“Why are you both walking so slowly? We have to hurry! He might be in pain! He might be wondering where I am! He might be doing both at the same time and if I know him well enough he doesn’t like multitasking all that much!”
Fluttershy hovered a few meters off the ground, anxiously dashing a few flaps ahead before turning back to glare at the two steadily trotting ponies following behind her. When her latest batch of words did little to speed them along, she swooped down to liberally nudge at their backsides.
As loud as her pained voice would go, Fluttershy yelled, “Discord’s in trouble and you two are acting as though it’s no big deal! We need to hurry!”
For the twelfth time in less than four minutes, Twilight and Rarity exchanged heated glances; daring the other to add more specifics to the predicament they had original presented to the pegasus. At the base of the yellow mare’s cozy cabin they had started out strong, saying Discord was in trouble and that all of Equestria hung precariously in the balance. Yet neither of the pair could quite summon up the particular words to help distinguish what kind of help he was in need of.
And since leaving her home, they had said not another word.
“Ow!” Twilight cried, as Rarity shoved a bony leg into her rips for the seventh or so time. “Stop that! You’re going to give me a bruise soon, Rarity!”
The white unicorn leaned in closer to her, the part of her face watching Fluttershy make hurried circles in the air forcing a smile as fake as a three bit coin. She whispered, “Then you need to tell her exactly what’s going on before she gets there. How do you think she’s going to react in the face off… well, that exposed monstrosity.”
Twilight grew pale at the thought, also from the notion of breaking down the situation to such an innocent soul as Fluttershy. “But she takes care of creatures for a living, right? And Discord’s a friend so… she might if we ask, right? Maybe?”
Rarity glared at her. “That’s a big maybe, darling. Here, let me help.” She craned her neck towards Fluttershy. “Fluttershy! Twilight has something important to tell you!”
Twilight blanched at Rarity. “You bi—”
But already her vision was covered whole by the distressed pegasus. “What’s happened, Twilight? Has he gotten worse? Are we too late? Should I go back for more blankets? Does he need a tourniquet? Does he need honey for his throat? Does he have an unset stomach and needs me to rub his belly until he feels better? Oh please, Twilight, please tell me what’s going on!”
Twilight shut her eyes for a moment—imagining punching Rarity in her smug face until it wasn’t so smug anymore. “Okay, Fluttershy. The truth is Discord’s in trouble.”
Fluttershy flew up until she was mere inches from her nose. “Yes! Yes!”
“And he needs a very special kind of help.”
“Yes! Yes!”
“A very… personal type of help.”
“Yes! And?”
“And if he doesn’t receive it in time or correctly, he might die along with everyone else in Equestria.”
Twilight’s mane fell to her face as a gust of wind ruffled it thoroughly. With a leg she parted the frayed mess and scanned the empty dirt road. “Fluttershy?” There was not a trace of her friend, besides the faint outline of a yellow and pink blur somewhere far in the distance.
“That was your plan?” Rarity scrunched her face at her. “Get her so riled up she’d dart ahead of us? What’s she going to think when she gets there? I doubt that sweet, sensitive soul has ever even seen a penis, let alone a draconequus one, and now her mind’s going to snap in half simply from the sight alone. We should have told her exactly what was happening and then given her time to digest the oddity of it all. I know I still am. And I still don’t understand everything.”
Twilight stared at her friend with tired eyes, hopeful that they’d still be friends when this all blew over. “Rarity, with all due respect: shut up and run with me.”
So the two friends galloped ahead in the meek task of salvaging Fluttershy’s innocence.
***
“Where is she? I can’t see her through the crowd.”
Twilight parted a few dozen shocked gawkers with her horn, trying to clear a path to the bench of indecency. Before she could tell who was around it, Pinkie Pie came bouncing towards them.
“This is a great turnout, isn’t it?” She actually looked pleased.
Twilight hurriedly scanned the dozens of new attendees. “Pinkie! You were supposed to cordon off the area, not announce it to everyone! Now there are more trapped ponies than before—so much innocence lost in a single day!”
Pinkie seemed unperturbed. “So your plan was to put me in charge of shushing up a get-together and not instead making it bigger and better than ever? You really picked the wrong pony for the task, Twilight.”
Twilight glimpsed the steady blue sky. The lazy clouds and the far away lands she had read about but never dared venture to. She had wings now, so she could fly wherever she wished whenever she wanted. At that moment, if she really felt the push, she could have risen up into the air and never returned, and instead left the situation for the rest of the gang. The idea sounded tempting—oh, oh so very tempting—but she’d never forgive herself if she left the hundreds of watchers and possibly the fate of all of Equestria in the hoofs of others, especially when she had been appointed the responsibility.
Nevertheless she really hated her friends that day.
She put a hoof to her temple. “What do you mean you made it bigger and better than ever?”
Pinkie smiled brightly at the idyllic thought. “Oh, you know. Just some simple things to help spice up the show—if you hadn’t noticed, it’s a little bit repetitive! And yet still quite the crowd pleaser! I put stage lights to either sides of the bench. A fog machine in back for when it gets dark and we can try for a spooky-type theme. A called a DJ sometime ago but they haven’t gotten back to me yet. They only told me to stop prank calling them and then hung up. So I called again and again and again and again—”
Someone was tugging on Twilight’s shoulder.
“Twilight! Look!” Rarity screamed. “We’re too late!”
The crowd had parted and now Twilight had a clear vision of the bench at the center of it all. Discord still sat where he was, single hand busy while his other hand played a small travel-sized videogame. A small brown colt sat a few ponies away, crying while he watched him work. The most horrific sight of all was from the yellow pegasus that stood as still as a statue right in front. Even from that distance Twilight could tell her hair had lost most of its body, falling flat to her shoulders and back.
“Fluttershy!” she yelled, galloping over.
She came to her side and regarded the shocked mare, whose eyes focused on the disgusting act in front of her without any acknowledgment it was occurring at all. Already she had mumbled something, but the noise from Pinkie Pie’s immense speakers to both sides of the bench (some kind of techno remix, she thought) drowned out any such semblance.
“Fluttershy, I’m so sorry,” she began. “We tried to tell you before but neither of us had the courage to completely explain what was going on. You see, supposedly draconequus’ need to ‘vent’ once ever hundred years, and if they don’t, then they can doom all of Equestria by not finishing. There’s more to it than that, but we thought since you take care of animals every day—and seem to be the closest to Discord on a personal level—you might help him along the way. I know we’re asking a lot, Fluttershy, but—”
“Nope.”
Twilight saw Fluttershy’s mouth move but couldn’t be completely certain of what she had said. She leaned in closer. “What did you say?”
“Nope.”
Twilight lowered to the ground, honestly deflated. “I understand, Fluttershy. It’s a lot to ask of you—of anyone, really. I’m sorry we didn’t fill you in earlier. Are you okay?”
“Nope.”
With rising worry, Twilight crossed over to the front of her friend, completely blocking out the continuing slap-show behind her. Fluttershy’s vision only remained where it had been, every few seconds blinking lazily, her mouth hanging limp.
With trepidation, Twilight asked, “Is something wrong, Fluttershy?”
“Nope.”
“Do you want me to take you home?”
“Nope.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“Nope.”
Twilight fanned a leg in front of her. “Can you say anything besides ‘nope,’ Fluttershy?”
“Nope.”
Rarity finally entered the odd little scene. “What’s wrong with her?”
Twilight sat on the ground. “I don’t know. She keeps on saying ‘nope’ and won’t budge from the spot. She won’t even look anywhere else.”
“Could it be the draconequus’ curse?” Rarity interjected.
“He said it doesn’t affect Element bearers, if anything he says is true.”
Rarity came closer to glimpse the poor mare. “Then I think the sight alone broke her completely, Twilight. She wasn’t ready for this. She’d never be ready for this! We were foolish for dragging her along—she’s too innocent for such things!”
“Nope,” Fluttershy mumbled.
“Fluttershy?” Rarity asked. “Fluttershy, darling, can you hear me? Are you all right?”
“Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope…”
Lazily, Fluttershy’s wings scooped against the air, steadily dragging her upward. While her body remained rigid in place, her wings carried her up and away, all while she continued to mumble, “Nope,” a hundred times over. Thirty-seconds later she was out of sight, leaving Twilight and Rarity to contemplate their bleak situation by themselves.
Twilight couldn’t help but glimpse the sky for her friend. “What happened to her?”
“She just literally ‘noped’ herself from the situation,” Rarity answered. “Something I wish I had thought of hours ago.” She sighed. “Well now what, Twilight? She was our best bet and even a thin one at that.”
Twilight thought for a moment. “Let me talk with the master of ceremonies again.”
***
Since she’d last seen the busy draconequus, Pinkie Pie had outfitted him with a red and white Hearts Warming Eve hat as well as a number of gaudy pink necklaces. Somehow he even had a black sports-coat on, even though Twilight was not about to press for details describing how Pinkie somehow got it on him while he continuously needed a hand to spare.
“We need to talk,” she started thickly.
Discord lowered his game system. “Hello, Twilight. You find someone to help me with my needs, or are you only waiting for every pony in Ponyville to come watch the act?”
“This ends now, Discord!”
“Does it?” He smiled at her. “Great! Then come on down and give us a hoof! I bet you’ve read a book or two on the subject!”
Once again, Twilight blocked out the near-mesmerizing sight below with a leg. “I’m not touching anything, Discord! But I do have alternatives. You said this only ends when you finish, whether by yourself or by someone else. Well… I elect to use magic to end this right this very minute!” She angled her horn towards him, small sparks already building around it. “When this spell is through with you, you won’t want to touch yourself for another thousand years! You might have wasted everyone’s time up until now, but I’m ending this without your consent or approval.” She gritted her teeth together. “I’d grab hold of something, Discord. This might be a little… painful.”
Yawning, Discord scratched the inside of his ear before flinging a ball of wax at a nearby horror-struck pony. Eventually he rolled his eyes and said, “I wouldn’t be too hasty if I were you, Twilight.”
“And why’s that?” she said, still charging her horn.
“Because even I don’t know what’ll happen if magic is used to finish the job. We draconequus are mysterious creatures—there is still much to learn and much to unlearn. Say what you try works: congratulations. But say it backfires and you send all of Equestria into a blackened void instead, Princess? Wouldn’t your face be red? Or blue. Or non-existent, because you’d be dead and all that. But if you still think this is the best course of action, fire when ready. I can only hope my prostate can heal itself in time…”
For a moment longer Twilight continued to charge her horn, set and determined to end all this nonsense and get back home to her exciting read. Yet to act impulsively would be unlike her, especially when the entire world rested on her shoulders. And wasn’t there still time to figure a few more things out?
Discord’s smirk reemerged. “Or Twilight Sparkle, you cut to the bittersweet ending and face your problems head on—tackle them with both hooves leading the charge. I know in the past you’ve been known to…” He stopped in mid-sentence, switched hands and drank from a cup of punch that Pinkie must have left for him some time ago. With a resplendent sigh he finished the drink and said, “…swallow your pride from time to time.”
For the second time that morning, Twilight Sparkle thought of all the creations in the universe—the untold planets and aliens that might exist just beyond their world. She thought of the research she could have been conducting into such things and the leaps in academic study she could have been providing for the betterment of all pony-kind, right at that moment. And yet instead of any of that, she was now asked for the second time to help jerk off a draconequus… right in front of everyone in town.
She said sheepishly, “Let’s me quickly see what Applejack’s up to.”