The Library of Discord

by Chinchillax


Chapter 8

Fluttershy and Discord were left alone in the hallway of the library.
“What are you still doing here, Fluttershy?” asked Discord.
“I… I want to be your friend, Discord.” Fluttershy responded.
“Why? You have no idea who I am, I’ve caused untold pain and stress to you. Why in the multiverse would you ever want to be my friend?”
“Because I know what it’s like to not to have friends.”
Discord stared at her.
“I… I didn’t know what I was feeling for the longest time. I was so alone. But I had always, always been alone. I thought that’s just what life was like. Just sadness… and fear of making a mistake and worry about the future and the fear of others. I had no idea what the feeling was, but now I can recognize it. It was loneliness. For the first time in my life, I now have friends. I never had any before, and now that I have them I understand why I disliked life and was so scared all the time. The feeling was loneliness, Discord. I couldn’t understand that I was feeling loneliness until I finally had friends to compare the feeling with.”
He stopped levitating above her and slowly sat on the library floor in front of her.
“You must be lonely Discord. You don’t know that’s what you’re feeling because you don’t know what not being lonely feels like. I didn’t either. It took me so long to see that there can be good in the world, and I look at you and see how much being lonely hurts you too. You don’t recognize it, but that’s the feeling.”
Fluttershy saw Discord do something she had only seen him do once before, his eyes started to water. Fluttershy took the moment to get closer to Discord and place a hoof around him.
“It’s okay, Discord. It’s okay.” Fluttershy tried to assure him. “It’s just us here. Please tell me about yourself. I’ve told you about myself. Can I hear more about you?”
“You would never understand, Fluttershy.” Discord softly argued. “You cannot comprehend all that I’ve been through. All the things I’ve experienced and read and felt.”
“Twilight said that time passed by differently here. I could stay here for a year and it wouldn’t matter.”
Discord was taken aback. No one had ever wanted to spend any time at all trying to understand him, let alone offer a year to understand.
“I’m willing to stay and listen for as long as it takes to understand and appreciate you enough to be your friend, Discord. I know how lonely life can be. I know how sad that loneliness can feel and I don’t want anyone to ever have to feel that way. Everyone deserves to have a true friend that they can talk to.”
She draped her left wing over Discord.

He looked at her, and then back to his hands. He sighed and tried to begin. But there was too much to say. He sat there for a few minutes before finally beginning his story.
“I’ve been alive for trillions of years. That’s something you can’t understand, you’ve only been alive for a few short years. You can’t comprehend the amount of time I’ve been alive. I… don’t know how to put the length I have been alive into something you can comprehend. 1 million seconds is 11 days. 1 billion seconds is 31 years. 1 trillion seconds is 31688 years. You can’t even understand the numbers I am talking about, Fluttershy. No one can. It’s just me. I’m the oldest living thing in the universe. Why? Because I’m not even from this universe.
“When a universe dies, the reason it does so is because there is too much chaos. The pure hydrogen in a sun will slowly fuse and fuse and fuse to ever more complex elements. When the whole universe has gotten to the point where all the hydrogen and smaller elements are gone, the universe is simply too chaotic to function. There are no suns to even support life anymore.
“I’m from one of those past dead universes. I’m completely immortal in every way and so I have witnessed the births and deaths of several new universes. But the old one’s still lingered. I collected those old chaotic universes. There were so many of them. There are still so many of them. I was their funeral director. I tried to get what information I could from those places. But there wasn’t enough. I’m too immortal, Fluttershy. I eventually take in so much information that I finish everything there is to know about a place.
“That’s when I figured I would create the library. I would take all these old chaotic universes and make them into a library that would contain all the information about those universes, as well as all information there could possibly be. Everything is contained in this library. All possibility and probability exists in some form here. I gave form to all those old dead universes and I’ve been reading all of it since I made the library.
“I’m about 45% done with my complete reading of the library. A lot of it is nonsense. But sometimes I find things that are truly beautiful. Sad things, happy things, everything is here. It’s why I like it so much. Because I am immortal and this is the first thing in a long, long time that has actually taken up my unlimited time. True immortality is a very sad thing, Fluttershy. Everyone dies. Even the so called immortal Princesses will die eventually. I can't imagine their immortality spells lasting through the destruction of the universe.
“Not me though, I’ll outlast this universe, and the one after it, and the one after that.” He sighed sorrowfully “I… I’m just so glad I have this library. It’ll take me the lifespan of innumerable of universes before I finish it. It’s the only place I know that will last so long. I just wish this library could last longer than I will.”
Discord started to cry. He had thought about what it would be like to tell someone his story, to tell anyone what he went through, what he continues to go through day after day. Eon after eon.
“I’ve run out of things to experience. That is the eventuality of being truly immortal. There’s nothing left to learn.”

There was no sound but the stillness of the library as Fluttershy tried to think of how to comfort her friend.
“Have you ever experienced being friends with me before?” Fluttershy asked.
This gave Discord pause. He had experienced nearly everything there was to experience, at least through books, that is. “I…” he struggled to find an answer “Well… no. I guess I haven’t.”
“Being with someone is not something you can read about, Discord,” Fluttershy expressed. “It’s something more than that. Ponies, sentient beings, living things are what truly make up life.”
“But… you’ll die someday. It hurts too much to try to get to know others when you’ll outlive them. Everything will die someday, except me.”

Fluttershy took this in and stopped to think for a few moments.
“Maybe if you are a good enough friend to me, I’ll agree to become immortal, like you. Then you could always have someone with you no matter how long.”
Discord stared at Fluttershy for several moments before finally softly asking. “You would really do that… for me?”
“I’m not sure if I could agree right now to stay with you forever. I still need to get to know you more. You’ve shared with me so much, and I didn’t understand all of it. But I think I understood enough to see that you have been lonely for a very, very long time.”