I picked up Derpy at her place at approximately seven. As usual, she wasn’t quite ready when I arrived and I had to wait for several minutes for her to lock up her apartment and join me. The wait was well worth it as she was sporting a gorgeous party dress that showed off her curves. I couldn’t help but stare at her for a minute as she clamored in. Noticing my distant expression and distracted demeanor, she waved her hand in front of my face, pulling my attention to her face.
“Earth to Joseph. This is ground control. Are we going to go out tonight or are you just going to stare at me?” she asked with some irritation in her voice.
I bumbled and mumbled for a minute before my brain caught up with my mouth, “It’s just you look so stunning tonight. I couldn’t help myself.”
She blushed and retorted, “You don’t look too bad yourself.”
“Do you really think so, because you are dressed to kill and I seem to be dressed to maybe maim somebody.”
“You really know how to turn a phrase,” she snarked sarcastically, “Come on, let’s go get deafened, blind, and drunk.”
“That sounds like an excellent plan.”
I nodded assent and put the car into gear. The driving was relatively uneventful and allowed me to steal a glance or two at Derpy and reassert her gorgeous physique. The radio suddenly caught my attention as my MP3 player decided at that time of all times to play ‘Winter Wrap Up.’ I blushed and reached forward to turn down the volume, when Derpy beat me to it and turned it up to nearly maximum. The frame of Anne rattled something terrible as the song blared out of my car, much to Derpy’s delight, to my slight pain and to the visible annoyance and astonishment of a few nearby motorists.
We arrived at the club well after nightfall and I got raped for parking at some outrageous fee, but we made it. The hypnotic music emanated from the former warehouse and like flies to flame, we approached with fascination and glee. I argued with the bouncer who promptly let Derpy in for free but barred my entrance. I reluctantly paid the cover and we entered the club. Multicolored strobe lights pulsated in time to the music as a DJ sporting jet black hair and shades stood at the turntables, looking like he was having the time of his life. The energy in the room was almost palatable as the crowd swayed, danced and, for some very uncoordinated people, spastically flailed to the beat of the electronic music.
I took Derpy out on the floor and we swayed and danced to the music, the music and her body mesmerizing me with every step. I felt almost in a trance as everything seemed to meld together into a grand feeling of contentment. A few hours on the floor later found us exhausted and we sashayed over to the bar. We gulped our drinks in silence, as the music made conversation difficult. However, that didn’t stop me from noticing her periodically itch her thigh at about the same location where I’d expect a cutie mark to be. I subconsciously itched the same area, and thought it more than mere coincidence. I raised my voice to try and ask her about it, but she misunderstood my intentions and grabbed me by the hand and pulled me back out onto the dance floor. I tried to voice my protest, but she wouldn’t hear of it as we returned to the dance floor.
I put the question to back of my mind and gave myself over to the music. One track after another melded together putting me into a lucid state of dream-like alertness. The line between reality and dream became harder and harder to define as the club and people disappeared into colors and shapes. The once overwhelming music became seemed almost muted and reduced to a dull throb, methodical and regular, almost like a heartbeat. The lights and figures coalesced into new creatures and shapes. A scene began to be played out before my eyes, almost surreal in its seeming reality.
“Cloud Kicker, go! Save yourself. I’ll hold him.”
“No, Blossomforth. I will not leave you. If we die, we die together. Kickers always protect those who cannot protect themselves. “
A maniacal laugh filled the air. “Knock, knock my little ponies. Come out, come out, where ever you are.” The agent of chaos himself walked into my field of view. “Ah, there you are. Are you two ready to come out and play?”
“What do you want Discord?” Cloud asked with great venom in her voice.
“Oh, nothing much. Just perpetual chaos, the ability to rule with absolute impunity and no meddling kids or their dumb dog to stop me.”
“What do you want from us?”
“Oh, nothing much. Just your undying loyalty. And if you join today, I’ll make you an element of disharmony for no extra charge.”
“We’ll never join you!” I defiantly asserted.
“Tis a pity. Such excellent ponies as yourself would go far in the Discordian Empire. Your loss.”
“Cloud, if we don’t live though this, I just want to say I love you.”
“I love you too, Blossom, more than life itself.”
With that Cloud Kicker bravely charged Discord as he casually yawned and turned her legs into roots bound into the dirt floor of our house with a wave of his unsightly claw, crimson with a red fluid I could only assume was blood.
“Love, does it conquer all? Well, you two will just have to find out together.”
Bodies and minds gone forevermore
Five score divided by four
“No! I screamed as I wrapped my forehooves around Cloud hoping to shield her from destruction as the world was enveloped in white light emanating from Discord’s talon accompanied by evil, maniacal laughter.
A flash enveloped my vision as I returned to the world of the living. “No! Cloud!” I screamed.
Derpy looked at me with a face of terror and fear muttering, “The children. My foals. Dinky, Sparkler. I can’t protect them. I couldn’t save them. Why?”
Derpy promptly swooned and collapsed at my feet and I was overwhelmed with a desire to do the same, but I resisted the urge and pulled her from the dance floor, much to the disgruntled dismay of some people I had the unfortunate happenstance to bump into. Several colorful insults and much cursing later, I sat with her at the bar as the bartender proved more than helpful providing her some water and me a free drink to calm my clearly shaken nerves. I offered payment, but she refused it claiming, “I saw what happened down out on the floor and...”
“Ma’am?” I asked, as she became almost frozen in place.
I stared at her, my panic beginning to rise as I jumped over the bar and checked her pulse. It was normal, elevated but she was very much alive. All of a sudden she came to, startling me as well as herself as we shared a quick gasp.
“Berry, are you alright?”
“I’m not sure. It was all so real…”
“Anything I can do to help?”
“No, I’m fine for now. I guess I need to lay off the bottle for a while or something.”
The music then came to a halt as the DJ slumped over the turntables, resulting in deafening audio static from distortion making everyone in the room cover their ears in discomfort. A bouncer removed the catatonic fellow as a person who I could only assume was the manager apologized and plugged in a disc of some sort and restarted the music. Several people filed out of the club in a huff as the crowd murmured, but eventually people returned to their evening. I offered my help to the bartender as we revived the musician.
“Hey, Neon. Are you alright?” the bartender asked.
“Yes. I’m fine. Just a bad dream. I’ve had worse on acid trips.” He responded.
“Are you sure, because I’ve never seen you black out like that, even when your high.”
“If I say I’m fine, I’m fine. I don’t need you dotting on me like a foal, Berry, I mean Fransisca.”
I thought about the strange exchange and was just about to say something when I noticed Derpy beginning to stir. Slowly Derpy came to, as we shared a hug. She cried into my shoulder, presumably about whatever her vision was. I almost cried out of resonance, as I knew Derpy well enough to know that if something made her sad, it was something devastating and someone needed to be paid a visit in pain for making such a sweet soul sad.
I figured whatever event befell us also befell them and wisely decided that it was time to head home; Derpy and I were both much too wound up from our flashbacks to continue to enjoy ourselves anymore. The ride home was obnoxiously silent and my attempts at conversation all ended up in failure. It would seem that whatever vision she saw had shaken her up really badly, especially since she was rarely one to be silent. I apologized for the dreadful night and asked her to call me if she needed anything. She nodded assent and headed to her apartment.
I rode home still trying to piece together the pieces of the puzzle in my head. All the events of the evening seemed surreal and impossible, yet I had a cutie mark on my flank and a flashback to Discord’s betrayal. Things were falling into place too perfectly for this to be mere coincidence, but Equestria wasn’t real, or was it?
My head was ablaze with thoughts and the buzz of alcohol, so I decided to pop a couple of acetaminophen tablets to combat my worsening headache. A quick shower revealed my cutie mark, now much more pronounced with two interlocking flowers one pink and one teal. I resolved to do research tomorrow online and give Derpy a call to try and figure out what to do. I fought to stay awake as I prepared for bed, before collapsing into a messy pile on top of my sheets. The late hour, brain overload, and pure exhaustion conspired to let me fall quickly to sleep.