//------------------------------// // Epilogue // Story: Let's Try This Again // by HypernovaBolts11 //------------------------------// Princess Celestia sat at her throne, her eyes narrowed, her hoof tapping against the arm of her lavish chair impatiently. Discord materialized at the front of the room, along with a crowd of cardboard cutout ponies, all with their hooves in the air as they silently cheered on the draconiquus, who bowed to each of them as he made his way down the isle, and finally came to the base of Celestia's throne, whereupon he threw his head back, and flipped backwards in a sort of reverse bow. The solar monarch was not amused, and she said, "I assume you know why I called you here, Discord." He shook his head, his front legs held behind his back. He snapped his talons once, and a cardboard cutout of a certain changeling appeared in front of him. He put on a black top hat, a black vest, and a monocle, and blew bubbles out of a pipe he held between his lips. "Let it be known," he said in the most stiff and formal voice he could muster, "that I, Discord, was not responsible for the escape of this fine looking fellow right here." He draped his taloned arm over the cutout, and leaned against it. Celestia winced, and she asked, "Then how did he escape?" Discord said, "Elementary, my dear Celestia. You see, after Cosmos went ahead and croaked, he made a pact with me, dictating that I would protect his only son until the boy's mother joined his father's soul in the afterlife." He took a moment to puff a few bubbles out of his pipe. Celestia raised an eyebrow at the spirit, and said, "But his mother is dead." "Well, yes, but there arises a minor paradox. You see, just because she is dead, does not mean she is in the afterlife. Her soul has stuck around, and she is still watching over her son. Even still, when she moves on, she will be sentenced to an eternity in Tartarus, not Elysium, where her late lover is. So she will never join him, and thus, my powers were diverted to saving the changeling's life when you nearly killed him," he said. Celestia said, "You claimed no part in his escape." "That I did, but I was not able to consciously choose to spare him. My powers were simply sucked away from me, interrupting a lovely chat I was having with the Smooze, you remember him, and I had no way of stopping it. I am the victim here, Celestia, and you cannot deny that a pact is a pact. I had no choice," he said. Celestia bit her lip, and held her forehead with a hoof. "Okay, so if I attempt to kill him, he'll just get away. There is no process by which the pact can be dissolved, as Cosmos has moved on, and I still can't fix the course of events," she said, gritting her teeth. Discord snapped his talons, forcing his outfit and pipe to vanish. He grinned, and said, "Well... Maybe you can't, but I know someone who can." Celestia looked up from her throne. "Who?" she asked. Discord shook his head, and said, "I cannot say. See what happens when I try." He opened his mouth to speak again, but a piece of duct tape appeared over his mouth, and he couldn't make it disappear no matter how many times he snapped his talons. So he simply glanced at the cardboard cutout he'd brought into existence. He vanished, leaving the princess to stare at the image of her nephew, which then fell backwards as its stand was removed by one of Discord's talons, which then grabbed it and pulled it into the floor. To be continued...