The Royal Canterlot Gardens were quite a sight, especially in summer. Many ponies came to see the gorgeous flowers, to try to navigate their way through the Castle labyrinth, and admire the lovely lake right near the back of the gardens. Most ponies, however, went to the gardens to see the sculptures there. The number of artists who tried to recreate the statues was immeasurable, just as the number of sight-seers.
Some ponies believed that some were real ponies, that had been turned to stone by a cockatrice. Others believed that they were just plain old statues. Everyone believed that until Discord broke free of his stone imprisonment. He brought chaos to Equestria, ruining pony's lives, changing them for the better, and making the whole of Equestria a mad-house.
But some of the sculptures had fallen apart, or simply disappeared. As time went on, the Princess had many ponies re-sculpt the statues, but they were never quite as good as the first ones. Finally, only three remained; the statue representing Victory, the statue of the Draconequus Discord, and the statue representing Cunning. They were placed where nopony could damage them, but were still view able to the public.
Everyday, Celestia would send down elite guards to patrol around the gardens, but specifically the original Statue garden. One pair would guard the statues, and the other pair would patrol through all of the Royal Gardens. Many ponies had wondered why such careful measures needed to be taken; after all, the only ponies capable of harm there were the local teenage gang! The same had been relayed to Princess Celestia, but the princess had responded calmly, "My little ponies, I only post guards there for concern that the Statues might be vandalised." Most inquiries had stopped after that.
Our story begins with those statues. Well, not specifically the statues themselves, but what was inside the statues.
This, is Cunning, Victory, and Discord.
The Collective Consciousness was a big place. So big, that if you lost your car keys in it, they would be almost impossible to find. At the very most, it could fit a trillion ponies in. But only one pony was occupying the grand space, a small being. It was an earth pony, her eyes closed as she dozed through the aeons. Never exactly falling asleep- never exactly awake. Dozing for centuries... She knew what had been happening on the world outside, but had not been able to contact anypony. Not that she had cared much. Not after the first century, anyway.
The Consciousness, now, was just a big white void. It normally took the shape of whatever the main controller wanted it to look like. But since no-one had it in their control, it just took the default background of white. The mare stood out easily, her bright aqua blue mane laid atop a light green coat.
Suddenly, a large *POP* echoed somehow through the great expansive plane as a being popped into existence. It had it's arms outstretched, with an expression of horror etched on it's face. As soon as it had materialized, it promptly fell over onto the earth pony. The earth pony screamed as loud as anypony could, and flung the creature off her back, glaring in it's direction. It hit the ground with a thump, making it groan.
"DISCORD, THOU BASTARD!" The earth pony bellowed, her face colouring red with anger. She marched right up to the mismatched creature and slapped him across the face. "HOW DARE THOU LAND UPON ME?" She kicked him, and, just for good measure, hit him on the face one more time. The Draconequus groaned again, and opened his eyes to see a very angry earth pony above him, her hoof raised high.
"Hey, Victory," He chuckled weakly, rubbing his nose to check if it was broken. "How's it going?" He tried to get up, but the earth mare, Victory, had her hoof on his chest.
"What exactly do thou think thou art doing, beast?" She hissed, spitting in his face. Discord winced, and wiped the saliva off. He grinned sheepishly up at Victory, raising his claw and scratching his head.
"I was just turned into stone, Vicki. Gimme a break, okay?"
"Discord, I told thou not to call me Vicki, or I would, how do thou say it, 'Kick thy butt?'"
The Draconequus' eyes opened wide as he realised what would happen. As Victory brought her hoof down, he teleported out of the way, appearing a few feet away. Victory snarled, and leapt after him, barely hitting him before he teleported away again. This time, he fell to the floor, being very weak from the amount of magic being drained from his body. Victory was about to leap on him when there was a second flash of light.
A petite, white pegasus with a light yellow mane had teleported right in front of them. She opened her light grey eyes and glared at the earth pony.
"Vicki, what's going on?" She asked, her voice as smooth as glass.
Victory shot a look at her, but held her head high. "I was simply trying to knock some sense into Discord- surely thou would do the same, Cunning?" She spat the last word out like it was venom upon her tongue. Cunning raised an eyebrow.
"Knock some sense into him? More like beat him till he's barely conscious, then tie him up with a rope..." She muttered. Victory stared at her.
"Cunning, thou surely know that that was self-defence? Thou assaulted me, and left thy doppelgangers to misuse my mind!"
The pegasus rolled her eyes, and sighed. "I wish we weren't stuck in here. The rest have been released or have been carried away in the wind. We're the only ones left in this stone gaol."
Silence reigned all throughout The Consciousness. It'd now turned into a country-side setting; green grass, blue skies, wheat, potatoes, carrots.... There was also a slight breeze flowing through the area. It cooled down Victory's angry face and made her brain relax. An idea sprang to her mind, like so many idea's she'd had before. But this one stuck.
"What if... we didn't need to break free ourselves?" She stammered. The others looked at her in surprise. "What- What if we had others to do it?"
"What, influence ponies?" Discord asked. Victory shook her head.
"No, create our own, and use them to break free!"
The two other beings pondered this for a second. A wide grin spread about Discord's face, and he rubbed is eagle claw and lion paw together. Cunning zoomed off into the distance, muttering to herself. Victory, annoyed that they were already thinking and creating, decided to make a good one. Let's see. Pegasus mare- Dark Blue, Purple and pink mane. Mis-matched coloured eyes- flag of victory for a cutie mark. Pleased with her choice, she knelt down and thought her into real life.
A few miles away, three cries could be heard coming from the Everfree forest.