Burn What You Create
by Mystic
Equestria was a place of rolling green farmland, quiet woodland, gentle twisting rivers and sleepy towns. At the heart of this kingdom was a city unlike any other in the entire world. A perfectly ordered spread of buildings, made from pure white stone and the cleanest-cut timber, surrounded a castle of towers that shone like pearl in the sunlight. Colourful flags danced in the wind, each with the signs of the all the old pony tribes.
It was a marvellous city, peaceful and idyllic, the result of decades of work and persistence—a symbol of what ponies could achieve when they worked together towards a single purpose.
Only now, less than an hour after sunset, the city was in absolute chaos.
It had all started with the pale moonlight floating down from the night sky. It bathed the city with a wash of silver, highlighting the shadows and drawing out the colour from the earth. But then, almost without any warning, anything the moonlight was touching began to smoke. It left a misty haze of silver lingering in the air, pooling in great clouds high above the buildings.
The smoke had drawn the first ponies from their beds and out into the streets. They had puzzled over the smoking city, only to step back into the shadows in horror as their coats began to singe and their flesh burn if they stood out in the moonlight too long.
It was then when the first fires had started. White and blue flame licked at the city, spreading hungrily from structure to structure, consuming everything with icy cold fingers. The ponies screamed at each other, trying to understand why their homes were being destroyed in cold fire, and how was it even possible.
The monster was dramatic if nothing else, and it was then he made his first appearance. His shadow was as tall as a building, and just as real as his body. He weaved in and out of the misty haze of silver smoke that filled the air, sending ponies fleeing for their lives, forgetting all of their worldly possessions in their haste.
Every building that the monster touched instantly turned to glass, the crystal reflecting the firelight and throwing it around the smoke, lighting it up in strange and unnatural ways. The ponies packed themselves into these glass structures because the fire couldn’t catch, and the smoke almost seemed to stay away.
Yet with each building he passed, the monster would flick his wrist, his mismatched hands encased in a magical glow, and the ponies inside would die. The buildings exploded upwards in a shower of glass shards that fanned out like a cloud of confetti. Ponies on the streets looked skyward at these glittering clouds of glass, awed in the way they refracted the moonlight, before the glass rained down, cutting and slicing anypony not under cover.
Even as the ponies screamed, trying to flee their homes, the monster laughed in reply. He giggled as he floated through the streets, the hungry fire tickling his skin as he flew absentmindedly through it. His laughter echoed despite the roar of the icy cold and the wind, and it made the skin of the ponies on the ground crawl as if little bugs were covering their bodies.
It was the laugh of someone who was enjoying himself. The kind of laugh foals made while playing in their imaginations in the park.
And he was enjoying himself. In fact, he hadn’t had this much fun in years.
He waved a claw almost lazily in the air, and a whirlwind of icy blue flame twirled high into the sky, setting the smoke lingering in the air ablaze. Loose tendrils of fire drifted down to the city streets, only adding to the confusion and terror. He pirouetted in the air like a dancer, landing lightly on the roof of somepony’s home, before leaping off and causing the entire building to collapse like a house of cards in an explosion of glass and sparks. He laughed again, jumping from building to building, flattening each one as he leapt away.
But playtime was coming to an end. The monster had work to do, and he had places to be and ponies to meet. He knew they had returned after hiding for so long, and he was going to make them burn exactly like their city.
A giggle drifted through the air, mischievous and obnoxious.
“Seriously, Discord! Stop hiding! You promised you would be serious, and this is the perfect way to get somepony to spot you!”
“They have to find me first, and so do you! That’s how hide-and-seek works, Tia.” His voice seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at the same time, making it impossible to locate.
Celestia’s eyes narrowed, her wings twitching at her sides. She looked around, determined to find her younger companion as quickly as possible and thus beat him at his own game. Only then would he finally behave and do as he promised.
The gardens were surprisingly empty, the sounds of the fountains tinkling gently in the background, hidden somewhere by the rows upon rows of trees, bushes and flowers. Grassy paths crisscrossed the gardens, fenced by small interlocking arches of glass that sparkled in the sunlight.
Celestia grit her teeth in frustration. She couldn’t see clues of his presence anywhere, despite the airy and wide open spaces of the garden. It’s not like there was anywhere he could hide easily! That must mean he was a long way away and was probably cheating.
She had only taken her eyes off him for a second too…
Stalking slowly down the path they had been following, she moved her head from left to right, keeping her eyes peeled. Her search failed to produce any results, though, and she felt her frustration burning in the back of her mind and growing hotter with every passing second.
Ugh. She shouldn’t even be bothering. It’s like he—There! His tail! It peeked out from behind a statue of a hydra, the little tuft of fur at the end twitching from side to side.
Struggling to keep the smile off her face, Celestia crept closer. Discord seemed oblivious of her presence, his tail still lying in perfect reach.
At the last second, the little alicorn pounced, trapping his tail with her magic. “I got you—”
Only, the tail wasn’t connected to anything. It hung limply within her golden magical aura, twitching and twisting like a trapped snake. Celestia cried out in horror and dropped it, jumping back for good measure.
She was rewarded with cackling laughter coming from the trees behind her. Discord floated down, his tail snaking up to reconnect itself to his body. He was about the size of a small pony, and his face was lit up with the widest smile. “You should see your face, Tia!” He clutched at his stomach, hooting with laughter. “Priceless!”
Celestia’s face burned in embarrassment. “Discord! Quit playing all these silly games! Somepony will see you, and besides, you promised you would at least try today!”
“Yeah, yeah. Whatever you say, Tia,” Discord replied, still chuckling.
Celestia harrumphed and stormed out of the small clearing, weaving her way through the trees. Discord hovered behind her, clicking his talons and making silly faces appear in their trunks.
“Where are we going, anyway?”
“To a spot where you can practice without us being spotted.” She really meant ‘where you won’t be spotted,’ but the collective always made him feel better.
“Well that just sounds boring. And besides, I don’t need to practice!”
“Yes you do.”
“You’re no fun. You’re always so serious, Tia. Lighten up a little! Life doesn’t always have to be so stiff and boring.” He paused for a moment, thinking. “You do know that you are allowed to have a little fun, right? Or is that something they hate up at the castle?”
“I’m allowed to have fun,” she replied shortly. She skirted a path along a small pond, graceful willows leaning like old ponies and draping the water’s surface with their weepy branches. “I just know that practicing is important as well. And anyway, you seem to have more than enough fun for the both of us. A little structure in your day will do you good.”
“Structure is booooring.”
Celestia didn’t reply, instead stepping through the curtain provided by one of the willow branches and into a small clearing tucked up beside one of the castle walls. The willows and the pond provided a screen hiding them from view, and the sunlight that drifted in was green and peaceful.
Celestia stopped, turning to her reluctant companion. “Here we are. I come to this spot to read and think, and I think it will be perfect for your lessons.”
“Lessons?! Now you’re making it seem even more boring! How is that even possible?!”
“Discord!” Celestia reprimanded. “Stop it and pay attention.”
Discord made a show of sighing before flopping down to rest on the thin air. He yawned, and then looked at Celestia with his big yellow eyes, waiting as patiently as he could. The fact that he hadn’t changed a tree into foam or something was definitely a good sign.
“Alright,” Celestia said after taking a deep breath, “we both know that you are definitely very good with magic—”
“Yeah I am!”
“—but we also know that you are also limited in the types of magic you can do.”
Discord pouted a little.
“So, while you are very good in metamorphism and telekinesis, things like your ability to create and construct items from nothing is lacking.”
“I can make faces appear in trees! That’s making something from nothing.”
“No, that’s an illusion. Different once again.”
The draconequus folded his arms. “So? What’s the big deal? The type of magic I can do works just fine.”
“But you could do even more, and that’s what I am going to teach you.”
“Teach me? Ugggh. Let’s go turn the soup into bath water or something. That’s way more fun.”
Celestia frowned, but otherwise ignored his comments. “Now, because you think you are so clever, I have a challenge for you.”
“A challenge? It’s already too easy. Make it harder.”
Celestia smirked. “The challenge is this: I want you to grow me a tree. Not create an illusion, or just make a copy of an already existing one, but make a completely unique, brand new tree.”
Discord blinked. “What? Is that it? Make a tree?”
Celestia nodded, her smirk still firmly in place. “Yes, that’s it. It just has to be able to survive completely on its own without magic, but otherwise, that’s it. It won’t be that hard… will it?”
Discord stretched in the air, making his joints pop unnecessarily loudly. “Pfft. Eeeasy. Let’s grow your silly tree and go and make the candles shoot lightning or something!”
“Ah-huh. As soon as you finish.”
“Trust me, this will be over in seconds.”
The monster stalked the hallways of the castle, his misaligned body painting deformed shadows on the walls. The once-lavish furniture lay scattered around the rooms, broken into small pieces, and the carpets were singed and stained.
A small army of walking statues shambled the halls aimlessly, looking for any more of the pony guards they had just finished dispatching.
Despite the castle’s thick stone walls and the fact that the fire was yet to catch inside, the icy cold was nearly unbearable, and the air was being choked with silver smoke. The monster barely registered the cold, though, and he had no need to breathe.
“Come out, come out, Celestia!” the monster cried, his voice echoing loudly. “Hide and seek really is a lot of fun, I know, but I just want to talk… Surely that’s not so hard to believe!”
There was no reply.
“Did you think that I would leave everything like you wanted? Did you really think that things would stay the same? Tsk tsk. You are a very smart pony, Celestia, but heavens above can you be naïve sometimes.” If he was going to be the bad-guy here, he figured he might as well talk like one. After all, it was definitely fun.
He winked out of existence to appear in a completely different room. This one was filled with torn tapestries already being stained by the smoke in the air. With no sign of his quarry, he repeated the process, checking all of the major rooms in the castle one by one. He was certain she would be here… He had expected her to come to him, though, her eyes blazing with fury and fully intending to do battle.
But he couldn’t find her anywhere.
Snarling in frustration, he took himself up to the observatory before closing his fists down violently. There was the tortured scream of stone being rent apart, and the entire tower began to tilt dangerously to the left. The monster teleported outside and hovered near the tower, watching it begin to fall faster and faster to the ground. With a snap of his talons, however, the broken part of the spire stopped moving, hovering in place unnaturally still.
He began to wind his hand back, almost as if in preparation. With his spare hand, he pointed towards the clouds before throwing the tower magically into the sky. It soared in a great arc before plummeting like a meteor down into the residential area of the city, the earth shuddering with the impact.
He had entertained the hope right until the last second that she would come and stop it before it hit, but he watched the tower wipe almost an entire block off the face of the earth with an expression that almost looked like a pout.
He sighed exasperatedly. He wasn’t playing the game very cleverly. He was getting impatient and letting himself down. If he wanted her to come to him, then he would have to change his tactics.
Fortunately, he knew just the thing.
With a flash of bright light to make sure he was as visible as possible, the monster spun around and made his way down to the gardens.
Celestia couldn’t help but giggle at the sight of Discord struggling. He glared at the patch of soil that bulged and shifted underhoof, his face twisted into a snarl of concentration. He held his mismatched hands out in front of him, moving them in complicated patterns as he tried to create a ‘simple’ tree.
Celestia wasn’t sure, but it almost looked like he was sweating… She giggled again at the thought. “See? I told you it’s hard.”
“No you didn’t,” he snapped back. “It won’t be that hard… That’s what you said.”
“Well it’s definitely not what I sound like.”
“Yup. It is. Now stop distracting me! I almost have this.”
Celestia stopped giggling, but she couldn’t quite wipe the smile off her face.
Discord grunted, and he brought his hands up, the earth bulging upwards before splitting into small clumps. A sickly and twisted-looking trunk rose out of the ground, pale brown leaves unfurling themselves and hanging limply even as the tree grew. Finally, it came to a stop standing about as high as a pony, its branches struggling to hold their own weight. Several leaves fell off and floated to the ground where they promptly dissolved into dust.
Celestia looked at it for a long time. “Um…”
Discord cried out in frustration and the entire tree broke down magically into nothing, blown away quickly by the wind.
“Well, it’s definitely better than your last attempt!” Celestia rolled her eyes when Discord growled. “Don’t be so angry. I told you it would take practice.”
“I hate this.”
“Don’t be such a little filly. Just try again. I know you can do it, because you’re definitely getting much better.”
“It’s just a tree! A stupid tree! This shouldn’t be this hard!”
Celestia moved over next to him, her horn glowing gently. “It’s not just a tree,” she said, the earth shifting as something coiled beneath it. “You’re creating something from nothing. You are making something that’s alive.”
With that, a sprout burst out of the ground, slowly working its way upward, branches spreading out in all directions, little green leaves budding and unfurling themselves to the light. The trunk grew thicker, and both of them could almost feel the roots taking hold in the earth.
When the tree was almost as high as the Queen, she stopped its growth. The sapling stood proudly, its white trunk without a single blemish or mark, and its branches wide and its leaves a perfect green.
“See? You can create something just like this. It just takes practice.”
Discord sighed, rubbing his forehead. “You owe me for this…”
Celestia laughed. “I owe you? Well, if you say so. Now come on! You’re so close!”
The monster floated down to the willow trees next to the pond silently, touching his legs down and standing upright. He snapped his talons and the willow branches turned into writhing snakes that moved out of his way to form an arch as soon as he approached. He could see the tree beyond, unchanged even after all these years.
The monster took another step before he heard her:
“Stop.”
He smiled, but did not turn around. “Stop? Why would I want to stop? I am just visiting! And even then, if I remember correctly, I came to this spot almost as much as you.”
“You don’t belong here, Discord. This isn’t your home anymore.”
He chuckled mirthlessly. “That’s a little mean, don’t you think? It never was my home. You snuck me in so the Queen wouldn’t wipe me from existence. And she almost succeeded too. But I made her pay for that, didn’t I? I still am.”
He heard her stamp her hoof on the ground and snort in impatience.
“Well, now that I have you here, we can talk—”
“Leave.”
Discord sighed and spun around, raising an eyebrow at the interruption. “And what makes you think I would do that?”
Celestia glared at him, her multicoloured mane floating around her armoured body like water. She looked so tired with shadows hanging under her eyes, and her armour was battered and bent. “Because I am giving you a chance to leave and stop burning everything that I have helped create and maintain. You don’t have to create chaos...” Celestia took a deep breath. “I don’t want to have to fight you, Discord. Please don’t make me fight you.”
You were my friend...
“Oh so now you don’t want to fight? Make up your mind! I swear, you are as random as me.”
Celestia’s eyes pleaded with him. “Not again. I am sick of fighting, Discord. I just want you to leave the ponies alone. That’s all. You can leave, go back to the Frozen Mountains, just please leave the ponies alone. There doesn’t have to be fire and death. That’s not who you are. You make silly pranks and harmless fun. I’ve done it with you!”
Discord’s face split into a cold sneer. “Go away? Ha! I’m having so much fun, Celestia! What on earth would make me want to leave? Where else can I have this much fun? Silly pranks are foal’s games, and I am no child. I mean listen, can you hear their fear and confusion? I know it’s a little hard to hear them over the flames, but if you listen very carefully…”
Celestia’s expression fell, and she shook her head. “Please, Discord. I can only give you one more chance… If you don’t listen, then that’s it. I’m sorry, but I’ll have no other options.”
“You don’t have any options as it stands, Celestia!” Discord snorted. “I mean, really, what can you do? I was always stronger than you, and now it’s just you and me, completely alone.”
“Not alone!”
Both Celestia and Discord turned to face the newcomer, an alicorn the colour of the night sky, her mane shimmering as if filled with stars. She glared at the draconequus with pure hatred, a blade of blue light floating near her head.
“Oh Luna!” Discord cried out. “Fancy seeing you here! I thought Celestia would have left you back safely at home so you wouldn’t miss your bedtime!”
“Luna!” Celestia cried. “Not yet—”
Luna’s eyes burned like fire. “He must pay for his crimes, sister! He shows no remorse or conscience. We cannot allow him to walk the earth when he insists torturing the ponies. And now he uses my moon to sow chaos and fear! Do not be weak!”
“Please,” Discord said, inspecting his talons as if bored. “You two couldn’t stop me. But then again, who am I to stop you from trying… Come on! Try it! It will be fun! Winner keeps Equestria, okay? That sounds perfectly fair to me. That way I can make sure the whole thing is nothing but a wasteland before moving on. Doesn’t that sound wonderful, Celestia? I told you I would start slow and get bigger and better. Soap roads and candy floss indeed. I am going to create something fantastic.”
Celestia didn’t get a chance to reply before Luna launched herself at the draconequus with a snarl. Her blade of light twirled in the air, aiming for his neck. Celestia cried out for her to stop, but Discord was too fast. He blinked out of existence before reappearing a little to the side, the branches-turned-snakes already stretching out to wrap around and imprison the alicorn.
Luna cried out, her blade slashing at the snakes which turned back to branches the moment they were cut. With a blast of magic, she freed herself completely, the branches falling down like cut string, their leaves scattered around the lawn.
Discord grinned, already waving his hands in the air, waiting for another attack. “I was right. This is fun.”
“Stop it, Discord! I don’t want to fight you.”
“But your sister does, Celestia, and she’s a good match.” With a flick of his wrist, all of the leaves scattered along the ground rose up into the air, curling into thin needle-like spines.
“Don’t attack him, Luna. We can still end this peacefully.”
Luna flashed her sister a look. “He doesn’t deserve peace. He deserves to be imprisoned for millennium!”
Discord clapped his hands together, his eyes glinting. “That’s right. But first you will have to beat me. Maybe then you can bring me to… justice. It sounds like I deserve it, after all. So many dead ponies…”
“Luna… wait!”
Luna didn’t wait. Her horn glowed magnificently as her body was covered in swirling magic, and she charged Discord. The draconequus laughed, and snapped his talons one last time.
There was a flash, and every single one of the needle-like leaves transformed into shards of glistening diamond. With a rasping hiss, they took off like a flight of birds, racing towards Luna in a maelstrom of razor sharp death.
“Luna!”
Luna’s shield bore the brunt of the shards, but she collapsed with a cry as the diamond slashed and tore at her coat, embedding themselves deep in her flesh when her magic failed. Discord waved his hand, and the alicorn went flying backwards, landing down at Celestia’s hooves, her blood already staining the grass.
“You monster!” Celestia screamed. “You hurt her!”
“Ha! That was eeeasy! Make it harder, please! Come on, Celestia. You’re next!”
Celestia ignored him and the raging anger burning so brightly in her chest—turning her vision red—and looked down at her sister, her magic already tending to her wounds. The shards wriggled out of her sides, and Celestia was thankful that Luna’s normal armour had kept any from going in too deep. Even still, the smaller alicorn was soaked in her own blood, and Celestia quickly sealed the worst of the cuts to prevent her from losing any more.
“I told you to wait,” Celestia whispered gently into her sister’s ear, forcing herself to breathe easy.
“I’m… sorry.”
“Don’t be. We’ll be alright, I promise. We can do this.”
“Of course we can…”
“Just like the Oracle said, alright?”
Luna nodded, her eyes shining brightly once again. Celestia helped her to her hooves, and they faced Discord together.
“Oooh, two at once? Double the challenge, double the fun.”
Celestia raised her head up high, her eyes blazing like the sun, her earlier anger held firmly in check. “Discord, Spirit of Chaos, you have no place in this world. I have given you the option to leave peacefully, but you have turned me down. I have no other choice than to sentence you to imprisonment for a period of at least two thousand years.”
Discord began laughing, and didn’t stop. He clutched at his sides as he rocked backwards and forwards, howling with mirth.
“Do you have anything to say for yourself, Discord?”
Discord wiped a tear from his eye, his laughter dying almost instantly. He looked at Celestia with steel in his expression, drawing a target over his chest with a finger. “Go for it.”
Celestia sighed. Everything was still for a moment, and then her world turned white, and she watched the fear begin to creep into Discord’s eyes. And just for a moment, she saw the small draconequus she remembered. But then she heard the screams from the ponies still suffering down below, and the image faded.
The strongest type of magic is that which creates, and Celestia and Luna had created something wonderful. Rather, they had found something that allowed them to create a magic that Discord could never truly overcome because he would never truly understand it.
Friendship and love need to be nurtured, but with enough effort and skill, they are as steady and unstoppable as a tree growing from the earth.
The garden was engulfed in rainbow light, and for a moment, even the fire burning in the city didn’t seem so bright.
“Discord!” Celestia cried out in shock. “You’re… you’re doing it!”
Discord grunted one last time before adding another, and final, flash to the magic. The tree in front of him stood about two metres high, and was filled with leaves of brilliant shades of red, orange, yellow and even black. The ashen trunk was thick and straight, and the branches spread out in a perfect circle.
“I… did it! Ha!”
“You did it! I knew you could! Look at it, fully grown and perfectly healthy. And all in a day, too!”
“And it’s even bigger than yours,” Discord teased, sticking out his tongue.
“That doesn’t matter! The important thing is that you did it!”
Discord smiled to himself. He looked down at his hands, still glowing with magic.
“That means we can do all kinds of new magic. We can move onto creating more than one tree at once now. Maybe we can make a tree out of glass or something that lives completely off magic!”
There was a flash, and Celestia stared open-mouthed as Discord’s tree burst into flames, burning as bright and as hot as lightning for a little more than a second before vanishing, leaving nothing but a curtain of fine ash that blew away with the wind.
Everything was silent for a heartbeat.
“Discord… what… what did you do?”
The draconequus shrugged nonchalantly. “I burned it. I made a tree, and it was boring me, so I made it fun again.”
Celestia looked around, unable to comprehend his behaviour. “But… but you just destroyed it!”
“Yup! Burned it to ash in less than a second. Look at that!” He chuckled and began to move out the clearing, leaving Celestia standing in shock.
“But… why?!”
He looked back over his shoulder, the smallest smile on his face. “It was fun, and I felt like it. Just make another one if it’s such a big deal.” With that, he left the clearing and moved out of Celestia’s sight.
The rainbow light faded in time, leaving the world as dark as death. The fires and smoke had all vanished the second Discord had fallen, although the destruction remained. The draconequus himself was locked into stone, imprisoned just as Celestia said he would be. The garden had been completely destroyed in the blast, all of the trees stripped of their leaves and their branches torn. All except one.
“It’s done….” Celestia whispered, her legs shaking and threatening to give out. It had required so much energy… “It’s over now.”
Luna murmured something, but all Celestia heard was the word ‘justice’.
Celestia stood next to her sister, looking at the statue with a mixture of sadness and relief. It was laying on its side in the shade of a tall white tree with perfect green leaves, the only tree to appear unaffected by the battle.
Celestia was still for a long time, letting her sister lean on her for support. Eventually, she leaned down and nuzzled her fondly. “Come now, there are ponies who need our help, and we must be there for them together.”
“Discord will stay imprisoned?”
“That he will.”
“Then let us go.” Luna stepped away, holding her wings out for balance support. Celestia horn flashed, tending to Luna’s wounds again.
When she was finished, and Luna could move properly, Celestia smiled. Luna took off, already heading down to the city, her horn glowing like a beacon in the night sky.
Celestia followed a moment after. She turned as she launched herself into the air, casting a look down at Discord, imprisoned in stone, paralysed beneath the tree.
Then she turned away to face her ponies and didn’t once look back.
My eternal love and gratitude to Sessalisk for her input. Thanks for reading!