//------------------------------//
// Chapter 3. 1 Corinthians 13:2 
// Story: The Ponies who Played with Fire 
// by A M Shark 
//------------------------------//

Chapter 3

"If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing."—1 Corinthians 13:2





Deciding to ignore the pegasus's comment, Discord vanished in a flash of light, causing the sauce he was covered in to suddenly fall to the ground. He reappeared, now sauce-free, floating in midair with his back to the three ponies, looking in the direction his spaghetti cyclone had gone. It was still whirling away toward Ponyville, expect that now without him controlling it, it was rapidly disintegrating, flinging globs of sauce and clumps of pasta in all directions, and would likely collapse as soon as it reached its destination.

Not quite the entrance he'd had in mind.

Feeling a tad irritated at that, he turned to scowl at the three ponies. However, his mood brightened when he saw them trying unsuccessfully to wipe off their own coatings of sauce, and he thought of a way to give them a bit of payback.

Swooping down closer to them, he conjured a spray bottle, held it above them and squeezed the trigger. The spray bottle did not merely spray, but squirted water in a steady jet that would have done a hose credit. The ponies squealed in surprise and tried to jump away but by then they were already drenched. On the plus side, though, they were no longer slathered in sauce. Once they'd been sprayed down, Discord tossed the spray bottle aside, pulled a hairdryer from behind his back and turned it on them as well. The three ponies braced their legs against the blast of warm air, and in the space of a few moments they were dry.

"Hey, thank—" the pegasus started to say, but before she could finish, her coat, mane, and tail suddenly poofed out in all directions, making her look as if she were built entirely of gray and yellow puffballs. A second later, the same thing happened to the two unicorns.

"No trouble at all," Discord chortled as he switched off the hairdryer, and vanished a second time.





Meanwhile at Sugarcube Corner, Fluttershy suddenly heard the wind kick up. Had a storm been scheduled for that day? She hadn't thought so, but maybe—

Then she heard screams and the beating of hooves outside. A scheduled storm wouldn't normally cause that much panic so what could—?

"Take cover, everypony!" Rainbow Dash suddenly shouted from outside.

What everypony in the bakery did was look up in time to see her shoot through the bakery door's open upper half, carrying a stallion in her front legs.

"Ow!" the stallion yelled, as his dangling back legs banged into the closed lower half of the bakery door. He leaned forward, trying to tuck his back legs up away from the door, and the movement caused Rainbow Dash to tip forward as well, sending them into an unplanned somersault. As they tumbled across the floor, Rainbow Dash pulled herself free, jumped into the air, and flew back to the door to slam its top half shut.

It wasn't a moment too soon, as the slamming of the door was followed by a loud splatting sound from outside, and Fluttershy saw what appeared to be ... globs of tomato sauce and strands of spaghetti smacking against the windows. Before she could do much more than squint out the nearest window, trying to make sense of what she was seeing, the splatting sound stopped.

"What's going on?" Pinkie asked, poking her head out of the kitchen and catching sight of the new window decorations. "Hmm, that's not very nice. Pelting the windows with tomatoes. But at least the spaghetti's well-cooked."

"That stuff came courtesy of a tornado, not some rude pony," said the stallion from his spot on the floor. He had ended up on his back near Fluttershy and Applejack, and now as she looked down at him Fluttershy realized it was the same stallion she'd seen at the post office the day before.

"Who are you?" Pinkie asked, trotting over to him, followed by Twilight and Skywishes. Gummy had latched onto the front of Skywishes's coat collar and hung there like a large scaly brooch.

"Ah, the name is Screwjob, ladies," said the stallion. "Now don't tell me your names. Let me guess them. Let's see... Twilight Sparkle." He pointed up at Twilight and she nodded.

"Pinkie Pie."

"That's me."

"Uh..." Screwjob frowned at Skywishes, clearly drawing a blank.

"That's Skywishes," said Twilight quickly. "We just met her today ourselves."

Screwjob nodded and moved on to Fluttershy. "Hello, Fluttershy. Nice to see youuu—" As his gaze shifted to Applejack, he suddenly seemed to lose control of his tongue and the last word came out as gibberish. He rested the back of his head against the floor and blew his breath out in a half-sigh, half-whistle. "Mercy me, get a load of that beautiful girl."

Applejack arched an eyebrow at that.

Then Rainbow Dash called from over by the door. "Hey, girls, what about this stuff outside? Don't you think we should check it out?"

"Oh, come on, Ray," said Screwjob. "We're getting to know each other—"

"I really think we need to see what's going on out there," Rainbow Dash interrupted, her tone emphatic.

"She's probably right," said Twilight. "We can finish our ... introductions later." As she moved to follow Rainbow Dash outside, she glanced quickly at her friends and Fluttershy could guess what she was thinking: Screwjob had just called Rainbow Dash "Ray."

And he had a postcard with him when I saw him at the post office yesterday…

These musings were interrupted when Screwjob started to sit up and winced. "Uh oh, I think I hurt something when my legs smacked into that door."

"Here, let me take a look at them." Fluttershy started to move toward him, but he waved her away.

"No, no, I don't need that. I just need somepony to help me get back on my hooves. Somepony strong enough for me to lean on for a bit. Hey, how about you?" He pointed at Applejack. "You look good and strong."

Applejack gave him a slightly suspicious look and a raised eyebrow, then shrugged and moved to help him. She let him hang onto her withers as he eased his hind legs underneath him. As he pulled himself up, he kept grunting and wincing as though in pain, but when his face was turned away from Applejack, Fluttershy noticed that his expression didn't seem to match the sounds he was making. Judging by his expression, he actually seemed to be enjoying hanging onto Applejack.





After Discord disappeared, the three pony puffballs just stared at each other for a couple of seconds.

Then the pegasus finally spoke up. "Well, girls. I guess we better get home and wash this stuff down." She patted at the fuzz now sticking out from her foreleg.

Unknown to the three ponies, Discord had reappeared a short distance away, now hidden so that he could watch them unobserved.

The pegasus looked down at herself and felt her side, her hoof vanishing into the poofy hair. "Where's my mailbag?"

"It must have gotten blown off in that tornado," said the pink unicorn.

The three ponies all spread out, apparently searching for the mailbag. Finally the pink unicorn discovered it in a clump of bushes and pulled it out with her magic. The pegasus took the bag and peeked inside.

"Oh drat," she muttered mildly. "All the mail blew out." She looked to the pink unicorn. "Amethyst, you wouldn't happen to—"

"Of course I made a list of your deliveries, Mom." The pink unicorn sounded like she might be smiling. "Don't I always?" Then she sighed. "Of course I left it back at home, so we'll have to wait until we get back there to check it."

The pegasus slipped the bag's shoulder strap over her head, having a bit of trouble getting her poofy mane under it, and the three ponies spread out again to gather up the mail that had gotten scattered in the tornado's wake. Amethyst and the smaller unicorn did most of the gathering, grabbing up the mail magically and sending it back to the pegasus.

As he watched them, Discord gave the unicorns' magic levels an experimental prod and discovered that they were both pretty low. He doubted either one could do much more than float things about. Then a new idea occurred to him, and, grinning, he snapped his talons, causing the static in the three ponies' hair to act like a magnet on the scattered letters. The mail came swarming through the air from all directions, and Discord snickered as it covered the three ponies from head to hooves.

As they struggled to get the mail off their coats and into the bag, Discord decided to follow and continue amusing himself with them while he formulated a new grand entrance for Ponyville.

That tornado's probably reached Ponyville by now, and they're probably expecting me to make some big show of it. But I am the Undersecretary of the Unexpected, therefore, I won't show up! I'll just let them wonder where I am for a while.


Yes, build up a lot of suspense, then I’ll show up when I’m good and ready, and they’re least suspecting it.





Screwjob still had his forelegs draped across Applejack's back when they and the rest of the ponies ventured out of the bakery and began taking in the sight of the spaghetti piles strewn throughout the town.

"Hey, get—OFF ME!" Skywishes shouted.

Is she yelling at Gummy? Fluttershy wondered as she spun toward the other pegasus. Why would Skywishes suddenly start yelling at Gummy to get off when she'd been patiently letting him gnaw on her ever since he'd first latched onto her sleeve?

But no, there was Gummy just standing there on the ground while several feet away Skywishes struggled with ... what was that thing? It seemed to be orange, black, and white but was flapping about too much for Fluttershy to make out any details.

"Get off! Get away!" Skywishes shouted as the flapping thing rammed itself into the side of her head before she managed to swat it away. Now Fluttershy saw that the object appeared to be a six-winged, two-headed parrot made of paper stained with tomato sauce. It swooped down on Rainbow Dash, then Pinkie Pie, then Twilight, forcing each of them to swat it away as Skywishes had. Then it flew toward Applejack's head, but before it could reach her, Screwjob suddenly flipped himself over her back and kicked out at the "parrot," sending it spinning away before it straightened itself out and shot back toward Skywishes.

The coral-colored pegasus rolled her dead eyes skyward. "Oh, for—"

Then on a sudden impulse, Fluttershy thrust herself between Skywishes and the attacking origami. The parrot smacked into Fluttershy's forehead, making her wince, but instead of pecking at her like it had Skywishes and the rest of the ponies, it hooked its upper wings over her ears, wrapped its middle wings around her head, and let its last pair of wings fold in as it nuzzled her forehead with its two heads, smearing her all over with tomato sauce in the process.

As she reached up to cautiously pat the odd piece of origami, Fluttershy felt a mixture of disbelief and nervous excitement course through her as one thought drown out all others.

He's back!





Applejack gave Screwjob a disgusted look and tried to step out from under him.

"What are you doing?" he asked as he hung on and moved with her. "I need you to help me keep the weight off my legs."

"Give me a break. If you can kick and flip around like you just did, there's nothing wrong with your legs."

"That was an adrenaline rush! And I'm already feeling the pain of it. Look." He shifted his weight back and forth from hoof to hoof. "Ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch—Hey!"

Applejack had suddenly ducked her head—causing her hat to fall off in the process—and backed out from under him. Screwjob thrust his front hooves down to catch himself before he fell on his face.

"I thought so," Applejack muttered as she moved to pick up her hat. "You were faking it."

Screwjob looked embarrassed, but quickly covered it up. "Hey, it's called 'selling an injury,' okay? I'm a wrestler. I need to be good at that sort of thing. You don't want me to get out of practice, do you?"

Putting her hat back on, Applejack gave him a Do-you-really-want-to-go-that-route?-look, and Screwjob flung his forelegs in the air.

"Oh sure, blame a guy for trying."





Meanwhile the rest of Ponyville's citizens had begun coming out of their homes as well. They must have guessed the unusual weather they had just experienced signaled Discord's return because they were muttering uneasily among themselves. They knew the draconequus had played a part in helping Fluttershy find Applejack a year ago, but since then he hadn't really done anything to endear himself to the rest of Equestria. If anything, he had managed to purge any goodwill most ponies might have been willing to give him.

Noticing this unease, Twilight flew up above the crowd where they could all see her. "Everypony don't panic. Just try to go about your business while I let Princess Celestia know about this. She'll know what to do."

With that, she flew off in the direction of the library to collect Spike and send her message. But as she flew she began to wonder just what Celestia would advise her to do.

Especially considering what had happened a year ago right after Discord had left Fluttershy...





It was the day before the planned "Welcome Back Applejack" party.

She had just gotten back from helping Applejack get things sorted out at Amberlocks' Orchards, and was going through some of the information the earth pony had collected on changelings during her years in hiding, when Fluttershy had shown up. The pegasus's face was blotchy, her eyes were red from crying, and her voice had trembled when she told Twilight that Discord had left with no word of explanation.

When Twilight had explained the situation to Celestia later on, Celestia had told her to bring the Elements of Harmony and she would show Twilight a spell to summon Discord with them.

It had sounded like a good idea, but unfortunately when Twilight went to get the Elements of Harmony out of the case she had been storing them in, they were gone. Thinking she might have misplaced them at some point, she and Spike had proceeded to turn the place upside down looking for them, but after a long unsuccessful search, the pair had called it a day and gone to bed, planning to continue looking for the Elements the next morning.

However, things didn't go quite as Twilight had planned that next morning.






Twilight had been slowly coming awake when…

"Gooooood morning, Princess."

She had heard that mocking voice only a few times before but there was no mistaking it. Startled awake, she turned to see Discord lying in the bed right next to her!

Twilight shrieked and tried to fling herself out of the bed, (How long had he been there?!) but the sheets suddenly seemed to come to life and wrap around her, pinning her wings and legs against her body so that she couldn't move. Discord smirked at her efforts to escape.

"Let me go!" Twilight shouted, now more annoyed than frightened. Her horn flared with a magenta glow as she pointed it at him, but before she could fire off a spell, he reached over and pressed down on the end of her horn with a finger. Her horn bent as if it were made of rubber and suddenly the tip was pointing down at her face instead of his. Realizing that any spell she shot off would just hit her, she quickly extinguished her magic.

"What do you want, Discord? Fluttershy—"

Discord's gleeful expression suddenly hardened. "Shut up!"

Twilight had never heard him sound that angry before, and that shocked her into silence more effectively than any spell would have.

Discord's expression twitched as if he were in pain, but then he resumed smirking. "I suppose you've been looking for the Elements of Harmony," he said, studying the talons on his eagle claw.

"How did you—? Wait ... you stole them, didn't you?!"

"Stole them?" he repeated in a mock injured tone. "No, I'm just borrowing them for an indeterminate amount of time.."

"That's the same—"

"THAT ... is not important right now." His voice suddenly lost its cheerful tone. "I'm here for one reason. I've got places to go and I don't want you or any of your friends using those pesky things to yank me back here like a yo-yo. Understand?"

Twilight glared back and nodded.

"You can have the Elements back on the condition that you don't try to summon me with them. Do I have your promise?"

Twilight hesitated. What should she do? Should she promise not to use them? What would happen if she didn't? What would—?

Discord glanced down at a watch he hadn't been wearing until just then. "Not to pressure you, but if you don't give me an answer, I'll just take the Elements with me when I go. So by all means take your time weighing all the possibilities. After all, you've still got about..." He glanced down at the watch again. "Five seconds… Four… Three..."

That decided it.

"All right!" Twilight shouted. Whatever else happened, she couldn't let Discord just waltz off with the Elements. "All right. We won't use the Elements to summon you."

He quirked a pierced eyebrow. "Promise?"

"I..." Twilight grimaced. "…promise."

"Pinkie Promise?"


How did he know about that? Still, she recited it.

"Excellent. Au revoir, Princess Twilight." Then as if to get in one final shot, he flicked her bent horn—causing it to snap up straight again—before vanishing. The sheets binding her loosened, but she continued to lie there, wondering just what she'd agreed to.

Until Spike came in a few minutes later to inform her that the six Elements had somehow materialized in his bed while he was sleeping.

Later when Twilight had gone to Celestia to explain this new situation, the princess had seemed surprised at Discord's actions but had decided that they would not try to summon the draconequus and instead wait and see what he planned to do.

"In the meantime, Twilight, I want you to leave the Elements with me, and don't tell your friends about the summoning spell."

Those requests had puzzled Twilight but she went along with them anyway.

After all, Celestia must have had a plan to deal with Discord if he put a toe or talon out of line.

The draconequus must have been thinking the same thing because since that day, he had been keeping both feet firmly behind that line ... but with his long neck and body stretched as far out over it as he could without magically extending them.






Discord watched the three ponies through binoculars he had conjured as they made their way to a house on the edge of Ponyville. He could see the results of the cyclone covering the town and while those spaghetti strands sticking to things were an interesting effect, he decided he didn't really like the tomato sauce splattered all over the place. Messes generally didn't bother him, but that just looked a bit too much like a murder scene. With a snap of his talons, all the tomato sauce turned to pesto sauce.

That's better, he thought as he tossed the binoculars aside and teleported to the house the three pony puffballs had just entered.





As Twilight flew away, Fluttershy gently peeled the two-headed parrot from her face and allowed it to walk along the back of her hoof like a regular bird would.

Skywishes eyed it with dislike. "You better hang onto that thing, seeing as you're the only one it hasn't tried pecking to pieces."

At the sound of her voice, the parrot turned in her direction and seemed about to launch itself at the coral-colored pegasus, but Fluttershy quickly put her other hoof over it. The parrot relaxed, then began butting its paper beaks playfully against the underside of her hoof.

"Dinner is served," said Pinkie, setting down two plates of spaghetti in front of Fluttershy and Skywishes before moving on to set three more out in front of Applejack, Screwjob, and Rainbow Dash. "Dig in," she said, sitting down with one last plate of spaghetti in front of her.

She was just raising the plate to her muzzle when the tomato sauce promptly turned to pesto sauce.

"Awww." Pinkie put the plate down, crossed her forelegs, and scowled at it. "I don't like pesto."

"I'll bring you back some TreeHAB-grown tomatoes," said Skywishes, though her dry tone made it hard to tell if she was joking or serious.

Pinkie brightened. "Oh, would you?"

"I've got to use them up somehow." Skywishes popped the cape-like collar on the back of her camo to pull it up off her wings.

"You mean you're leaving?" Fluttershy asked as the paper parrot (whose sauce stains had changed from orange to pale green) squirmed out of her hooves and used its beaks to haul itself up her mane onto the top of her head. As it settled itself there she scarcely felt its weight.

"I want to check on the TreeHAB. When I designed the thing, I didn't really factor in spaghetti storms."

"Ooh wait, wait, wait!" Pinkie shot into the bakery and a few seconds later emerged with several bakery boxes. "Just a little something for you to enjoy on your way."

Skywishes raised her eyebrows a fraction. "That looks more like a lot something."

"You can never have too many cupcakes and cookies," said Pinkie, setting the stack of boxes down between Skywishes and Fluttershy. "And don't you worry, Wishie. I know just how to pack them."

Skywishes grunted skeptically, but didn't protest when Pinkie began slipping the boxes into the large pockets on the camouflage coat. Exactly how the pink pony managed to fit that many boxes into the various pockets was a mystery to the ponies watching her, but somehow she managed. When she stepped back from Skywishes, the pegasus looked a good deal lumpier than usual, but when she tried taking off, the extra weight didn't seem to hamper her. She flew in several wide circles, rolling her body this way and that, even flipping upside down a couple of times.

Rainbow Dash squinted one eye as she watched Skywishes. "What's she doing?"

"Probably testing how well she can move with that extra weight before she actually goes in the forest." said Fluttershy.

Apparently satisfied with her little test flight, Skywishes swooped around to face the other ponies. Pulling up to hover in front of them, she raised a hoof to wave goodbye.

The other ponies returned the gesture and Pinkie even threw in a couple of bounces.

"Come back soon, Wishie!"

"I plan to."

And with that she turned and flew toward the Everfree Forest. No sooner was she out of sight then Pinkie Pie turned to Rainbow Dash, who was hovering nearby.

"So, Rainbow, is Screwjob your mystery pen pal? He called you 'Ray' just like the postcard did, but if he is, how come he signed the card 'H?' There's no H anywhere in 'Screwjob.'" She paused briefly, raising an eyebrow and twisting her mouth in thought before turning to Screwjob. "Unless you spell it S-C-H-R-E-W-J-O-B or S-C-R-E-W-J-H-O-B or—"

"I spell it the conventional way, and as it turns out, I'm not this H you speak of." He gave Rainbow Dash a sly sidelong glance, a wickedly teasing grin on his muzzle. "But I know who is."

Rainbow Dash swatted at him with one of her wings and he dodged. Then she turned resignedly to her friends. "All right, all right, you might as well know. H stands for Highflyer."

"Who?" The name was met with blank stares from her three friends.

"Wait ... I think I remember somepony named Highflyer..." Fluttershy tilted her head in thought and, remembering the parrot perched on her head, put a hoof up to catch it if it slipped. But there was no rustle of paper or the feel of anything moving about on her head. Frowning, she felt her head with both hooves then looked around. "Hey, where'd the paper parrot go?"

The other ponies looked about for it as well. Pinkie even grabbed the edge of Fluttershy's mane and shook it to make sure the origami wasn't hiding there, but there was no sign of it anywhere. Had it flown away when they were busy watching Pinkie Pie load up Skywishes or had it just magically vanished? None of them could say.

Sudden tears pricked Fluttershy's eyes at the realization that the parrot was gone. With its arrival had come the hope that Discord was nearby, but now it had left with as little warning as he had over a year ago. Had the draconequus sent the little messenger to taunt her with the idea of his return only to cruelly snatch it away again?

"You all right Fluttershy?" Rainbow Dash flew over to her and tried to peer down into Fluttershy's face.

Fluttershy quickly wiped at her eyes. "It's nothing. I just ... got some oil from the pesto sauce in my eye." She wiped at the sauce still smeared on her forehead. "Does anypony have something I can use to wipe this off?"

Screwjob clamped his teeth down on some of his bandages and yanked a napkin out of them. "Here hoo ho," he said, his voice garbled by the napkin clenched in his teeth. Fluttershy briefly wondered why he had such a thing stuffed in his leg bandages, but accepted the offering.

"So you used to know Highflyer?" Screwjob asked as she wiped the pesto from her face.

"A little," she said, grateful for the return to subject. "I didn't know him that well personally, but I used to think he was so cute." She couldn't help blushing at the memory. The Highflyer she remembered from flight camp had been light brown with big blue eyes, a dark wavy mane and tail, and very small for his age.

Screwjob snickered. "Well, he ain't cute anymore. He grew into one ugly dude. A good wrestler though." He paused then added. "But don't tell him I said that, or he'll get a swelled head, his mask won't fit, and his career will be over. And if his career is over, who am I supposed to spend my time beating up?"

"So why's this Highflyer fella sending you postcards?" Applejack asked Rainbow Dash. "And why didn't you want us to know about it earlier?"

"It's a little..." Rainbow Dash looked up at the sky as she searched for the right word. "...complicated. You know how Scootaloo still can't fly?"

They nodded. Scootaloo had been trying to fly for years without success, and now as a young mare she had been forced to accept the fact that she would never be able to fly.

"Well, she was feeling pretty down about that, and..." Rainbow Dash glanced over her shoulder at her own flapping wings, and suddenly pulled them in, dropping lightly to the ground. "I couldn't really tell her that being flightless was no big deal because..." She trailed off but rustled her wings, making her meaning clear. "So to encourage her, I started looking for other flightless pegasi who've done awesome stuff in spite of that, and that's how I found out about Highflyer."

Applejack chuckled. "Wait, his name is 'Highflyer' and he's flightless?"

"As flightless as you or me, Apps," said Screwjob.

Applejack glared at him. "What did you call me?"

"Apps. You like it?"

"No."

"Awww." Screwjob pouted but it seemed a tad over-exaggerated, making Fluttershy suspect it was fake.

"Anyway," said Rainbow Dash. "I managed to get in touch with him, and he agreed to meet Scootaloo."

"It was either him or Brimstone," said Screwjob, apparently done with his sulky act. "But then again Brimstone is kind of cuckoo so he's probably not the best example of a successful flightless pegasus. Even with the pyrokinesis."

"Anyway," Rainbow Dash gave him a stop-interrupting-look. "After he and Scootaloo met, we ended up sort of staying in touch." Her expression softened. "He's even been teaching us how to wrestle."

Screwjob raised a hoof as if he were a colt in school.

Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. "You can talk now."

"Thank you." He turned to the other ponies. "The wrestling lessons are where I come in. High's got a certain wrestling style not everypony can pull off so he let me in on things to offer my ... expertise."

"But that doesn't really explain why you didn't want to tell us about this," Fluttershy pointed out, addressing Rainbow Dash.

"Yeah," Rainbow Dash looked uncomfortable again. "That's the complicated part."





Once the three pony puffballs were inside, the pegasus pulled off her mailbag and fumbled about in her fuzz to remove her mailpony uniform, leaving them in a neatly crumpled heap on the floor. Then she and the two unicorns went into the bathroom and began running water in the tub.

"You sure this'll work?" asked the purple unicorn.

"No, but it can't hurt to find out." The pegasus dipped a hoof into the water, probably to test its temperature, and a burst of static sparks crackled where her poofed-out hair touched the water. She jerked her hoof back with a yelp, accidentally scattering drops of water on the other two, who yelped as static flashed where the water touched them.

"Whoops, I guess I was wrong. Sorry girls, I—Hey, look." She held up her damp hoof which was no longer hidden by poofed-out hair.

The three ponies covered the floor with towels, climbed in the tub, doing their best to ignore the static shocks, and took turns dunking themselves underwater. None of them noticed the image of a draconequus that was peeking out from the edge of the mirror, watching them. When any of them looked up, the image quickly ducked back out of sight.

"Ahh, that's better," said the pegasus as they climbed dripping out of the tub.

That's what you think, Discord mentally chuckled as the three ponies began rubbing themselves down with towels.

Amethyst was the first one to notice something was wrong when she glanced in the mirror. "Uh, Mom? Dinky? Is your hair sticking out all weird?"

"Huh?" The other two ponies yanked the towels off their heads and joined Amethyst at the mirror. All the hair that made up their coats, manes, and tails was standing out like the quills on a startled porcupine.

Then a fourth face poked into view behind them in the mirror; a face with piercings, a scruffy beard and eyebrows, and a large fang jutting down from one side of its mouth. The three ponies jumped back with startled cries, knocking into each other and falling to the floor in the process. They looked over at the spot near them where the creature casting the new reflection should have been, but there was no one there. A booming laugh came from the mirror and, looking up, they saw the draconequus reflection in the mirror doubled over with laughter before he collapsed against the side of the mirror, clinging to it for support.

"Have you been following us all this time?" asked Amethyst. "Making our hair do all this weird stuff?"

"I'll give you three guesses, and the first two don't count," he told them between giggles, wiping tears from his eyes. Then he reached out and grasped the edges of the mirror, his fingers emerging from it to curl around its frame. He pulled himself forward and emerged from the mirror as if he were pulling himself up out of water. His long tattooed body coiled back and forth as it emerged until the tufted end of his tail whipped out of the mirror. The ponies all ducked as he swung the lower half of his body about and settled his rear end on the counter. "I must say, that's a good look for you three."

The light purple unicorn looked up at him, alarmed. "But we can't spend the rest of our lives looking like this!"

"Ooh, I don't know. Maybe you'll start a new fashion trend." This was met with several seconds of uncomfortable silence. Discord sulked and threw his head back, letting out a loud, persecuted sigh, like a teenager who had been asked to clean up their room for the tenth time. "Fine, hand me a comb." He held his hand out and the three ponies scooted back nervously. "Oh, never mind. I brought one."

A rubber currycomb flashed into his paw and the pegasus suddenly disappeared from her spot on the floor, reappearing on his lap. She looked bewildered at this, though that might have been mostly due to her pupils still pointing in opposite directions. Discord wrapped one arm around her, trapping her in place, and started rubbing the currycomb over her back in hard brisk circles, digging the rubber teeth deep into her coat, and causing the long spikes to morph back into short close hair.

"H-h-hey, that feels kinda n-n-n-nice," said the pegasus, her voice coming out in a stutter as his movements jostled her. The unicorns had moved forward as if they'd intended to pull her away from the draconequus but halted at those words, and watched the scene in front of them with wary fascination.

As he smoothed her coat down, Discord began noticing little details about the pegasus that he'd missed both when she was covered with tomato sauce and when her coat was all poofed-out.

I've seen this pony before! It was the same mailmare that had delivered Fluttershy's letter to Twilight over a year ago! The letter Twilight never knew about because he had swiped it.

"I d-don't think we've r-r-really been intro-d-d-d-duced," said the pegasus. "I'm M-m-muffins, but y-you can c-c-call me D-derpy. Every-p-pony does."

Discord began dragging the currycomb through her tail. Normally it wasn't the ideal tool for combing a tail but such things never stopped him before. Since his brushing was no longer jostling her, Derpy pointed to the two unicorns.

"And these are my girls: Amethyst Star and Dinky Doo." She glanced back at the draconequus. "And we know who you are, but where have you been? And what are you doing back here now?"

"Later. Tell me what's been happening since I've been gone?"

As he worked his way through rubbing down the three ponies, he quizzed them on what had been happening over the past year. He learned that Twilight had made several potions to see through changeling-windigo-hybrid disguises, but had no way to test them to see if they actually worked; Pinkie Pie had been swapping recipes with the ponies who had taken over Triple Treat's bakery, and exchanging party planning tips with the ones who now ran Cotton Candy's business; Applejack had taken on Rarity as a partner at Amberlocks's Orchards—Applejack took care of supplying the orchard's cider while Rarity handled the social side of marketing it to the upper class—though there had been talk about them training Apple Bloom to take over when she was a little older; Rainbow Dash had been getting and sending mysterious letters and postcards (several of which Derpy had delivered personally); and they had all been searching for the seldom-seen Skywishes.

"You are certainly an unexpected font of information about this town," Discord mused, shooting Derpy a cagy squint, as he worked the comb through Dinky's mane.

The pegasus shrugged her wings. "What can I say? Ponies often treat me like I'm part of the background and act like I'm not there at all. My job takes me around town a lot and I see more than most ponies expect."

"So I see." He wasn't sure how intentional her now very pronounced wall-eyed gaze was. Finished with his grooming chores, he set down Dinky and leaned back on the counter as he flashed the comb away. "And Fluttershy? She's still with that what's-his-face, I suppose." He took care to keep his tone bored.

"I'm not sure which 'what's-his-face' you're thinking of," said Derpy. "The only date I've ever seen her on was about a year ago, when I saw her around town with Big Mac. I asked her about it later, but she said they decided it wasn't for them. Pretty sure he's with somepony else now and Fluttershy still just has her animal friends."

"What?!" Discord's voice came out in a rather uncharacteristic squawk but he couldn't help it. He could still recall in painfully clear detail the sight of Fluttershy smiling and laughing with Big Mac. He had been so sure ... but now ... now to learn that nothing had come of that... Well, thanks a heap, Fluttershy! I spend all this time preparing myself to see you with another stallion and you can't even do me the courtesy of being in a relationship! Wait a minute, what am I saying?!


Then he noticed the three ponies were staring at him and quickly forced a chuckle. "Startled you there, didn't I?" he said, putting his hands on the back of his neck and twisting it as if trying to work out a kink, but really using the movements to disguise the fact that his moth tattoos were darting about, acting as discombobulated as he felt.





Fluttershy had a lot to think about when she got home that evening.

For one thing, Rainbow Dash had not revealed what was so complicated about her relationship with Highflyer ("It'd probably be better if you heard it from him as well as me."), but she had promised to set up a meeting with him as soon as possible. Fluttershy tried to imagine what the tiny colt she had once thought so cute looked like now, but it wasn't easy when Rainbow Dash and Screwjob had provided so few details.

Then there was Granny Smith's death. Fluttershy could still remember over a year ago when the old earth pony had confessed she didn't have much longer to live and she wanted to know the truth about Applejack's disappearance before she died. How might things have gone if she had not been desperate enough to turn to Fluttershy? At least she had gotten to enjoy one last year reunited with her once-thought-dead granddaughter.

Before she went inside, Fluttershy glanced toward the Everfree Forest and wondered if Skywishes had made it back to the TreeHAB yet. What if she hadn't? What if she was out there in the dark forest all alone?

Fluttershy shook her head. I'm sure she's fine. She's spent a lot of time in there, and knows her way around. So why couldn't she completely shake this uneasy feeling?

Once inside, the sight of Angel's empty bed brought sudden tears to her eyes. Looking for something to wipe her tears on, she spotted Discord's thrown-away scarf wadded up on the couch, and the sight of it brought even more tears. Knowing that Angel was gone for good was hard enough ... but coupled with the fact that Discord might be nearby and hadn't shown himself... How could he feel so close and yet at the same time so far away?

Curling up on the couch, she gathered up the scarf and buried her face in it.

Discord, where are you?






Discord's ears twitched as he thought he heard a faint whimpering sound. Just a few moments ago he had lain down on the bed in Derpy's guestroom. Now he was sitting in the middle of a vast, featureless, almost colorless expanse. Most creatures would likely find such a situation terrifying, but Discord was only intrigued, partly because he knew he was dreaming, and partly because his dreams usually had a lot more going on in them. Pushing off the ground, he glided through the empty dreamscape, watching to see if the scenery would get more interesting and trying to figure out where the whimpering was coming from.

For several minutes he saw nothing but the emptiness around him, then far below him, he spotted a pale yellow pony with a pale pink mane and tail. He hadn't seen any sign of her before that, she was just suddenly there. Dropping down so that he was floating just a few feet above her, he saw that she was hunched over with her face buried in her hooves ... she was the source of the whimpering ... and she was Fluttershy.

He circled her, but she didn't seem to notice him even when he stuck his pierced face close enough to hers that they were almost touching. Earlier he had kept telling himself that he would feel nothing for her when he saw her again, but now he felt a sudden urge to take her in his arms and soothe her crying. He even started to reach toward her, when a new thought made him halt.

Why do you even care that she's crying?! She's just one more pony in a vast herd of them! She's not even worth your notice!

I can't help noticing her when she's crying like that!

Then conjure a remote and put her on mute!

But I don't want to do it that way! I'll shut her up the way I want to! Besides, this is just a dream. What can it hurt?





Fluttershy was still crying into the scarf when it suddenly started moving. She pulled it away from her face and noticed that her surroundings had changed. She could no longer feel the couch underneath her and it was so dark she could barely see.

Then she felt the scarf slipping out of her hooves as it slid over one shoulder, across the back of her neck, and down over her other shoulder. She trembled under its touch but did her best to stay still, torn between fear at the strangeness of this situation, and hopeful excitement at what it might signify. Then she felt the part of the scarf touching the back of her neck being pulled away from her. She started to turn to see who or what was pulling on it, but one of the scarf ends suddenly wrapped itself around her chest while the other end caught her face, turning it so that she was looking ahead again.

But they weren't scarf ends anymore…

The one across her chest was now a furred arm, and the one holding her face was a taloned hand! Oh, please let it be him! She twisted about, this time in the same direction the hand holding her face was moving, causing the hand to lose its grip on her. Reaching out, her hoof came down on a familiar shoulder, and she was suddenly face-to-face with an equally familiar dragon tattoo emerging over that shoulder. Pulling back slightly, she realized that she and Discord were currently face-to-throat, and tipped her head back to see his face. But that and his neck from the dragon tattoo up all seemed to be hidden in shadow.





There, she stopped crying. Now send her away.

Discord moved his hands from around Fluttershy and placed them against the front of her shoulders, intending to push her away from him. But his dragon tattoo suddenly lunged forward, pulling itself free of his neck. It shot out past Fluttershy and he felt its long body spooling up and off his own. Before either of them could react, the tattoo wrapped around them multiple times. Discord then felt it sink back into his skin, leaving Fluttershy pinned against him chest-to-chest. He tried to teleport out of their bonds but it didn't work. He tried to phase through Fluttershy but that didn't work either.

"Discord what's going on?"

"How should I know?! Uppity tattoos."

She looked up at him with a puzzled expression.





Fluttershy could feel the tattoo pressing against her like a damp rope, but it didn't melt into her skin as it had Discord's.

"Discord what's going on?"

There was no answer and she looked up, hoping to read his expression but once again saw only darkness where his head should have been. She tried to spot any tell-tale glint from his eyes or facial jewelry but there was none.

Is his head even up there? It would have been a strange thing to wonder if it had been anyone else, but considering what she'd seen him do in their time together the fact that he might literally not be all there was a distinct possibility.

One of her hooves was still on his shoulder, and now she moved it to his neck. As she gently slid her hoof up toward where his neck disappeared into the shadows, it reminded her of that night before they'd confronted Amberlocks, when he'd turned himself invisible and she'd had to locate his face by touch.

What would she do now if she found nothing where his face should be? Before she could give this much thought, his neck suddenly flinched away from her touch, and he seemed to be trying to pull away from her. She tried to hang onto him, but then her eyes snapped open and she was back on the couch in her cottage, tangled in the scarf. Letting out an almost inaudible scream, she buried her face in the couch cushion and beat her hooves against it in frustration.

She'd been taken in yet again by one of her dreams!





"Oof!" Discord was jolted awake when something smacked him in the face.

"Let Mom go!"

"Wake! Up!"

Wha—"Oof!" He was smacked in the face again. He shook his head, then looked up to see two pillows, one encased in pink light and the other in yellow, floating above him. The pillows came swinging down toward him and he swiftly snapped his fingers, causing the pillows to shoot away from him and toward their wielders. He heard startled cries followed by a pair of thumps and turned to see Dinky and Amethyst each pinned to the wall by the pillows. The two unicorns were trying to pry the pillows away magically, but the constricting cushions held them fast.

Then he became aware of something squirming against his chest and looked down to see Derpy lashed against him via his dragon tattoo. Heaving himself up into a sitting position, he seized a section of his dragon tattoo where it was stretched across Derpy's back and yanked hard, snapping the tattoo in half in a spray of ink. The tattoo squealed but he ignored it, grabbing another section and snapping that in half as well. Finally Derpy was free, the dragon tattoo's head and front limbs were straggling off Discord's back while the rest of it was strewn about in broken segments on the bed, and the vast majority of the room was drenched in ink.

Discord studied the scene for about five seconds, then stuck his fingers in his mouth and whistled. All the ink began sliding off whatever surface it was stuck to, and rolling into balls that trundled about gathering up more ink the way a snowball would gather snow. These ink balls positioned themselves between the dragon tattoo segments, gluing them back together. Then Discord peeled off the fragment of tattoo still stuck to him and jammed it into one end of the reassembled tattoo. He swung the repaired tattoo over his shoulder and let it wrap around his body like a whip, before turning his attention to the still-trapped unicorns. He snapped his talons and the pillows floated away from the wall, allowing Dinky and Amethyst to drop the short distance to the floor. Derpy ran over to make sure they were all right.

"Care to explain what prompted that pillow assault?" Discord asked, crossing his arms and cocking an eyebrow.

"We heard Mom yelling and came to see what was going on," Amethyst said irritably.

"I don't know what happened," said Derpy. "I heard you tossing and turning and muttering in your sleep so I came in to check on you. Then your tattoo just jumped out and wrapped around me."

The dragon tattoo ducked its head as if it were embarrassed, and Discord felt his body tense. What had he been muttering about?! Had it just been gibberish or had the words been clear enough to understand?!

"Well, that's what you get for barging in on a creature of chaos unannounced!" he snapped to cover his unease before vanishing in a flash of light. The skylight above the three ponies flipped open, and they saw a second flash of light outside before Discord poked his head in through it. "Next time knock!" And with that he pulled his head back out of sight as the skylight slammed shut.

"Hmph, what a grouch," Amethyst muttered before yawning and clumping back off to bed.

Derpy gave her younger daughter a nudge. "You should get back to bed too."

Dinky took a few steps toward her room, then glanced back at her mother. "What about you?"

Derpy glanced at the clock. "Oh, since I'm up, I think I'll get that mail from yesterday delivered. Don't want it to get lost in today's mail."

Dinky leaned in to give her a nuzzle. "Alright. Good night, Mom."





Meanwhile up on the roof, Discord conjured a GPS and used it to look up Fluttershy's house in relation to his present location. It wouldn't take very long to fly there, and even less time to teleport, so why did the idea of going there suddenly feel like such an impossible journey?

He looked up from the GPS and toward Fluttershy's house. The dream he'd had moments ago had stirred up his already muddled feelings. He longed for clarity and that made him irritable. Holding Fluttershy for those brief moments in the dream had filled him with a longing to hold the real Fluttershy. Yes, she had chosen some other stallion over him, but had apparently changed her mind about the whole affair. So why did he still feel so reluctant to see her?

Because it wasn't just the fact that she'd chosen some other stallion over him. He realized that now.

It was the fact that her choice had affected him so strongly.

He had let her into his life and in doing so, had allowed her to have too much power over him.

"Mind if I sit down?"

The draconequus almost jumped out of his skin, both figuratively and literally. He whirled around in the direction of the voice to see Derpy, now dressed in her mailpony uniform and with her mailbag slung over her shoulder, flapping next to him. He shrugged and she landed next to him. She peeked curiously at the GPS screen, clearly never having seen such a thing before, and he quickly switched it off before tossing it away.

Derpy frowned after it, then looked back up at him. "You look confused."

For some reason the gentle understanding in her tone irritated him. "I do not. Look who's talking."

"You're not sure what to do, are you?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about." He disappeared and reappeared further down the roof's length with his back to her, a not-so-subtle hint that the conversation was over.

But Derpy pressed on anyway. "Discord, do you know what I sometimes try to ask myself when I'm not sure what to do?"

Still not looking at her, he raised his arms in a shrug. "Doesn't matter to me one way or the other."

"Do I do something to be loved, or in order to love?"

Discord was looking in the direction of Fluttershy's house again and only half-listening. Then his head jerked up as Derpy's words fully registered. "Wait a minute!" He whipped around to face Derpy ("Who said anything about love?! I didn't—!"), and found himself addressing an empty spot on the roof. Looking up, he saw the gray pegasus flapping off toward town.

"Hey!" he shouted, but she must not have heard him because she kept flying. He briefly considered flashing up in front of her and demanding to know what she had been talking about, but decided against it, not wanting her to know she'd confused him. Besides, he could always replay the scene via his cinematic memory.