//------------------------------// // Unfocused Reflections // Story: Once There was a Beautiful, but Tragic Knight... // by Jade Crossroads //------------------------------// Discord plunged his head into the icy pool of water to both wake him up and clear his head. Water droplets dribbled from his beard as he resurfaced. Nothing made sense anymore. Not that anything “normal” ever did to him, but this twisted sense of humor that replaced the more common of it, the more understandable or even the unpredictable sense of the word…. It was just short of annoying. His dreams were more the exploration of questions he was hard pressed to answer. To his misfortune the questions went unresolved now as they had been before now. A century spent in seclusion and still nothing had changed. Discord was still alone, still exiled and still, much to his aggravation, puzzled. He’d spent a long time sleeping,fifty years or so from what he could gather, and now it had been more years to top off the already staggering total of moon phases. He had spent too much time in a state of lethargy, it was difficult to wake up, but he managed. From what he could tell ponies still kept a good distance from his forest despite seeing little of him. That was good news if there was any such thing. He was still tired, but he needed to stay awake or time would pass him by and somepony would find him curled up like that. They would probably assume him dead, but some idiot would come back with a speaker and make sure of it. Slow heart rate or no, Village folk he’d observed years ago didn’t take risks and neither did he for awhile. Discord knew it would only be a short time before the neighboring peoples would explore these territories of his and disturb what he had built here. It was time to scare them off again. He stretched out and yawned as he looked at his surroundings. He was proud to see his magic had held up and the trees hadn’t come an inch closer to the little enclosure than they had been before his long nap. Was it normal pony behavior for a mother to leave her child? He tried to shake the unbidden thought out from his mind, but alas, it was already branching out. It was too late to stop the blasted thing from consuming his thoughts. He'd observed one house for an entire week, and not once did the parent, either one of them, abandon or neglect their children for a second. much like he had been in his appearance, he was alone in that as well. He had gotten over the fact long ago, or so he told himself, but something had brought these thoughts back to life and they proceeded to plague him to no end. He had tried to, traveling to either side of the end of the world just left him tired, and feeling foolish. Did he really believe running form the source of all his problems would make them disappear? That was the intelligence of a pony, not him. Discord wasn't sure he knew what he was doing anymore either. The reasoning behind this was also left unresolved in the aftermath of the twilight dream he had been having. He'd waged his little war with the two ruling alicorns and he had - in the end- lost. Perhaps he was a sore loser, or maybe he just had nothing better to do than scare ponies off as he traveled unexplored territories and the towns he observed. Did he prefer to annoy them? Or was it his intention to ensure they never had a moment to rest from his lingering presence and looming threat, not unalike to the way they and all the creatures of the Everfree regarded him as a youngling. It wasn’t that they could end him or the fear that they’d take some hoard of dragon's gold he didn’t have. There was no logical explanation for his attachment to these specific woodland areas, so did he simply want to keep their tyrannical ways out of his “home”? Couldn’t he just move and travel somewhere they’d never find him and nopony would dare search for the draconequus? A few times he might've helped the ponies’ society, but he’d always be spotted before he could make a difference and he'd be reminded why he hated those ponies and all other Equines in the first place. To think he was even distant kin to them drove him mad. They're nothing but a nuisance. The feeling had been mutual he knew, though honestly, where was the harm in having a little fun? All they ever did was work until they died, aside from that he only ever saw them arguing amongst themselves and crushing any kindness misguided individuals had the decency to show. Sometimes it was by force, he was the monster though time and time again he had stopped these acts before they went farther than chasing the poor souls down. He had them to blame for his loneliness, for they showed even less niceties with him when they saw his silhouette crossing the boundary between the forest and the towns. “Yet they still persist to invade my territory they had gladly given up to me before hand!” he growled. As more and more of his memories began to flood back through his state of a clouded mind, his dislike of ponykind was renewed. Discord glowered down at his reflection on the pond's surface. He slapped at it, but the water would just ripple until the haunting image behind the pain and suffering of ponykind, the face of all that destruction and chaos returned. He got tired of looking in a mirror. The draconequus didn't hate how he looked, he was a rare specimen and unlike the form of a pony entirely asymmetrical. He wasn't ashamed either, again, he loved himself. He just hated the times he would see or wonder what all those ponies feared. What inspired so much fear at a glance? His horns were mismatched, one being that of a stag, the other was.. He wasn’t really sure. He hadn’t seen any animal around yet that had a similar appendage atop their head. and unlike that of a unicorn’s they emitted no magical current , he could try perhaps, but why would he? He didn’t need to use as much concentration and brain power as them, so there was no need to use that nor could it ever prove as an advantage.His eyes were a deep red, what were the whites of other animals or ponies eyes, were instead a yellow as if they too wished to differentiate themselves from the normalcy of anatomy as well, they were different sizes. His head was that of either a pony or a donkey, it really depended on who you asked. He had heard different opinions on that subject alone when tales or supposed sightings of him reached his ears. He also had his fang that protruded out from the side of his mouth no matter what he tried, that seemed to frighten ponies the most besides his magic and his unique eyes. Sure he had the look of a predator, mayhaps a funny looking one, but he couldn't bring himself to eat anything containing… perish the thought, meat! He had an interesting enough diet without that disgusting alternative. It was barbaric! It was foul, somewhat literally where the matter concerned pegasi. He snorted, bird brains the lot of them whether it's in their blood, genes, ancestry or not. They were all the same and of no real concern to him. If only he could convince himself of this, then maybe the rejection he felt each time he entered a village unseen would stop hurting. He didn't’ ask too much, but he knew it was too high a cost for him to ever pay in order to receive. A foolish wish that would never come to fruition, which only brought him back to his initial question; Just what was he hoping to achieve? It wasn’t as if things were headed in a direction he’d prefer over the way things were before, when he was still a foal and he could pretend that nothing was the matter. Before his dreams of joining the world beyond were dashed to mere fragments of what they were before.