//------------------------------// // Epilogue: An Expansion, an Explanation, and an End // Story: Discord's Apprentice // by Architect Ironturtle //------------------------------// Discord sat in his hot tub, mulling over the events of the past few days with a cloud of chocolate and a glass of cotton candy. Once Twilight had stopped blubbering about Cockatrices the peace talks had gone surprisingly smoothly. At first, System had been quite difficult, despite ultimately having the same end goal as Princess Celestia. It was all, "Cutie marks are an organizational tool, not an expression of self," and other such nonsense. Discord was the nonsensical one here, and he really didn't like System of all ponies trying to outdo him. In fact, the group was about two inches from coming to blows again when Luna walked in complaining about the 'Unholy noise' that was interrupting her sleep. "Honestly, Sister," Luna groaned as she rubbed her face with her hoof, "After that fiasco with the Buffalo I thought you were going to soundproof the negotiation rooms." She lowered her hoof, opened her eyes, and blinked. System blinked back. Slowly, the blinking stopped as their wings started to twitch. "Sister," Luna said calmly, "Why didn't you wake me when you were having such fine company over?" System became much more agreeable after that, especially after Luna ended up sitting next to him. In the end, they had decided that nopony was going anywhere. System would stay on the surface, employed by the nocturnal half of the diarchy in the same way Discord worked for the Diurnal side. That was why after Luna had heard about everything System had done she'd been the one to drag him off to the training courtyard and give him a proper thrashing. Discord had dropped by about five minutes after the explosions had stopped, looked in on them, and promptly spun around and goose stepped away, complete with webbed feet. That was something he had never wanted to see, and just remembering it was enough to make him consider getting the brain bleach back out despite its earlier ineffectiveness. The Spectrum mostly sorted itself out, in the end, as while Twilight was busying studying it to decide what to do (since the number of magical accident reports that had stacked up over the course of half a day had convinced all present that it couldn't stay as it was) she had accidentally brushed against the less chaotic side with her horn. Discord was with her at the time, and he thought the resulting stabilization was rather like dropping a rock in a tank of supercooled water. That left the Spectrum in its new form, half chaos, half order, with the world sandwiched in between. It smacked of balance, and as strong as Discord's distaste for the concept was, he had to admit it was the best option. Equestria needed a certain amount of order to function, Chaos magic was easier to use than ever, and blah blah blah. Ugh. In any case, his future self had just dropped by and told him to stay where he was for the next few minutes, but hadn't explained why before vanishing back to the future. Now why was that? He didn't think he'd left any loose threads, but- Discord's train of thought was derailed by the sound of his door swinging open, and Pinkie ducked under the wheels as it soared over her head and out into Ponyville. "I figured out how the door works," she said, mane poofy, but lips straight. "So you have," Discord said, gesturing towards a chair he lifted up next to his tub, "But I bet you can't explain it." Meanwhile, only one thought circulated inside his head, a simple, Last test. Pinkie floated up through the center of the room and sat, coiling her tails around her like a born natural, "The trick is in the Spectrum," she began, "You have to find the part that's tied to the spell on the door, see what color and type of magic it is at any given moment, then sync your spell to match. The thing is," she gave him a hard look, "There's no possible way I could have figured that out on my own unless the Spectrum was free, because the changes were based on something that it wouldn't have been able to show me even if I had found it, so I have to ask: how much of this," she gestured with her hooves, each movement summoning a bubble depicting the event in question, "System, the Spectrum, my schooling, all of it, was planned?" Discord smiled thinly, "Less than you would think," he said, as a PAC-man behind him chose to eat the bigger yellow spot, "While I had a general idea of what would and might happen, I never tried to pin down the specifics. They vastly prefer to sort themselves out when Chaos is involved. In fact, that is the essence of Chaos as you can now understand it. It's all about letting go. Take this ball." He held up a small blue super ball, rolling it around in his palm, "Let's say I wanted to lift it. If I used magic the way Twilight does, I'd have to memorize an equation and decide exactly how I wanted the movement to take place. Would I be changing gravity? mass? Applying suction? A strong wind? Using gravity to pull in the other direction? Ordered magic need all the details tied down. Actually, now that I think about it Twilight's OCD tendencies are a large part of what makes her such a good caster, and don't you dare tell her I said that." He coughed out green feathers as Pinkie giggled, "Anyway, Chaos is just the opposite of that. You have to let the world decide how it wants to change, and be willing to roll with those changes as they come. You understand this now, or you wouldn't have been able to use the door. If you did that with normal magic, it would blow up in your face, which is why Twilight can't Chaos cast to save her life." He snickered, "Not that watching her try isn't amusing." "So no, even if I had had a complete plan for your apprenticeship, it wouldn't have stayed on track very long. I know looking back it doesn't make the most sense, but what fun is there in making sense?" He grinned smugly at her as he finished. "That's a cop-out explanation and you know it," Pinkie stated, although she was smiling back as she spoke. "I guess it is, in a way," Discord admitted, "It's still the best you're going to get, though. Can you live with that?" Pinkie thought for a moment, then nodded. "Good. In that case," Discord snapped his fingers and teleported to the floor, wearing a suit of armor covered in Chaos stars, "Could you be a deer and join me?" Pinkie slapped a pair of antlers on her head and popped down in front him, her head cocked to the side in puzzlement as her tails gently waved in the purple breeze from the fan. Discord pulled out a giant garishly rainbow painted warhammer with a large Z where the head met the handle and said, "Pinkamena Diane Pie. Come forth." Pinkie stepped forward and knelt as her antlers vanished into her mane, and Discord tapped her three times on her left shoulder with the hammer handle, "Your apprenticeship is now complete. In the name of Chaos I dub thee Lady Pinkie, Mistress of Chaos. Rise, and claim your title." Pinkie gasped and leapt up, emptying her entire supply of confetti into the room at once, quickly burying both of them under a pile of paper. "You know what this means, Discord?" she asked, as the mess disintegrated, then went on without waiting for an answer, "A GRADUATION PARTY!" "That it does," Discord said with a chuckle, then sighed as he drooped a touch, "I suppose you want to go plan that now? With all your friends?" "And you, silly," she said as he hugged him with her tails and hooves, "It's also your I-Get-to-Stay-Forever-and-Don't-Want-to-Buck-System-in-the-Face-Anymore party!" Discord perked up at that, "You mean you still want to spend time with me even after I've taught you everything?" Pinkie pulled back, and stared him in the face for moment, then slapped him. "That was for being thick," she told him, then hugged him again, "and that was for caring whether I still think you're a friend." She let go and dropped to the ground, holding the door open for Discord, "Now come on, we've got a party to plan." Discord floated through the door on a happy cloud, and Pinkie turned to follow him. However, just before she closed the door, she looked over her shoulder and said, "This is the only time I've ever interacted with the audience in this entire story. Think on that." Then one of her tails looped around the edges and pulled the door shut, the faint sounds of terrified screams and enthusiastic squeals escaping before the connection was cut. THE END The door banged open as a purple symmetrical Draconequus barged in, "DISCORD, IF YOU DON'T HELP ME FIX THIS RIGHT NOW..."