The Elements of Discord

by Midnightshadow


Chapter 2

The Elements of Discord

Chapter 2

An MLP:FiM Fanfiction by Midnight Shadow

My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic © Hasbro and Lauren Faust. Please support the official release


“Angel! Run! Tell the others! Tell the others!” Fluttershy screamed, but the portal closed. As the very fabric of reality bent around her with a disconcerting wrench, Fluttershy found herself screaming. It felt like she had been turned inside out and reassembled backwards. The dizzying whirling maelstrom subsided, leaving her reaching and gasping for breath like a beached fish. Even now, as her head cleared, everything felt... wrong somehow, an unnerving oddness which grated on her hooves. Blinking, she stood up, swaying. She didn’t know where they were, but it looked like the Everfree Forest... only it felt different. She got the feeling she wasn’t in Equestria anymore.

“Damn you and your stupid pets! Oh well, one blasted rabbit can hardly interfere with our plans. He’ll be dead before nightfall. Now you, get in the cage!” Slice’n’dice pointed with one hoof first at Fluttershy, then at a cage built atop an old rickety wagon. Fluttershy considered flight - literally, which was unusual for the usually earth-bound pegasus - but two armoured, burly and menacing pegasus ponies closed in, flanking her double. They levelled pikes at her and glared, and she decided against fleeing. Where would she go, anyhow? Her usual shy demeanor reasserted itself as, head bowed, she clambered into the small, dank and filthy space.
“Come on boys, let’s get our prize to Little Miss Great One,” Slice’n’dice said, spitting the remaining scraps of fur and feathers from her recent escapades onto the ground, “we’ll pick up the rest on the way.”
The wagon was hitched, the ponies pulled it, and the group trundled out of the forest towards town.

***

“Ah Poniberg, how I loathe thee.” said Slice’n’dice as they crested the hill and a strange facsimile of the town Fluttershy knew of as Ponyville lay before them. Fluttershy couldn't help but stand and stare in wonder. Everything was so... similar! The park, the library, the mayor's residence... but it was all somehow wrong. The wrong colour, the wrong shape, doors and windows barred or broken. Fluttershy started weeping again, softly. Wherever she was, home was far, far away.
“At least there’s somewhere to get out of the rain, unlike the sodding Everscream Forest. Always so dank and dreary.”
Fluttershy looked on mutely, as they passed the outskirts, the fearful pegasus began to take in just how much it was like Ponyville, and yet not. It was disconcerting. Houses were in the same place, but they were different. More run-down, faded, and in disrepair. Windows were shuttered and doors were barred. Everywhere, ponies trotted through the streets avoiding each other’s gaze. Ponies spoke in whispers, if at all, and scattered when they saw the wagon and who was pulling it.
Fluttershy felt her heart sink, whatever had happened, wherever they were, it was going to take a lot more than a little luck to get away. How would a pony like her know how to get home from another world like this? She slumped in the corner of the wagon and cried herself to sleep.

***

Fluttershy came to as the jostling and bouncing stopped, the echoing clip-clop of hooves on stone dying away to silence. A stick was poking her, and she roused fitfully from her painful sleep on the floor of the wheeled cage.
“Wake up!” hissed a voice mumbling through the stick held in its owner’s mouth, “The Great One wishes to see her prize.”
“Where are we? Who wants to see me? ... Are you going to let me out?” whispered Fluttershy quietly, almost squeaking.
“Silence! Silence or I'll kill you!” hissed the voice again, poking Fluttershy with the stick. The light grew bright enough to illuminate the same yellow pony who had captured her. It was not her double, but one of the guards who had poked her.
"Fool! Leave her!" Fluttershy’s doppelganger hissed and batted the stick away from him, chasing him off.

As she looked around, Fluttershy realised she was far from alone in the room. Other than the two nameless guards that had barely spoken to her, and her strange twin that had called herself Slice’n’Dice, several other almost-familiar ponies accompanied them. They each bore powerful resemblances to ponies she knew, but in every case the resemblance was twisted and lacking. It was more than unnerving, it made her all the more fearful.
“Hold!” rang out a voice, soft yet edged with a malice that made Fluttershy’s blood run cold, “You’ll not be harming our guest. My Mistress needs her, and she wants her in one piece. You know how you get carried away, dear Slice’n’Dice, not satisfied until every last ounce of enjoyment is gone - you’ll not touch her either without my permission or I’ll have your hide.”
The last few words were spoken in a barking hiss, sibilant yet cutting. The other ponies flinched though Fluttershy couldn’t see the speaker. Several of the other pony-doubles gathered around her cage now. Fluttershy definitely recognized some of them, though they were twisted caricatures of her friends. A red pony, fat and huffing instead of sleek and muscular; ironically, his 'ugly mark' as Fluttershy had remembered her double had called it, was an applecore. A pink unicorn pony, her forelegs covered in scars, head drooping low and hair covering her eyes, her ugly mark seemed to be more scars. Fluttershy wasn’t sure at this distance and in this light whether they were actually scars or just a mark.
Well that’s Big Mac and Pinkie Pie, sort of, thought Fluttershy to herself, and noted an orange pony bowing and scraping before a ruined stone throne though the pony upon it was entirely in shadow. Flutter’s head lolled to one side and she screwed up her eyes to make sense of the ugly mark,
“A snake?” she said aloud, loud enough to attract the attention of the not-Big Mac.
“That’s mah sister you’re talkin’ about, you’d best be silent and not be sayin’ another word or imma go git mah beatin’ stick.”
“Hush now Big Mouth!” said Slice’n’Dice, and planted a swift rear hoof-kick in the red pony’s muzzle, “you’d best keep that flapping jaw shut or I’ll shut it permanently!”
“Ponies, please, our guest... leave us now. I must get acquainted before my mistress arrives and you needn’t bother her with our plans for her friends.” The words was spoken by the same quiet, soft voice that had silenced the small group before. Its power hadn’t diminished and the group of ponies dispersed, though not without jostling and kicking, into the shadows surrounding the room.
“I know all about you, Fluttershy, and your world. Equestria... it shares so much with our own, even the name is similar. Even its ruler. I don’t understand it all, but your world is a mirror of ours,” said the pony from the throne, stepping into the light, “where things aren’t quite the same.”
“W-why am I h-here?” asked Fluttershy, cowering at the back of the wagon as the pony who had spoken previously clopped closer. Fluttershy watched as the form of a grey pegasus pony stepped halfway into the wan circle of sunlight drifting through windows high up in the hall. The pony had grey fur, yellow hair and a single blue eye. Fluttershy gasped when the pony moved closer and revealed she had only the one eye, and was almost sick when she saw that the pegasus had only one wing. “Derpy..." Fluttershy shook her head, this wasn’t the real Derpy, this was... somepony else, “but... what happened to you?” asked Fluttershy
“This?” asked the pony, raising the stump of her burnt wing and regarding it as if it were some alien tentacle, “My mistress demands a high price for obedience. They called me mad before, but I knew my place, and my mistress answered my call. She took my eye and she took my wing, boiled it away in her glory,” the pegasus laughed, a shrill, mad laugh, “smoke and feathers, that’s all it was, burning flesh, such a sweet, sweet fragrance, and the pain was exquisite - she took my offerings and bestowed gifts upon me in return. Power, glory, respect. They fear me now, Fluttershy, they fear Bubbly Grime, they fear my command of her minions, they fear my power..."

The pony was quite, quite mad, realised Fluttershy, as the grey pegasus changed tactics, stepping close to the cage so Fluttershy could smell her rancid breath, “I can give you so much, you are a pegasus after all, I can give you a place next to mine, my right hoof mare, to dwell in glory in the world which is to come when my mistress ascends, when we her chosen ascend. Do you want that?”
Fluttershy shook with fear and she could barely speak, but she managed a few words, “In-in my wo-world you’re the sweetest pegasus pony I know. You wouldn’t hurt a fl-fly, Derpy, you may have... issues with your eyes, and your flying, but we love you. I love you. You’re the best mail-pony Ponyville has ever had.” Fluttershy gulped, ears splaying low against her head, realizing what she’d said, “I don’t know who you are, you’re not our Derpy - you look like her, kind of, but you’re not her. You’re evil. You’re twisted. I’ll have no-nothing to do with you. Good day.”
Fluttershy turned around and started sobbing softly to herself; the evil, warped mirror-image of one of her best friends, Derpy, standing there before her so full of cruelty and malice was more than she could bear, “Go away, I’ll never help you.” said Fluttershy through her wings, which she held close around her head.
“Oh I know,” said the not-Derpy softly, “I didn’t think you would, and that’s not why you’re here. It’s really quite simple; Some ponies... just want to watch the world burn.”

***

“Get your butts in gear you lazy mules! We’ve got an invasion to spring! Git on up there, in formation! I’ll have your hides if you ain’t in position in ten seconds flat!”
There was the crack of a whip and a wail, and another of the slave ponies went down under the brutal flail, he was too weak to rise and a couple of heavily-armoured guard-ponies dragged him off out of sight. There were brief sounds of a struggle, a single choked off cry, and then silence. Nopony raised so much as an ear in interest.
They were a haggard lot, almost to a pony their eyes were glassy and dull, without hope. The well-fed amongst them were armoured; these were the guards and their lackeys, making sure the masses of predominantly earth-ponies were kept in line. Pegasus ponies flitted through the skies above, delivering messages and swift justice, or harrying stragglers. The unicorns were huddled in groups, intelligent and haughty expressions upon their muzzles. Above them all, watching with an imperial gaze as she sat upon a golden throne, was a beautiful winged unicorn mare... or she would have been beautiful if she had allowed her countenance to show so much as an ounce of compassion. Behind her, dotted throughout the war-camp, were her flags and standards. To those who could read - the elite unicorns, a few of her chosen pegasus consorts and personal guards - the script spoke of honour and duty. To the rest their message was simple: obey.

Queen Celeste surveyed her lands with disdain; with the banishment of her elder and weaker sister Selena a thousand years ago, Celeste's absolute, molevolent rule had been cemented and complete. She had thereafter controlled both day and night with an iron hoof, bestowing boons and meting out her own ideas of justice to her pathetic subjects on a whim. And yet, a little voice inside her whispered, true total victory had eluded her. The Elements of Discord had been scattered in that fateful final battle, which had culminated in her triumph over her sister, and had seen her sister’s powers all but extinguished.
Then, with the escape from banishment and sudden, irritating resurgence of her treacherous goody-good sister, Celeste had been forced to search once again for that source of ancient magic which she had abjured so long ago. It had taken the investigations of a wall-eyed mare of inconsequential background to discover their location and unlock the secret to their recovery, work which she had repaid well.
Loyalty was useful, Celeste thought to herself, as far as it went, though the uppity nag oft had notions beyond her station. Celeste had to agree, however, that the results had been worth the effort... so far.

Celeste turned to a faceless armoured unicorn guard, “Fetch my six commanders, they are relieved of whatever duties they are currently executing and are required to attend their queen. Now.” Her voice was soft, but commanded more than just respect. It required utter, unwavering devotion.
“At once, milady.” said the unicorn, and hurried off in a clatter of hooves. It did not do well to keep the Queen waiting, one did not get the opportunity to do so twice.
Celeste narrowed her eyes as she watched the invasion forces, using her magic as much as normal vision. Idly, her mind was cast back to her latest and greatest triumph, and failure. Her favoured disciple, one Daybreak Glimmer, had grown arrogant with the power heaped upon her, and had attempted to depose her mistress the Queen and take Celeste's place. It hadn’t ended well. Celeste chuckled as she thought about it. The consequences she had bestowed on her errant ex-disciple were an eternal, visible reminder to the rest of her subjects, constantly inspiring fresh obedience and respect.

Celeste smiled cruelly, Glimmer's would-be cronies had abandoned the apostate, turning to the Queen herself and pledging their lives. She’d seen fit to 'reward' them, coincidentally tying them body, mind and soul to her own will.
Amanita Jack, the self-appointed leader. Heartless in pursuit of her own best interests, her talents deemer her worthy to stand amongst the best, despite her deficiency as an Earth Pony. In many ways, she was the same as her brother, Big Mouth, though he was useful only as a bully and meatshield. Having said that, Celeste recognized that even brute strength and ignorance had its uses.
Weepy-Cry the pink unicorn... to be truthful, Celeste just liked to watch the despondent pink pony cut herself up over her inability to please the Queen. Everybody needed a jester to kick, it was even better when the jester kicked itself.
Vanity the pegasus, oh yes... Vanity was a beauty, and silver of tongue. The Queen kept her around purely for the ego boost, as because she, Celeste, was the most beautiful pony in all of Estrosia, and she knew how much that ate at Vanity's soul. She knew just how much it burned and writhed within the pegasus.
And then there was Rainbow Crash, the well-built and well-hung red pegasus stallion with the glorious rainbow mane and tail, her sometimes-consort and the brains of the bunch. Second in intellect only to her and Slice’n’Dice, who was by far the more crafty but only capable of thinking of herself.
They lined up now in front of her and abased themselves. They would do, but they needed to be shown their places. Again.
With a hearty thump that shook the plateau where they were standing, a huge, adult, purple dragon landed behind the winged unicorn queen, proffering a paw to her. She daintily hopped upon it and rose to stand on the creature's head. “Ah, my subjects, my worthy chosen few. Are all the preparations in order? When may the hour of my glorious conquest begin?”
“My lady,” answered Crash, his deep and booming voice rolling smoothing from this lips, “your troops are assembled. They have been trained and outfitted... some of them may even be fit to be called soldiers, where they are not mere squalling infants. Your armies stand ready.”
“My magicians are ready,” whispered Weepy-Cry, “if it pleases Your Majesty.”
Celeste snorted, “if that feeble attempt at opening the gateways yesterday is anything to go by, I think not, but it will have to do.” The queen sneered, laughing internally at the pained expression on the unicorn's muzzle. Fresh scars already attested to her despondency; the queen had been pushing the unicorn hard. Weepy-Cry seldom found any other way to release tension.
“Logistics are a go, ma’am. Food, supplies, gear... you name it, you got it.” Amanita spoke up, proudly presenting her well-organized troops.
“Very well, my little ponies. You have done well. Everything is in order, and so we march. I order the gateways be opened fully. My trusted commanders, you shall go first to prepare the way and my troops will follow on the morrow. Accompany Bubbly Grime and obey her commands as you obey mine, she comes now at my call.” the glorious winged unicorn monarch raised her head and looked expectantly to her left.
There was a flash of light and the grey, one-eyed, one-winged pegasus appeared, having teleported in. She flew gracefully, despite one wing being made of baleful fire and the other being stumpy and misshapen.
Celeste leaped from the dragon’s head and landed lightly before Bubbly Grime, and the latter bowed before her mistress. "You serve me well, Bubbly Grime, in all things."
"Yes, Mistress."
"You will pledge your body, mind and soul to my cause?"
"I do! I swear it!" the pegasus said, muzzle buried so deep within her forehooves that her voice was slurred and muffled.
"Very well, then receive my boon." Celeste touched her horn to the pegasus’ head and with another flash of light and a painful grimace from Bubbly Grime, a small pearly white horn burst from her flesh.
Bubbly Grime hissed, writhing in pain, as dark strands of power arced their way across her body. The now-winged unicorn seemed to fill out, her empty eye-socket glowing with a soft blue-white glimmer where her long-gone eye use to be. It seemed to stare into the nothingness beyond infinity, focused on some dark hell of no return. The other ponies found it disconcerting, and kept their heads lowered, exchanging furtive glances.
“Arise now, High Commander Bubbly Grime, I name you my first and most favoured disciple. Your mastery of the black arts has earned you a place in my pantheon, and I grant thee my mark. Be thou now a Winged Unicorn, few amongst the many.”
Celeste turned, and clip-clopped to stand next to Bubbly Grime. The queen bid her new favoured disciple rise and take her place at the queen's side. Celeste noted with cruel amusement the pain on Weepy-Cry’s face at the sudden elevation of a mere pegasus. “Go now, my generals; prepare the gates, marshal my armies and spread my power to this new world.”
“At once, mistress!” her minions said in unison, though they stayed with heads bowed nervously, until the Queen had ridden her dragon away, and her mad laughter no longer rang in their ears.

***

In another world, near a town that was still reeling from the aftermath of a storm the likes of which had never been seen before, Zecora was trotting out of Ponyville on her way to check up on her own hut. She prayed it hadn’t been destroyed by the weather or falling branches, though well before the onset, her tail had been twitching and she had locked away her most precious tomes in safety. She’d secured them and gathered up what cantrips and curios she could before the oncoming gale, the better to prepare for their need.
On the edge of the forest itself she spied a weakly hobbling pony emerging into the meadow, carrying what appeared to be a bundle of rags in her mouth - no, thought Zecora, that’s no pony, that’s a unicorn, but what’s missing... her horn?
Zecora stepped closer, and the pony flicked her ears back and shuddered, her painful steps halting and then reversing as she tried to back away, “Ho now, dear pony, I’m here to help, no phony!”
In a whirl of motion that caught her by surprise, a small furry form leaped from the unicorn’s back and puffed itself up as large as possible between her and the unicorn, it tried to growl and failed. For all it’s slight size, the sheer bravado impressed the zebra-pony, “little one, do not fear, it is help you will find when Zecora is near. Calm yourself, calm, tell me all about it.”
Angel, for that is who the bunny was, backed up slowly and carefully, looking back at the blue pony for support. Wordlessly, the blue pony with the shattered horn nodded, and the bunny seemed to fall in on himself and collapse. Zecora rushed to his aid and noticed his injuries, and those of the unicorn she recognized as Trixie, for all their meeting had been brief.
“Trixie, unicorn of blue - what is it that has happened to you?” asked Zecora, trotting closer and nuzzling the unicorn softly on the face, “you’ve lost your horn... how?”

Trixie just wept, and the zebra found herself comforting the injured equine to the best of her abilities. Through rough sign-language, Trixie explained that she had been attacked, her horn had been shattered - she carefully unwrapped the forlorn bundle of rags wherein she had secreted the pieces to display to Zecora, who looked like she would be sick - and somehow rendered lame and unable to speak.
“We must return to Ponyville at once! Mayor Mare must hear of this most heinous attack! Who did it, can you tell me, describe them?”
Trixie glanced about, and then drew very carefully a half-moon shape in the dirt, and a rough pony-shape around it.
“Luna... no... Nightmare Moon?”
Trixie shook her head, then nodded it, then deliberately drew a cross through the shape, and drew another next to it. This one was a star-shape within a pony.
“Celestia? Wait... no... Twilight? Twilight did this?”
Trixie again nodded, and then shook her head, and drew an arrow between the two, and eventually drew a moon-shape inside her Twilight-picture.
“Twilight Sparkle has taken up the mantle of the Nightmare Princess?”
Trixie drew a crown, and Zecora blinked, “Twilight Sparkle, the Nightmare Queen? We must hurry back with all speed, we must fetch Celestia, and Luna!”
Zecora was so agitated she forgot to rhyme for a moment, and could barely contain herself enough to proffer a small bag of snuff-like herb to Trixie, “I do not usually agree with such acts, but this herb here will give you a boost, that’s a fact.”
Trixie looked dubiously at the small bag, then gave it a sniff, and then more of a sniff. It was like firecrackers going off in her brain. She felt like The Great and Powerful Trixie again, it was wonderful! She felt light-headed and giddy and wanted to dance. She reached her head again for another sniff but the bag was taken away very swiftly.
“Woah there, that’s enough, you can get quite addicted to this stuff!”
With some begging, a little pleading, some pushing and a lot of cajoling Zecora managed to get her injured, hyperactive charge moving in the right direction. She now held Trixie’s horn - in her euphoria she had ignored the bundle - and Angel the rabbit rode in Zecora’s bag. She had recognized Fluttershy’s pet even in his dishevelled state and vowed to heal him to the best of her abilities. Even more urgently, Celestia and Luna had to be warned.

***

In their mad gallop it seemed like only moments before they were entering the outskirts of Ponyville, but the trip had been rough, especially on the injured Trixie. In her doped-up state she couldn’t feel it but she was pushing herself beyond tolerance, just one of the reasons Zecora frowned upon the use of certain medicines in her collection except under exceptional circumstances - and these counted.

The mysterious bag of herbs was beginning to wear off and Trixie stumbled and fell heavily into the dirt where she lay, breathing heavily, eyes white and a thick sheen of sweat matting her coat. She started to convulse.
Zecora pulled up short and threw her hood back, yelling though she too was out of breath, “Spike! Spike!” she called loudly, rewarded with the pitter-patter of small draconic feet from behind her. Turning her head to see the young dragon approaching nervously, clasping his front paws together, she spoke clearly and without haste as she laid her hooves on the unicorn and attempted to stop her from biting or swallowing her lolling tongue, “quickly, I need you to fetch Princess Celestia at once, and a nurse! Trixie is injured most severely, maybe worse!”

The little dragon turned almost white at being ordered to fetch the princess - nopony fetches royalty! - but did as he was bid, pushing his way out of the crowd which had rapidly formed around the trio of exhausted animals and scurrying off to catch Celestia before she left back to Canterlot, her work done with containing and calming the storm from the night before.