Chapter 5
"If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity the one who falls and has no one to help him up."—Ecclesiastes 4:10
Fluttershy tried to keep her frustrated sobs quiet so that Discord wouldn't hear her, but outside the bedroom he could hear her just fine. The draconequus let out a soft groan and massaged his forehead with a paw. He'd been careful not to let it show but over the past several days he himself had been growing steadily more frustrated. He had brainwashed Rarity, Pinkie Pie, and Rainbow Dash with ease and yet this timid little pegasus, who he had hardly expected to present a challenge, had somehow managed to resist all his manipulation.
At first this had surprised and intrigued him, but now it was only irritating. If Applejack was indeed dead as they believed, Fluttershy was the only pony still standing in his way. Technically there was still Twilight Sparkle to deal with, but he was sure there was no way she could take him down without her friends to help power the Elements. Of course, the fact that Applejack wasn't around might be enough to keep the Elements from working so Fluttershy's corruption might not be necessary ... but the fact that he had already spent several days trying to force her into being the opposite of her Element made him reluctant to abandon the scheme.
Which brought him right back to the crux of the matter: Though she clearly feared him, Fluttershy had found the courage to stand up to him, but he had yet to get any cruel or sadistic reactions out of her. That was all he needed to throw her under his spell and that was the one thing he just ... couldn't ... get! The fact that this was the only thing holding up his plans for Equestria made the pegasus's existence feel like a rock he kept stubbing his toe on with every other step, and waiting for that one essential reaction was beginning to feel like rooting for a sport's team that just wouldn't get off the bench.
He had been so sure he'd pushed her hard enough with his antics just a few minutes earlier. When she'd gotten right in his face and yelled at him, he had been eagerly anticipating the moment when she would finally drop that kindness act she'd been trying on him since he'd arrived.
And that moment never came. As soon as he'd dropped the cabin back to the ground (intentionally not giving her a chance to prepare for it) she'd just put away all that anger and politely thanked him for listening to her. At that point Discord had felt irritated enough to tear out his own bushy eyebrows. Not just magically detach them but actually yank them out, roots and all. He had granted the pony her requested alone time merely because he needed some of his own.
Levitating his legs back off the floor, he glided back and forth across the room, drumming his eagle talons lightly on his upper right arm and tugging at his beard with his lion paw while he reviewed his options.
If he couldn't manipulate Fluttershy into being cruel, he could always just jab her on the skull and brainwash her manually but the idea held no appeal to him. Sure, the results would be the same and no one would ever have to know that he had taken that short cut...
But he would know. And any time he looked at the pegasus afterward he would be forced to remember that he had cheated at his own game, and that by cheating at his own game he had essentially admitted that he hadn't been able to win against her.
No, he decided. No pony is going to beat me at my own game! Especially not one afraid of her own shadow!
He might resort to the manual brainwashing if things became desperate, but right now there was still time to break her the more entertaining way. He just needed to formulate a new method of attack. He glanced out the window at the snow-covered landscape which now looked almost like a blank canvas waiting to be splattered with paint. The simile sparked a new idea in his mind. There was only so much that even he could do in this little cabin. Maybe going out and having a larger space to manipulate would give the scheming section of his brain fresh inspiration. It'd be a shame to let all that blank whiteness go to waste. A shame not to fill it with something weird and colorful.
Fluttershy finally managed to get her crying under control. She offered Angel a small watery smile as thanks for his comfort. Then the smile slipped when she realized that she hadn't heard anything outside the room, and the fact that it was that quiet made her wonder what Discord was up to. Putting Angel on her bed, she went to the door and opened it a crack just in time to see Discord teleport away from the window and over to the front door.
"What are you doing?" she asked fearfully as she saw him put his paw on the door knob.
"What does it look like? I'm going out."
Fluttershy pushed her bedroom door open all the way and ran toward him. "But-but-but it keeps storming out there! What if you get lost? What if you freeze to death?" As much as she disliked the draconequus, she didn't want him to end up freezing to death in a blizzard. "What if—?"
"Oh, please." Discord said, making a coat appear on his body and a scarf appear around his neck. "You honestly believe flakes of frozen water are going to hurt me?"
"But—"
"See you later." With that, Discord pulled the door open and let a wall of snow tumble into the cabin. Fluttershy shrieked in alarm and ran forward to try and push the door shut on the snow. Discord disappeared in a flash of light. As Fluttershy struggled to force the door shut, she saw him materialize outside and wave good-bye to her.
Tears of anger filled her eyes as she looked at the snow now covering the cabin floor. You did that on purpose, she seethed as she watched him fly off. You could have just teleported outside without opening the door, but you wanted to leave me with a huge mess to deal with.
Unbeknownst to its inhabitants, several semitransparent pony-shaped creatures were currently swirling through the air above the cabin, drinking in the strong emotions that emanated from it. When the draconequus appeared outside the cabin they could sense that his heart was as cold as the air around them. As he moved away from the cabin, they followed him, invisible against the clouds, and feeding on the power coming from him.
Despite the cold, Discord was enjoying himself, changing the landscape around him into anything that came to mind. He didn't make any of those changes permanent, but rather designed them to slowly fade, allowing them to bleed together one on top of the other. Jungle, tundra, candyland, and many other places, all with a few bizarre details mixed into them. The snow continued to fall but he didn't mind. It was an interesting effect, watching it cover the cacti, the palm trees, and the gumdrop trees all at the same time.
However, he was beginning to get tired of working against the wind. Any time he tried to redirect it, more gusts took its place. Spotting a cave some distance away, he teleported to it to get out of the wind.
"Brrr," he commented, making his coat and scarf disappear as he shook off whatever snow had managed to stick to his scales and fur. He also shook his head from side to side, causing the wasp tattoos on his neck to fly about over it as though agitated before settling back down in different positions. Then he grabbed his dragon tattoo by the neck and peeled it away from where it emerged over his shoulder. The tattoo let out an annoyed screech and spat out a stream of multi-colored ink that splattered across the cave wall. Ignoring this, Discord pulled the tattoo paw-over-claw and it began to slide up off his body. Once it was completely off, and still screeching in protest, he shook it out like a sheet. Finally satisfied, he slung it back over his shoulder, causing the tattoo to slap wetly across his upper back before it wrapped around and around his body. The tattoo stuck wherever it touched and sunk through the fur to the skin below.
Flashing his coat and scarf back on, he glanced around the cave before jumping into the air. With a snap of his fingers, he turned the cave's floor into ice and its walls to rubber. Landing, he skated across the ice, bouncing off the now-elastic walls like a pinball, and letting his mind drift back to a certain butter-colored pony.
Thinking back to their last encounters, he realized he'd almost gotten to her. Maybe he didn't need to change his tactics after all. Maybe it was just a matter of wearing her down, and—while she'd proven to be more resilient than he'd expected—he had indeed been wearing her down. Musing on this, he continued to skate about until his feet were numb and his legs felt tired. Slowing to a stop, he leaned over, resting his hands on his knees. Maybe it was time to go back, he decided.
He straightened up, crouched to take off ... and to his surprise found that he couldn't move his feet! Looking down, he saw that both his feet were encased in ice, and that more ice was silently but swiftly creeping up his legs! He let out an annoyed grunt and snapped his talons, intending to make the ice disappear. But the ice did not disappear or even slow its progress. Now it had reached his hips. He tried to smash the ice with his tail but the ice had already reached his tail's base and was traveling over its length. He felt his tail halt in mid-swing. Twisting his neck around he was just in time to see the tufted end of his tail get swallowed up by the ice. Now the ice had reached the middle of his long body.
He tried changing the ice into water, marshmallows, lasagna, jello, anything he could think of but the ice stubbornly remained ice. Now it was up to his chest. He conjured up a blowtorch and tried applying it to the ice, but it had no more effect than anything else he had tried. He flashed the blowtorch back out of existence, intending to replace it with a larger more powerful flamethrower, but by then the ice had traveled over his arms and before he knew it, his hands were encased in the stuff as well. At that point he gave in to blind panic. Now the ice was racing up his neck. He twisted his head this way and that, grunting, straining, trying to will the inevitable not to happen...
Then the ice closed over his face. For the first time in days he couldn't move, not a finger or a toe. He couldn't make a sound. He couldn't shiver in the cold that surrounded him. He couldn't even make his eyes go wide in horror though they were trying for all they were worth. All the memories of being imprisoned in stone came rushing back. Once again he was trapped.