//------------------------------// // Fairy Piece // Story: Cozy Glow: FIENDship is Magic // by RainbowDoubleDash //------------------------------// One Year Ago “Have you heard the new Sapphire Shores song yet, Cozy?” Ivy Song asked. She pranced alongside Cozy as the two walked home from school. “Serves – her – right! What else could she have done? Serves – her – right! She thought it was for fun!” Cozy giggled and fluttered her wings. “You’re really good at singing, Ivy Song!” Cozy said. No she wasn’t. Ivy brightened. The earth pony stepped up to Cozy. “Really?” She wasn’t bad, but she wasn’t really good, either. She was average. “Really good!” Cozy repeated, bumping her flank against Ivy’s own. “I bet you could be a pop star!” No she couldn’t be. Ivy was too plain-looking, nothing stood out about her. Maybe that would change, maybe it wouldn’t, as she got older. Her voice could change too, get better. But right now, Cozy Glow was lying through her teeth. But Ivy smiled and giggled and kept on singing, and Cozy Glow laughed and sang along with her as the two walked home from school, which meant that the two were friends. In fact, best friends. The friendship was new. Cozy had already had a circle of friends at her school, of course, and always had, but Ivy Song hadn’t been one of them. They lived in the same upper-class neighborhood of Fillydelphia but just hadn’t possessed overlapping interests. But ever since Nightmare Moon had returned, Cozy Glow had wanted to make sure she had more friends. She needed the Magic of Friendship, after all, and if the whole school were friends with her, then surely that would be at least equal to the six Elements of Harmony. Right? So Cozy got to know as many fillies and colts at school as possible. She pretended to like everything they liked. To be interested in everything they were interested in. It wasn’t easy, especially when she had to fake liking something like sports or chemistry. But she could do it. She would get the Magic of Friendship. Uncle Fork had approved as well. Ivy Song’s family was almost as wealthy as her daddy’s, and Ivy Song’s mommy was an influential member of the city council with a lot of connections. So ever since Cozy had started hanging out with Ivy Song more to make the filly her friend, Uncle Fork had been able to spend a lot of time with Miss Song. Make connections of his own. Cozy and Ivy turned a corner. “So what are you doing this weekend?” Ivy Song asked. “Throwing a party!” Cozy answered immediately, and smiled. “I’m going to invite everypony in school, and I’ll even bake my own cupcakes! I’m getting really good at them.” Ivy Song looked sideways at Cozy. “Another party? But you threw one last week. And the week before.” “So?” Ivy shifted. “Nothing. I do like parties! But there’s always so many ponies.” She scuffed a hoof as she trotted. “I think I like it more when there’s just a few ponies. The ones you know really well.” She looked back to Cozy. “What if instead of the whole school, it was just me and Marble Heart and Nettlekiss and Silver Dare?” Cozy was already friends with Marble Heart and Nettlekiss and Silver Dare, though. “I like making new friends…” she said, but noticed Ivy’s expression, “…but I guess you’re right. It’s still a party even if it’s only five ponies!” Her best friend brightened, and Cozy did too. This was a momentary setback for her plan to become friends with the whole school, but it wouldn’t do to lose her best friend in the process. So if a smaller party would help with that, then Cozy could grin and bear it for now. And then a nearby house turned upside down. Cozy Glow and Ivy Song both froze. One moment, the house – a very large and very nice house – was sitting in place, just as houses were supposed to. The next, with the sound of splintering wood and shattering concrete, it simply lifted itself up out of the ground, rotated, and then set itself back down, somehow balancing on the point of its roof. Cozy Glow swallowed. “What – ” The sun set. The two fillies yelped, grabbing hold of each other at the sudden change. Another nearby house rocketed into the air, soaring upwards a hundred feet before stopping and remaining suspended there. The road beneath them rolled. The world tilted, and Cozy and Ivy screamed as they started sliding down a suddenly rising hill while the pavement turned to soap. Cozy started beating her wings, taking to the air. Or trying to. Ivy was still holding onto her and Cozy was still new to flying. “You’re too heavy!” Cozy exclaimed, being pulled along with Ivy as she slid. “You’re dragging me!” “Don’t let go!” Ivy screamed as she picked up speed. The two fillies were careening towards an iron fence. Ivy was moving too fast, faster than a grown pony could gallop. This was going to hurt. Cozy tried to get Ivy off of her, but her supposed friend’s grip was too tight and she was dragging her down with her… But when Ivy hit the fence, instead of coming to a sudden stop, the fence bent inwards, slowing but not stopping her. Cozy was thrown from Ivy’s grasp and into the fence. It bent like it was made of cushions. Cozy rolled down the fence, landing on Ivy and driving the air from both their lungs. The sun rose again, but into a sky full of pink clouds. Rain started falling – brown rain. A drop of it landed in Cozy’s mouth. It was chocolate milk. Cozy and Ivy picked themselves up, swiftly becoming drenched in the downpour. “What’s going on?” Ivy asked. “I don’t know!” Cozy answered. “But you’re the smartest pony I know!” Ivy exclaimed, looking around. The streets rippled and roiled again, flattening out. Ivy stated galloping, and Cozy found herself following. “My home is closer!” Cozy followed, trying to keep her panic down, trying to keep focused. Whatever was happening didn’t make it easy. Chocolate milk clung to her pelt and her feathers, sticky and gross. As she watched, another house came apart, separating out into individual rooms that then arranged themselves into a pyramid, the ponies inside screaming. Ivy’s house came into view. It was intact. Ivy charged straight for her front gate and ploughed through it without slowing down – at least until she saw a dog charging at her. Her pet retriever Goldie. “Meow! Meow! Meow!” Goldie called, causing the two fillies to screech to a halt. Goldie ran right up to Ivy and started rubbing against her like a cat would, with delicate steps and an arched back. Ivy burst into tears. “Goldie!” she cried, grabbing her dog, looking him in the eyes. “Goldie, what’s wrong with you?!” Goldie responded by rubbing against Ivy more, which Ivy accepted even as she wailed. Cozy just stared. The house next door turned into gelatin. One of the maids that attended Ivy’s house came running, screaming, from the house – chased by a swarm of flying feather dusters that swatted at her. Cozy turned and took the air, fleeing. She heard Ivy cry out behind her, but Cozy didn’t slow down. Flight may still have been new to her, but Cozy found strength in her wings that she never would have expected was there. She tried to ignore everything she saw from the air. She tried to ignore that the buildings of Fillydelphia’s downtown, visible from the sky, were twisting and warping and changing, coming apart or merging together or sinking or starting to fly. She tried to ignore that she could see the trees in the park uproot themselves and begin to fight one another. She tried to ignore that one of the streets became a deep, fast river, the ponies that had been on it suddenly needing to swim for shore. She tried to ignore the sheer chaos all around her, and she focused instead on her house. She found it, and found it intact, mostly. Except that the grass in the garden was now twenty feet tall. And the greenhouse was now literally green. And the gate rippled back and forth like it was dancing. But the house itself was still in one piece. Cozy landed on the front step and opened the door – and an ostrich ran out. Cozy ran in. She ran past the parlor and the dining room and ignored the stairs entirely. She heard shouting from somewhere else in the house. The curtains turned into hanging snakes that snapped at her, but she ignored them too. One of the butlers appeared with a violin in hoof that he was playing expertly, oblivious to the chaos as he danced through the halls. That made Cozy stumble, eyes growing wide. “Gray Leaf!” She exclaimed, the butler’s name. He didn’t react. She ran up to him and tried to prod him with her hooves, but he just kept on playing, ignoring her, eyes closed. The chaos could infect ponies. Not just the world, not just animals and plants…the chaos could infect ponies. Cozy let out a scream as she ran into her daddy’s study. The chaos wasn’t here yet. She ran straight for the chess board, the game, where it always lay, and dragged it under her daddy’s desk, slowly, carefully, trying not to disturb any of the pieces. Once she and the game were under it, she crouched down next to it. “Don’t change,” she whispered to the chess board, “please, please, please, don’t change, don’t let it get you, don’t let it get me, don’t let it get you, don’t let it get me…please, please, please…” Cozy had no idea how long it took. The sun and moon moved too much and too randomly in the sky to keep track of time. It felt like forever. It was probably just a few hours. But eventually, there was a rumble, a tremor through the whole world. Bright, rainbow light washed over everything. Warmth spread through Cozy’s body. The white king fell over from the tremor, but it was easy to put back. And afterwards, everything was back to normal. Cozy’s uncle found her crouched underneath the desk again, curled up next to the chess board. She refused to move, but this time he didn’t try to pull her out once he made sure she was safe. The chaos had been caused by the spirit of chaos, evil, and disharmony: Discord. Cozy had never heard of Discord before. Apparently he’d been a statue in Canterlot Garden, and had been for the past thousand years, but had escaped this morning. Once free, he’d set about spreading strife and panic and chaos across all of Equestria and beyond, warping the world according to his mad desires. But he had been defeated, once more by the Elements of Harmony, by Princess Celestia’s personal protégé Twilight Sparkle and her friends. The Magic of Friendship had, yet again, defeated a great evil before it could do any permanent, lasting harm to Equestria. Cozy Glow invited as many ponies to her party that weekend as she could.