//------------------------------// // C̛͟҉͢h̛͏a̶̡͢͠͡p̕͠t̶̢e̷̡ŕ̷̷̢͏ ̷̡9̡͏̢҉ // Story: Refined Starlight in a Broken Vessel // by the-pieman //------------------------------// I approach the statue. By now the guard has run off. I know he’s not stupid, so he’s probably left to get backup. I think about how to release the imprisoned Spirit. I suppose I could just try to break the statue. I take the coal dagger and reform it into ‘brass’ knuckles on my right hand. I clench my fist and swing hard. I definitely made a crack. My hand hurts a bit, but I can easily tell that I did a good job as the crack is spreading. Light shines from the cracks, blinding me. I hear more cracking and then a laugh. It’s very... well, I suppose the best description would be ‘charismatic’. I lower my arms and I can see Discord standing in front of me. His figure leaves quite an impression, one that is hard to forget. But not that scary to be honest, despite multiple insistences that he was a monster. He seems more like a standard chimera to me. “Well this is a surprise.” He chuckles, leaning down towards me. He’s almost half again taller than me, and probably a lot longer than that if he were stretched out. “You are quite interesting. What are you, my little rescuer?” “I’m a human. And I suppose I am speaking with Discord, Spirit of Chaos?” “The~ee one and only!” He strikes a pose and confetti appears, showering him as a fanfare blares. Quite the showman. He goes back to leaning towards me, an amused expression on his face. “So, why did you free me? Not that I’m complaining, of course.” “I want to get to know you.” I answer plainly. An eyebrow literally raises off his head, fluttering away like a butterfly after it achieves liftoff. “Really?” Discord asks, more than just a hint of surprise in his voice. “Yes. I heard about you from the princesses and Element Bearers.” I explain, and this gets a narrow-eyed look from him for a moment, until I continue. “Unfortunately, they seemed heavily biased, so I took their information with a grain of salt.” The other eyebrow raises, this time simply going up at a steady pace. “Well, more like an entire spoonful. Anyway, I want to hear about you. I doubt you’re the terrible villain they claim you are.” “Of course not!” he insists, smiling happily. “I just like to have fun. It’s not my fault that not everypony appreciates my idea of humor.” “I relate completely.” I say, nodding sagely “Ah, a kindred... well, you aren’t a spirit in the literal sense, I suppose.” he says, paw to his chin thoughtfully. “Forget it. How about you demonstrate your idea of a good time?” I ask invitingly. “You... are the first person to ask, kid.” he pulls em into a hug from the side, in spite of having been in front of me. “I like you.” With a snap of his talons, we are on a rooftop in a fairly rural town. A bit more advanced than Ponyville, but not a sprawling city by any means. “Teleportation that doesn’t blind you? I appreciate that, thank you.” “Why should magic annoy someone?” he says waving his paw in dismissal. “That’s just inconvenient.” Glad to see someone understands. “Agreed. So where are we?” “This, my disciple of chaos, is the city of Trottingham.” He gestures towards the little city with a sweep of his arm. “Looks boring.” I say pointedly. “My thoughts exactly.” He laughs as he snaps his paw-fingers and dark clouds form over the city. “That’s it? Rain? You’re gonna make them wet?” “Wait for it...” Discord says, giggling an excited chuckle. Suddenly, I hear a clap of thunder and it starts raining. But it’s not rain. Oh there’s water all right. Bottles of water. I burst out laughing. “Oh lord, that’s awesome!” He smiles happily, “Isn’t it just?” We share laughs as we watch all the ponies run from the plastic containers falling from the sky. They’re freaking out like crazy. “H- hey Discord... “ I pant from all the laughing. He wipes away a tear. “What?” “Can I have a turn?” I ask, catching enough breath to speak properly. “What can you do?” I look around and I see a pony run under the canvas cover of a nearby store. I point at it. “Teleport me behind that pony.” “Let’s see what you got, kid.” He snaps his fingers and I’m behind the pony as requested. I grin. This is going to be awesome. I wait for a few moments and then I Spark up, my glowing blue form drawing the pony’s attention. “Boo!” She screams and runs out from under the canvas... *thunk* Just in time for a bottle of water to bean her right on the head. “Critical Hit!” I shout as I pump my fist in the air. Suddenly I’m next to Discord who’s laughing his head off. Literally, his head isn’t on his shoulders but rolling on the ground. His body, however, is in the traditional, goofy ‘laughing uproariously’ pose. “That... That was perfect! Ahahahahahahaaaaaa...” I pick up Discord’s head and reattach it... on his rear end. “What’s up, assface?” With a *pop* he’s back to normal and we high five each other, laughing like maniacs. I grin and say, “L- let’s do something else!” “You don’t even have to ask!” Discord shouts. I’m having a blast! We continue our laughing as we cause havoc throughout Trottingham, freaking out ponies left and right. Discord starts some music out of nowhere and we dance to the offbeat ‘rhythm’, watching as ponies avoid whatever nonsensical obstacle they face. This is the most entertaining day of my life. “Hah, I knew the princesses were lying. They just have no sense of humor!” “You are my new favorite person, Anthony!” Odd, I don’t recall telling him my name... eh, oh well, who cares? Our two-man, city-wide party continues until the light of dawn. Wait. Dawn. I turn to Discord. “Celestia’s awake.” I say with an evil grin. Discord returns my expression and snaps his fingers. We are outside the throne room. I whisper into Discord’s ear and he chuckles, nodding. Discord disguises us as potted plants while we wait, but when Celestia approaches her throne, I’m no longer a plant. I leap onto her back and mash a magically-summoned three-layer cake into her face. “Good morning, Celestia. Did that cake you up? I must say, that white fur makes you look a little pastry.” “Anthony!” She wipes the cake from her face. “What in the world-” “Wait, you missed a spot, right here!” I repeat the process, this time with a pie. Discord can’t help himself. He returns to his normal form and we end up rolling on the floor, holding our sides as we laugh. “Discord!?” “Nope.” I say. “It’s Chuck Testa!” Discord and I high five again. “Anthony!” she has a wild look in her eyes, and her voice cracks with panic. I can’t help but start laughing again. “What is going on? Why is Discord free!?” “If you forgot, I mentioned my intention of meeting him. And I consider you a liar.” I say, still on the floor. She just looks confused at this, a panoply of other emotions mixing in her expression as her eyes flick between me and Discord. “What?” “We spent the entirety of last night causing chaos, and I honestly didn’t see him do anything nearly as bad as you say he did.” I reply, folding my arms and sticking my tongue out at the princess. A guard rushes in and slides into a kneel at Celestia’s hooves. “Y- your highness, P- princess Luna, she’s been attacked!” Celestia’s eyes burn with rage. “Disco~ord!!” I step in front of her, hand up. “Actually, that was me.” Both Celestia and Discord gasp. Discord pulls me towards him. “You hurt Luna!?” He seems... a bit angry. “I do not tolerate anyone who desires my imprisonment, and when Luna summoned me to her chambers last night, she had the nerve to suggest just that, even while wearing the diamond moon I blacked out to give her.” I say matter-of-factly, keeping the tone of a librarian reminding someone to be quiet. Discord and Celestia blink, but Discords finds words first. “Woah, that’s harsh. Both of you, I mean. So what’d you do?” “Why don’t you go see for yourself.” I say, shrugging. “Geez kid, you’re pretty dark.” Discord says, backing up a bit, looking puzzled. “Yep.” My reply is simple, but causes Discord to grin nervously. Luna has been moved from the floor to her bed, but her horn is still very visibly damaged, the dark burn marks easy to see, even against the dark blue of her horn. “You know, Luna pissed me off so much, that technically she’s the reason why I decided to release Discord in the first place.” I mention. Celestia magically yanks me towards herself, her ‘kind and benevolent ruler’ mask pretty much broken out of sheer rage. I admit, angry Celestia is pretty scary, but I stand my ground. “You suggest that my sister is the one at fault here!?” I keep my calm. “Of course not. I attacked her, if anyone’s to blame, it’s probably me.” This earned another ‘Woah.’ from Discord and a deeper glare from Celestia. “So Celestia. Do you wanna try and take me on? If I can stop the Elements of Harmony, I doubt you’d be much better off. Just go sit on your throne and look all pretty for the nice ponies while the grown-ups do their things, okay?” Discord has his eyes crossed and has a smile literally bigger than his head. “Oh my, I certainly missed quite a lot of delicious chaos, didn’t I? Anywhats, I believe it is time we make our leave.” I realize Discord means that he’s going to teleport us, so I make sure my last words make an impact. “Call me when you get a sense of humor and humility.” “Daaaaaayum girl, you got burned!” Discord snaps his fingers and we’re outside the castle. “You certainly have guts, kid.” Discord comments. “And you must be tough to beat Luna. How good are you at magic?” “I’m not. I don’t use magic. My powers are natural abilities that make themselves known over time.” “Very interesting, but just to check...” He snaps his fingers. “There, I’ve negated any access you have to magic. If you try anything related to magic, it won’t work.” I grab some coal from my pocket and demonstrate a few tricks just as usual. Then I Spark up and pick up a stick, jabbing it into my chest, successfully demonstrating intangibility. Then I Ignite and incinerate the stick to ashes. I power down, and grow until the tallest tree around is as big as a toothpick, then I shrink back down to normal. Discord’s jaw is literally touching the ground, his eyes wider than dinnerplates. “I can also cancel out magic if I’m aware of it being used before it affects me.” “Really?” Oh, he sounds like a kid who just realized he’s been locked inside a candy store overnight. “Ask Twilight. The Elements of Harmony were a joke.” “You stopped the Elements!?” Once again, he looks shocked. I’m impressing all the deity-level folks around here, and it feels awesome. I shrug, playing it off as nothing, though I honestly still don’t know how I did it. “Wasn’t that hard, honestly.” “But...” he says, looking baffled. “No counterspell is that strong!” “I thought we settled that I don’t use magic.” I say, smirking. “So you can stop the Elements of Harmony?” “Yup.” “And defeat Princess Luna using just your hand?” I nod, smirking. “In ten seconds if I’m close.” Discord pulls out a referee whistle and blows hard, raising his arms. “Watch out, we got a gamebreaker over here!” I chuckle. “Heh, I suppose. Now, how about we go pay Twilight a little ‘visit’?” “That sounds like an absolute delight!” He says, wiggling his fingers/talons in the traditional ‘evil plotting in progress’ manner. “Well, we’re here, anyway.” I say as we near the giant tree. “We are?” he looks around, neck ignoring biological constraints again. “Huh. Well, I admit this town did look quite different last time I was around.” Discord says, taking in the scenery. “Really? What was it like?” I’m very interested in what he came up with to change things around here. “Reversed gravity, purple-checkered grass, soap roads, and cotton-candy clouds that rained exploding chocolate milk.” Discord replies, grinning and looking dreamily into thin air as he reminisces. “You, Sir Discord, are my hero.” I give an exaggerated bow of respect. He practically preens at the praise. “You have no idea how much I appreciate someone who sees my work the way I do.” “I might have an estimate at least.” I snark. “Anyway, what say we say hi to the librarian?” I walk in the door and see Twilight reading a book as usual. She looks up and rushes to me immediately. “Where have you been!? I checked the hospital, but they said you ran off!” “I didn’t like their methods, so I left.” I say, shrugging it off. “I spent the rest of the time in Canterlot. Although I spent a night in Trottingham.” “Trottingham!?” “Yep. By the way, I made a new friend.” “Really?” she seems relieved. Heh. “That’s great! Who is it?” “Oh, I think you know him.” Discord pops out from behind me. “Oh, how wonderful it is to see you, Twilight Sparkle!” She stammers... “D- Dis-” *whump* and faints. I’ve moved Twilight to her bed, and sit by her side until she wakes up. I assume Spike was out running errands. “A- Anthony?” “Hiya Twilight, you feeling okay?” A long groan issues from her as she tries to remember. “Not really. What happened?” she looks around the room, still kind of out of it. “You ran up to me as I walked in and tripped, you hit your head.” The lie rolls easily from my lips. She doesn’t even get suspicious. “Oh. I had the worst dream.” She says, eating up my lie like it was a piece of caramel. “You did? Do tell.” It’s hard to keep from laughing. “I dreamed that you freed Discord.” she chuckles out a nervous titter. “I’m soooo glad you didn’t. It would have been a disaster.” “A disaster? You mean like this?” I chuckle, holding up a mirror. Twilight sees her reflection and completely flips out. While she was unconscious, Discord and I pulled out some markers and drew all over her face. I gave her nerd glasses, buck-teeth and a fancy moustache. Her forehead just below her horn had “Discord was here!” on it and a smiley face on each cheek. Seeing her reaction, I positively lose it and fall off the bed laughing like nuts, and after a moment, Discord pops in and joins me. “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!!” Now I’m being chased out of the library, dodging books which are being flung at me. I could Spark up and go intangible, but when she thinks she might hit me, it’s just more fun. Then I get another idea. I grab one of the books. It’s Daring Do. Perfect. I run over to the window. “Hey, Twilight! You should really be more careful about who you throw books at!” I dangle the book in my right hand as I Spark up and forming a single flame on my left index finger, my mouth a naughty ‘o’ shape as I slowly move my left finger closer to the flammable piece of bad literature. “Don’t you fucking dare!!” she shrieks, and a series of vases hover behind her in her magical grip. This is great... seriously, this is the best! “Oh my, someone learned a big-girl word!” “Anthony, you are so dead!!” And I’ll rue the day, yadda yaddaa~aah that vase almost hit me.