//------------------------------//
// This Is His Perfect Domain and He Still Messes Up 
// Story: Looks Like I'm Gonna Have To Start Trying 
// by marmalado 
//------------------------------//

To say that Odd Todd was someone forgettable was a falsehood. The white streak in his hair. The choice of outfit that made him fit right into the "People of Walmart" group. The cackling laugh that could echo through the bullpen. He was the living epitome of the sin "kids" and served to highlight just why adults looked down on them so much. 

There were pro-normalcy people and anti-normalcy people. Odd Todd was firmly on the side of anti-normalcy, and that was because he found flaws within Odd Squad's method of operations that blended in with his skewed perception of reality. It was because he was a former Odd Squad employee that the threat level to both the organization and to society was astronomical. That, and kid villains had higher rates of competency than their adult counterparts.

Oprah knew Odd Todd well. She had been the one to let him go about his life out of sheer ignorance. It wasn't all too often her precinct got an oddness-fighting prodigy in its employment base, and she had assumed he was harmless. As for his partner Olive, speaking to her boss about the issue was as nerve-wracking as a socially anxious person actually going to get a job in the first place. It was these two factors, among others, that led to countless lives being taken with what was, for all intents and purposes, bullets. Not actual bullets, mind, but pies, because Odd Squad was a kid-friendly franchise and some of the gadgets were already skirting the line when it came to looking gun-like.

For her part, Oprah didn't want to really reminisce about it all. But it was kind of hard not to when her next opponent, who stood at twice her height, looked like he could pass for Odd Todd's I-was-a-failed-government-lab-experiment brother. And was sneering at her, which just made his face all the more punchable.

"So let me get this straight." She took a deep breath. "So your name is Discord, you also come from 'Equestria', and you want to turn this world-"

"Into chaos, my dear!" Discord threw...well, what Oprah would reasonably call "hands" up into the air with delight. "Starting with you. Though I hardly think you need any work done."

"Because I'm a human."

"Exactamundo!"

The question of how Discord even knew about humans danced on Oprah's tongue for a moment, but quickly returned to the lungs, curled up, and died when she realized he was probably Odd Todd's brother. Because only Odd Todd would be so despicable and petty as to send his brother to his old precinct on his old boss's birthday. And she was sure he knew when her birthday was, because she never let anyone live it down starting from the week before.

"So you want to make the world more odd?" she repeated.

"I much prefer 'chaotic'. But to each his own."

"Aren't they the same thing?"

Discord paused for a moment. His eyebrows moved up and then down in thought. "I...suppose they are. Hm. I've never quite thought about it before." A snap materialized a propeller cap marked with a question mark on the front, which he put on his head.

Not knowing her latest opponent had such a power, Oprah's eyes began to widen. "What was that?"

"What was what?'

"That thing. You snapped your fingers and something appeared. Hold on." Oprah stuck her tongue out and squeezed her eyes closed, pressing her index fingers to the sides of her head as she got her brain working. "Okay, I'm thinking of a juice box. Fruit punch. Shmumbers brand."

Not that she could see it, but if she could, Discord's look of interest would have been priceless. Her eyes were open and shifted toward the ceiling, though, as she rummaged through her ever-trusty hammerspace spine.

With a ding, out came the very object she had been looking for. Nice and full, perfectly box-shaped, and with a straw already in the top so she didn't have to resort to putting her lips to the tiny hole embedded in it. "Can you do that with your fingers?"

"Well, it's a bit more complicated than hammerspace and wishes." Discord rolled his hand around and around, until it eventually started moving on its own. He detached it from its arm and let it do its thing. "But if you want to simplify things, then yes."

"...That makes no sense. You just contradicted yourself."

"My dear, nothing in this world makes sense." Attaching his still hand to his arm again, Discord looked around with confusion. "Exactly where am I, anyway?"

For a second, just a single second, Oprah wanted to lie. She knew this anomalous nature-defying being would go insane if she uttered the name of the organization she worked for. But if he was really Odd Todd's brother, then he would surely know of it, right? So it shouldn't be a shock to him. That was her theory, and she was sticking to it.

"Odd Squad. Precinct 13579, to be specific."

This brought delight to the already-grinning Discord. "Odd Squad, you say? I suppose that would only serve to add another layer of confusion into why I was brought here through a tube and a ball." His body separated into three parts, with his thorax separating into two more pieces so his hands could twist those and get all the cracks out in a way that was anatomically incorrect, but didn't so much as faze him. "Ahh, much better. Don't you have a better way of getting down here?"

"We're..." Oprah's brain, on sheer instinct, tried to force her to do math. She repressed the urge. "...hundreds of feet under the ground. The tube system has been an efficient and safe method throughout many years of usage."

As Discord pieced himself back together, he scoffed. "My back would say otherwise."

"Did your organs get mixed up and turned around too?"

"Mhm." Discord pat his torso a few times. "I figured the ride back to Equestria would reverse things, so I never bothered to fix them. They float around in there all the time, anyway."

Oprah blinked as she took a sip of juice. "Wow. You really are Odd Todd's brother."

"Huh?"

"Why did Odd Squad never put that in his familial records?"

"What are-"

"I mean, it's not the first time an Odd Squad agent has a sibling that doesn't look remotely like them."

"Hold on." Discord put his hands up. "Miss..."

"Oprah."

"Oprah..." A pause. "Like Oprah Winfrey?"

"I...yes?"

"Are you her daughter?"

"No."

"So you're just named after her."

"The writers named me. You'll have to take things up with them."

Discord opened his mouth, then closed it. And then it opened again. "Well, uh...anyway. Exactly what do you mean by 'you're Odd Todd's brother'? Who is 'Odd Todd'?"

Another sip of juice. "You don't know who Odd Todd is? Even though you're brothers?"

"We're not brothers! I don't even know who he is!"

"Oh, so you're a clone!"

"I'm not a clone!"

"So what are you, then?"

"I'm a draconequus!"

"Ah, so part dragon and part horse." Oprah nodded. "I can't say I've ever seen those before. But you look like you're a lot more than a dragon and a horse."

Discord grabbed his face and comically pulled it down. It snapped off like a mask that had been stretched to its limit, the same as its owner, with an identical face underneath it. "Enough already!" Extending a talon, he pressed on Oprah's forehead, relieving her of her color and turning a shade of monochrome. "There. That should hopefully take your naivety down a notch." Snapping his fingers conjured into existence a dial that read "naivety", which he moved to the left so the level went from 3 to 2. Not that he noticed the shockingly-low number, however, as he was too busy admiring his handiwork.

The dazed Oprah stumbled around for a moment, trying to come to her senses. Memories flickered in her mind, bad memories that involved those she loved getting hurt. One that stuck out in her mind was O'Donahue getting thrown into a tree by a villain who looked a lot like Discord, and that was enough for her to rapidly shake her head in order to dispel whatever hypnosis Discord placed on her. She certainly wasn't expecting that power of his, but she didn't care. Nor did she even stop to think if the memory her brain conjured up was even legitimate, because villains came in all shapes and sizes and so one looking like a draconequus certainly wasn't out of the question.

Her mouth bared every inch of her teeth, her brown eyes flaring with pure rage as she got into a running stance.

Discord remained unfazed. "Now, are you willing to tell me exactly how I can get out of-"





"This is getting out of hand." Polly Graph sighed. "Oscar, can't you just make three different cakes with a Cake-inator gadget?"

"I could, but I wouldn't have called you if the situation was that easy, heh."

Olive clapped her hands together. "All right then, how about this? Each one of us will make a case for each flavor. Whichever one gets the most applause is the winner. I, of course, will be the representative for the vanilla group. and in order to show you all why you don't need to make your food fancy, I have an essay prepa-"

A popping sound heralded the arrival of a dish that was covered with a silver top. Otto caught it neatly in his hands, though his knees were forced to suffer from the weight of what was underneath. With a grunt, he set it on the table behind him, draped with a purple tablecloth and lined with all sorts of purple party decorations. He took a few sniffs, and it was then that his mouth began to water.

"Who needs cake? We have chicken!"

Ripping the top off, Otto showed the masterpiece he had caught to the other party guests. It was, indeed, a roast chicken, arranged with no garnishes or seasonings whatsoever but appearing to be fully cooked and safe to eat.

"Otto, I'm getting a bad feeling about that chi-"

Olive's warning flew past Otto like a leaf on the wind. He grabbed a wing, tore it off, and bit into it with all the eagerness of someone who had been waiting twenty minutes for a grilled cheese and French fries.

He chewed a few times, each one slower than the last. Then he stopped. His expression turned from excitement to sheer horror as he looked to see what was inside of the food he just ate.  

"Thish...ishn't chicken."

Normally, Olive would have told him to finish chewing, because eating with your mouth full was impolite. It seemed he wasn't interested in that. "It's not? Then what is it?"

Otto swallowed his bite and looked at his partner, sweat beginning to pour down his forehead. "I don't know. But if a villain's trying to poison us..."

He collapsed to the floor, clutching his stomach. Every single one of the party guests wisely backed away.

"...I think they succeeded."