Chapter 2- Old Grudges
The very force of the word shook the ground beneath the ponies' feet, causing a few leaves to fall from the trees that lined the clearing and the ponies to shout out, afraid. Fluttershy held tightly onto Discord's tail. Grimacing slightly, the draconequus reached behind himself, pulled the pegasus off and set her on the ground next to him, raising an eyebrow at her before facing the bushes again.
"Yes, Constance, my name hasn't changed over the last fifteen thousand years. Good to know your sense of dramatics hasn't either," Discord inspected his claws closely. "Why are you in the bushes anyway?"
Said vegetation trembled and parted as a large creature came through them. Constance stepped into the light, and all of the ponies scrambled back a few feet, Fluttershy making small, frightened noises in her throat. Constance had the form of an enormous black and white striped cat, making Opal look like a mouse in comparison. Her body moved as smoothly as a snake's, her teeth were sharp, and her claws, half-out, gleamed in the dim light. Despite her fearsome appearance, though, she did not look angry. In fact, her face was devoid of emotion as she stopped right in front of the draconequus.
"Speak for yourself," The cat said shortly. "This is a forest. It is rather hard not to be in the foliage. In point of fact, you were in the bushes too, until you entered the clearing."
Discord snorted. "At least I wasn't hiding in the bushes."
Constance raised an eyebrow. "I was not 'hiding in the bushes'."
"Looked like it," Discord sing-songed.
It was silent for a moment as Constance seemed to decide not to reply to the taunt. None of the ponies wanted to speak. There was a sense of power that seemed to weigh the very air down, and it had the most interesting affect of making their mouth's not want to move, and their vocal chords to not function properly.
Constance's ice blue eyes slowly wandered over to the six. As she registered their presence, the feeling suddenly went away. Twilight stepped forward, wondering whether the cat had made the pressure lift or not.
"Um, excuse me," She said softly. Constance looked directly at her, and Twilight shrank back slightly from her piercing gaze.
"I was lead to think you did not like ponies, Discord. Why did you then bring six of them with you?"
"It's a long story," Discord said bluntly.
"Oh, a long story. You and I are not immortal or anything," Constance replied, so subtly sarcastic that Twilight could see almost see her roll her eyes.
"Constance, we have something to tell you," Twilight continued. "There's a-
"Oh yeah!" Discord nearly yelled. He flew over to Constance and grabbed her shoulders. She looked slightly shocked at the sudden contact. "Don't know if you've noticed, but there's an overbalance of order, and I really need to pull in some more chaos, but I needed to let you know so that you wouldn't try to block the effort, and now that you know, I can do it!" Discord let go of the Spirit, and she stepped back a few feet, still looking shaken, as the draconequus flew up above the trees. There was a brilliant flash of light, and a light breeze began to blow. Landing lightly on his hind legs, Discord wiped his hands, looking pleased with himself. "Done, and done. Well, we can go home, now! Bye, Constance, see you later!" He began to walk back the way they had come.
"Wait, where are you going?"
"I just said! Home," Discord gestured vaguely in front of himself. "We're done, you don't ever have to see me again, bye-bye!"
"Get over here."
Discord stayed where he was.
Constance sighed quietly. "Please."
Smirking, he flew back. "What do you want, old buddy, old pal, old friend?"
Constance muttered something derogatory under her breath, and motioned the others back. Closing her eyes, she waved her paw. With a brilliant blue flash, the air shimmered. Constance opened her eyes and began examining the thing that had appeared in front of her. Discord sat back as if he'd seen this before, but the ponies gaped at it.
"What the hay is that?" Applejack muttered.
"It's so shiny!" Pinkie Pie shouted. Rainbow looked at the pink pony with annoyance, Fluttershy stayed silent, and Twilight was unable to form words.
"Is that a map?" Rarity asked slowly.
"Yes," Constance replied, not looking at her.
"But," Rarity paused uncertainly. "It's, um, moving."
"That is correct."
"But," She paused again. "Maps don't move."
"It is a live, holographic map of Equestria," Constance explained, finally glancing in her direction.
Twilight snapped out of her state of shock. "A live map? Like, it shows the weather? And what all of the ponies in Equestria are doing at this very moment?" Her voice was full of excitement.
In response, Constance put her paws over a city and pulled outward, causing the map to grow in size, and the city to get bigger. At this scale, they could see the forms of ponies walking around, talking, and going about their daily business.
"What city is that?" Applejack asked.
"It looks like Manehatten," Fluttershy said quietly.
"Are we really watching what those ponies are doing right now?" Rainbow asked.
"Yes," Constance seemed distracted as she maximized the map again and began to look carefully at the clouds.
"That's awesome!"
Discord leaned forward, peering at the map. "What are you looking at?"
"Are those pegasi moving the clouds?" Constance pretended not to have heard his question.
"Yep! We pegasi control the weather!" Rainbow boasted.
Constance blinked at the cyan pegasus. "Fascinating."
She looked at the map for a moment longer, then glanced at Discord. "I gather the clouds are not supposed to move on their own, then."
"No, the ponies don't particularly like that. Nor do they like cotton candy clouds and chocolate milk rain," Discord scowled.
"But I loved the chocolate milk rain!" Pinkie Pie jumped up and down in excitement.
"Oh, Pinkie, you're not like other ponies. You're special," Discord's voice dripped sarcasm, but the pink pony was unaffected.
"Ooh, yay!" She shouted. Discord rolled his eyes, smiling.
"Quiet," Constance snapped. She was focused on one end of the map, where a storm was pouring down rain on Phillydelphia. "This is not manufactured weather. This is random," She glanced at Discord. "You are not doing this?" She pointed at the dark cloud.
"No," Discord said, annoyed. "I don't do stuff like that anymore, thank you very much."
"Well, I am not creating it either, so that is a problem. If it is not you, and it is not me, than who is it?"
"Nopony alive today has the capability to do that except for us," Discord countered.
"I woke up today. Maybe someone else did as well," Constance stated bluntly.
"But who..." Discord trailed off uncertainly. "Can't you do your scan thing? You're pretty good at that."
Scowling, Constance turned back to the hologram and waved her paw over it. The whole map glowed blue, except for a small dot north of Phillydelphia. The dot glowed a deep red.
"What's that?" Twilight asked softly.
"Let us find out," Constance replied, and zoomed in the map. An image came in clearly. The two Spirits looked at each other.
"Malade," They said at once.
As the name left their mouths, the wind whipped around the clearing, causing the trees to sway in the wind. The sound of branches hitting each other filled the air, and dead leaves rained down from above. There was a sudden, strange pulling sensation, a loud bang and everything went dark.
And the forest was quiet.