Applejack headed home from another successful day of apple bucking, with her brother by her side. The edge of the sun slowly disappeared over the horizon, leaving vibrant oranges and reds in its wake. Being with her kin brought a spring to her every step; it bounced even higher when she saw Granny Smith and Apple Bloom on the front porch of the farm, waving at her.
“Hi, Applejack. Hi, Big Mac.” Apple Bloom happily greeted.
“Hey there, youngins. How was harvestin’ today?” Granny Smith welcomed with a nonchalant wave of her hoof.
“It’s going great. We got the whole west orchard finished today. Isn’t that right, Big Mac?”
“Eeyup.”
“So what ya got cooking, Granny? Ah sure am starved,” Applejack asked, her stomach grumbling in agreement.
The conversation between the three of them continued, and Apple Bloom’s attention soon wandered off when she couldn’t find anything to say. They seemed lost in their own little world, so she decided to view the rest of it while the sky formed streaks of purple. She noticed a flash of white light behind the tree line. The gears in her head turned and her eyes narrowed. The hobbling and erratic movement of long serpentine limbs sent a chill up her spine.
“-so Apple Bloom decided she wanted ta help me instead of going off to frolic with her friends today. She’s really growin’ as a pony,” Granny Smith continued.
Apple Bloom poked Granny’s hip with one hoof. Her attention focusing on the old pony, then back to the trees, and back again to Granny. “Uh, Granny? Granny Smith?”
“That’s great to hear, Granny,” Applejack said. “That reminds me. You haven’t heard the timber wolves howlin’ at night yet have ya? Cause earlier today we saw some tracks-”
Apple Bloom poked her sister’s side. The pokes became more frantic and her head kept swiveling from the orchard to her family. She was sure she could see Discord about to exit the tree-line.
“Uh, AJ, you listening? Hello? It’s kind of important,” Applebloom said.
The filly could count on at least one member of her family to listen.
Big Mac said with a loud, not-quite-booming voice, “Hey, Apple Bloom is tryin’ ta tell ya’ll somethin’.”
The two older mares looked down at her. The filly frowned and pointed behind them. “Chaos incoming.”
The other three members of the Apple family looked with wide eyes at the hobbling being that approached. He was covered in bandages. A thick neck brace enveloped his long windpipe, while he held a crutch under one arm. One of his legs was wrapped in gauze like an injured conga-line dancer.
“Bonjour everypony!” he greeted.
Applejack’s heart sank with the equally unexpected and unwelcome arrival of the spirit of chaos. She craned her neck back towards her family and whispered out of the side of her mouth, “Ok everypony, we prepared for this. Just like we practiced.”
“Oh, my dear Applejack you wouldn’t believe the day I’ve been having, but I know I can always count on the hospitality of you simple folk. Somepony as dependable as you wouldn’t turn away a pony in need,” Discord said.
Discord was so focused on Applejack’s face for her impending reaction that he didn’t notice as the rest of the Apple family huddled closer together. The slight creasing of her brow and the narrowing of her eyes caused Discord’s face to waver between an impish smirk and a worried frown.
“Not normally, but ya ain’t normal, or a pony fer that matter,” she said.
“You words wound me, Applejack. I most certainly am a pony,” Discord raised his eagle limb and stuck out one talon after the other as he continued, “I’m also a dragon, lizard, griffin, mule, goat, dear, lion, platypus on my mother’s side-”
“Stop!” the Apple family yelled.
The mismatched spirit shut his mouth and looked at the farmers. His appendage had grown extra talons as he had listed his collective parts until it had a new total of nine. His fist clenched as he let it fall to his side, the extra talons disappearing. His eyes narrowed, just a little.
“Why are ya here Discord? And more importantly, why shouldn’t we kick ya out right now?” Applejack asked.
Discord sneered, “Ooo looks like somepony developed an attitude since I was here last. Can’t even go easy on the crippled elderly, such as myself?”
“Ya ain’t hurt Discord. We all know ya can’t be injured like a normal pony, so quite fakin’ it,” Applejack said.
With a bored expression, Discord spun into a mini-tornado causing his bandages to randomly fly off. When he stopped spinning, he looked like his normal chaotic self again.
“Just because I don’t get injured doesn’t mean I can’t feel pain. Seeing as how we both are feeling impatient, I’ll just skip straight to the point then. I need a, ugh, friend to accompany me so I can have some fun. Celestia forbid I’m actually left by myself for more then two minutes, then again, I can cram a lot of chaos into that timespan. All the other element bearers are too busy and you know what they say. A friend of a friend is as good a friend as any...at least, I think that’s how it goes. I wasn’t really paying attention to Fluttershy during that particular lecture,” he said, waving his claw in a circular motion.
He turned his back to the farmers. One paw was held up to his chin as he pondered. Imaginings of chaos went swimming, flying, and unicycling through his head now that he finally had his required ball and chain.
“I was thinking that first I’d create some giant tap dancing jelly beans to liven things up.” He wiggled the claws of his lion’s paw erratically. “After I get bored with that, I’ll open a window into another dimension and see what’s going on over there for awhile, maybe steal some ideas. Don’t worry, I’ll be sure to close it when I get bored. After that, I’ll just wing it and see where it goes,” Discord went on.
Once again, he didn’t notice the subtle cues of pony body language, such as Applejack grinding her teeth or her lowered head and wide stance. Then again, he wouldn’t have cared if he had. “Ah ain’t going nowhere with you, and ah most certainly ain’t your friend!”
Discord’s head turned back to Applejack. He usually loved surprises, but this was the rare kind that inconvenienced him. He had been certain that she would follow him after hearing the others couldn’t be bothered. One of them was required to do it by order of Celestia whenever he was out of the castle or not at Fluttershy’s cottage. He felt a smidgen of indignation. Applejack’s family seemed to be supporting her with the refusal if their sour frowns were any indication.
Discord put his claws on his hips.“You can’t say no to me! Didn’t you hear? The other five are indisposed. You have to be my companion by default, or it goes against your princess’s orders. Now go on a chaotic magical adventure with me right now missy!” Discord pointed one talon at the ground in synch with his last words.
The four ponies supported each other. They weren’t about to be cowed by this chained dog.
“Oh, I heard ya,” Applejack said.
“But she ain’t about ta go off with some hoodlum, just so he can have his play time!” Granny Smith continued.
“And she would never be friends with some jerk-y feller who almost destroyed our farm twice!” Apple Bloom supported.
“Eeyup!” Big Mac confirmed.
Discord was flapping furiously in the air as his last option wriggled out of his grasp like a wet trout. The muscles in his face tightened as he prepared to make the longest and most convincing argument he ever had to date. He knew the rules by heart so he could exploit every loophole. Plus, if that didn’t work, he could always try deceiving the dull earth ponies through fast talk. Earth ponies were supposed to be the dumb ones right?
“Now listen here, the rules regarding my freedom were-” he started.
Applejack stepped forward, with her family supporting her every word with angry glares at Discord.
“The rules were made by Princess Celestia, and if ah don’t want to follow ‘em because it might endanger my home or my family’s safety, well then, ah guess she’ll just have to take that up with me personally,” she interrupted.
Discord’s face twisted into something ugly that reminded one of a caged lion being poked at by its captors.
“You’re supposed to be one of the Princess’s order loving lackeys! You can’t do that!” he bellowed.
“Ah just did,” Applejack stated in a low voice.
“And she ain’t changin’ her mind,” Granny, Apple Bloom, and Mac said in unison.
Instead of the tantrum or argument the Apples were expecting, there was a long uncomfortable silence. The muscles under Discord’s paw bulged. His digits twitched, but didn’t snap. He continued to float before them with barely contained malice, as the sun set behind him.
“Fine,” he said eventually.
Without so much as a snarky comment he snapped his claws and was gone in a flash.
“Woo-hoo! We did it! He’s gone!” Apple Bloom jumped with glee.
Applejack wasn’t so sure. In her gut, she could feel something was off. You could never be sure about things that involved the spirit of chaos. The way he had left might have simply been his version of acceptance. It might also mean he was cooking something nasty up from a freshly formed grudge. It was just unexpected; and everypony knew that when Discord did something unexpected, it spelled trouble.
“Yeah, great work everypony,” Applejack mumbled.
Discord had teleported back to his room at the castle. Fish were flying through the air like an open aquarium. The weather inside his room was momentarily cloudy, waiting to change when Discord got bored with that. The hoofball field sized interior was colored like a tie-dye shirt. All manner of things floated in the air. Powdered wigs with tiny dog legs ran around carrying random things like pinwheels on their backs for no apparent reason. Everything in Discord’s room was chaotic, different, and always changing. Too bad none of it was making him feel any better.
“Pull!” Discord yelled for the second time.
A robot made of wood with a wheeled tripod for legs and arms ending with pinchers pulled a lever planted in the tie-dye ground. After the lever was pulled, a diamond shaped watermelon was catapulted right at Discord.
Discord was wearing suspenders, a striped shirt, and a bowler cap, with a sledgehammer at the ready. He swung the sledgehammer like a baseball bat, and smashed his fruity target into chocolaty pieces. Discord took a moment to lick some of the watermelon-chocolate of his claws before ordering his wooden robot further.
“I mean really, who do those ponies think they’re speaking to? I’m older than their princesses combined, and they have the gall to blow me off?! Me?! They should be showering me with gifts! Praising the very ground I walk on! Everywhere I go I improve things. Instead they dismiss me like a child. Pull!” Discord said.
The robot pulled the lever and yet another watermelon —this one shaped like a six-pointed star— was launched via catapult at Discord. He hit this one too, causing sprinkles to burst out.
“They treat me like a prisoner and yet they call me the bad guy? I’m not the villain here. Why if anything, I’m the hero of the common pony, constantly being stepped on by the white mare. Pull!”
The wooden robot pulled the lever again, sending an apple shaped watermelon this time. Discord smashed that one like he did the others. Only this time, he was splashed with lemon juice. Drops of the acidic liquid made contact with his eyes.
“My eyes! My perfect yellow eyes!” he screamed.
His goofy outfit and sledgehammer disappeared. Now Discord was left covering his eyes with his claws. He blindly fumbled over to the robot, which was suddenly sporting a doctor’s uniform.
“Doctor, doctor! Will I ever be beautiful again?” Discord wailed.
He pulled his claws away to show his eye sockets. The gooey orbs used for sight were replaced by burnt-out sizzling craters.
The robot couldn’t move its wooden face as it replied, “Fact: space does not exist.”
“Oh no! Now how will I ever fulfill my dream of being the first supermodel to go into space?” Discord said.
The robot stated, “Eighty nine percent of magic tricks are not magic. Technically, they are sorcery.”
“Oh thank you doctor Woodbot. Now I know I can live as an independent woman, even without my eyes. I’ll just use sorcery to compensa- Oh wait, never mind. Found ‘em,” Discord said.
Reaching under his armpit, he pulled out a pair of light bulbs with red dots in at their tops. He screwed them into his eye sockets. At first they were dark, but the chaos master fixed that with a light tug on one of his ears.
“One in six children will be abducted by the Dutch,” was what the robot had to say to Discord’s antics.
“Ha, yeah I am phenomenal aren’t I buddy,” Discord replied as he snapped away the doctor coat on the wooden robot.
One of the dog-legged powdered wigs ran by Discord. The spirit of chaos stretched an arm out and picked up the Rubik’s cube that was on that one’s back.
“Now, feast your eyes on this!” he said.
Turning around so as to block the robots view, Discord’s shoulders moved up and down. A few times he would look over his shoulder, back at the robot. Finally he turned back with the cube in his outstretched paw.
“Ta-da! Eh…eh?”
The former cube was now shaped like an impossible arrangement of stairs. If a tiny pony were to walk on the stairs, they would go up or down them in a square for eternity, without ever reaching a top or bottom. Discord’s grin took up most of his face. This was what he considered to be the ultimate example of his work, creation of the impossible. A more scientific pony like Twilight Sparkle would have a mental breakdown trying to figure something like that staircase out.
All the robot did was give it a blank stare.
Discord’s enthusiastic smile changed to a frown. He stared back at the chaotically created robot, then at his room. This was as close as he could get to having his own kingdom again. Messing around with his random creations just wasn’t as fun as it should have been.
Something was wrong.
He realized that, no matter what he did here, it would always be contained. Whether his chaos was confined to this room or restricted by his harmonic chaperones, he still felt like a prisoner. It was almost as bad as being sealed in stone. Only now, his jail cell was this room, and the threats of being sealed up again his prison guards. This wasn’t true chaos. This wasn’t freedom. This wasn’t fun. He had this feeling in him that was akin to boredom, but it wasn’t, not exactly.
Discord put a paw up to his chin. What was that feeling called again? Oh right, helplessness, he thought.
He folded his arms behind his back with his eyelids drooped halfway down. The odd sensation was somehow worse then boredom for him. That was saying a lot. His momentary sulking flipped back to anger when he thought about his entire situation.
“This is all their fault! What kind of tyrannical, control-freak keeps a freethinker like me behind bars?!” he said.
Actual metal bars materialized before him and his newly adorned triangular, red-tinted shades.
Behind him, Woodbot yelled, “Row row, fight the powah!”
Discord snapped the bars and sunglasses away.
“I shouldn’t have to endure this! I should make them regret ever thinking they could control me. I’m the master of chaos for goodness sake. I’m not some tool here to make all their problems disappear when things get tough.” He summoned a small purple plush unicorn into his paw. “That’s Twilight Sparkle’s job. It’s high past time for me to get back in the game!” He enthusiastically proclaimed, kicking the plushie out the window. “Okay, for step one I’ll need a giant pinata, a used toothbrush, and whatever it is they serve for lunch in the dungeon’s cafeteria for this to…” he trailed off.
His devious mind tripped over itself as he came to a horrifying realization.
“Well, no, I guess that idea wouldn’t work since Twilight Sparkle still has that pesky enchantment on the elements. Maybe if…no Celestia would probably get the elements to her defense for that too. What if I, no that wouldn’t pan out either with Fluttershy being there,” Discord thought out loud.
Discord lived for the moment, but he was nopony’s definition of a short term thinker. He could come up with plans that would take eons to come to fruition if he wanted. He could think up unpredictable twists that would throw anything and everything on its head. Plan after plan sprung up from his unorganized mind. All of them hit a roadblock in the form of a certain yellow pegasus’s disapproval or ending up as a pigeon’s bathroom again.
He was alone in this. He had no way of getting away with anything for very long; not unless something changed the playing field substantially. It would have to be completely free of his direct meddling too. The only thing that could give him his opportunity would be if something else took the Elements of Harmony or the celestial sisters out of the picture on it’s own. Unless something just magically sprouted up out of the ground and changed the entire game, he was stuck.
Not to mention, he was still being watched everywhere he went. If he disappeared for even an instant without reports on where he had been, he’d be turned to stone faster than a chicken at a cockatrice mating ritual.
He could always just run. They’d never be able to catch him most likely. He could cause plenty of trouble along the way too. He cast that option out. There was no fun in being a criminal on the run. He wanted to be on top again, like the old days. He was not a coward or a quitter to start with anyway.
He could try doing things the messier way. He shuddered at the mental imagery of resorting to such crude barbarism. He was not a monster like some ponies labeled him, and if he had anything to say about it, he never would be. Discord was a lot of vile things, but that wasn’t one of them.
Perhaps circumstances might change the game at some later point in time, but for the foreseeable future, he was cornered.
“Huh, well played, ponies,” he spoke with far more melancholy than normal.
Discord didn’t feel like bothering with scheming anymore. None of his plans could conceivably free him for at least the next several decades. He wanted his freedom right now, not later. Discord and his ego deflated like a loosely tied balloon, sound effect and all. Woodbot rolled over and piped in with another nonsensical remark.
“Dreams are the subconscious mind’s way of reminding ponies to go to school shaved naked, and have their teeth fall out,” the robot said.
Discord’s deflated form perked up slightly. With his ears leading the way, he inflated back to his usual shape. A dastardly smile spread across his face.
“Huh, you know pal, while you were talking about sending foals to school naked or some such malarkey, I just had an idea,” he said. “When was the last time I had a nap? Just decided to get away from it all and go off to dream land? You can’t recall, can you?” Discord asked.
“...” The robot responded with silence.
“Neither can I! Why not catch up on my beauty rest? Not that I could get any more beautiful, mind you. I could have some privacy for a few thousand years to get my thoughts in disorder. I wonder what dreams are like. I’ve heard so much about them.” He pulled at his beard while imagining the dreams of ponies. “They’d have to be more fun than my current predicament. I’d get to mess with other ponies dreams as if I ruled Equestria again! They’d never guess their chaotic fantasies were caused by moi.” He gestured to himself with twirl of his lion paw.
“Not to mention all the changes I could make in my own dream kingdom, without so much as a complaint from anypony. It’s perfect! I’ll sleep things off and wake up to a new playing field, fresh as a daisy. Not to mention the other benefits to my special brand of sleep.”
He pushed his face against Woodbot’s own, his eyes bugging out. “Oh, but they’ll miss me when I’m gone.” Discord pulled away while he continued.
“They’ll wise up eventually and learn that my way was the best way. Then they’ll be sorry when their lives are still as utterly dull and predictable as they are now. Who knows, maybe some new threat will appear that only I could have stopped. Well they’ll just have to deal with it on their own.” He crossed his arms and pouted. “We’ll see how they get by without my help. They’ve succeeded by the skin of their teeth at best. They never appreciated my unique genius anyway.”
Discord snapped his eagle claw and in it appeared a picture frame of him and Fluttershy. He was his jovial self with his arm around her and she was smiling meekly in the photo. Discord offered it a distant stare, but soon changed his expression to a scowl.
“You never understood the truth of my world Fluttershy. Maybe I’ll see you in my dreams. Sayonara,” he said.
As Discord went to find a secluded place to sleep, he threw the photo frame over his head. It shattered on the ground, leaving the photo ripped down the middle, separating the pair.
“Now for some nice soothing sounds to fall asleep to.”
Outside of Discord’s room -several hallways over- a pair of golden-armored royal guards stood looking at a scrying glass leaning against the wall. The guards, one unicorn and one pegasus, sat in the lavish guest room. Both their brows were furrowed. The scrying glass was the same size and shape as a common vanity mirror. Unlike normal mirrors, this one was magically enchanted to reveal everything that happened in a specific area. Discord’s room was the place it watched now. Unfortunately, the picture in the mirror was suffering from a sever case of static. The pegasus decided to grab the mirror in his hooves. He then flew it to different positions as he tried to get the uncooperative thing to function properly. This went on for several minutes.
“Why won’t this stupid thing just work? Gah!” the pegasus guard complained.
“Careful or you might break it!” the unicorn guard behind him warned.
“Don’t you think I know that? You haven’t seen Discord do anything weird while I’ve been working this thing have you?” the pegasus asked.
“You mean weird stuff other than what he does in there normally? Last I saw he was just smashing watermelons and talking to himself, I think. Try turning the sound back on. Maybe it’s fixed now,” the unicorn said.
The hovering guard gave his partner an unsure look. He felt the cold sensation of glass on his nose as he pressed his muzzle against the mirror. Ear rending sounds of construction attacked the room. Hammer strikes, wood being sawed, magical jackhammers, as well as the sounds of things that hadn’t been invented yet could all be heard by the unlucky guards. There was also the sound of a crying baby mixed in to make it even more unbearable. The unicorn put his hooves to his ears and gritted his teeth. The guard holding the mirror found himself wishing he had an extra set of wings to cover his ears. He was pretty sure his eardrums had just exploded. Still, it had never happened to him before, so he couldn’t be sure about that.
“Okay, bad idea! Turn it off!” the unicorn guard yelled. His voice could barely be heard over the cacophony of noise.
“What!?” the pegasus screamed back.
“I said turn the sound off!” the unicorn barked.
“No I’m not turning it off! We need to keep an eye on Discord!” the pegasus shouted.
“I meant turn the sound off only!” the unicorn hollered as the construction noises kept getting louder.
“What!?”
“Turn the sound off! It’s too loud!”
“I can’t hear you! The sound is too loud!”
“What!?”
“I said the sound is too loud!”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you!” the unicorn hollered.
“What!?” the pegasus yelled back.