The Draconequus with the Dragon Tattoo

by A M Shark

Chapter 1. James 1:2-3

Chapter 1

"Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance."—James 1:2-3

---

Winter was on its way in Equestria, ponies were gearing up to stay indoors, and in Ponyville Fluttershy's name was currently worse than mud.

"I'm not sure what happened," Fluttershy sighed. She was standing in Carousel Boutique, confiding her problems to Rarity as the white unicorn worked on a new dress design.

"What do you mean, darling?" Rarity asked, pausing in her work to peer at Fluttershy over her work glasses.

Fluttershy drew in a deep breath and plunged into the story of how she had ended up in her current less-than-pleasant situation. She had been tending to her animals, helping them get ready for winter when the animals all seemed to go crazy. They had stampeded into Ponyville and gotten into the supplies in the market stalls. She had tried to stop them, but they hadn't listened to her. It had taken most of the citizens of Ponyville to drive the animals away, and since she had been taking care of the animals, the town had blamed Fluttershy for the accident. She'd had to give away almost all her money to pay for the damages.

"And now I'm all out of bits, and everypony is still mad at me," she concluded.

"Ooh, bummer," said a new voice, startling both Fluttershy and Rarity. They turned to see Pinkie Pie bouncing across the room, a bakery box balanced on her head. Neither of them had heard her come in. How the box didn't fly off her head when she bounced was a mystery they had long given up trying to solve. She landed between them and with a quick little jerk of her head the box's lid flipped open.

"Cupcake?" she asked, lowering her head so that the box slid smoothly off and landed right-side up on the floor.

"Oh, don't mind if I do," said Rarity, using her magic to levitate a cupcake from the box.

Pinkie selected two cupcakes from the box, tossed one into her mouth and held the other one out to Fluttershy.

"Thanks, but I'm not really hungry right now," said Fluttershy.

Pinkie set the cupcake down and threw her forelegs around Fluttershy's neck, pulling her into a tight hug. "Don't worry about everypony in Ponyville. Just give them some time to cool down. They'll come around soon enough."

"I suppose so," Fluttershy said doubtfully, partly because she wasn't so sure the advice would work, and partly because she wouldn't have expected this sort of advice from Pinkie. She would have expected the energetic earth pony to suggest she race all over Ponyville apologizing non-stop to everypony she saw. Then again, Pinkie had mellowed a tad ever since Applejack's disappearance. She was still her fun-loving self, but there were times when she seemed to become oddly quiet and contemplative.

Pinkie gave Fluttershy an extra tight squeeze, lifting the pegasus off her front hooves in the process. "Just wait until they need somepony to handle the animals again and they'll suddenly be your biggest fans," she chirped before releasing Fluttershy, picking up the cupcake box, and bouncing out of the boutique, evidently feeling her job there was done.

When Pinkie paused to glance over her shoulder, Fluttershy gave her a small smile of thanks. However, that smile disappeared as soon as the pink pony did. The trouble with ponies needing someone to take care of the animals was that the animals in question wouldn't be out of their hideouts until winter was over. Fluttershy's heart sank even lower at the thought of having to wait that long before getting back on Ponyville's good side.

Her musing on these depressing thoughts was interrupted when the bell above the front door jingled. She and Rarity looked up again to see a young pale yellow earth pony trotting up to them.

"Sorry I'm late, Rarity," she panted. "Harvesting the apples took longer than I thought."

Rarity waved a hoof dismissively. "Oh, don't worry about it, dear."

Anytime Fluttershy saw one of the former Cutie Mark Crusaders, it amazed her how fast time had gone by. It seemed like just a few days ago she had been foal-sitting them, but there was no denying that the three fillies had now grown into young mares. As fillies they had seldom been apart, constantly trying to earn their cutie marks, but now that they'd finally gotten them, the three seemed to have drifted apart. Oh, they were still friends, but their different talents had led them to pursue different interests and they didn't get together as often as when they were younger.

Now as Fluttershy watched Apple Bloom and Rarity, she felt a familiar mixture of amusement and sorrow; amusement as she tried to imagine Applejack's reaction to the fact that her little sister had begun to take after Rarity in fashion sense; and sorrow that the orange earth pony had missed seeing her little sister grow up.

Fluttershy could still remember when she and the rest of her friends had gotten the news that Applejack was missing. It had been the day after the Apple Family Reunion. Applejack had been seen at the reunion, but there had been so many other relatives also there that it would have been quite easy to lose her in a crowd. At first her siblings and grandmother had assumed she was just off with other family members when they couldn't seem to find her. It wasn't until most of their relatives had left that they realized Applejack was missing. They had contacted their relatives to see if Applejack had left with them by mistake, but everypony claimed that they hadn't seen her since leaving the reunion.

After several days had gone by with no word from Applejack; Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, Twilight, and Spike had spent months traveling Equestria, showing pictures of their friend to everypony they met, and asking if they had seen her, but their search had been fruitless. They had managed to find Applejack before when she had disappeared after a Canterlot Rodeo Show, but this time after searching for over a year with no results they were forced to give up their search.

In the ten years since then, much to many ponies' surprise, Apple Bloom had gravitated toward Rarity as a sort of substitute older sister and now she balanced her work on the farm with working as Rarity's assistant.

Fluttershy's thoughts were interrupted yet again when the bell above the boutique's door jingled again. The ponies looked up to see Granny Smith walking in.

"Oh, I forgot to tell you, I wanted Granny Smith to see some of my designs," said Apple Bloom.

While Rarity and Apple Bloom talked and worked on several designs, Fluttershy stood there, letting them drape her in several different dress designs, and letting her mind drift back to the animal stampede that had turned Ponyville against her. When she had questioned the animals about what had led to their rampage, they had told her they couldn't explain why they had done what they had done. All they could tell her besides that was a huge storm was coming.

"Is something wrong, Fluttershy?" Apple Bloom asked suddenly.

"Hm? Oh, well ... I..." Fluttershy fumbled for an answer before Rarity came to her rescue and explained the situation to her assistant.

"And now I don't know how I'm going to get the supplies I need," Fluttershy added, once Rarity had finished the story.

"If that's the case, why don't you stay at our farm?" Granny Smith called out from the other side of the room. "We've got enough supplies for a few extra ponies."

"Oh, I wouldn't want to impose—"

"You wouldn't. We've got a little cabin in an abandoned part of the orchard. You can stay there if you want privacy."

Fluttershy thought about it. It might be a good idea to get away from Ponyville for a bit. Maybe the time away would help her find a way to restore her reputation. "Okay," she said.

---

It was late in the afternoon in Canterlot and the Princesses Celestia and Luna were walking through the Canterlot gardens. A casual observer might have assumed that they were just taking a stroll, visiting with each other as most sisters did. But a closer examination revealed a certain tenseness in their movements that they couldn't quite disguise. As they moved through the sculpture garden, this tenseness became even more pronounced. Finally they reached their destination: one of the statues.

It was of a creature known as a draconequus. Its head was similar to a pony's, but its long, snake-like body had the limbs of several different animals. Over the centuries, the many gardeners and landscapers that had worked in the gardens had almost always agreed on one thing: that this particular statue was an eyesore among the other otherwise pleasing array of figures. Celestia had just endured their fuming and refused to put the statue in storage. She had decided long ago to keep the statue outside where it could be easily seen because it was not just any old statue.

Sealed inside it was her old enemy Discord. Imprisoning him had been a task neither Celestia nor Luna had enjoyed but they had had little choice in the matter. When free Discord had the ability to warp reality as he chose and this coupled with the fact that he had viewed Equestria and its inhabitants as nothing more than toys put there for his entertainment had been a dangerous combination. He had bucked every attempt to restrain him and finally, in a last desperate attempt to spare their land and subjects from him, Celestia and Luna had used the Elements of Harmony to turn him to stone.

When the Elements had chosen new bearers, Celestia had feared the spell imprisoning Discord would break and he might be free again. But that had been over a decade ago and his statue still showed no sign of cracking. Still it was better to be safe than sorry and the two royal sisters continued to regularly check on the statue.

Now they spread their wings and flew up to the statue, checking it from every angle. As they circled its head, they looked at its frozen stone face. Even the piercings in its ears, nose, and eyebrows had been turned to stone. In a few places the stone hinted at the texture of Discord's feathers, fur, and scales, but it showed nothing of the various tattoos that had covered much of his bizarre body. The only one Celestia could remember very clearly was a large one of a dragon that slithered up the back of his neck and coiled around and around his long body. How the tattoo had shown through his fur, she didn't know but she had found that trying to make sense of most of the things the draconequus had been able to do just resulted in a headache. The strangeness of his tattoos were actually among the more milder of his oddities.

Finishing their inspection and discovering no cracks, Celestia and Luna exchanged relieved looks.

"Looks like the spell still holds," said Celestia as they landed and walked away. As the princesses left the garden, the statues stood silent and motionless on their columns. Minutes ticked by and the garden remained empty. A half hour rolled by and there was still no sign of activity in the garden. But a very soft faint tapping and rattling sound was coming from the draconequus statue.

Unknown to the royal sisters, Discord's stone prison had indeed been slowly weakening over the past ten years. Now he was mentally prodding at the stone, trying to find its weakest areas. It was difficult because he had to take care he didn't break any of the weak spots just yet. If he tried to break the stone too soon, he might only produce cracks in it, and even the tiniest crack would put the royal sisters on alert. If he could have moved, Discord would probably have ground his teeth.

He wanted out. The thought that his freedom might be close was almost more maddening than the shock he had felt when he had first found himself imprisoned. But he forced himself to be patient, forced himself to remember that he couldn't afford to let any cracks appear in the stone until he was quite sure he could succeed in breaking it completely.

Comments

[alarajrogers]

Read this on fanfiction.net, really enjoyed it there. I know the only reason you gave Discord the tattoos was for the sake of the title but I actually think they really work for this version of the character. I also think the setup you had for a villainous Discord to reform because of Fluttershy is like 300% cooler than what the series actually did (which will leave people who are just reading it here puzzled for a while because you haven't posted that part yet but bwahahaha I've read ahead).

[MissytheAngle]

Yes, yes, it's on Fimfiction! Of course, I've read it on Fanfiction.net and am more looking forward to the ending, but it's nice to see it here. People may be thrown off by Discord having tattoos and piercings, but I think you made them fit well into the story despite not having much of a reason for them to be there in the first place.

[iHeart_Dragons]

I've been reading this on Fanfiction and I enjoy it. I really want to find out what happens in the end, so please finish soon.

[Alex Prior]

I really do hope that you know what you are doing.
The story has a lot of potential, but I am not yet sure how you are going to pull it off.

This is gonna be fun.

[vcjb242]

I like what I'm reading so far. This is awesome. :)