Entropy

by Dream Seeker

I Can't Change the Way I Feel

Author's Note:

I wrote this entire thing while listening to the song Entropy on repeat.

This is the original, single-chapter form of the story. The remainder of these chapters are the unfinished expaded form I was planning on writing before I cancelled it. I thought I might as well re-publish the original full version if I'm not going to finish the rest of the long-form version.

Discord sat on his throne. Around him sat the town of Ponyville, now the chaos capital of the world. The defeat of the Mane 6 was quite easy, really. He may not have been able to cast spells on the Elements, but he could cast a spell on their wielders. All he needed was to prevent them from seeing the Elements, with a simple snap of his claw. None stood a chance against him. But was he happy? Not really. He sat there, with Fluttershy in front of him, crying and asking him why.

"Why, why would you do this? I don't understand. I thought we were friends!" sobbed Fluttershy.

"I can't help it Fluttershy, this is my nature. I can't change the way I feel. I was born to be chaotic." Discord said, drinking a glass of chocolate milk. Just the glass.

"I thought you really had changed."

"I tried, but I just need to cause some entropy. I can't bare living without it."

"We had some fun times together..."

"What fun is there in ever making sense? But don't mistake this for not wanting to be your friend. I really enjoyed most of our time together. I just can't give up my chaos. I need it to feel good."

"What are you going to do to us?"

Discord turned his head sharply, 360 degrees. "I will let you live your lives, dropping in from time to time to say hello. I really am sorry about all this. Make no mistake, I won't mess with you. You taught me friendship. That is a part of me now, and I want my friends to be happy."

"Them fix this! remove the chaos!"

"I can't. I... guess I can make a hole in it... After all, perfect chaos is order." Discord said, snapping his fingers. Suddenly, Canterlot appeared to have changed back to normal. With another snap, Discord created a scepter and gave it to Fluttershy. "Congratulations, Fluttershy. You are now the leader of Canterlot, the non-chaos capital of the world." he said with a sigh.

"But how am I going to help all of my animals? They might get hurt!" said Fluttershy.

"Don't worry, just lead your city for a while. I'll start sending you animals." replied Discord, pulling his eyes out and rolling them on the ground. "I always get snake eyes." he muttered, seeing the results. He put them back on, and said, "Go on now. You got me to give up some of my chaos."

----------A Month Later---------A Month Later---------A Month Later---------A Month Later---------

"YOU HAVE CROSSED THE LINE!" Discord roared. He stood over the dead body of Fluttershy. "YOU WILL PAY FOR THIS!"

The ponies of Canterlot stood around, their heads tilted upwards. "She was a common pony, and she helped you." said Prince Blueblood in his arrogant, stuck-up voice.

Discord ground his teeth. "Enough is enough. You ponies have proven that I can't even cut you a little slack." he snapped his fingers angrily, and chaos covered Canterlot once again.

"If you're so powerful, why don't you just bring her back to life?" asked one noblepony.

"For all my powers, I cannot bring creatures back from the dead. That is why I never killed anypony. And your punishment for killing her, is eternal torture. Go to Tartarus." said Discord, turning away and snapping his fingers. In an instant, the city was empty, and Tartarus was full of nobleponies.

"I'm sorry, Fluttershy." said Discord, a tear slipping down his face. "I could have stopped this, somehow. My first and only true friend, gone..." Discord began sobbing. "I didn't want this! I wanted us to stay friends. If only I could stop wanting chaos. But I can't change the way I feel. Those nobleponies deserved that. Stuck-up little pricks." Discord growled. He snapped his claws, and the rest of the Mane 6 appeared before him. "I felt you should be here." he said to them. "The nobleponies of Canterlot killed her. May they rot in Tartarus."

The Mane 6, or Mane 5 now, cried for a while. "Couldn't you have done something to prevent it?" asked Twilight.

"Probably, but I didn't know until too late. I have made my decision." said Discord. "If I were to become non-chaotic while the Elements had frozen me in stone, what would happen?"

"Uh, I think you would turn back, if you no longer had chaos. You would probably still be immortal, but you would lose most of your power."

"Can you do that for me?"

"Turn you to stone? I'm afraid we would need Fluttershy to wield her Element."

Discord snapped his fingers, and everything went back to normal, but Fluttershy was still dead on the ground, and the nobleponies were still in Tartarus. "I'll be on the moon, you'll be immortal. Send me a dragon-fire message when you have an Element of Kindness. Call me for the funeral."

"Discord, why are you doing this?"

Discord stared, tears in his eyes. "Because it's what Fluttershy would have wanted."

He snapped his fingers, and appeared on the moon. He gritted his teeth and resisted breaking the laws of physics. Clasping his paws, he repeated one word over and over in his mind. Fluttershy.

Two months later, Discord was still reciting Fluttershy's name over and over, when he got a dragon-fire scroll.

"Ah, the funeral. I'll be there right on time. Until then, gotta practice my entran-no!" he shouted. "I must stay strong, for Fluttershy's memory." He popped in during the ceremony. Everypony gasped at his entrance, and during the chaos he moved to the front. He made a speech, then sat down to watch. Afterwards, he teleported back to the moon before Twilight could talk to him. He resumed his chant. Over and over again. When it no longer seemed effective, he chiseled Fluttershy's name into the stone with his claws. Then he got a really good idea. Over the next millennium, he chiseled Fluttershy's face into the moon, gradually, until it could be seen from Equis. Then, he teleported to Twilight's throne room.

"I think I have done it." he said calmly. "After over a thousand years, I have reformed."

"I was going to send you a letter within the week. We have found our Element of Kindness."

"Good. Test the Elements on me."

Soon, the Elements assembled. They closed their eyes, and cast the spell. Discord found himself surrounded by memories.

"I can't change the way I feel."

"I just need to cause some entropy."

Discord opened his eyes. They glowed a brilliant white. "I can change! I have! I was wrong!" a few moments later, the rainbow left, and Discord stood there, encased in stone. The stone began to crack, and Discord was free. He didn't overload the spell with chaos, though. He was well and truely reformed.

"I did it!" he said, weeping freely. "I'm reformed. I am so, so sorry Fluttershy! If only I had been stronger then."

Comments

[Avox]

The actual writing wasn't bad, but everything happened way too fast for me. This easily could have been a 100k word epic. Give us more to work with—don't just tell us what we should be feeling and why.

Make us feel, don't tell us. Build up Discord's characterization so that we can see his coup and then his eventual fall. Show us his heartbreak at Fluttershy's funeral. Elaborate on his time spent on the moon. How did he have the sudden epiphany that he did? Why? When?

Don't rush through everything. Take your time with it. I promise you that the story would be much better off for it.

[Dream Seeker]

4614097 The thought that this could be a 100k epic did cross my mind... You're right, I need to work on pacing. I'll probably start turning this into one, actually. I'll work on it.

[Avox]

4614151 I'll keep my eye on this then. You've got a lot of potential here, and I want to see where you take it.

[Dream Seeker]

4614185 I keep getting ideas that could be used for Epic stories, but I just don't have the pacing down yet.

[Avox]

4614302 I had the same problem, and this is what ended up working for me:

Don't just have things happen because "the plot demands it." Get from point A to point B logically without jumping from place to place. For example, how did Discord come to power? Where were Celestia and Luna? Why did he want to come to power in the first place? Why weren't the elements of harmony able to stop him?

Just keep asking yourself questions. Once you run out of questions to ask, then you're good to start writing.

If you want a cool method for outlining, I would totally recommend The Snowflake Method. It's time consuming, yes, but it works.