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// Blueblood, This Is Your Life! 
// Story: Not The Hero 
// by alarajrogers 
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I've alluded, a couple of times, to the fact that Blueblood is one of a group of relatively few ponies (well, few ponies and a griffon) that I believe would make good allies. The reason for this is so bizarre and freakishly twisted that... well, let's put it this way. Even if you never knew me when I was alive and free, the fact that you've read this far suggests that you know me well enough to know that if I'm calling something freakish and twisted, and it's not a compliment, it would probably be positively brain-breaking to a pony.

In Anon's world, we are an episodic film series for children.

I am not making this up. In fact I believe I alluded to it earlier.

There are a few things that have happened that I've forgotten to tell you about up until now, largely because "organized" and "Lord of Chaos" are not concepts that ever go well together. My trip to Anon's world was one of these things. When I first discovered that Anon could seriously harm me, my first instinct was to run for it. I've lived as long as I have by staying well away from anything I recognize as being able to suppress or counter my magic. On the same principle that traveling to Zebrica when I first broke loose was a good idea, I thought I'd go lay low in another world for a while.

It turned out that my travel options were very, very limited. The dimensional gates had been closed. The future was blocked. I could still travel to the past, but since the past is full of Chaos avatars and we have a bad habit of feeling that there can be only one when we meet each other, that isn't always all that safe. And some of the best time periods for me to travel to are time periods that I've already traveled to, meaning there are issues there. For instance, after Set died, his adopted son, the jackal prince Anubis, was possessed by the corruption of Apep as well, and he set himself up as a dark overlord, renaming Neighgypt to Anugypt and generally being the kind of totalitarian stick-in-the-mud that I really enjoy screwing with, so when my explorations of time periods without chaos avatars landed me there, I got caught up in a revolution led by a most attractive, but entirely too clingy and jealous, cat lady (by which I do not mean an elderly mare who collects too many cats, but a pony-sized sapient female cat), by the name of Baast. And because Baast, lovely lady that she was, had the flaws of being clingy and jealous... I really would like to avoid ever going back to Anugypt. Ever. 

Most other time periods I can think of have similar issues. It takes enormous effort for me to go back to any time period when I was in stone; the power of Harmony that bound me also puts up a lot of resistance to me re-entering those times in person, and I can't stay long without being forcibly bounced back. I could travel in space, but my last spaceship has sort of been lost to the ravages of time, given that I last used it some twelve hundred years ago, and as brilliant and talented as I am my talents don't lend themselves to the orderly precision with which a spaceship must be constructed if you want it to go faster than light and not use wormholes and not blow up while you are in the middle of nowhere. Wormholes, being dimensional gateways, are also off limits to me right now.

The only place I could go was Anon's world. So I did.

I admit I had some mild hopes at the time that maybe I could find someone with similar powers to Anon, who I could maybe recruit to help me against him or shut him down. My hopes weren't high – I've been to worlds with humans before and I've extensively observed them while I was trapped in stone, because they're hilarious, so I knew that generally speaking humans don't have powers like Anon does. But hey, Anon had such powers, so maybe there were other humans who might as well.

I couldn't find any evidence of where Anon himself came from – Anon being quite obviously not a real human name (well, not given what language Anon speaks anyway), I had no luck tracking down family members or friends of his. (This was before I'd interrogated the Elements about Anon and found out that supposedly his entire family was dead anyway.) I did, however, find out... okay, first of all you have to understand that in Anon's world, while films in theatres do still exist, most of the population owns tiny box-shaped movie screens that light up from the inside rather than relying on a projector, which play films that are sent to those boxes via wires called "cables" or via energy beams from space. They're called "televisions". These films play all day long and there are numerous "channels" of them, so at any given moment an inhabitant of Anon's world could choose between anywhere from 3 to 400 different films to entertain themselves with. (We will not even get into computers and the internet. You really don't have enough background to begin to comprehend those.)

Our world and the events in it – specifically the events happening to Twilight Sparkle and her pals – are the subjects of an animated film for children that plays a new episode once a week for half the year. The part that is somewhat terrifying about this is how frighteningly accurate this cartoon is. It starts by dramatizing Twilight's mostly incompetent efforts to deal with Nightmare Moonah before her return, the discovery of the Elements of Harmony, the freeing of Luna from Nightmare's corruption, etc. I watched the episodes I was in, a suitably dramatic two-episode story that was originally played a year after the first episode, and was... disturbed by how accurately the guy playing me manages to capture my voice. (Most ponies are at least somewhat familiar with animation, but for those who've managed to never bother going to a movie, animation is a film made by drawing pictures and then filming them, very fast, so it looks like they're moving, kind of like one of those cartoon flip books for foals. Because only the images can be manufactured this way, actual ponies, or in the case of Anon's world actual humans, must provide the voices for the drawn characters.) I toyed with the thought that Anon's world might be a parallel, a world where most or all of the beings on our world have counterparts or "cognates", and considered the possibility that the fellow voice-acting me was my cognate, but when I did a bit more research I discovered that most of his career consists of playing bit parts in laughably bad programs and movies, and a lengthy stint on a soap opera, and my cognate wouldn't be caught dead doing such things. If I'd been an actor, I'd be one of great renown, not a B-movie actor with history doing soaps. (Don't ask me to explain what soap operas are or why they're called that. Just don't. I've digressed enough as it is.) I did rather enjoy his portrayal of a chaotic space god alien, but the few other things he'd acted in that I got the chance to watch were deeply disappointing.

So back to the cartoon we are all in. Of course I watched most of the series. In the time I was there I only had the opportunity to locate episodes from the first two years, plus the first three of the third year; there's more, and at some point I might go back for it, but it's clearly diverged from our timeline by this point and is just fictional, because Anon isn't present in it. Up to the changeling invasion of Canterlot, the episodes appear to be relatively accurate depictions of our reality – somewhat sillier, more foal-friendly, and obviously since we are characters drawn, it's caricatured. For instance, they're even more inconsistent than I actually am about what size I am, and my legs and wings are drawn to be smaller in proportion to the rest of me than they actually are. (I'll admit that in reality they're on the small side, but in the cartoon, they're tiny.) Most mares all look alike aside from their colors, manestyles and cutie marks, and there are even fewer stallions shown in crowd scenes than would actually have been there in real life, probably because the program is aimed at fillies – I'm sorry, they're called "girls" when they're human youngsters. But the voices are uncannily accurate, and while I can't speak to the accuracy of the dialogue in any of the episodes but the one I was in, my episodes were eerily true to life and the dialogue sounds like something my charming enemies would say, in most of the others I watched. 

From the invasion of Canterlot onward, the story appears to diverge. Anon isn't in the Canterlot wedding episodes, so Princess Cadance and her boytoy save the day with the power of Lurve. The Crystal Empire returns, which hasn't happened yet in our world, and then Pinkie finds the Mirror Pool and duplicates herself... come to think about it, when she rejected my offer to be my Queen of Chaos she said something about Anon telling her that duplicating herself would be a bad idea, so that's probably him telling her about this episode. He may have seen more of them – as I said, these were the ones I could get my paws on during the short time I was there. But I'm not sure how much help to me they would be, because things are plainly going differently now that Anon is here.

I do not know how they have managed to so accurately depict our world. I do not know why the last name of the show's creator is the name of the goddess who created the world in several ancient religions that were old when I was young. I do not know how Pinkie Pie knows that the inexplicable characters "Y7" appear at the start of every episode, or what that even means, or why she was worried about losing them. I do not know how they seem to know at least some of our future (Anon would have had to see the episode with the Mirror Pool to warn Pinkie of the dangers of duplicating herself... but in the show, that happened after the Crystal Empire returned, which it has not done yet.) And the reason I do not know these things is I don't want to. If there is even the tiniest possibility that our world is in fact a fictional creation of some sort... don't tell me. I have a hard enough time with the fear that the world is my fictional creation and I'm still a statue, hallucinating. My preferred theory is that the creators of the show, consciously or unconsciously, are connected to our world in such a way that they can perceive what happens here, and then they write about it. If it goes the other way... I don't want to know.

In any case. I didn't find any humans with any abilities remotely close to Anon's, though it's possible that I wouldn't have been able to tell – were some of the celebrities on that world beings who'd warped their reality in order to become rich and famous? I can't detect Anon's power at work directly, only by inference, and there's so much chaos on his homeworld I doubt I'd be able to sense a rewrite of reality the way I did a week before my escape. However, if they exist and I can't find them, that's basically the same thing from my perspective as them not existing entirely... a dead end, and the magic of that world is strange and hard to use. On our world, chaos is magic; on that world, I can still feed on disharmony (of which there is plenty) and draw power I can use, but my abilities are very, very limited in comparison to what they are here. Simply maintaining the form of a human left me exhausted, too drained to perform much magic of any other kind, but taking my own form was out of the question – quite aside from the fact that there never were draconequui on the human world and dragons themselves only exist in their legends, humans are the only sapient species on their planet (that they know of and recognize as such, because the few others that exist don't use tools and there's no magic to make communication between species easier) and their attitude toward all the other creatures on their planet is that all animals were put on Earth for human use, and any that fall outside those parameters should be killed. And they have very, very, very sophisticated guns, much more powerful and dangerous than anything on our world, and with my magic as low as it was, I wasn't sure I could survive being shot. Which would almost certainly have happened if I'd taken my own form. 

So I had no good reason to stick around there. But the information I acquired from watching that show about Twilight and friends may prove quite useful.

You see, some of the episodes deal with stupid minor disagreements between friends and the like, but some have actual antagonists. The major antagonists – myself, Moonie, and Chrysalis, and I suppose Sombra, once he finally comes to the party – were all defeated in some fairly conclusive way. Moona became Luna, I got turned to stone, Chrysalis was flung somewhere random with all of her troops and might actually have died, and Sombra pretty definitely died in the show. The minor antagonists, however, were mostly just humiliated and ran off. Which means they are still around, in our world. 

I checked on Blueblood first, because I knew who he was already, and confirmed that he hates Anon. Then I went after the random griffin shown to be a friend of Rainbow Dash's, Gulla or Gilna or something like that. She spends her days bitterly complaining about ponies and her former friend and how much she hates Pinkie Pie, despite the fact that she lives among griffins and has no reason to dwell on one minor unpleasant incident in her past. She doesn't hate Anon, because she doesn't know him, but she's sworn vengeance on Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie and all of their friends. The showmare that bragged too much and was shown up by Twilight, Trixie Lulamoon, is also stomping around neighing about how much she hates Twilight and wants to destroy her, which is ridiculous because Twilight did nothing to her but save the town when Trixie herself couldn't. There are two unicorn brothers who attempted to put Applejack and her family out of business with a cider-making device of dubious quality, and they know of and despise Anon simply because of his friendship with Applejack. And there's a filly who for some reason is fixated with bullying and tormenting the little sisters of three of the Elements of Harmony, who hates Anon because he humiliated her publicly to protect the Bearers' sisters. Also, apparently, because he has a "stupid face", and because he has no cutie mark, regardless of how little sense this makes given that only ponies do have cutie marks. 

All of these ponies (and griffon) were shown to be antagonists in the cartoon in Anon's world. All of them obsessively hate Anon or the Bearers or all of the above, while every other single individual who knows Anon seems to love him. Anon was clearly familiar with the program before coming to our world. Just as he makes me into as stupid and clichéd a villain as he can every time I get near him, I believe he's turned these individuals into caricatures of themselves who hate him or his friends far more passionately than their interactions would actually justify, because they are "villains" and villains exist to hate the hero so the hero can defeat them, of course. He's stripped them of much of their former lives and identities and made their lives revolve around finding some way to get revenge.

So, since he's cast me as the main villain... I'm going to help them.

All of this is a distraction. Smoke and mirrors. If I don't present Anon with a suitably villainous plot to foil, he'll make one up and force it on me. As I believe I mentioned earlier, the Elements of Disharmony are mostly kind of useless. Oh, they each have abilities that will enhance my "team" in their quest for revenge on Anon or the Bearers; the Element of Arrogance should allow Blueblood to escape Anon's mind control and allow me to shock him into becoming his former self, the Element of Greed will help whoever I give it to to acquire and keep whatever it is that they want (and if what they want ends up harming the Bearers or Anon, bonus!), the Element of Rage will enhance its bearer's fighting ability and maybe even make them a match for Anon... but they're hardly some sort of sure-fire weapon, and against something as powerful as Anon I'm fairly sure all they can do is create a nuisance of themselves. Still, that's better than anything else in my arsenal can do, right now.

I might have to go get a few others, because thus far, my best three candidates – Blueblood, the griffon and Lulamoon – don't match the three Elements I have perfectly, as I believe I mentioned before. Blueblood's a shoo-in for Arrogance and the griffon can probably hold Rage but Lulamoon would be a much better candidate for Deception than Greed. I'm thinking of tracking down those unicorn brothers and giving them Greed, but Lulamoon's even more single-minded than any of the others and it would be a terrible shame to waste her, so maybe I ought to go try to find Deception. As for the little brat, I'm not entirely sure I want to bother using a filly, but she's a very clever filly with a very wealthy and influential father, and being a filly it's going to be much, much harder for Anon to take her on directly. She can do things like start whisper campaigns against Anon or lean on her daddy to help her (of course he loves Anon, so this might be difficult, but with one of my Elements in her corner she might be able to get her dad back on her side). I'd need either Cruelty or Selfishness for her. I know where Cruelty is, but I don't relish trying to get it – not that those who hold it could be a match for me the way Winnie was, but they're really, really disgusting. Unfortunately, I have no idea where Selfishness is. 

Well, I'll see how things go with Blueblood and Gilba. This is all a distraction to occupy Anon while I find a way to genuinely defeat him, after all, so maybe I don't need that many minions. 




So here is something you probably don't know about Blueblood.

When Equestria was founded, the six founders agreed that intermarriage between the three races – previously rare and considered near-treasonous – would be a good way to speed up the progress of harmony and friendship and all that jazz. The way to most sapient creatures' hearts is through their genitals, after all, and nothing says "harmonious friendship" like giving your future harmonious friends mutual orgasms. (I'm joking, of course, but in fact this is a very potent brainwashing technique Harmony has employed for millennia, one that almost worked on me more than once, before I figured out that if I wanted to maintain my pure, independent mindset and not be unduly influenced by the opinions of ponies I'd had sex with, I needed to toss them out of bed in the morning and tell them to hit the road. Oh, the sorrow and gnashing of teeth and "But I thought we had something special!" that would ensue. Positively delightful. Almost as much fun as the sex itself, in fact. But I digress.) So pegasi, earth ponies, and non-noble unicorns proceeded to attend mixers, court, date, and bump uglies within the next few years after the founding. However, while reportedly the then-Princess Platinum fully agreed with the plan... she married a noble unicorn. Because unicorn prejudices, within the noble class, were just that entrenched.

Imbrium was the daughter of Commander Hurricane (quite a randy old goat by then – it was his third marriage, to a mare much younger than himself. As a randy old goat myself, I heartily approve) and an Earth mare named Apple Scone, herself the daughter of Smart Cookie (who became Chancellor of the Earth ponies after Puddinghead, and deserved the position rather more) and a fellow named Johnny Appleseed, who almost certainly is probably not related to any ponies you know, most likely, because what kind of pony would put Apple in their name? 

Starfire, however, was the grandson of Queen Platinum of the unicorns, and the oldest of three. His mother and father were both noble unicorns. His father's parents were both noble unicorns. His mother's parents were Queen Platinum and a noble unicorn. Starfire's marriage to Imbrium was arranged out of necessity because the pegasus and earth pony tribes, for some reason, were getting fractious and objecting to the concept of being ruled by a monarch who apparently couldn't even be bothered to have sex with one of them. The idea would be that Celestia and Luna would thus descend from all three pony tribes, three of the six founders, and in particular the leadership of each of the three tribes. (Chancellor was a democratically elected position, rather like Mayor nowadays except ruler of the entire earth pony tribe rather than a town, and Commander was a meritocratic position earned rather than inherited, but it was pretty amazing how often the sons and daughters of Chancellors or Commanders found themselves elected to or appointed to their parents' positions. Ponies don't really have a keen grasp on the concept of not inheriting power. Even Mayor Mare is the third in her family to be mayor, after all.) 

Starfire's brother, Celestia and Luna's uncle Goldenblood, was an idiot. Public support for Celestia being what it was, he knew he couldn't even realistically get away with being her regent after her father died; Celestia was young, but of age to be crowned Queen, even if she declared that she refused the title and would continue to be called Princess until she had defeated the dragons and earned her father's position. (I am not completely certain why she never actually did this after overthrowing me. It's not because she promised Luna a full diarchy; she and Luna could both have been Queens. For obvious reasons, I've never had the chance to ask her.) He did, however, stick his muzzle into everything she tried to do and complained about most of it, made numerous snide remarks about her pegasus sister and "that monstrous pet of hers", aka moi, and generally made a huge nuisance of himself... up until the point where he grabbed a sword I'd enchanted, intending to kill me with it, and caused himself to turn into a solid foam dodecahedron that I might or might not have accidentally stepped on. What? I just said he was trying to kill me; it was self-defense. And possibly the defense of the entire pony nation, because if I'd let him take the throne as he'd been planning to after we all thought Celestia and Luna were dead, you would all be dragon droppings right now, most likely. Did I mention he was an idiot?

His and Starfire's little sister, however, idolized them both. I don't remember her name because she did her best to not bring herself to my attention. After I killed Goldenblood (I think... he might actually still be a hard foam dodecahedron someplace, that particular spell was built to last), she went underground. And after I was overthrown and turned into a magnificently attractive but enormously boring garden decoration, her descendants turned up, claiming to be the last unicorns of the line of Platinum. Celestia, who was very good at politics even then, embraced them as her long-lost "nieces" and "nephews", even though technically they would really have been many-times-removed cousins, and ever since then, the descendants of the line of Platinum hold the titles of Prince and Princess, and ostensibly consider Celestia their aunt. (And Luna, I suppose, nowadays.)

Now, keep this in mind. I ruled for maybe somewhere in the order of eight or nine centuries (I'm not good at keeping track of time, and in those days I made sure no one else was good at it either), and one thing I stomped out every time I found it was anything that resembled monarchy. Dictatorship, warlordism, or the inheritance of power... those things are anathema to the freedom of chaos and anarchy, and I crushed them wherever they appeared. (Usually not literally. The foam dodecahedron stunt didn't have to be repeated very often for ponies to get the idea to stop trying to kill me.) I did, at one point, find some unicorns claiming to be of the line of Platinum, attempting to rule a small territory up near Vanhoover, so I gave them all clown noses and hooves, drove half of them insane, and tormented the other half with public humiliation until they separated from each other, left their families behind, changed their names, burned their own cutie marks off with brands and painted fake replacements on their tushies, et cetera. Any pony attempting to rule over other ponies, particularly if they claimed to be authorized to do so by right of inheritance, was subject to the worst punishments I was willing to inflict, because that was my one rule under the rule of Unrule, the only law I held true to in the world of lawlessness I created: thou shalt not rule thy fellow pony, for their freedom is their birthright and to rule is to enslave. Ponies frequently claimed I ruled them, but this was never true; I unruled them. I enforced the rule that there should be no rule. Also I held lots of really amazing parties, but nopony remembers that part.

So the fact that there were scions of the Platinum line who managed to maintain records of their own genealogy, under my nose, for almost a thousand years, clinging to this clan memory of having once been princes and princesses in a world where those concepts had been made meaningless, for at least forty generations, when if any of them had revealed their identity to the world I would have mocked them into insanity... that tells you something. That tells you that this particular family is so incredibly, overbearingly obsessed with its own self-importance that they clung to their inherently meaningless "rank" for centuries, in secrecy, passing down the knowledge from parent to foal, until the day came that they could take their place in the monarchy once again as Very Important Sidekicks – hangers-on with no real power, toadies kissing up to the throne and being kissed up to by the populace in return despite their lack of any real power whatsoever.

This is the family Blueblood comes from. 

I don't like his type. I never have. Obsessing over birthrights and inheritance, feh. I may – and I stress the "may" – have been a high-priority candidate for the power I wield due to an unfortunate coincidence of birth, but I became a much higher-priority candidate from the effects of events occurring during my life, and in the end, I was given a choice. Admittedly a choice between "become the chaos avatar" and "stay dead", but at the time, death seemed fairly nice. There's a difference between dying and being dead; when you're dying, death is usually terrifying, but when you're dead, everything is very, very calm, and can be quite relaxing. Oh, there's no end of unquiet shades and terrified, confused spirits who don't really get that they're dead and anguished beings who died by violence and with something they left undone in life, so if you're looking for it, death is a rich source of chaos and disharmony, but for obvious reasons that sort of thing isn't exactly a downside from my perspective. So yes, it was a real choice. I am what I am because I chose to be, not because I was born to be (my biological father might have intended me to be born to be the chaos avatar, but he knew as well as I do now that it's a choice – chaos is freedom, chaos doesn't force itself on the unwilling.) And the idea of a creature who thinks it's better than others just like it on the basis not of what powers or talents or accomplishments it has, but on what some ancestor had, simply appalls me.

So Blueblood and his snooty belief in the superiority of the unicorn nobility and his own great specialness irritates me, and makes me want ever so much to burst his bubble. However, he's one of the few ponies, or any beings really, that I could potentially call an ally, because he hates Anon as much as I do. Anon has thoroughly mind-whammied him, mind you; in the past, while he certainly believed himself the epitome of equine breeding and superior to more or less everyone but the princesses, he did defer to any pony with both wings and a horn as his superior. Like most Equestrians, he used to worship the water he thought Celestia walked on, and he was one of the fiercest defenders of Luna after her return, because even if she did try to banish the Princess of the Sun, and the sun itself, and rule over Equestria in an Eternal Night that would eventually have frozen everyone to death, she was still an alicorn princess and that meant she should be slavishly kowtowed to. Now he plots against his aunts, evidently planning to try to overthrow them and usurp the throne. It'd be hilarious if it weren't Anon's work; the idea of Blueblood thinking he could rule or even wanting to is nonsensical, but there it is. He also used to be quite willing to accept earth ponies, pegasi and non-noble unicorns as friends, drinking buddies and bedroom companions, provided they grew up in Canterlot and were rich, or at least could convincingly fake it. Now he refers to Twilight Sparkle as a "peasant." Twilight Sparkle, chosen student of Celestia herself, greatest pony mage of the era, national hero, sister of his former best friend Shining Armor, whom he seems to have completely forgotten about, and long-term Canterlot resident from the upper-class districts. Methinks he may have forgotten what the word "peasant" actually means.

But never let it be said that I can't learn from the good ideas of my enemies. I know how Twilight Sparkle broke the unbalancing I inflicted on her friends. So I think I know how to wake Blueblood up. He already knows who the enemy is; he's one of the few that Anon has allowed to hate him. All he needs to do is remember who his friends are. And if the enemy of my enemy is my friend, then he needs to recognize that he and I ought to be best buds, at least until Anon has been defeated.




The best time to screw with a pony's mind is halfway between breakfast and lunch. Too early in the day, and they're bleary and tired and the whole thing seems surreal to them, or they blame it on not having eaten yet; too late in the day and they blame it on something they ate earlier; late at night and they think they're dreaming; and ponies who start drinking in mid-afternoon can blame anything that happens after that on being drunk. But between breakfast and lunch, they are usually alert and very much reality-focused. So of course, that is the perfect time to upend their reality.

Blueblood was in his bedroom, looking at himself in a mirror in enrapturement as he mindlessly adjusted fiddly little details of his clothing or manestyle or practiced different smiles in the mirror. Now, it would be the height of hypocrisy for me to complain about ponies gazing at themselves in the mirror, considering how much enjoyment I've gotten out of doing the same myself, but when I go adjusting my appearance, I go big. Either I'm at the mirror just to get a good look at the best-looking draconequus in the world to brighten my day, which takes me less than a minute or two because as gorgeous as I am, I know what I look like and there's a whole world of things that I don't already know what they look like to go see, or I'm at the mirror to adjust my own appearance, in which case I am probably turning into a dirigible, or a sheep, or a dragonfly, or a tree. Why fiddle with tiny details no one will notice? That's simply pure narcissism. 

I popped in behind him, hiding myself from the mirror, with a pencil-thin mustache and a camera. "Oh, sir, simply perfecto!" I said in an outrageously overblown Roamish accent. (Or possibly Neighpolitan. I always get Roam and Neighples confused.) "Hold that pose if you would!" I managed to snap a couple of pictures of him looking hilariously startled before he managed to turn around.

He gasped. "Discord!" he shouted, and then, "Guards! Guards! Protect me!"

"You need guards to protect you from having your picture taken?" I asked. "Let me guess, a few run-ins with some overly aggressive paparazzi?"

"Guards! Where are you?"

"Exactly where you left them, right outside your door," I said. "Of course you're not inside your door anymore, so they can't exactly hear you, but it's not as if they're the ones who went anywhere."

Blueblood looked around himself in a comical double-take, realizing that I had shifted him to a pocket dimension. Or, probably, not realizing this, but realizing at the least that he was now in an eerily empty misty gray place and not in his room anymore. (I know, the whole misty gray pocket dimension thing is overplayed, and I was so tempted to put him in a room made of bees, or the inside of a seashell with the sound of the ocean roaring through it, or something, but I didn't want anything to distract him from what I had to say.) 

"Return me to my room at once, peasant!" he snapped at me. My jaw dropped. I picked it up off the floor, dusted it off and put it back on, then shoved my eyes back into their sockets from where they'd been protruding by goggling at him. 

"Do... do you have any idea what that word even means?" I asked, trying to stifle hysterical laughter. I failed. Stifling hysterical laughter isn't really one of my talents. Through my hearty guffaws, I managed to choke out, "I was the ruler of Equestria for a thousand years!" It was actually more like eight or nine hundred. No one knows exactly, including me; I'm terrible with telling time, and while both Celestia and Luna are very, very good at it even when I'm controlling their sun and moon, I managed to throw even them off with random time loops, tossing them into another dimension for a week or twenty, mind-expanding chemicals, and so forth. "I'm more powerful than every alicorn in Equestria put together!" True, but if there was a fourth they might give me a serious fight. "I'm the immortal Lord of Chaos, you prissy little fop, how exactly do you get the idea of calling me a 'peasant?' I mean, words do have meanings, right? And they don't usually change overnight?" I got my laughter under control. "As delighted as I'd be to discover that ponykind had taken up the pastime of radically redefining their language at random, I'm fairly certain that 'peasant' still means something like an uneducated farmer with only the most basic magic. Which, I assure you, is the antithesis of me in every respect."

"Very well, then, would you prefer I called you 'monster'? Or 'freak'?" I could smell the fear on him, but with the strength of either great courage or unparalleled stupidity, he was still standing up to me. I wondered if this was due to Anon messing with him, making him so single-mindedly certain of his own superiority that he couldn't recognize when he was outmatched, or if he'd always been like this. 

"Oh, why not? As long as you don't call me Shirley. I hate that." I twined around him in air, not touching him – there's a time and a place to get huggy with a pony, but this wasn't it – with my tail near the "ground" on one side of him, my torso looping up the other side of him and over his withers, my neck bending around his and my face just slightly above his face, looking down. 

"I know you held Equestria in your grasp for centuries, after usurping the throne," Blueblood said. "But you could hardly have been called a 'ruler.' My family has legends of you tormenting my ancestors over those centuries!"

"I don't see how that's relevant," I said. "Sombra tormented the Crystal Ponies and he's still considered to have been their ruler."

"Sombra was not a usurper. You had no right to the throne of Equestria!"

"Which is why I built my own!" I said cheerfully, manifesting my gray and black antlered throne and plopping myself down in it. (True confession time: I use that thing to look impressive. When I knew Tia and Luna were coming for me, and I had reason to believe they'd taken weapons from the Tree of Harmony that could kill me (and if only I'd realized that the silly shiny rocks they brought instead were weapons from the Tree of Harmony, this would be a very different world), or when I was trying to intimidate modern ponies into not fighting me because I'd much rather play with ponies than have to hurt them to prove a point, I manifested that throne to sit on. It's actually not particularly comfortable so when I was secure in my dominance over Equestria, I was much more likely to sit on a beanbag, or a giant chicken, or a huge pile of fluffy leaves.) "As for your ancestors, I'm terribly sorry, but how did you expect me to resist such priggish self-importance? Their baseless certainty of their superiority for no better reason than the family line they were born to... it was like waving fish in front of a bear. I just couldn't help myself."

"Is that supposed to excuse your behavior? You drove my ancestors to madness!"

I leaned forward. "Did I? The rumors I hear today are that I used to kill and eat ponies. Did your ancestors tell you that?"

He visibly blanched – which is hard to do when you're already a white pony, but he managed it – and I might have been imagining it, but perhaps I smelled just the tiniest tang of urine. But he held his ground, which was actually somewhat impressive. Not that there was anywhere to run to, in a pocket dimension. "I'd heard nothing of the sort. We were told that you refused to grant your victims the mercy of death, that you even healed some who had tried to end their lives to free themselves of you, so that you could continue to torment them. Are the legends false, then, that they don't make you sound monstrous enough? The stories I've heard say that you've caused many a fate worse than death, but never death itself."

A knot in my gut that I hadn't even known was there relaxed. I could have hugged Blueblood, in the sudden rush of joy that swept over me. Anon hadn't altered the past. Just like the mares whose birth records still said they were stallions, just like the herd marriages where only one of the mares actually had legal paperwork for her marriage to the stallion and all of the others just seemed to believe they were legally married in a herd without any concrete evidence of the marriage. He'd left inconsistencies. He'd warped Celestia and Luna's memories to make them think I was a murderous beast, but Blueblood's opinion of me wasn't important to Anon, so he hadn't altered it. The bloodline that I actually had tormented had stories of my past deeds that were still true, and Blueblood still remembered them accurately. 

I'd known Anon had limits, because of the paperwork that hadn't changed. But I myself couldn't have altered papers on that kind of scale, so up to now, I had no sense of Anon having limits that I could begin to approach. But this... this was carelessness. Anon could have altered Blueblood's memories of me the way he'd altered Blueblood's personality and memories of his own behavior, but he hadn't bothered. And no one knows better than I do how a much more powerful opponent can be defeated through their own carelessness. I had a millennium in stone and the mental scars therefrom to prove it. 

I sprang out of my chair. "You are correct, sir!" I said, and pinned a small gold sparkle to his vest.  "You get a gold star! And that means I chose correctly. You are the right one to bear my gift."

"Your gift?" He sneered. "Why would I want a gift from you?"

"Because you want power?" I said. "But if you're truly uninterested in a magical artifact as powerful as an Element of Harmony that can make others recognize your natural leadership qualities and follow you, I suppose I could go find somepony else to give it to... maybe the mayor of Ponyville or something..."

"That little peasant? How could she possibly deserve such an honor?!" 

I waved my hand in front of my face. "Euw. Ever hear 'say it, don't spray it', Blueblood?"

"If you had an artifact such as you describe, and I'm hardly claiming to believe you, but if you did, why give it to me? Why not use it yourself, to take power?"

I laughed heartily at him. "Oh, you silly little princeling, you think I need trinkets to do that? I am power, Blueblood. But I don't seek to rule... to be perfectly fair, you were quite right. I wasn't a ruler to Equestria. I'm the Lord of Chaos; actually ruling anything is antithetical to my nature. I don't need ponies to follow me, I simply want total freedom to do as I wish. And there's really only one thing standing between me and my goal, and I think, given your opinion of him, that you'd make an excellent ally."

"My opinion of who?"

"Why, Anon of course! A little birdie's told me that you dislike the fellow almost as much as I do." A bird circled Blueblood's head, chirping "Anon is a disgusting dirty alien peasant! Anon is a disgusting dirty alien peasant!" 

A broad, sneering smile spread across Blueblood's face. "Ah, yes. I do recall the rumors that he put you in your place," he said, chuckling slightly. "While he is an uncouth, classless interloper who does not deserve the attention he receives from the Elements of Harmony, let alone my dear aunts, the fact that he has shown himself capable of defeating you is one of the few positive qualities the fellow has. Why should I throw in with you, a known treacherous monster, simply because I dislike the alien freak? He's hardly more freakish than you are."

"Well, I could say, because I'm a native Equestrian, while he hails from a completely different dimension. The well-being of this world matters to me because it's my home. For him, it's a vacation spot, and he can choose to pack up and head back to his home any time he likes. Or, I could point out that I have wings and two horns, and therefore by the divine right of alicorns, I have far more legitimate claim to power than he does."

He scowled. "That law is for ponies. You are far from a pony, beast!"

"Ah, but I'm part pony. My wings are those of a pegasus and a thestral, and my head is a pony's. Anon is entirely 100% coatless ape."

"Your head looks more like a goat's than a pony's," Blueblood said snootily.

"Let's not get personal here. I could also point out that, unlike Anon, I have the power to transform unicorns into alicorns, if I should so wish." That got his attention. The old Blueblood would have found the implication that I could grant him alicornhood scandalous, even blasphemous; it's part of an almost religious faith among the nobles of Equestria that alicorns are alicorns because they themselves are such advanced masters of magic and so in tune with the fundamental forces of life and magic that it's their destiny to become alicorns. That's why, when Cadance first ascended, the nobles accepted her so easily as one of them, well, except for that one power-hungry witch who put her to sleep for centuries out of jealousy. (Cadance actually does have royal blood, but it's the ruler who came before Sombra that she's related to, and the royals of the Crystal Empire, not Equestria, and it was far back enough in her ancestry that no genealogy that existed at the time could have proven it. Though she's named for that ruler, Amore, so it is kind of obvious. But prior to her ascension, she'd been an abandoned and presumably orphaned pegasus being raised by earth ponies, so the nobles did indeed have to wrap their heads around the concept of wings+horn automatically equals royalty, regardless of apparent ignoble birth.) This new Blueblood, modified by Anon's power, was very interested in the concept of being made an alicorn rather than ascending on his own merit. But while the idea enticed him... well, I admit, I'm not famous for my trustworthiness.

"I'm sure you have that power, but why would I believe you'd use it on my behalf? After you spent centuries tormenting my family, I can't imagine why you would want to help me achieve power."

"Your family offended me by claiming to be nobility, when I'd outlawed the very concept of any pony being superior to any other pony on the basis of bloodline." I landed, my paws clenching, clasping to each other and twisting. "But I don't make the laws anymore, so I have nothing against your line now. And the reason I don't make the laws anymore is that a certain pair of someponies decided to turn me to stone!" I didn't actually have to fake being angry about that. No, it's not something I go around dwelling on; life is too much fun to bring myself down by remembering the bad parts of the past too often. But I admit it, I'm not over it. I say a thousand years, but ponies started keeping accurate time records as soon as I was sealed, and according to them, it was closer to twelve hundred. And either way... over a millennium robbed from me, unable to move, to speak, to see, to feel, to use my magic... trapped in total isolation and loneliness, helpless and paralyzed... no. I'm not over it. I expected nothing different from Luna, but I'm not sure I will ever forgive Celestia for it. "So, if circumstances were to lead a pair of alicorns to fall from power, and a new one to rise, one who'd personally done me no harm... let's just say I'd consider it deserved retribution. If I have to put another pony on the throne, to gain an ally who can help me topple Celestia and Luna in the first place... picking someone who ponies would follow and who hates Anon almost as much as I do seems like a good choice to me."

"Well... what you say does make sense. Of course, if you're seeking an ally against Celestia, Luna, Anon, and the Elements of Harmony, I am the most logical choice." He smirked, his demeanor returning to his former overweening self-confidence. "Do you plan to make me an alicorn now, so I might help you?"

I snickered. "Nice try, but no. Oh noo no no, that's not how we do this. First, I have to restore your mind to the way it was before Anon altered your memories. Then I have to –"

"Wait, what? What do you mean, Anon altered my memories?"

"Oh, now you ask," I said. "Well, it's quite simple, really. Anon's altered the memories of every pony in Equestria in order to change the world to his liking, and give himself power. Now, as I was saying—"

"How? The pathetic little monkey has no magic, except for that cheap, bit-store jewel around his neck!"

"If you would stop interrupting me, maybe I'd be able to explain it," I snapped, though I wasn't actually angry – Blueblood was reacting exactly the way I'd wanted him to. "Now, we have to restore your true memories and purge your mind of Anon's influence. Then, I can give you the Element of Arrogance and make you its bearer—"

"The element of what?"

"Arrogance."

"I'm not arrogant! I am a prince of Equestria, of the line of Platinum, rightful heir to the unicorn throne and nephew to alicorns! I have every right—"

"Call it the Element of Pride, then. Call it the Element of Cheese for all I care. It's a powerful magical artifact, akin to one of the Elements of Harmony, that grants its wielder both strength of mind – so Anon would be unable to influence you again – and the power of leadership. For ponies who already have qualities of leadership, the Element of Arrogance amplifies their charisma, making other, lesser ponies bow eagerly to their will. But I can't possibly give it to you while your mind is under foreign influence."

"And do you expect me to let you into my mind? How foolish do you think I am, creature?"

"Not at all, my dear little pony. I don't need to enter your mind; all I need to do is show you your own past, to unlock what you have lost and restore your natural personality."

"And you say Anon has been somehow... influencing me?"

"Not just you... every pony in Equestria was affected. Some worse than others. You were fortunate, Blueblood; many, many stallions were turned into mares, with their memories and the memories of all the ponies who know them altered to match. Fancy being Princess Bluebelle?"

"What?! Nopony has that power!"

"Yes, but Anon is not a pony. I don't even know how far his powers extend; thus, why I need an alicorn on my side." I laid down on air, floating just below the level of Blueblood's head, looking up at him with my head propped on my talon. "I'll be honest with you, Prince. My own powers are great... but I'm no match for Anon, or whatever entity lives in his head. He's entirely too stupid for me to believe that he himself is wielding this power, but I think something lives inside him, something that acts to fulfill his wishes and desires. But whatever it is, it's out of my league. It's not just the Element of Protection, although that thing certainly doesn't help. He can influence even my mind, lower my intelligence when I'm in combat and make me make mistakes. Three times now he's almost killed me. I need an ally whose mind can't be influenced."

The truth is, of course, I have no reason to believe that the Element of Arrogance will fully protect Blueblood. The Elements of Disharmony carry a fifth of my power; with the whole of my power I'm still vulnerable, so the likelihood that the Element can do what all my power cannot is slim. On the other hand... the Elements are each concentrated on a small portion of my repertoire of abilities, and focus a full fifth of my power into a range of abilities much tinier than that. Because Arrogance is hyperfocused on the two things it does – make the Bearer resistant to outside mental influence and strengthen his or her ability to influence others – it might actually do better at those things than I, with all my power, can, simply because I'm not monomaniacally focused on only a small pawful of my own talents. And regardless, the Elements are a distraction, so whether Anon can overwhelm Arrogance's power or not, either way it will occupy his attention and buy me time. I know now that whatever lives inside Anon and shapes reality for him doesn't just have limitations on the range of its power; it's sloppy. It makes mistakes. Deep down, I think I didn't truly believe I had any hope until Blueblood told me that he still remembers the stories of me roughly the way they actually happened. There are holes in Anon's new reality, and one of my greatest talents is exploiting loopholes.

I can't actually make Blueblood an alicorn, by the way. I could temporarily give him wings and expand his magical pool, but it wouldn't last, and even if it did last, he'd essentially be a supercharged unicorn with wings, not an alicorn. Alicorns represent Platonic concepts, underpinnings of magic, and while there are spells to enable them to ascend, they have to actually be worthy of it for the spell to work. But he didn't know that.  

"What has he been influencing me to do? I despise the hairless monstrosity; if he were influencing me, would he not compel me to think highly of him, as all the rest of the sheep in the palace do?"

"That would be telling," I said, grinning. "Come on, Bluenose, we've got a show to get to!"

"A – what? Don't call me Bluenose! My name is Prince Blueblood!" he shouted, as I dragged him by one hoof to a stage, the smaller of two. I left him behind on the stage and teleported to the MC's station at the edge of the stage.

"Prince Blueblood, This Is Your Life!" I said into the microphone, as the words "THIS IS YOUR LIFE" flared to life above the stages. The audience I had thoughtfully provided started stomping their hooves wildly. "Yes, today we have a very special guest with us, fillies and germs. Prince Blueblood of Equestria! Let's hear it for useless, inbred hereditary nobility!" The crowd stomped even louder, almost but not quite drowning out the sound of Blueblood saying, "I say! How dare you speak of me in this manner!"

I ignored Bluey's outrage. "Now, Prince Blueblood, do you remember your last year at Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns?"

He snorted. "Of course I do. Full of studying and trying to impress the old bag, the same as all the other years."

"Then you'll certainly remember this fellow!" A spotlight shone on a replica of Twilight's older brother.

Blueblood blinked. "That's the captain of the guard... the one who married Princess Mi Amore Cadenza. Shining Steel, wasn't that his name?"

"Shining Armor, but of course you must know that, considering that he was your best friend."

"He what? Nonsense!"

"Let's roll the clip, shall we?"

I wasn't around for any part of Blueblood's childhood, of course, and he was never the object of any of my more thorough studies. But Twilight Sparkle was. And that included researching her brother. Still, I hadn't known about most of this before I went time-scrying through Blueblood's life; I can't easily travel to a time I've already lived through, particularly a time when I was in stone, but I can read the past like a book. Or rather, I can watch it, like a movie, because reading is terribly boring when you can have audiovisuals instead. 

Princess Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns isn't actually a school. It's a program that happens at a school. Canterlot Academy is a boarding school for children of the wealthy and powerful, regardless of race or in fact species – there are often youngsters whose parents are diplomats from places like Zebrica or Griffonia attending. The Gifted Unicorn magic-training program focuses entirely on magic, but that doesn't change the fact that the young'uns need to learn reading, writing and 'rithmetic. As well as science, history and how to make a crayon drawing your parents won't be embarrassed to hang on their refrigerator. Blueblood and Shining Armor were both in the program, though both dropped out after getting their cutie marks, so they were never in it at the same time as Twilight. Of course, neither of them had close to the sort of talent Celestia was looking for in a personal student, but that's why Twilight got the shiny tiara with the purple gem in it and they didn't.

I pulled up images of the past and put them on display, letting Blueblood see himself palling around with Shining Armor. They had had the sort of relationship where Blueblood thought he was in charge and Shining Armor humored him. 

"But – this is – he isn't even a noble!" the Blueblood of today sputtered.

"Oh, but it gets worse, mon petit cheval." I grinned at him as the images from the past continued to play, in which Blueblood was excitedly telling Shining Armor about confirmation he'd gotten from Celestia that the legendary lost princess of love really had existed, and his theory about where she was, and his plan to sail out to the island where he thought she was trapped. Shining Armor, quite sensibly, pointed out that this was an amazingly stupid idea for two colts without cutie marks to undertake alone. After a bit of brainstorming, the colts solved their problem brilliantly by bringing a pegasus filly named Daring Do in on their plan. And by brilliantly, I mean "still amazingly stupid, but now the children no longer thought so, thus ensuring that they'd carry out their idiotic plan."

"She – she's a pegasus!" modern Blueblood wailed. "How could I – this can't be! This can't be my past! You're lying!"

"Search your feelings," I told him. "You know it to be true."

We continued to watch – or rather, he continued to watch, and I continued to watch him – as the three foals hopped the train to Manehattan, purchased a boat and supplies with Blueblood's money, and sailed northeast, having all sorts of heartwarming adventures and bonding experiences that I really don't care about, though several of the moments where they almost got themselves killed were hilarious. Blueblood's primary motivation here had been his belief that as a prince, it was his destiny to awaken the lost princess with True Love's Kiss, or something like that; Shining Armor's motivation appeared to be to keep his friend out of trouble; and Daring Do's motivation was purely the desire to explore, as, not being nobility, she didn't exactly have the funds to go buy her own boat. Over the course of their adventures, Blueblood and Daring Do both discovered natural talents for exploration and orienting themselves, resulting in remarkably similar cutie marks, while Shining Armor discovered his specialty in shielding magics. 

Then they got to the island, disarmed various traps, and found teenage Cadance, trapped in magical sleep, where she'd been stuck for the past four hundred years after a jealous noblemare, angry that Celestia wouldn't agree to engage Cadance to her son, had gotten hold of a dangerous magical artifact, bespelled her, and hidden her away. (Celestia had sent out several expeditions to try to find her, and none of them had succeeded. The reason Blueblood knew where she was was that, to nopony's great surprise I imagine, the noblemare who bespelled her was one of his ancestors, and on her deathbed had repented and confessed to her son where Cadance had been hidden. Her son, being a fine, upstanding citizen of Equestria, had written down his mother's dying words and then promptly hidden them away in the vaults so Celestia would never find out it had been his mother's fault Celestia's adopted niece was lost. Blueblood, on an exploring expedition through one of his family's older mansions, had found the document, and instead of telling Celestia had concocted a plan to find and marry the lost princess himself. To be fair, he was probably more motivated by romantic notions and fairy tales than scheming for power.) Much to Blueblood's shock, he had no luck whatsoever awakening the princess with a kiss, but Shining Armor just shook her by her withers to try to wake her, and it worked. 

Afterward, we watched as Blueblood's distraught mother pulled him out of school, hysterical that Celestia hadn't prevented her son from endangering himself, and demanded that he continue his education from one of his family's estates, more or less under lock and key. So Shining Armor found his calling and his future wife, Daring Do found her special talent and her destiny, and Blueblood got locked up by an overprotective mother who wouldn't let him see his friends again until he was an adult, by which time they had drifted apart. Funnily enough, the whole time we were watching Blueblood and Friends' entertaining adventures, Blueblood continued to insist that nothing like this had ever happened... it wasn't until the end of the story, when he saw the fate his mother inflicted on him, that his memories finally came back.

He knelt on the stage, reeling with shock, simultaneously trying to deal with the fact that all his recent memories and attitudes and beliefs had been warped beyond his recognition, and the realization that his adult life was completely empty and hollow because he'd been denied the chance to exercise his special talent. As tempted as I was to giggle hysterically at his inner turmoil, I refrained. I was trying to win him over as an ally, after all. Besides, despite my best efforts to remain completely callous, I did feel slightly sorry for him. Attempts not to exercise my own talent have never worked out well for me, and I knew what it felt like to have had two childhood friends you went adventuring with where the friendship was broken entirely by time. Anon had taken Celestia and Luna's memories of that time, but left mine so I could grieve the loss; now I was returning the favor, giving Blueblood back the memories of his own lost friendships that Anon had taken, so he could fight Anon for me. 

Blueblood looked up at me, eyes wet. "How – how long have I forgotten myself?"

"That depends on what you mean," I said. "If you mean how long since Anon got his hooks into you... probably it happened right around Shining Armor's wedding. If you mean how long have you been leading a meaningless shell of a life devoid of purpose, don't ask me, ask yourself."

"I turned on my aunts. I was plotting to destroy them. What have I done?"

"So far? Not much. You probably never had a chance against them, you know, but you'd have destroyed your relationship with Celestia and ended up cooling your hooves in a dungeon for years."

He sighed. "I suppose... I owe you a debt, then, for restoring me to myself." He got up onto his hooves. "What gift do you have for me, then? And how do you expect me to fight a creature that warps minds?"

"I don't. I expect you to occupy his attention. Make his life miserable. Stir up the nobility against the human interloper, accuse him of taking advantage of Equestria's fair maiden heroes – which would be completely true, by the way, they didn't all spontaneously decide to fall in love with him on their own – turn Luna against him, that sort of thing."

"Luna? Not Princess Celestia?"

"Celestia's probably a lost cause, but I know for a fact that Luna subconsciously wants to get rid of Anon. Maybe you can convince her that Anon is a threat."

"I'm... not very close to Aunt Luna, I fear."

"No, but you stood up for her when she came back from the moon, and I suspect that counts for a lot, with her." I reached into my pocket and withdrew the Element of Arrogance. "Do you choose to bear the Element of Arrogance, then, and protect yourself from Anon's mind-manipulations?"

Blueblood nodded. "I do. I'm no great fan of that uncouth pack of mares that ruined the last Gala, but they are Equestrian heroes, and the thought of some monstrosity from another dimension mind-controlling them to love him disgusts me. To say nothing of what he attempted to do to me." He snorted, stamping a hoof in anger. "I'll take it. But once Anon is done with, we will no longer be allies, creature. I do not do this for the sake of my own power – I remember, now, that I'm more than content with what I already have. I do this because Anon needs to be stopped."

"That's all I need from you." I grinned, and snapped my talon. The Element of Arrogance appeared, a platinum circlet on his forehead. In the center of the circlet there's an ivory cameo of a pony, made from the horn of a long-dead centaur. The image, a generic unicorn, shifted to become Blueblood's silhouette as I concentrated, bonding the Element to him. It was a good fit, not that I expected differently. Tiny gems all around the cameo, representing (and storing) magic, changed from clear diamonds to a pattern of white, gold and blue, matching his colors, and the pattern itself shifted from a circle to the compass rose shape of his cutie mark. 

"I don't feel any different," he complained. "Are you sure it's working?"

"Of course it's working. It's bonded to you perfectly."

"Do I need to wear it all the time for it to work?"

"No, but it helps."

"I don't think Aunt Celestia will be happy with me wearing a royal circlet," Blueblood pointed out. 

Also, she might possibly notice that that's the same artifact that was stolen from the Canterlot Museum. "Oh, very well." I snapped a talon, and the circlet changed to a chain around his neck, supporting a pendant that held the ivory cameo and gem insets around it. "Wear that under your clothing if you must, but it should simply look like a rather egotistical ornament at this point, and you can claim that one of the many mares who typically throw themselves at you gifted it to you, or something. Most likely, any story you make up will be believed as long as it's not outrageously implausible."

"And what happens if it's discovered that I'm carrying a magic item you gave me?" The idea was obviously occurring to him for the first time, his eyes starting to go wide as he realized how much trouble he could get into by throwing in with me. "Will you give me some means of contacting you if I need your help?"

I put my arm around his withers. "Blueblood, Blueblood," I said in my best patronizing tone. "Chaos doesn't work with a safety net." I let him go. "I'm all about freedom of choice. You're the bearer of the Element of Arrogance now, and you can do whatever you want with it. Go sniveling to your aunt to tell her all about what I said? Lay down and lick Anon's feet like everypony else does? It's all up to you. You can choose to use this to fight Anon, or you can choose to use it to demand higher taxes for the peasants and bigger swimming pools in Canterlot. Either way, bestowing the Element is all the help I can give. So no. You don't call me, I call you, and I probably won't."

Blueblood glared at me. "So if I'm caught carrying an Element of Chaos—"

"They're Elements of Disharmony, actually."

"Oh, I'm sure that would make it better," he sneered. "You've recruited me as an ally and yet you'll do nothing to help me?"

"Correctamundo," I said. "Believe me, I've got my paws full dealing with Anon already. You've got experience in the political intricacies of Canterlot, the indulgence of Princess Celestia, and now, the power to make almost any pony believe you and want to follow you. If you end up getting yourself into trouble with all those advantages, you're entirely too dumb for me to risk myself saving you."

And, rather than get into another round of arguments about why I should make an exception to the rule of "chaos helps those who help themselves" for Blueblood the special snowflake, I vanished.

One down, two to go from the supply I've got, and I've got up to three others I could go looking for to bring into play. (There's seven total, but I'm not using Hatred. I've seen what that thing does.)