It was mere moments later that Discord found himself in the statue garden for the second time in a day. Nerves couldn't help but flair up as he followed Luna and Celestia trotted behind him, almost as if he had been here before, "If either of them say they got me a gift, or ask me to sing again, just send yourself to another dimension and save yourself the trouble."
As they walked through the statues, Discord couldn't help but feel that a disquieting feeling was growing in the pit of his stomach. It was almost as if rather than being an actual victory, he was marching to the gallows, trying to enjoy the last view his eyes would ever see while his innards cried out for a last meal.
Suddenly Luna came to a halt and softly spoke only three words, "We are here," the trio looked up at the statue of a pony nearly forgotten by all, the smugness of a moment forever captured on his face.
Celestia stepped forward with a small frown and looked up to the statue. After a few moments she spoke aloud, "Prisoner A-A-Twenty-Three, commonly known as Determination, you have been granted a probation by the justice system as of this date, prepare for reanimation."
The two sisters nodded at each other and cast a spell simultaneously. Discord stood back with a pair of sunglasses on his face to block out the blinding light that the two unleashed. Several moments later, the light died down, and the two ponies backed away, "Welcome back my little pony," Luna said with a reassuring smile.
Celestia frowned slightly at the blue unicorn laying in a daze in the grass, "Try not to cause any trouble. I leave you now under the care of Discord. Sister, we must be away," With that the two sisters left Discord alone with his new charge.
Discord looked down at the pony lying in the grass, a small smile on his face as he held out his paw, "Hello, name's Discord, but I'm sure you know that already;"
"Shhh, silence if you please, I must think," the pony rudely interrupted Discord with a frown, "I've been forced to stand in that position with my eyes open for what feels like forever. This grass and I have a lot of loafing to do."
Discord's jaw dropped in shock at the clout of this unicorn before he frowned deeply, "Listen here, I talked my way into letting you out early because you are needed for a job, now if you would kindly;"
It was amazing how fast he moved at those words, the stallion jumped to his hooves so quickly that his hat and cape flew off of him into the dust, "Oh by the old gods! How could I forget, I was supposed to be at the Canterlot Airship Yards," he paused and did some quick math in his head, "Eight months ago! Oh, I hope that they did alright without that message I was supposed to deliver to maintenance about replacing the hydrogen with helium."
"You wouldn't happen to have been on the crew for the Titan on your last day out, would you?"
The pony stopped his frantic movement for a few moments to nod while he tried to grab his satchel, only to find it still made of stone, "Yeah she was on my roster, why do you ask?"
Approximately Eight Months Ago...
It was an overcast day as a small group of ponies stood awaiting the arrival of the airship Titan, the worlds biggest, and safest airship. Amid the group of ponies there was a gryphon and unicorn working together on a recording device, while a team of nearby ponies were filming for the national newsreels.
Brightsound paused from her work at the station and pointed a hoof at the gryphon letting him know it was time to begin, "Hello everyone across Equestria, be you a pony, gryphon minotar or what have you. This is Herb Razortongue reporting. It is a beautiful day here in Neigh Jersey, slightly overcast but it shouldn't be a problem for the expert crew of sixty one aboard the Titan. Yes, the pegasi are now leaving the ship to bring in the mooring lines, as is traditional for these proceedings."
On cue the pegasi passed the several mooring lines to the waiting earth ponies, as several unicorns took a magical hold on the silver giant. "And now here she is coming in for a landing, and it's starting to rain again as they bring it closer to the mooring mast, the motors are just barely going to help keep her in place."
Suddenly everything went wrong, a sudden spark caught the rear of the ship on fire, spreading panic through the masses, "Oh by Celestia it has burst into flame! Everypony get out of the way!"
Quickly, a team of pegasi above, unleashed an emergancey torrent of rain, while a set of unicorns buckled down to carry the entire weight of the ship, and others still snuffed the flames out entirely. "And that was a near fatal disaster today here at Neigh Jersey, Thankfully, there was a strong staff of unicorns and pegasi available, or this could have been the biggest disaster in the history of airships. Who knows how this will effect the business of airships as it stands today."
As the memory of the recorded broadcast played through Discords memory, a glazed look fell on his features, one that he quickly shook out of his brain and gave a small smile, "Nothing they couldn't handle."
It was then that the unicorn began to panic slightly, "I can't believe it! Maybe if I hurry, I can beg for my old job back. What if they make me start at the beginning again? I can't go back to loading cargo! WAIT! What about my stories! They are all still petrified! Hey, think you can lend me some magic so I can get this satchel out? I kinda need it, it's got my I.D. and paper work. OH! What about my apartment? What if they rented it out? My stuff! Oh, I gotta get to the south end of town and see if Steam Shine has been holding it for me," the unicorn kept rambling at a mile a minute as his voice kept getting squeakier with panic.
Discord raised a talon to say something, only to keep getting interrupted by the pony, again and again. Finally he had enough and grabbed the stallion by his horn as he hyperventilated into a paper bag, "Be silent you ungrateful little... I mean, relax. I'm going to try an exercise with you to calm you down, would you like that?"
The unicorn nodded slightly as he stared deep into the mismatched red eyruses of Discord's yellow eyes, "Now I want you to empty your mind."
"Empty my mind?"
"Empty your mind of everything not related to story writing."
"Empty my mind," the effect seemed to be working as he seemed to relax slightly under Discord's stare.
"Empty your mind of everything not related to writing. Writing, and breathing..."
Inside the mind of the relaxing unicorn, a visual image of an office space with about a dozen versions of himself sitting behind desks materialized. Suddenly another version of himself, this one wearing glasses and a top hat burst into the work space, "I just got orders from the top, everything not related to writing has to go!"
"Everything?!" The group of ponies echoed back at him.
"EVERYTHING!"
Instantly there was a flurry of unicorns galloping about in a frenzy as they began to shred all files and folders not related to writing. One eager pony was shredding entire files from the drawer of long term memory. Some of witch included, Foalhood Memories, Spice Tips, the surprisingly thin folder marked Proper Social Skills.
The boss part of the mind came up to him stomping his hooves on the tile, "Come on come on, faster! What do you think I pay you for!"
To his shock, the stallion raised a hoof and answered back, "You don't pay me! We don't even exist at all. We're just a clever visual metaphor used to personify the abstract representation of thought."
The boss was apparently not pleased with this as he gave the lesser version of him a stern look, "One more crack like that and your outta here!"
The other unicorn threw his forehooves together and got on his knees, "NO! I have comic books I want to buy!"
Thus the anarchy spread across the filing system of his brain, in an attempt to literally delete everything as if they were cyberponies and the memories were an army of timelords.
Discord gave his best smile to the stallion as he tilted his head, "How do you feel?"
The pony continued to stand there with his mouth slightly open and his eyes unfocused. Discord blinked a few times as he waited before growing impatient and snapped his fingers a few times, making a variety of silly hats appear atop the unicorns head. Nothing happened, he didn't even blink in response. "Oh great, I broke him! Just my luck."
The unicorn's response was to simply drool slightly onto the grass. Discord grimaced at the sight, "Ugh, lets get you out of here before Celestia finds out," with a snap of his fingers the two disappeared, back to the Ministry of Practical Chaos, leaving behind the petrified satchel and books.
Three hours later, and Discord's nerves were in shatters on the floor. After several attempts to pick them up and place them back where they belong, he would find them falling out again. He couldn't help but pace the room, muttering to himself, "Okay, the author is hidden for now, but what if somepony finds him? Maybe some work would calm me down. A drink perhaps? I should check in on him..."
Discord seemed to be stuck in a loop as he repeated the phrases over and over in different ways, would sit down for a few seconds, then finally stand up to pace his office again. Discord turned around and poured himself a glass of melonade as he kept talking to himself, "Steady Discord, just take one quick peek on him and see if he's recovered yet."
After a few seconds of nodding, and arguing with himself in the mirror, then having to tap out and give in after his reflection reached out for a sleeper hold, Discord left the relative safety of normality that was his office, and entered the rolling waves of the hallway. Discord quickly grabbed the nearest skateboard, and rode the waves down the hall, swerving to the left and right to avoid other ponies on roller skates, and the chain chomps roaming the halls.
"Lord Discord! Oh, Lord Discord! Can I speak with you for a moment before quitting time?" He turned to the voice calling after him to find Random Thought surfing the linoleum on a mop bucket with wheels, "I need to ask you about the latest figures coming in. We are getting complaints, stating that there is no practicality in dissolving bits, and ponies are frustrated that their money keeps disappearing. The gryphon at the national bank ripped his feathers out he was so furious!"
Discord groaned as he lowered his sunglasses to address him, "Have the dissolving bits shipped back here, we will pay the difference, and get somepony to slow down that rate of dissolve! It's supposed to take decades to break down to keep inflation down, not instantly!" Random Thought nodded as he veered to the right into another hallway, as Discord continued down for several moments, then took a left and entered the stretching gallery.
Upon entering the room, the wall behind him slid shut, and began to stretch taller and taller. The dizzying chamber had no windows, nor doors, only four portraits that became longer with the room, relieving to be longer, and more sinister as they did.
Discord floated up to the image of Luna walking a tightrope over a river of snapping hydras and pulled it open. On the other side he found the small, hidden chamber. Once inside, Discord's eyes lit up like the lamps on a carriage, and began searching for the pony of interest.
After several minutes of searching around the room, and finding a discarded black and red uniform with an artistic star pin, flugelhorn, sombrero, boots he could swear he never saw before, a doctors coat, and lastly he discovered several kitchen appliances mashed together with a refrigerator, a hastily scrawled note reading Time Machine taped to the door.
Discord opened the door of the fridge, and inside, huddled in the bottom corner, he found the author. His hooves were wrapped around his head as he shook, "Oma, why am I not good enough? Can't I go to college too?"
"Well, I see you're making a slight recovery," Discord said as he lifted the trembling unicorn up, "At least now you are making complete sentences." He heaved the pony over his shoulders and walked across the storage room, and finally placed him on the slightly torn couch in the corner, "Do you feel better? Would you like something to drink?"
The pony nodded slightly at the question, as Discord passed a glass of cider to him, "Now, tell me, what do you remember?" As he asked the question, Discord watched in some amusement as his guest tried to lift the glass with his hooves, mumbled a few times, then gave up, "Sorry, didn't hear you."
The pony sighed and gave up on the drink before answering, "A few scattered bits of my foalhood, life experiences that I can draw upon in writing. Other than that, all I seem to recall is how to write stories, and breathe," as he finished the sentence, he grabbed the drink with a weak magical grip, and quickly threw its contents into his own face.
"It also seems that you have a drinking problem," Discord said with a bit of a grin, "Well, come along. It's time to see if letting you out was worth it. We need to test those writing skills!"
The unicorn tried once again to drink from the glass, this time by trying to lap it up like a dog, after failing once again he looked up and nodded, "Alright, but I need a typewriter, paper, and you to tell me what you want."
Discord paused, waited for a few moments, then finally answered, "Do you know anything of science fiction?" The pony simply nodded in response, "Wonderful, here is your premise, a form of travel, and a disaster." as he said these things, the lights went up, and a typewriter appeared with several stacks of paper.
The pony nodded a few times before he froze and looked at Discord with a frown, "What does that have to do with science fiction?"
"Oh, nothing really. I just wanted to know if you know about it," Discord answered with a grin, "Now get to it!" The pony nodded and popped his neck. After searching for a few moments, he found and put on a pair of glasses, then began to type...