Chapter 9. Ezekiel 36:26
Chapter 9
“And I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.”—Ezekiel 36:26
When Fluttershy woke the next day, she went into the main room to find Discord already gone and the books they’d been looking through the day before lying in the middle of the room. She found the tiny journal on top of the pile and paged through it.
The first list was titled “Petal Blossom” and the items on it were:
1 apple cake
3 jugs cider
4 doz. apple spice muffins
3 batch apple turnovers
3 lb. apple chips
1 corn cake
1 doz. popcorn balls
1 loaf pumpkin bread
2 apple pies
On a hunch, Fluttershy looked through the list of cider customers, searching for the name Petal Blossom and after a few minutes she located it. She looked through the rest of the lists in the journal and was able to match each of their titles with the names of ponies in the cider customer list. When she got to the last list that consisted only of the six pony names, she studied them for several seconds before getting out her knitting to give her hooves something to do while she thought on the names.
Why would Applejack have a list of customers with no list of orders under their names? The list hadn’t been dated, so what if Applejack had written it but hadn’t had a chance to add their orders before she’d died?
Her thoughts were interrupted when Discord suddenly flashed into the room with several thick books tucked under his arm. “Honey, I’m home,” he quipped.
Fluttershy set aside her knitting and trotted up to him. “Did you find out where Glitter Glide and the rest of the ponies on that list are?”
“Oh, I found out alright,” he said and the joking manner faded from his voice. “All six of those ponies have been spending the past decade six feet under.”
Fluttershy felt her throat tighten up. “You mean they’re ... they’re dead?”
“Oh, yes. Quite dead ... and all killed in the same manner.”
Setting down the books he was holding, which Fluttershy now saw were various registries, he snapped his talons, causing a large map of Equestria to appear on one of the cabin walls. A rolled-up paper flashed into his hand and he threw it at the map like a dart. The scroll struck Baltimare and stuck there like a piece of well-cooked spaghetti. Then it unrolled, revealing itself to be a photograph of a white earth pony with a dark pink mane and tail, and dressed in a white lab coat and goggles.
“Strawberry Swirl worked as a botanist in Baltimare, apparently experimenting with combining different fruits together. Apples that tasted like grapes, bananas that tasted like kiwis and strawberries.” He snorted scornfully. “She should have put me on the job. I could have gotten results,” he snapped his talons and several different types of fruit sprouted on the branches above them. “like that.” And maybe I will when this is over, he thought, imagining some ponies biting into watermelon slices only to discover that they tasted like bananas.
“Discord...” Fluttershy’s soft voice jerked him back to the real world.
“Hmm?”
“What happened to her?”
“Oh, one day she didn’t come in for work. Her lab partners went to her house but she wasn’t there. They checked all the other places she normally went, but there was still no sign of her. Then two weeks later a garbage collector found her dead in a dumpster. When they examined her, it turned out she’d been strangled to death. They never found out who killed her.”
He conjured more scrolls and tossed them one after another at the map, explaining who the ponies on them were.
Triple Treat was a lavender unicorn with a coral-colored mane and tail. She had worked in Manehattan as a commercial baker who had specialized in fancy cakes and other elegant foods.
Cotton Candy was a magenta earth pony with a frizzy mane and tail the same light blue as her namesake. She had worked as a party planner in Fillydelphia, a fact that combined with her looks made her seem so much like Pinkie Pie that Fluttershy found it unsettling.
Both Triple Treat and Cotton Candy had gone the same way as Strawberry Swirl. One day they hadn’t shown up for work, and a few weeks later their strangled corpses were found in dumpsters.
Glitter Glide had been working as a weather pony in Cloudsdale.
“She’d applied to the Wonderbolt Academy and had been accepted, but didn’t show up for the first day of training,” said Discord. “A week later, she was found floating in a river. The ponies that discovered her thought at first that she’d drown, but further examination revealed that she’d died of strangulation before she’d ended up in the river.”
Sparkleworks was a light orange unicorn with a blue mane and tail. She had been an explosives expert and firework-maker in Appleloosa. Two and a half weeks after not showing up for a blasting operation on the outskirts of the town, she, like Glitter Glide, had been found floating in a river.
The last pony on the list, Sunny Daze, was a loopy-looking white pegasus whose bright orange mane and tail were full of yellow and magenta streaks. She had been a painter who spent most of her time in Los Pegasus. She would often go off alone for weeks at a time so her disappearance hadn’t been noticed as soon as those of the other ponies. It wasn’t until the day when her body washed up on the banks of a river several miles from Los Pegasus that anypony realized she was dead.
Fluttershy gazed up at the map of Equestria and at the six photos marking the six locations each of the ponies had disappeared from. Those poor ponies, she thought sadly, wondering about the friends and family members they must have left behind. They had all come from different towns and cities, they had all had different professions, and yet they had all been killed in the same manner. Could that be the reason Applejack had written their names down?
Discord’s voice cut into her thoughts. “Apart from their deaths, the only thing they seemed to have in common was being Sweet Apple Acres cider customers.” After a pause he added, “I hear Applejack was pretty good with a rope.” and wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.
“Discord,” Fluttershy’s voice was as soft as usual but there was a hint of steel in it. “You’d better not be implying that she killed them.”
Floating in midair, the draconequus propped himself up on his elbows, clasped his paw in his claw, rested his chin on them, and gazed at her with an air of polite interest.
“You have an alternative theory?” There was something in his tone that made Fluttershy feel he’d already come up with another theory himself and wanted to see if she could deduce it without his help.
She swallowed, choosing her words carefully. “Well ... I know Applejack wouldn’t have killed them ... but maybe she found out who did ... and was killed so she couldn’t expose them.”
He golf-clapped. “Very good, Fluttershy. That’s just what I was thinking.”
They spent the next several days combing through the lists of Applejack’s customers to see if any of the rest of them had met with fates similar to those of the current six victims. In the past years several of them had died but all their deaths had been either natural causes or unfortunate accidents. Only those first six had been unsolved murders, and only those six had occurred before Applejack’s disappearance.
Discord also magically sliced wedges off the Apples on the ceiling and stuck them on the map wherever those particular Apples lived. Most of the Apples were earth ponies, but there were a few pegasi and unicorns scattered among them.
“I’d say it’s about time to start putting together a profile of our killer,” said Discord when they’d finally finished going through the customer list. Both he and Fluttershy felt that their theory about Applejack being killed to cover up the other murders was their strongest lead. He studied the seven photographs stuck to the map; they had added Applejack’s photo on top of Sweet Apple Acres.
“Hmm. We’ll have to consider the fact that the bodies of the other six ponies were all found while Applejack’s body is still missing,” he mused, stroking his beard. “There wasn’t too much effort put into hiding the others. They were dumped as if the killer didn’t care if they were found or not. My guess is the killer didn’t think they’d be traced back to him or her, but didn’t want to risk Applejack’s death being connected with them, and thus put more effort into hiding her body. That makes me think Applejack wasn’t one of the intended victims, but rather was killed because she knew too much.”
Fluttershy nodded. “That does seem to fit. When they didn’t show up for their usual cider orders, Applejack must have noticed the similarity in their deaths that everypony else missed. But what about the cider bottles...”
“Pardon?”
Realizing Discord didn’t know about the cider bottles, which might be an important clue in themselves, Fluttershy quickly explained their yearly arrival, and why they had led Granny Smith to believe a fellow family member had killed Applejack and had been taunting her about it ever since.
When she had finished her explanation, Discord vanished and reappeared a few seconds later with the ten cider bottles. A table flashed into existence in front of him and he set the bottles down on it. He and Fluttershy began going over each bottle carefully, hoping they might find some clue about its sender.
Fluttershy sighed. “I’ve seen this type of bottle before. It’s made in Canterlot but it’s sold all over Equestria so it could have been bought in any of those cities or towns. The apples for the dried peelings could have been bought just about anywhere as well. Or they could have been grown by the killer.”
Discord tilted one of the bottles, hearing its contents slosh. “Let’s take a look at what’s in them.” Uncorking the bottle, he flashed a pair of tankards onto the table and poured the bottle’s contents into them. He stuck a glowing talon into one of the tankards and stirred the liquid. “Hmm. No poison. No oddball ingredients. Nope, it’s just plain old regular cider.” He sounded disappointed. Then a new idea seemed to occur to him. Two more tankards flashed onto the table, this time accompanied by a jug of Sweet Apple Acres cider that had been in the cabin kitchen.
“Let’s do a taste test,” he said, picking up the tankard he’d been stirring. “See how the two types of cider compare.”
First they tried the bottled cider, then they tried the Sweet Apple Acres cider. Fluttershy had expected the Sweet Apple Acres cider to be better just by default but was in for a surprise.
“They’re about the same,” she said, when they’d finished their taste test. “If I didn’t know any better I would have sworn I just had two tankards from the same jug.”
“Same here,” said Discord. “Which probably means they were made with the same recipe...” he slumped. “Which probably just means they’re using a family recipe that all the Apples know and it doesn’t really add anything to our case.”
By then it was getting dark and cold so Discord snapped a fire into the fireplace. Though they didn’t voice their thoughts aloud, it was clear from their expressions that both detectives were feeling stuck. They had found a possible answer to their question of why Applejack had been killed, but they seemed no closer to answering the question of who had done it.
“Maybe we should take a break,” Fluttershy suggested. “and come back to the case tomorrow with a fresh start.”
Discord decided that she had a point. “In that case, let’s have something to drink besides cider.”
He snapped his talons and two large tall glasses of what appeared to be chocolate milk appeared in midair in front of him. A second later, a bucket of ice and a scooper appeared next to him. He scooped up a heaping pile of ice and poured it into one of the glasses. Putting the glass on the floor, he gave it a shove, sending it sliding toward Fluttershy. Then he turned and dumped a heaping scoop of ice into the remaining glass as well.
Fluttershy eyed the beverage with a touch of apprehension. Chocolate milk with lots of ice in it was not her idea of a cozy by-the-fire-type drink but the least she could do was be appreciative of his effort. She took a small sip, then her eyes widened in surprise when the liquid that touched her lips turned out to be much warmer than she’d expected, almost like hot cocoa. She looked up to see Discord blowing on his own drink before taking a sip.
“Aren’t you going to drink the glass instead of the milk?” she asked, referring to a stunt she’d seen him do a few days earlier.
Discord flicked his eagle hand to the side with a dismissive “Tuh! That is an acquired taste, my dear Fluttershy,” he said in a mock pompous voice. “Tis all in the delivery.” Bringing his head down closer to hers as if sharing classified information, he shifted back to his regular voice. “It’s great the first time around, but once ponies start expecting it, it loses something.”
Drawing back, he winked at her and she responded with a soft laugh. Though she knew it had just been part of his snob act, she had enjoyed hearing him say “my dear Fluttershy” without any of the sarcasm he would have employed when they’d first met.
Despite deciding to take a small break from the case, Fluttershy still felt her eyes drifting toward the map covered with photos and apple slices, and she wondered aloud, “Maybe if we could figure out which Apple was in all those locations at the time those ponies disappeared—”
“Fluttershy ... are we sure ... it was only one Apple who committed the murders? How do we know it wasn’t several of them working together?”
As these questions sunk in, Fluttershy realized with dismay that it was true. She had just been assuming that there had only been one pony involved in Applejack’s death, but now that she looked back at their evidence there was no concrete proof of that.
If more ponies were involved ... how could they possibly know which ones to rule out?
They decided to sleep on it.
Fluttershy went back to her bedroom. She glanced absently at the calendar and froze when she realized what date it was. Hearth’s Warming was tomorrow!
With the way it had been storming nonstop there had been little difference between night and day, and she had been so occupied with the case that she’d lost track of the days and had paused each day only long enough to check them off the calendar.
Now she wished she could have done something special for Hearth’s Warming. It was too late to send any presents to her friends. The fact that it was still storming outside made the idea of trying to visit them out of the question. Maybe she could give Discord a present ... but what?
Her eyes lit on the scarf she’d been knitting over the past several days. It was long enough to wrap around one’s neck several times. Maybe it would do.
She held the scarf up to examine it, and felt her heart sink. The scarf was a mess. It was thin in some areas and thick in others. Its colors all seemed to clash, and strings were trailing from almost every row. It looked like a giant ratty, multi-colored woolly bear caterpillar that had been pinched thin in some places and over-inflated in others. One glance at it would probably have given Rarity a heart attack.
But Rarity isn’t here, and really what else can I give? Fluttershy wondered. She searched for something to wrap the present in, but could find nothing. Finally she had to make-do with tucking it into one of her saddlebags. She jotted “Happy Hearth’s Warming” on a scrap of paper and slipped it into the bag so that the corner was poking out.
She peeked back into the main room to see Discord snoozing on a long oddly-shaped bed he’d conjured for himself. She moved quietly to the bed, intending to put the saddlebag at its foot, when one of Discord’s eyes popped open.
“What’s that?”
Fluttershy froze like a filly caught doing something wrong. Before she could set the saddlebag down, it suddenly disappeared from her mouth and reappeared in Discord’s hand as he sat up.
“It’s ... your Hearth’s Warming present,” she mumbled, looking at the floor. In his hands, the present looked even more pathetic than it had when she was holding it. Why would he even want that joke of a scarf from her? He could snap a dozen scarves or anything else he wanted into existence in less than a minute. She scraped a hoof nervously against the floor. “I—”
She stopped and looked up when she heard the rustle of the saddlebag being opened. “You’re supposed to wait til—” But it was already too late.
Discord had brought his tail around to hold the saddlebag with his tail tuft as he held the scarf up in both hands and examined it through narrowed eyes. At the sight of his expression, Fluttershy dropped her head again. Of course he was unimpressed with her efforts.
Well, if nothing else, maybe he’d at least get a few chuckles out of her feeble attempt at a gift. “I know it’s not much, but—”
“No one’s ever given me a present before,” he said in a soft awestruck voice that managed to startle her far more than if he’d shouted.
“Never? Not even on your birthday?”
He let out a humorless snort. “I don’t even know when my birthday is. I never bothered to keep track considering I never really had anyone to celebrate it with.”
“But surely you’ve had at least one friend before.” Fluttershy may not have been as out-going or have as many friends as somepony like Pinkie Pie, but even in her loneliest moments she had always had at least one friend.
“No,” he said softly with none of his usual flippancy.
Fluttershy remembered the doubts she’d had earlier about giving him that present. Deep down she’d begun to feel more than a little jealous of the fact that he could top anything she slaved over with just a snap of his fingers. She’d tried to deny it but underneath her soft-spoken manner she had been seething with envy at his power.
But now she began to realize that when it came to forming friendships Discord’s power may have crippled him as effectively as her shyness had her. Maybe even more effectively.
She had often run into situations she couldn’t handle on her own where she had been forced to put her trust in her friends. It was in their weakest moments as well as their strong ones when their friendship showed its true power.
Discord’s never had to put his trust in anypony, she realized. He’s never experienced any of that... And suddenly the power he wielded seemed like a poor trade-off when compared with the wealth of love and trust she and her friends had cultivated over the years. In that moment all the envy she’d been secretly harboring toward him fell away to be replaced with compassion.
“You have one now,” she said, wrapping her forelegs around his body from the side. At her touch, Discord went as still as if he’d been turned back to stone. Then Fluttershy felt his eagle claw stroking her mane with uncharacteristic tentativeness.
Outside the cabin, snow had heaped up almost to the roof. The wind howled and shrieked, but inside the cabin was warm and cozy.
Fluttershy was curled up near the fire, wrapped in a blanket and dozing with Angel in a nest of blankets near her belly. Discord was lying on his stomach with her blanket-clad back against his side and his long body curled around hers in a huge C. Discord himself wasn’t that sleepy yet and was currently reviewing all he had done with Fluttershy in the past few days. Ever since she had risked her life to break him out of that ice he had felt his hard heart softening toward her.
Hearing her declare herself his friend had felt like being offered a plate of food he’d been waving away all his life, only to finally try a bite and find it unexpectedly delicious.
Looking down at her, he fingered the scarf he now had wrapped around his neck. He liked its lumpy uneven appearance, and the way its colors tangled together instead of following a pattern, but there was more to it than that. It wasn’t like the things he could instantly make or unmake with a snap of his fingers. It had taken time and effort for her to make it; he had seen that with his own eyes. Giving the scarf to him had meant that, in a sense, she had given that time and effort to him, and the thought melted the last stony layers from his heart. Wrapping his lion arm around her, he let his long neck curl along the floor and gently nuzzled her mane as he finally surrendered to the feelings that had been growing over the past weeks and allowed their new alien warmth to flow into his heart.
As his eyes drifted shut, he little suspected that warmth would be accompanied by a powerful surge of magic. The magic burst from him and whooshed unseen through the cabin.
Outside the semitransparent pony-shaped creatures that had been circling the cabin and the farm were knocked out of the air and down into the snow as the magic struck them like a tidal wave. It rushed on, billowing outward to the far edges of Equestria, doing the same with all the other semitransparent pony-shaped creatures it encountered before it dissipated. For the first time in weeks the wind was silent and the snow ceased to fall.
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That was simply amazing
Daaawwww......Fluttershy gave Discord his first present. Thats so sweet!
This was a very good chapter, just like the last one you put out. And again, can't wait to know what happens next
So beautiful I am so happy with tears of joy in my eyes
there weren't any tears of joy faces so I just put raritydespair
THIS IS AMAZING! have some mustaches
You update so fast!!! How do you do that??? It's so awesome! I just don't understand, because I always take forever!
I'm always excited to see your updates. You write so well. I just love all this tension you have everywhere, with both the case and the chemistry between the two friends of Discord and Fluttershy. You show it so well in this story. I can just feel the endorphins everywhere! Is that weird to say? Yeah, probably.
You just write so well, and I am so, so glad that I gave this story a glance despite my initial trepidations. (Did I use that word right?) (Okay, I checked the dictionary, I used it right, good. You deserve good vocabulary in your reviews.) It's just been so rewarding. And you have so many parallels between the show and this story, and yet it's still completely different and your own. At least, that's how I see it. I love reading about how Discord feels. This one was especially touching, what with the scarf and Discord's surprise at the gift.
Great job, my friend, bravo! I will wait as long as you need, though I do it in anticipation!
Hmm.
The Windigoes are gone, but when shall they return? And how did they get there?
Also, ponies. Applejack's List. We all know it's an Apple. We don't know, who.
Hm. What if she's actually dead? That'd be a twist.
I shall continue.
6384661
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Omg, I'm in love with this chapter.
Firstly, I like the AU concept that even if Celestia had no involvement with trying to 'reform' Discord (which always rubbed me the wrong way; 'Reform'. Not rehabilitate. Not to change his behavior, but to change himself. Reform, remold *himself*, everything about himself, as if he's clay, and not millennia old, and then do things for ponies to whom he owes nothing, and that he should just understand why he should immediately, even without any cultural upbringing in that concept, because one quiet pony let him get away with a lot of stuff. *Of course* he went with Tirek, they were idiots about how psychological addiction and trauma even works), and making him stay with essentially a parole officer, Fluttershy and Discord would STILL be exactly what they both need, together.
I love that it illustrates how true it is that kindness can do the strangest things to people. In real life, punks, thieves, hardened criminals... they can all be brought to tears as easily as anyone. We're all human. We need to feel valued. It's awesome that there are AUs where that happens without Fluttershy feeling obligated to do so because the Princess told her to, so that Discord never has that doubt to fall into.
I love that he Loves the scarf, because only he could ever haha, and it's so Fluttershy to worry that he wouldn't.
I obviously haven't finished the story yet, but with Applejack... 10 years and no body, and she had magical friends looking for a year? Taking the other murders in mind, my hope is that she's in hiding, and she's afraid she'd still be killed if everyone didn't think she were dead. It would make sense that she would try to comfort her Granny with her trademark Apple flowers and family cider recipe... It's like she's trying to send a note, but they're too busy grieving to understand. Without a body, and with that clue, I'd never let myself believe a family member or friend were dead. Maybe the killer would have gone after her family if they thought her family knew anything, so she faked it. I'm hoping at least. And I'm hoping Granny finds out before it's too late, if Applejack is alive. And I feel a heartburn coming on about Granny, as well as Angel, because it feels like a parallel played on purpose. I have an old cat, I know how Fluttershy feels about not wanting to think about it heh.
6746126 Hey, I know it's been a while since you posted this comment, but thanks for posting it as I really appreciated it.
*Chuckles* And regarding Applejack, I'm guessing you've probably gotten to that part of the story by now.
I knew it!
7000375 Knew what?
❤SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE❤
Discord can't fight the love. Nor should he.
9021818
Ya'll made a fine fanart there.
6746126
Yeah and it speaks to friendship a lot better when it isn't a task that they are given to help discord make friends. Not that anyone besides fluttershy gave a real chance.