Chapter Twenty-eight
The Power of Eight
"The... Element of Willpower? I've never heard of that before." Twilight says as she slowly stands up.
"Listen Twilight," I say walking away from her to get a little distance. "I know you have a lot of questions, but I need you to hold them off for now. Now please, do as I ask and use the Elements of Harmony on me!"
"Why? What's this plan of yours anyway?" She asks getting frustrated, and she wasn't the only one.
"Damn it woman! Do as I say or chaos will rule Equestria forever! Do you want that?" I yell at her. A worried look crossed over her face, like she thought I was going to hurt her.
"Twi," Applejack puts a reassuring hoof on her friend's shoulder. "You can trust him. He's only lookin' ta help out. And if it weren't fer him you'd still be a statue." Bless that farmer’s heart.
"Okay." Twilight eventually says trusting Applejack's judgment. "Girls, line up! We're putting Discord away for good this time!" On her command the other bearers got into formation. Soon each of their Elements began reacting with one another and their eyes glowing a white light. I prepare myself as for what will happen next, as Harmony was formed, the rainbow shot from the bearers and towards me.
The rainbow hits me and it swirls around like a vortex. I feel a mixture of feelings surface up inside me, feelings I never dreamt there could be. I felt love, warmth, serenity, pride, faith, calm, and wholesome. Heh-heh, of course: harmony. This is what being in complete state of joy was like? I like it. In fact, I like it so much, maybe I'll share it with Discord. But even this sort of level of harmony couldn't possibly soothe such a beast.
My senses snap back and I extend my free hand, and the most peculiar thing happens. The Rainbow vortex starts swirling more rapidly around me, then it begins to get sucked into my hand like a vacuum. Soon there was nothing left of the shimmering rainbow that surrounded me, yet Harmony was still there.
My Element's flame explodes out of the sigil, but not the same kind of fire. This was not an orange fire that was wild and destructive, this was a rainbow fire. One that was soothing and well-mannered, and very strong. The fire was so strong that it engulfed my sword and my entire right arm. I brush my fingers through it, it felt more like soft wool.
Everyone else stares in awe at the new hybrid Harmony. And Discord... Discord looked terrified.
"Scared?" I ask him in a giddy voice. I raise my flaming blade so it points directly at him. "You should be!" And just like that, an explosion of rainbow fire bursts from my blade and shot for a one way trip to the King of Chaos. He said nothing, he did nothing; he didn't scream, laugh, cry, or curse. The last thing I saw him do was giving me that deer-in-the-headlight look and held up a sign saying 'HELP!' Then Harmony took him.
The rainbow fire of Harmony and Willpower engulfs Discord, like a whale on a school of fish. I can see inside the fire as Discord began to petrify, and once the process was complete, the rainbow fire shoots up into the sky and spreads out in all directions. It looked a lot like a sonic-rainboom, only it was fire, not just a spectrum. As the fire spread, everything under its embrace that Discord changed began to revert to its original form. I covered my eyes as everything the fire swept under began to glow and change back to nromal, the grass turned from blue back to green, the castle was no longer made of candy, and clouds became clouds.
As the light died down I removed my hands, to see a shining Equestria and an imprisoned Discord. I look back and see that Celestia and Luna were given back their horns, wings, and flowing manes. It worked, it actually worked!
"YEEEAAAAHHHHH!!!!" I shout to the heavens. The uninjured cheered whooped with me. The others who fended off Discord earlier cheered too, though their cries were a little weak.
"What the-?! What's happening to your arm?" Rainbow Dash yells over us all and cutting off our cheering. She's pointing a hoof to my left arm with an expression of terror over her face. I look down to see what bothered her, and then my stomach went cold with fear.
It was slowly petrifying, working its way up my arm, already past the elbow. I began to freak out, not clue as to what was happening or why. I panic, trying to scrape, peel, and rip the stone from my arm. As it reaches my elbow I get smart, I use my Element and light my arm on fire, burning away the casing around my arm.
As the last bit fell away from my fingers and the fire died out, we are left to utter shock and wonder, and a hangs in the air. I flex my arm and stretch my fingers, everything was working fine.
"What happened?" Sharla was the first to ask. "Why were you turning to stone?"
"The Elements of Harmony purge and neutralize all darkness," Luna explains, having first hand (hoof?) experience. "But they do not destroy. That is why Discord is encased in stone, he the exact opposite of Harmony-"
"Because he is chaos, and uses chaos magic." I finish, my stomach feels like a dagger of ice was just thrust inside it as I realise what happened. I look to Sharla and Applejack, and I can see that they figured out the same thing. We hear a laughter that belongs to none of us, an all too insidious and familiar laughter. "And I... I took a bit of his chaos, and he was given..."
"Your Element's power!" Discord finishes for me just like how I did Luna. The stone statue of Discord crumbles away, freeing him. He flips the sign around from saying 'HELP!' to 'NOPE!' "That's right! Or have you forgotten, young Jesse?"
"You knew," I turn to Corig and Krinox, both looking better since the combined powers of Willpower and Harmony were unleashed. "You knew about this didn't you?"
"Yes, we knew." The Diamond Dog leader says somberly. "Ever since you saved us from a second death, we've known."
"So why didn't you tell me? You could have saved us a heap of trouble!" I yell at them furiously.
“And what difference would it have made, hmm?" Krinox matches my rage. "If we told you that you could not beat him you still would have gone after him and tried winning. But in the back of your mind you would know, you would ignore it but you would know, he will win."
"Of course I'd win! After all, I am the fire. And you can't fight fire with water, it just doesn't work out." Discord brags victoriously.
"So, that's how it is? He has truly won." Celestia says. I turn to her, not believing what I heard. But I could see it in her eyes, the expression on her face. And something else, a cold hard, and very sorry expression in her eyes.
"Princess, you can't mean that!" Twilight asks, not believing her teacher to give up so easily.
"I don't care what any of you are saying!" I lift to the ready. "I don't care if Discord is unbeatable, if we can't win, if you've given up! I'm not stopping!"
"But," Celestia say, not breaking eye contact. "Unless we had a draconequus of our own I don’t think we stand a chance."
"One of our own? How could we get one? What draconequus would even join the side of Harmony?" Dash asks their ruler.
“I know exactly how." I say not liking the idea. I know the price, and I can see the end result as well as Celestia. "Twilight, hit me with the Harmony again."
"But we just saw that Harmony doesn't work against Discord no matter how amplified it may be. And it'll even affect you." She counters.
"Just do it!... And it's not meant for Discord." She's reluctant at first, but she gives in all the same. The lights shine in their eyes and the rainbow hits me. It swirls around viscously again, and this time I don't vacuum it in, instead, I let it surround me. The rainbow spins faster and faster, creating a small storm of wind. I turn my sword the other way so the blade faces towards me. I grip it with both hands and plunge it into my chest.
I fall to my knees as my own sword goes in one way from my chest and out the other. Everyone gasps as the see my apparent suicidal action, but it only looks suicidal. But by god, it hurt so much. Fire shoots from the tip and starts spreading like a spider web. The web spreads out and grows, until at last, one flame passes right through Shining Armor.
"Shining!" His wife cries as the flame goes out from one side of his body and out the other.
"Easy Cadence, it doesn't hurt." He touches where the flame is cut off from entering him. "Doesn't even feel warm." The same thing proceeds to happen to seven others: Sharla, Flex, Krinox, Corig, Chief, and Vana. None of them feel a thing as the fire pierces into them.
The fire web burns out, and as shown, it caused no harm to the people it hit. I have that bit, now I just need the chaos. As I reach deep inside me, I bring out the chaos that's been laying dormant. I begin to scream as I feel Harmony attacking me now that chaos is no longer hiding deep inside me, safe from the two colliding.
"Princess! What's happening to him?" Twilight asks over the head winds. She does not answer, only looks on sadly and regrettably at what she had to do. Then again, I could have just said no.
My body lights on fire, a mixture of grey, orange, and red. The fire is to help keep Harmony from petrifying me, among other things. The rainbow starts to form with the fire, mixing in with the greyness of it. I hear something snap. I feel something snap. I howl in pain as I feel the effects coming to, as my body changes. My muscle tissue moves around, bones length, grow, and form, and skin changes.
A bright and dark lights blinds everyone, and finally, my pain stops. Smoke comes off me, I lie in a small crater that was not under me when this started. I open my eyes, my vision blurry at first, but soon things clear up. I wave my hand in front of me, but it wasn't my usual human hand. It was a beefy, muscular arm covered in orange fur. I slowly stand up, a bit wobbly but quickly getting used to my new appendages. I stood on one hoof and a dog paw instead of a feet.
As I looked over the worried and scared expressions on some of my friends I realize that I was now towering over to be about the same height as Discord. I breathe in deeply and stretch my arms, my right being the muscular one I first saw, but my left was much different. I had feathers poking out from my shoulder down to just before my elbow, with an eagle’s talon for a hand.
I no longer had a flesh body, now it was covered in fur of a white and black stripe pattern, not as muscular as my orange arm, but more so than it used to be. I brush my hands through my hair, only to find that I no longer had hair, instead it was more like bristly feather/spikes/mane. I also found that I had two horns on my head now, one on the center of my forehead that was a unicorn horn, and the other on my left side like a bull horn. The bull horn pointed downward instead of up like the Chief's does. Along with my hair changing, my skin seems to have been replaced with incredibly hard scales and I now possess a row of sharp teeth.
I felt something swish behind me, I crane my head to find two different wings. My right, a feathered wing that was a mix colour of red, yellow, and orange; the other was a green leathery type wing that looked to belong to a dragon. But that's not what I felt sway before, it was lower down. To my giddy surprise I find a long bushy dog tail. That probably made it all worth it.
But the most distinguishing part about this new body of mine, I still had my Element sigil. Embedded into my chest!
"Jesse?" Sharla asks worried. "Is that you?"
"'Course it's me, who'd ya think, hmm?" I reply like this was no big deal.
"A-hahahahahaha." Discord howls with laughter. "Again! He's done it again folks!"
"What happened to you?"
"Discord was right, you can't beat fire with water, only fire can fight fire. So I had to force myself to become a draconequus." I explain to my confused friends. "Using my Element I forced it to happen, but I needed traces of DNA from different creatures, hence the fire web. But being foreign to my own body I needed a way to make them be compatible with myself."
"So that's where the Elements of Harmony came in?" I nod in response as Twilight starts getting the idea. "But why use chaos magic? Aren't you running a risk of turning yourself to stone without it hiding?"
"We draconequui are creatures of chaos, Twilight Sparkle." Discord says feeling more than obliged to answer this one for everyone. "He needed to make chaos noticeable to actually become one of us. It's like saying you're a unicorn with no horn. Speaking of which..." He snaps his fingers and Twilight, Celestia, Luna, and Cadence's horns and wings disappear. Again.
My Element lights a grey fire in my chest and I snap my orange fingers and a grey flame flies out from them. The fire travelled to one of the mares who Discord just targeted and landed atop her head, it made its way to her back and jumps to the next mare. As the fire burned away, the missing features had returned to each of them. Discord frowns in disappointment and confusion.
"Now how did you do that?"
"Have you forgotten already Discord?" I ask sarcastically. "I'm the bearer of Willpower, whatever I think can happen will happen. Throw a bit of chaos into the mix and there's nothing I can't do!" As a demonstration, I slam my fists together, grey fire burst from them and wraps around my hands. I slam my eagle fit into the earth, the ground gives way to my strike and a fissure begins to form starting at me and moving towards Discord.
Grey fire explodes from the fissure in the shape of animals. Discord pops a firefighter's costume on himself, equipped with hose. He pulls back a lever on the hose and a jet of water bursts out of it and drenches the animal shaped fire, causing the fire and water to cancel out and turn into steam.
"Hmm, maybe water does work nicely against fire." Discord comments through the steam.
"And maybe you should shut up and be more vigilant!" I yell high above him. When he reduced my fire to steam I took advantage of my situation and flew above him. I jump off an invisible wall and shoot myself towards Discord, even Dash would be jealous of my speed.
The grey fire around my hands begins to lengthen and form a trail behind me. I crash into Discord, tackling him to the ground. We tumble around again, but this time I make sure not to make the same mistake twice. As I pick Discord up off the ground, the grey fire that formed a trail behind me morph into flaming chains and wrap around his arms and legs. The same fire chains wrap themselves around my own arms and legs, anchoring us together
"Got ya!" I yell in triumph, holding him in a bear hug from behind.
"Do you really think that these can stop me? Honestly boy, I thought better of you." He struggles to free himself, but my grip on him was too tight and the chains only tightened themselves.
"Sorry Discord, but those chains are binding. Once they got you, they aren't letting go. I made sure of that, but just to be safe," I released my eagle hand from him and plunge it into his chest. A chorus of gasps rang out from the others.
"Jesse, there is no need to kill him!" Princess Celestia shouts trying to stop me.
"Kill him? Nah, I'm just getting back what's mine." I say pushing my hand farther into his chest. I finally find what I was searching for. I wrench my hand out of him and pull out a tiny bit of normal looking fire, no hole was visible in Discord's chest from where my hand was.
"Hey, I liked that." Discord complains trying to grab at the flame.
"Too bad, besides, it originally belonged to me." I counter, holding my missing piece of Willpower out of his reach. It flies out my hand and floats above my head. "Twilight, I got back my missing piece of Willpower, use the Elements of Harmony to turn him to stone!"
"That's great, just get out of the way or you'll get consumed too." She yells back, happy for this nightmare to finally be over. Celestia put a hoof on her student's shoulder, a look of sorrow across her face. Twilight's hope slowly washes away as she realizes something is wrong.
"Afraid I can't do that Twilight," I say softly. "If I complete myself, then I lose all my chaos power, reverting me back to a human. And these chains are made from more chaos than anything else. And once I lose my chains, these chains disappear-"
"And I'll be gone the moment they do." Discord laughs again. No matter what may happen, he wins.
"Then what do we do?" Fluttershy asks Twilight. "We can't turn him to stone too, not after what he's done for us."
"But if we don't then Discord will be free." Twilight counters, torn between two difficult choices. "He may be locked up now, but I don't think those chains can hold forever."
"They can't. Listen Twilight, I've made my decision. If self-sacrifice is the only way to beat Discord then I will gladly make that sacrifice."
"But you can't!" Sharla yells rejecting the plan. "What would happen to you? This might kill you."
"Trust me bird-cat, he'll live. I've had firsthand experience." Discord says dryly.
"Then what about us? You're friends. What about Shantze and Light? What would I tell them? They look up to you, you know. Shining Armor, you're with me on this aren't you?"
"... Do it Twilight." The Captain says unable to look at anyone.
"What?!" Sharla yells looking betrayed. "How could you be okay with this? He's your friend, he's saved your life a number of times before! How can you just stand by and let this happen?"
"By using every fiber of my body to stop myself from agreeing with you!" He shouts back, a tear rolling down his face. "Oh course he's my friend, I'd do anything to make sure he was as safe as my own wife! But if I did that then it would only be selfishness, not nobility. As Captain of the Royal Guard I must protect and see to the safety of the country and the crown before anything else. Even if it means I would have to sacrifice myself for that. And that's just what he's doing now, putting the safety of his friends before his own well-being. He's protecting us, he's protecting everything and everyone."
"He's right Sharla, I'm doing this to protect you. All of you." I say with a gentle smile, no hint of regret in my voice. "So, seeing as though I won't be needing this, I have a more practical use for it." The cut off piece of Willpower begins to mold itself into a sheet of paper. I catch it in between two fingers and gently guide it to Celestia. "Don't think ill of me Sharla, you'd do this for your brother wouldn't you?" She couldn't say anything back. She turns her head away from the pain, tears I her eyes.
"Are you sure?" Twilight asks, hoping that we could think of another way out of this. But she knew as well as I did, this was the only way. I nod my head, at peace with myself.
"So this is how it ends? I must say, I'm actually okay with turning back to stone. I had a lot of fun that's made me well and content." Discord says to me looking satisfied as we see the Elements of Harmony come together.
"You seem awfully calm about this. Some may even say peaceful." I remark with a sly smirk. He shrugs, the chains clinking together as he moves.
"Well, there's a difference between being evil and being chaotic. I just wanted to have fun, mess with some ponies, sit in my old throne again, so to speak. And you've provided me with dump truck loads of fun. Of course I don't relish going back to that stony prison, but at least I'll going back with a smile."
"I take it that is going to be the closest to a thank you I'll ever get from you?" I ask as the rainbow of Harmony shoots into the air. He smiles and chuckles like I made an amusing joke, watching as the rainbow shoots towards us.
I can feel the power of Harmony much stronger this time as it strikes. It sort of hurts, but in a nice way, like when you slowly peel off a band aid after a perfectly healed cut. Perhaps because I was a draconequus now. As I feel myself petrify, I stare at my friends.
As I petrify, I put my left hand on my hip and bring my other one up in a two fingers and solute off. Making a large, goofy smile. If I'm going to be stone for the rest of my life, then I may as well be in a cool looking pose. And that's the last I remembered before the darkness consumed me.
