If asked, Shining Armor would have to admit that his plan with the crusaders could have gone better. The fact that The Elements of Harmony had actually been in the book had been a nice surprise (he had been expecting some sort of trick or riddle, maybe something that would help him search the library for them). He had told the young ponies what he knew about what happened and started to explain his plan.
The main idea was simple. The crusaders would split up and go to one of the ponies. The younger pony would then try to get the older one to remember who they were and how they were supposed to be. Hopefully hearing this from somepony would help Shining's friends come back to themselves and get past whatever Discord had done to them.
Overall the choices of who would help whom was pretty easy. Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle, being the younger sisters of Applejack and Rarity, had known the older ponies their entire lives. Apple Bloom had practically been raised by Applejack and Sweetie Belle spent nearly as much time at Rarity's as she did her parents home. The Cake Twins were similar when it came to Pinkie Pie. Although not genetically related, the two of them had grown up with Pinkie, having her be there for them like a big sister.
That left Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash.
Twilight had volunteered to try and help Fluttershy. Granted, the filly was not a sister to the pegasus, nor had she known her very long. Still, Twilight liked Fluttershy, and wanted to at least try. If that did not work, then she could always try with help from Pound since he sometimes helped with the animals.
Everyone assembled had expected Scootaloo to be the one to try to help Rainbow Dash, seeing as the latter was the former's idol. For her part, Scootaloo was absolutely on board with helping save Rainbow Dash. Unfortunately, her plan to help was far different from Shining Armor's. The young pegasus filly grabbed her helmet and ran for the door.
"If Discord is that one that did something to her," Scootaloo announced, "then I'll find him, and I'll make him undo it." She then slammed the door behind her as she took off.
Shining Armor gave the remaining crusaders the element for the pony they were trying to help, told them to meet at Sugarcube Corner either way, and wished them luck.
Now he was running through town trying to find Scootaloo, carrying his and Rainbow Dash's elements with him. Between the head start she had and how fast she could move on that scooter, it was going to be difficult to catch her. Shining Armor was basically running around town hoping to find the young pegasus at random. The upside was that Scootaloo was probably doing something similar in searching for Discord. Shining just hoped the he would find Scootaloo before she found Discord. There was no telling what the creature would do the filly if he got his clutches on her.
Up in the sky, a spot of white caught Shining Armor's attention. Under normal circumstances, it probably would not even have registered to Shining Armor, much less have been given a second thought. But these were not normal circumstances. In this case, it was strange because of how normal it was. It was a regular, puffy, white, cloud. Not pink. Not releasing some sort of food. Just a cloud.
Well, not just a cloud. Shining Armor was pretty sure that he could see movement on top of it. That meant that there must be a pegasus up there.
"HEY!" he called out. "Hey, you on the cloud. Excuse me."
A familiar form shifted to look over the edge of the cloud, glaring down at Shining Armor. The coat was not its normal shade of sky blue, nor was the mane its usual rainbow array, but he still recognized the pegasus staring down at him.
"What do you want?" Rainbow Dash yelled back. "Can't you see I'm busy?"
While glad to have found Rainbow Dash, Shining Armor wished it had been under slightly different circumstances. Now that he had found her, he could try and get her back to normal. Except if he did that, he could not keep searching. He may not have known the filly very well, but if something happened to her...
"I'll let you get back to whatever you're doing," Shining Armor shouted up to Rainbow Dash. "I just need your help quickly. Have you seen Scootaloo?"
"Scootaloo?" Rainbow Dash repeated, sitting up more.
"Yeah. Pegasus filly, about this big," -- he held up his hoof to about her height -- "orange coat, rides a scooter, worships the ground you fly above."
"I know who she is!" Rainbow snapped. "Why the hay are you looking for her?"
Shining Armor shifted, ears pinning back as he looked around. He really did not want to tell her about what he had intended, or what Scootaloo was planning to do to try and help.
"It's... complicated," he answered. "Look, I take it you haven't seen her lately. Since you're up there, could you look around and tell me if you see her? I would really appreciate it."
"Fine," Rainbow Dash sighed, rolling her eyes. Standing up, she turned around and started looking at the town around her. Her ears pinned back against her head, wings and tail giving a flicker of annoyance. Rainbow's gaze scanned the town quickly, taking in the details and filtering them back out as they were not Scootaloo, her scooter, or a trail of dust indicating something moving on the ground at a rapid pace.
Finally, Rainbow Dash caught sight of Scootaloo. The filly was still on her scooter, wings flapping to travel as fast as she could. From what Dash could make out, Scootaloo was heading toward...
"Oh, no," Rainbow gasped out, eyes going wide.
"What?" Shining Armor called out. "What is it? Did you find her?"
Instead of answering, Rainbow Dash shot off from the cloud, causing it to pop in the process.
*****
Discord sat upon his throne. He had been having a lot of fun creating chaos all across town, but now he felt like he could use a little break. See what is happening from what he had done already for a while.
In his paws, he held his own version of a toy puzzle cube he had discovered. The original was interesting in that he had not seen anything like it before, but rather boring. It was a cube, with each side a different color that was made up of nine squares. The idea seemed to be to move the squares until the colors were mismatched, then try and line them back up again. On the surface, it sounded rather dull. However, the anger and frustration created by some when trying to solve it was far more entertaining.
His own take on the thing was a lot more in line with his taste. He had not yet figured out how to turn it into a tesseract, so it was -- sadly -- still a cube, which still meant it was only manipulable in three dimensions. However, there were far more squares at a whopping six hundred and twenty-five. It had the six basic colors, as well as black, white, the alphabet, twenty-three randomly selected numbers (including Pi to the seventeenth digit), and a variety of pictures of himself. With all this, it would be impossible to solve the way the traditional one was, but the reactions of ponies who tried would be well worth it.
Although now that he thought about it, few ponies would probably be willing to even try to begin with. Perhaps he had gone a little overboard on this particular case. Still, it was fun for him to move the squares around.
"Discord!" a voice called out.
Looking up from his cube, Discord found himself staring at an orange pegasus filly in a helmet. She had her front hooves resting on the handlebars and was crouched down. Her purple eyes were narrowed as she stared at him.
Discord blinked at the filly, recognizing her. She had been one of the three whose fighting had helped him finally break free of his stone encasement.
"Who wants to know?" he asked as he returned his attention back to his toy.
"Whatever you did to Rainbow Dash," Scootaloo stated, "I want you to change her back. Now."
That was interesting. Here was a filly, not even with a cutie mark (which was supposed to be some big deal in their world for some reason) trying to tell him what to do. Not quite the same way as that Zircon Crown or whatever her name was.
Tossing the cube aside, Discord turned and looked at the filly before him. His paws tented together as he narrowed his eyes, studying her.
Under his gaze, the young pony shifted, looking away. Her wings gave a flick as she stared at the ground. Taking a deep breath, she looked back up at him and tried to look tough. Discord gave her credit for not being completely stupid. She was smart enough to be afraid of him.
"And if I don't?" he asked. "What are you going to do about it?"
Closing her eyes, Scootaloo kicked her scooter into motion. Her wings buzzed as they flapped, pushing her forward as fast as she could go. Scootaloo let out a battle cry as she charged, which probably would have been a lot more impressive if it sounded less like her screaming in absolute, abject terror.
Well, this is amusing, Discord thought as he watched the filly charge at him. Leaning his chin against his balled up talon, he watched her, curious at what she was going to do.
A bright flash of light drew his attention from the charging filly. As he watched a rainbow colored ring spread out, growing wider and wider. From it, a rainbow colored streak of light flew directly toward him.
No, Discord thought, his eyes going wide. It can't be. It's can't be. I defeated them. There's no way.
The rainbow streak continued to come closer toward him.
"Nooooooooo!" Discord cried out, throwing his arms up to cover his face. "I don't want to go back. I'm finally free again. I don't--"
He saw the colors of the rainbow blow past him, the energy slamming into his body. There was also the sound of an explosion ringing in his ears.
A second passed. Then another. And another.
Discord opened his eyes, looking around. Discordia looked the same for the most part. He had not actually paid attention to the place, and it was always changing, but it was still full of chaos. Discordia was still here.
More importantly, he was still here. In the flesh. He could still walk, he could still talk, and he could still cause chaos. Whatever had happened, it had not returned him to his stone form.
A grin spread across his face as he began to chuckle. The chuckle grew louder and stronger, building up inside his body until he released. Soon it became full on hysterical laughter.
*****
Shining Armor blinked, blinded by the flash of light, then gave a hard shake of his head to try and clear the echo of the sonic boom from his ears. He was not entirely sure what had happened. One moment he was trying to get Rainbow Dash to help him find Scootaloo, the next he saw Dash taking off, and then there was a massive explosion of rainbow light.
Just like the one when I was applying to Celestia's School, he realized.
Before he could consider that fact any further, Rainbow Dash returned, carrying Scootaloo with her. The rainbow maned pegasus (and it was rainbow colored again, just like her coat was blue), held the orange filly against her chest. Scootaloo held her scooter too her just as tightly, her eyes wide and jaw clenched. After dropping the filly gently to the ground, Rainbow Dash landed and gave herself a shake.
"That," Scootaloo started, "was... the most awesomest thing ever!"
Scootaloo was grinning as she turned to facing Shining Armor, hopping off her scooter and bouncing up and down.
"You should have seen it," Scootaloo shouted. "I was all like 'grrr,' and Discord was like 'whatever.' Then I was like 'aaaahhh!'" -- she ran a circle around Shining Armor with her eyes closed -- "Then Rainbow Dash was all BOOM! Woosh!" She flung a hoof out as if in a flying motion. "After that, Discord was all 'oh no!' And tha...."
Scootaloo stopped in telling her story when she noticed Rainbow Dash's face was less than an inch from hers. The mare's ears were pinned back against her head, her jaw was clenched as she bared her teeth, and her eyes were narrowed as she glared. The entire effect was enough to make Scootaloo gulp audibly and take a step back.
"What," growled out Rainbow Dash, "were you... thinking?" Her wings flared out. "Why would you do something as crazy and reckless as charging right at Discord? Do you have any idea how dangerous that could be? What he could have done to you?"
"It's what you would have done," Scootaloo whimpered.
Between the statement and the look of being on the brink of tears from Scootaloo, Rainbow Dash paused. Closing her eyes, she rubbed at her forehead. Slowly, she took a long, deep breath, then let it back out. Her wings pulled back against her side once more.
"Look, squirt," Dash continued in a calmer tone. "First, sorry for scaring you, but you really could have gotten hurt or who knows what. Discord isn't exactly one you can guess what he'll do. I mean look at all he's done to Ponyville." She motioned a hoof to the town around them.
"Second, just because I do something doesn't mean you should too." She paused, rolling her eyes. "Ugh. Can't believe I said that. I always hated the 'do as I say, not as I do' argument." She then turned her full attention back to Scootaloo. "But I'm an adult, and have at least some idea what I'm risking. Besides, part of the reason I do stuff like that is so that other ponies don't have to. Just like the guard, or The Wonderbolts. Way I see... why are you hugging me?"
This last part was not directed at Scootaloo, but at Shining Armor. At some point during the conversation, the unicorn stallion had moved closer and was now hugging Rainbow Dash tightly.
"You saved her," Shining Armor said with a grin. "Scootaloo was in trouble, and you saved her."
"Of course I saved her," Rainbow Dash snapped, pushing free of the hug. "Why wouldn't I. I've told you before, 'I would never leave a pony hanging.'"
Except I did, she suddenly thought. On the train. Discord offered me my wings to save Cloudsdale, and all I had to do was abandon my friends. They needed my help with him and The Elements and I just took off.
A click drew her from her thoughts. She looked down to find that the necklace for her element was now placed on her.
"That's right," Shining Armor agreed with a smile. "And you have no idea how glad I am that you remember that."
"We did it!" Scootaloo shouted, tossing her front hooves up in the air. "Our plan worked."
"Oh, no," Shining Armor said, cutting off the filly's celebration. "You are not going to get out of trouble by sharing the blame. I had no intention of any of you putting yourselves in danger like that."
At that, Scootaloo sagged back down. She smiled, giving a slight chuckle.
"What's going on?" Rainbow Dash asked, looking at the two.