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Cozy Glow lay in the middle of her cage, still asleep, her breath going steady. She started to blink as loud, thunderous stomps rang through the underground prison. Drowsy, Cozy sat up. She yawned without restraint, forehooves sunken in her lap. Her eyes were heavy-lidded and her vision still blurry.
While she rubbed her eyes and yawned again, something got dropped into her cage and on her hindlegs. Cozy opened only one eye to look at it, the other one still covered by her hoof. She could barely make out that it was a thin piece of paper.
“Another one?” Cozy closed her eyes and let a new yawn escape, a big one this time. “Already?” She smacked her lips to try and make the sticky feeling in her mouth go away. Then she took the envelope into her hooves.
Cozy opened it slowly, failing with the first few attempts before she could finally pull out the letter. She unfolded it but, as she wanted to start reading, her glance only fell on white, empty paper. She blinked twice, then rubbed her eyes again, believing not to be fully awake yet. When she looked back at the letter, it was still as empty as before.
“Golly..... Is this some kind of joke? Who would send an empty letter?” Cozy yawned a fourth time. She was already about to crumple the letter together with the envelope, making it just another piece of junk to clean up for Cerberus, as she heard ominous, rolling laughter.
“Not so fast,” a voice said.
In one corner of the letter, Cozy's eyes caught a faint movement and, only now, she could see a small, drawn figure peeling itself out of the paper. It had no colors, just a silhouette of thin pencil lines. It appeared to Cozy like an unfinished sketch of what was supposed to become a finished drawing one day, but its size was as small as someone tried to hide it. The shape of the tiny figure, however, was familiar to Cozy.
“Discord,” she said and frowned.
“The Lord of Chaos, to you!” Discord's deep voice corrected her. He now stood on the paper as a solid figure, the flat lines somehow forming a three-dimensional body.
“Whatever.....” Cozy shrugged, then presented Discord a yawn. It happened more for demonstration's sake, than tiredness, this time.
“Whatever, whatever.....” Discord mimicked her voice. “You know, that's just like my reaction when I heard about this little plan of Equestria's youngest princess.” His voice took on an amused tone at the very last word.
Said tone coaxed a snicker out of Cozy, but she suppressed it quickly and gave Discord a glare. “I don't think that you of all creatures are here to teach me something.” The trademark sneer in her voice had returned, gone from it was all tiredness. “I'm sure you are not even supposed to be here, Dipcord.”
Discord's laughter rang out again. “I am certainly not,” he spoke. “But doing it like this is so much more fun than the old-fashioned way, don't you think?” The word “FUN” appeared in big, bold letters on the paper. They rapidly flashed in all colors of the known spectrum and also in a few colors that Cozy could not even begin to describe.
The filly looked at the lettering for a few seconds, then her pupils dilated and a slight headache kicked in. Cozy closed her eyes, held a hoof at her forehead and groaned.
“I am sorry,” Discord's mocking voice echoed into her ears “did I forget to add a seizure warning?”
The sentence had barely left his tongue, as Cozy's eyes shot open again. Grinding her teeth, she let her right hoof come down on the paper, aiming for Discord's tiny figure. The flashing letters disappeared and Discord merely jumped aside with a graceful leap.
“What do you want from me, Dipcord?!” Cozy hissed at the draconequus.
Discord frowned up at the filly. “Hmph. No fun, huh? I just wanted to do this the nice way..... Twilight Sparkle really was right about you.” He snapped his claws and teleported away before another hoof hit the paper.
Discord reappeared on Cozy's head. “So much anger, so much hatred and so much pain.....” he commented, nonchalantly.
Below him, Cozy Glow growled loudly, confirming Discord's assessment.
Discord's frown deepened. “Acting like this won't make that dark spot in your heart go away.”
Before Cozy Glow could strike at him again, Discord teleported back onto the paper. Cozy's hoof hit her mane, like she unsuccessfully tried to swat a fly.
“There is a whole list of things I am supposed to go through with you,” Discord addressed her again. “But for now, I will only tell you this, my raging young villain.” He pointed behind Cozy, at the bulky figure in the other cage, who was still sleeping.
“You might want to stay away from this centaur the best you can manage,” he spoke to Cozy sternly. “I have worked with him enough to know that he will stab you as soon as you are not needed for his plans anymore.”
Immediately as Discord had ended, he disappeared. The empty paper remained in Cozy's hooves for a moment longer, then it disintegrated alongside the envelope that had contained it.
Cozy Glow, still red in the face, gnarled her teeth. “How often do I have to say it, this blockheaded fool cannot betray ME!”
The angry, frustrated scream that followed the statement woke Tirek up. Confused and sleepy, the centaur glanced around in his cage.
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