted nervously. “Rai—... ...—sh?” She blinked in and out of existence like a yellow-and-pink flame. “Caref—... … —oo close t—!” Her soft, pleading voice dissipated.
Rainbow scuffled to a stop, as close as she could manage. She clenched her eyes before the red-and-yellow could peek out from beneath her lids. The mare held her breath in, struggling against her unsavory half, precariously, like performing an acrobatic trick on the edge of a cliff.
Then—out from the mess of voices and imp spit—
“... … …you rang, Sparky?”
Rainbow Dash sucked her breath in... but she did not move. She simply stood there—crooked and weak—with jaws clenched tight.
“The least you could do is ask for me. By name.”
In the midst of the goblins, tables stretched in a line, covered with stacks of strips that the Accountant-Bloods counted with dutiful vigor. Every once in a while, a spiraling serpent or skittering insect of chaotic translucence would manifest from the Marrow, scraping at the night sky, terrified at its sudden gift of brief, blissful sentience. Out from this maddening mosaic, the most chaotic spectre of all materialized, sporting a fanged grin as he swam his way towards his anchor.
“You can even adopt a new moniker if the old one still sickens you so much,” Discord said, billowing through the bodies of imps and goblins and junkyard specimens. He twirled around with ballerina grace and cooed, “'Goat Face.' 'Jeremy.' 'Hillary.' 'Boob.'” A twirl of his dragon's tail, and he winked. “”Lancie!' That's a good one. Eh... nobody cares...”
Rainbow breathed through her teeth, forcing her eyes tighter shut.
“What's all this, anyways?” Discord said through a bored yawn. “Your way of embracing the Dark Side literally?” He pretended the play bongos on the head of multiple goblins. “You already spent half-a-continent pretending to have a broken wing, Sparky. I doubt you can pull the same prank with your eyes. Besides...” He glanced over, eyebrow arched. “...you're going to need them all the more now... with what you're having to contend with.”
“... … ...” Rainbow's throat swallowed.
“Oh, I know about it, alright. Being stuck inside you is like being stuck in stone, Sparky. I get terribly... insatiably bored.” Discord rolled his red-on-yellow eyes. “I really have no choice but to subject myself to your insufferable exposition gluttony.” Nostrils flaring, he morphed his wrists into button-eyed goblin puppets and had them do battle in the twilight. “So you've been invited to join the bat-party, eh? Lucky Sparky. Better pack yourself a cape and cowl, cuz them's some brooding motherfuc—”
“They could kill me dead,” Rainbow Dash hissed, as if it poisoned her to expel words towards him. “Lexxic. The matriarchs. The whole friggin' gang. It's very likely an ambush.”
“So she does talk!” Discord's fang flickered in the cosmic light. “Well, if I didn't pick a lovely time to crash the convention! I wonder... does she sing too?” He exchanged curious glances with the goblin-puppets. “Or am I going to have to wait until Season Five for the solo?”
“But sensing their one connection to Luna on me... and then executing me?” Rainbow gnashed her teeth, eyelids tightening. “It doesn't make sense.”
“Hahahaha!” Discord tossed the puppets into nothingness with one ecstatic shrug. “I know! And that's what makes this side of the cosmic toenail so darn exciting! Then again...” He snaked over towards her and wrapped nebulously about her petite frame. “...going on a suicide mission in the name of 'harmony' isn't particularly sensible either. So... I suppose...” He waggled his eyebrows. “...one pony group is going to have to outnonsense the other. Tell me... who here is more equipped with chaos? You...? Or the ones obsessed with raining down ever vengeful nighttttttttt on their heretical foes?”
Rainbow shuddered. “... … ...there's just no way to tell.”
“Isn't there?” Discord stood up straight, folding his forelimbs. “If you tell this to anypony, Sparky, I'm going to deny it. But...” His eyes squinted and his head spun around three times to scan for “listeners.” When he was finished, he swiveled his cranium to a stop, smirking. “...deep down, I have a soft spot for Celestia and Luna.”
Rainbow's muzzle scrunched.
“How could I, you ask?” Discord winked. “Because far beneath all of their super serious surface smegma, they're champions of chaos—just like me! After all... what sense was there ever in planting the cute little death ziggurat in the middle of this world? Just to have a place to store harmony? Piddlesticks, I say! The piddlestickiest of piddlesticks!” He snaked around Rainbow again and breathed ghostily into her face. “Your precious alicorn progenitors planted far more seeds of chaos than I ever did.” He gestured. “The Trinary War? The exodus and death of Endrax? The sad-sack broken heart of Verlax? I had nothing to do with all of that nonsense! But the alicorns did... straight from the beginning.”
“... … ...”
Discord's face hung between a scowl and a grin, or perhaps it was both. “You can't imagine how unbelievably jealous I've been of such an accomplishment.” One second. Five. Ten—“But now! Everything's just peachy!”—He sprung up and spread his arms out with a joyous expression. “Because we're right here in the thick of it! And now you have the means to do something for this crazy shindig that's been in the cards for far... far too long, Sparky!”
Rainbow seethed. Nevertheless: “And what's that?”
“Uncork the bottle,” Discord exhaled. “Let it alllllll implode.”
She started to tremble, ears flicking as if letting off steam.
“Stir up the bee's hive. Turn the bastards on each other,” Discord hissed. “The bugs, the bats, and the blowhard shards. The imps and the dihmers and the spiders too—rattle the glass jar and then smash it against the ground.” His red pupils slowly enlarged until they took up the entirety of his sockets. “See who survives the longest when the rain sweeps over. Let chaos play out...”
Rainbow shook and shuddered—
“...and when the smoke has settled, you can pick up your precious prism. Oh, and trust me, I'm all for it. I really am. Because there'll be no sense in that either.” Discord grinned a razor-sharp grin, his hairy jowls flaring. “...life... and the quickening of that life... is so very wonderfully nonsensical, once you think about it...”
“You're... wrong...” Rainbow grunted.
“Now now now Sparky, look around you!” Discord gestured. “This whole crap bucket—”
“—deserves to live!” She flashed her eyes open, red-and-yellow as entrails. Spittle danced between fangs. “Even as ugly as it is! Because I've been ugly too!”
“Right now...?” Discord purred, eyelashes fluttering. “I'd say you're positively radiant—”
“Hrsssssssssssssssssssh—!” Rainbow hissed, seethed, rolled her eyes back—
FLASH!
Discord was replaced by a gasping Fluttershy.
Rainbow Dash stumbled backwards, panting for breath. Gone were the fangs and the discolored eyes. Meanwhile, two warm streams of blood ran down her scarred brow. She looked forward with tiny, timid pupils.
The entire crowd of goblins had frozen in place, staring and blinking curiously at the crazed spectral pegasus who had been rambling to herself. Slowly—with awkward grace—they returned to their bustling exchange.
“Mmmmm...” Nervous, Fluttershy floated closer to her anchor. “...Rainbow Dash? Can you hear me?”
“... … ...” Rainbow raised a hoof to her head. She felt the blood... watched as it stained her fetlock—like so many Dihmer she had witnessed before.
She only wished he could be purged just as easily.
“Rainbow...” Fluttershy calmed, her ears nevertheless folding back with mild disappointment. She kept her voice soft: “What... did he say...?”
Rainbow inhaled deeply. “Everything I predicted he would.” She pressed her blood-stained hoof to her pendant. The lightning bolt and the juices matched. That was poetic enough for her. “Everything I'm dedicated to kicking in the friggin' teeth.” She frowned. “Long ago, a circle was broken... and it was wrong. I'm not gonna let it stay that way forever.” She shook her head before glaring at Fluttershy. “I'm not going to give up on this side of the world—no matter how miserable or misguided they may be!”
Fluttershy nodded, understanding. “And if the Bloodwings kill you for your courage?”
“They won't. They can't.” Rainbow marched firmly away from the junkyard. “I'm too damned awesome to let that happen to the world.” Her wings spread, and at last she was flying again. “Come on. Let's go.”