21: Interviewing Mr. Disc.
“I only got some polka-dot tea on hand,” I told them as I stepped out onto the porch. I put the tray on the piano, glancing over at the double crusaders with me sitting in their chairs that I waved into existence. Scoot’s had on her one of those recorders that you have Ms. F.
“What in the hay is polka-dot tea?” Applebloom asked as I was handing out cups to them.
“It’s part citrus, and part whatever I had for dinner last night,” I answered. After all six of them had their cups, I poured out the dotted liquid to them. Once it settled in the cup, the tea had a blue base with colorful circles at the top, where all the other flavors were at.
Anyway, after a spit-take from both Sweetie Belle’s, an okay from Appleblooms, and can I have some more from the Scoots later, I opened up the piano, telling them that I was ready for the interview.
“But you must keep in mind though,” I added, “My memory isn’t as it used to be, so I may or may not remember everything on my part. So what do you girls want to hear?”
“Why not something relaxing?” Sweetie Belle from our universe suggested. (You know what, for now on, I’ll just refer our Crusaders by their names and the others will be given nicknames. Sound good to you Ms. F? Good.)
“Mousier Chopin’s music is always relaxing,” I said, and began to play a Nocturne from memory. “So girls, what do you want to know from a weird little man like me?”
“Perhaps Y'all could start from the beginning?” Bloom suggested, “That’s always a good start Ah think.”
“Very well,” I nodded, “At the beginning of it all, I couldn’t remember much because it all far too dark and wet to see.”
“Ah wasn’t askin’ the beginning of the world here,” Bloom interrupted.
“I wasn’t. I literally couldn’t remember anything past childhood. Maybe for you girls probably remember what it was like being a baby, but I couldn’t. Anyways, at the start of it all, I wasn’t born and raised here. Truth be told, I couldn’t tell you where exactly since my earliest memory was that we were moving into a house in another town other than here. I could, however, tell you what I remember of mom.
“My mom had love with music; I guess that’s where I got it from. She was a teacher herself who taught students how to play the piano in our home. I have a blurred memory of all the people who went in and out of our house. Sometimes there were children that were younger then you, other times it was really old people who came to learn how to play. As you could guess, she taught me as well. Although, I have to admit, sometimes she can become strict with me on the piano when she’s having a bad day. Like this one time, I was practicing one of Beethoven’s music and I happened to miss a key, and then, WHAP! She smacked my wrists with the flat side of a ruler and told me to play again.
“Now don’t get me wrong, mom wasn’t as all evil, but she wasn’t all good either. She did care for me surely. But as a kid, I was difficult to handle.”
“Why’s that?” Scootaloo asked.
“You see, as far back as I could remember, the way my own mind worked was always a bit… funny then how everyone else’s does. For example, when I was a kid, mom asked me about the imaginary friend I had, (Smooze I think it was) which I kept insisting that he was real because, to me, I could literally see him. Not just my imaginary friend, but practically everything that some thought I was pretending, I actually saw and heard. I think (don’t quote on me on this) that there was a time where I could control my imagination. At times, I saw worlds underneath the bathroom sink and heard a conversation while mom was playing.
“Yet, I admit that there were times, plenty in fact where my mind became too out of control.”
“How so?” Belle questioned.
“Tell me, did any of you ever had the feeling that before you go to bed or when you’re trying to sleep, you can’t help shake the feeling that there’s a monster nearby?” They nodded. “There were times where not only have I felt that, but at times, my fears would manifest themselves right before me. Even when I screamed for mom, she comes in, turning on the lights, I would still see it.”
“Like that shadow that grabbed me?” Applebloom inquired.
I nodded, “Yes, but it was usually different every time. Like the time where I thought my toys were attacking me. Or when the food in the kitchen started a revolution and tried throwing me into the microwave. Or the time when I pulled the covers of my sheets to find an abyss that threatens to swallow me whole.
“But it wasn’t all nightmares in the daylight though. Sometimes, my hallucinations gave me hours of entertainment. In truth, I once thought that all kids hallucinate when they played. But the other children recognized that I was different because even though they may stop pretending, my imagination still kept going.
“Of course, there were other problems as well. Sometimes, my hallucinations would cause me to hurt people or myself. Like this one time where I jumped off the roof because I honestly saw wings on my back and I wanted to try them out. I ended up breaking a leg from the fall. Mom was both terrified and angry at me for doing that.”
“Didn’t your mom ever tied to help you?” Sweetie Belle asked, “I mean, didn’t she tried to get you pills or something?”
I shook my head, “Never could afford them. Mom wasn’t making enough like a piano teacher as the years went by. I guess the lack of a livable income probably affected her more than anything. Perhaps it could be one of the reasons why she took up drinking. Don’t get me wrong, mom wasn’t what you might call an alcoholic. She drank only when she had a bad day that she needs relief from. When she did, I tried to stay away because her personality flips from the mom that I knew into this…” I trailed off.
“M-Mr. D?” Scootaloo started, “Did your mom, you know, hurt you?”
“Physically, no. But when she has a bad day she couldn’t cope, and some amount of alcohol later… She would be the one breaking things of whatever she could get her hands on. Where it be her dress or my drawings that I worked hard on, she would break things, sometimes yell at anyone who came near, things like that. When she yells, let’s just say that I’ve learned a few things that you girls shouldn’t know until you’re late teenagers and leave it like that.
“Then one day, after she got drunk… I never saw her again.”
There was silence behind me, but I kept playing. “I think I was about… ten, maybe eleven when mom disappeared. I woke up one morning, expected to see her cleaning up the mess she left behind, only to find an empty house. So you could imagine as a whole day went by without any sign of her. Eventually, I just broke down. Not just crying but getting angry that I too smashing whatever I could get my hands on.”
“Dear Celestia,” Bloom commented, “That’s downright horrible!”
“That’s a very kind way of putting it,” I replied.
“What about your Dad?” Scoots asked, “Do you ever had one?”
I shrugged, “Can’t say. I don’t really remember him… or… do I?” I stopped playing to think for a moment. “I don’t think I’ve known him personally since I grew up with mom… But Dad… I think I’ve seen him once. I’m not sure about it, but I did remember when I was very little that Mom was having a really heated argument with somebody downstairs. Being the stupid kid that I was, I remember going down to find mom and… somebody in the kitchen. All I remember was that I asked Mom what was going on. The next thing I knew, I woke up with a few bruises that I defiantly don’t remember getting. Maybe it was my dad, but all I know, I never saw that man again. More tea?”
They shook their heads, saying things like: “Not right now.”
“Suit yourselves,” I muttered before deciding to play another piece.
“So,” Belle began, “What happened after that?”
“Well, to make a long story short, I was put into the Foster system, going from family to family for quite a while. Of course, in my mental state, I didn’t last very long. I didn’t bother making friends since I wouldn’t have a clue where I would be the next month, so I turned to my art for a company. It was during my teenage years that I improved my artistic skills in drawing, chalk, and discovered the use of paint for the first time. For fun, I actually did characters of the families that I stayed with while using my twisted sense of humor. Like I remembered drawing a portrait of a family if they were made up of pineapples, or the time that I drew the mother as a werechicken, I guess you might say that I was interested in surrealism from the start.
“Then one day, when I was about… fourteen or fifteen, I was staying with a family that was able to get me on these pills to make me sane. These are the same pills that I take to this day mind you.”
“You know what I just realized,” Scoots asked, “I think there’s one major difference between you and our Discord.”
I stopped playing and turned around, “Oh? And what’s that?”
“With Discord, he said that he’s been around since… well, forever. So I guess when he’s been around as the spirit of Chaos, nopony has ever tried to treat him, saying he’s sick. But with you, ponies- sorry, people here did try to help you. I guess.”
“Really?” I raised an eyebrow. “Anyways, where was I? Oh yeah, the pills. For a while, when I took the recommended amount of pills, it was, really one of the worst points in my life because not only had the hallucinations stopped, but my creativity as well. In a way, I didn’t really feel like… well, me. Taking all of those pills means that I turn into someone else, someone dull, unimaginative, and not as chaotic. In truth, I didn’t like taking the whole thing because my personality becomes a shadow of itself. So I learned that I didn’t have to take it all, which lead me on a never-ending balancing act of sanity and insanity.”
“But has that ever gotten you into trouble?” Sweetie Belle asked.
I sighed, “Sometimes it has, like the time in high school in my gym class where I was having a hallucination that the students were falling through the floorboards that collapsed on them. The teacher didn’t even leave paranoid me out of there until class was over to take my pills.
“Anyway, as my art skills improved, I learned that I could use my mental illness to my advantage, where I was able to see things, imagine things that nobody around me has ever dreamed up of. I started taking the Tim Burton approach where I would try to draw down whatever thought took a casual stroll across my head. I studied the artwork of Salvador Dali, Andre Breton, and Frida Kahlo, just to name a few. I painted my way through High school and into college.
“While I was in college, I was introduced to not only other artistic styles, but I’ve encountered a club on campus that was made entirely of outcasts. It was a group where I encountered Chrysalis who was trying to become an actress; Grogar was a Goth who always kept to himself; Tirek was what I liked to call an Armature Machiavellian; and then there was Somnablua, she was one of those who cared more about her looks than anything and would do anything just to keep herself young.
“Once I got out of college, for a while I survived on commissions from anyone that needed something painted. I painted mostly portraits, sometimes for jerks like Sombra when he was in charge of the Elementary school. Other times people would buy my surrealist art to hang them upside down in a living room somewhere.”
“Then, one day, I was hired by Celestia and Luna to paint their portraits. They started talking to me as I painted them. I told them that I didn’t have much of a job outside of doing art. Then to my complete surprise, Celestia offers me a job at the school as an art teacher since theirs had retired at the time. They were even putting in a regular salary so I could actually have a life.”
“So how were ya when you started teachin’?” Applebloom asked.
“At first? I honestly had next to no idea what I was doing. Trust me; I wasn’t used to being around others who have to pay attention to me before. But after a while, through trial and error, I learned how to become a teacher that you know today. Some of the students I had liked me because I was so unusual. I would cancel classes at random so we could go outside, or that I would assign the class to sketch out whatever they had for lunch, or that I would have them create something to their favorite music that was being played at the same time during class.
“Before I got fired, I could do practically anything to my madness desire that didn’t involve me getting into too much trouble. I was once known for pulling pranks with anyone. Students, teachers, janitors, the principal, really no one was safe from my little fun that I felt like doing. I didn’t do anything cruel, but I did go for the unusual. The weirder, the better, like the time I super-glued the cash register in the cafeteria to the ceiling, or that time where I littered the inside of a teacher’s car in eggshells.
“Then one day, I ran out of my meds, which, I assume some of you know that lead me to me getting fired and Celestia had me committed to the mental hospital. It was a place where I spent three miserable years in. Being locked in a padded cell with a straightjacket, doctors try to pry open your head to figure out why you’re so different from those outside, and the food was something that should be put on a survival show.” I stopped playing, took a moment to look behind me before I get too invested in my own rant. “Sorry, but when you’ve been in a place where you were told every day that you were broken, you tend to feel a bit cranky looking back on it.”
Both Appleblooms nodded, Scootaloo said, “So, how did you get out?”
I turned back to my piano and started to play something else, “If you could believe it, Celestia had a change in heart and had me taken out of the nut factory. I couldn’t figure out why though, by the time she let me out, she was a bit more… forgiving? I think that might be the word, I’m not sure. But after spending three years in a madhouse, Celestia had changed somehow. Because the last time I saw her, she was so mad at me for what I’ve done that she wouldn’t listen to what I had to say, but here, she’s a whole lot nicer towards me but still kept an eye on me.
“When I returned teaching, I had trouble trying to reintegrate since my reputation was at this point tarnished. Nobody wanted me to substitute, students were on edge when I entered the room, and the worst part was no one had the courage to talk to me. That was until a student named Fluttershy came up when she noticed that I was having a rough day. Later that day, we had tea on this very piano where she did something that no sane person had ever done before.”
“What’s that?” Belle squeaked.
“She asked if she could be my friend. Mind you, up to this point, I was mostly avoided because of me being too different to the point that I was unlikeable. I never had a friend who not only became one but stayed because all the people I’ve met ended up going away. Even those ‘pals’ during my university days eventually drifted away. But with Fluttershy, it opened the door that, maybe someone won’t mind that I’m crazy.
“And then, I was introduced to you three, Applebloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo. Well, I wouldn’t use ‘Introduced’, more like came to me for ideas to figure out what you were good at. All the while, I purposed ideas to you three and no matter how dangerous it was you still took it. But when things got frustrating, and you three told me that you appreciated for having me to help you…” I trailed off, taking my hands off the keys of the piano, I turned to them, “Crusaders, I have a confession to make. On that day, for the first time when I got home and reflected what you said to me, I cried. This time, it wasn’t out of self-pity or depression, for the first time, I cried out of joy. Yes, joy, an emotion that I haven’t felt since I was a little kid. The three of you made me realize that I’m not the only one who is going through being different. It was at that moment that all of you became a little more than just friends… but the family that I never could have. For that, I’m forever indebted to you all for what you’ve shown me. I guess I should say this that’s been long overdue, so Crusaders thank you.”
The six of them all smiled and all of them got up to put me in the middle of a group hug.
_*_
“Afterwards Ms. F, I told them how I ended up in Equestria, and the rest, as they use to say, is history.”
She smiled, “That was quite lovely. Did you know what they’ve done after that?”
I shrugged, “When we were done, they said thanks and went their way. Why? Have they gone missing or something?”
She giggled, “No actually, both Crusaders are where they are meant to be. In truth, I came by because a certain redhead wanted me to give you this.” She pulled out from her inside suit pocket a rolled up paper book and gave it to me. It was done entirely out of crayon, with a close-up of me and the words “Mr. Disc” above. In truth, I could easily tell that it was done by the Crusaders, yet I admit, it was a good drawing of my good side.
I flipped through the little paper book, it had snapshot drawings of my life on one page and a written part on the other. At the end of the book, there was a picture of me, the six crusaders, and on the other side, it read: “A huge thanks to Mr. D for letting us interview him. For taking his time in telling his story, for being a good friend, and being the dad we never had.”
Dad? I couldn’t help but grin at that word. That or maybe it’s just the caffeine kicking in.
“Thanks,” I said, then a thought came to mind, “Say before you go, can you answer me one thing?”
“And what’s that?”
“Who did you say brought this to you? You mentioned a redhead, so was it one of the Appleblooms?”
“No actually,” she answered, getting up from her seat on the couch, “Some motherly figure from the other side asked to give this to you. So now that my business is taken care of, I need to run so I won’t be late for an appointment.”
After we said good-bye, I took the book into the studio, for I think I could get an idea or two from what those crazy kids have given me.
It's... It's done. I can't believe it. It's finally done.
So, I got to ask, what did you all think of it?
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oh my god...that's Fausticorn she's talking about, isn't it?
Es goooooooodddd
Oh... it's done?
....aw.
I think, you should take a bow. The rest of us will be clapping and stomping in ovation.
6014289 Well, since you insist. *Bows*
holy moley was that a long story!
But even so it was great and a wonderful read! Though at sometimes i say it got a bit wierd i was always pulled back with the wonderful storytelling and great comedy! 
6014266
Eeeyup.
You sir deserve a applause and a reward
What I think about this story?
...
I have to say... This is top notch.
Love how you write the characters and the setting, which a great deal if you asked me. Also liked on taking some tips from the comments/discussions and adding to the story to explain or see on how they play out.
Still... At the middle part of the story, when introducing magic into the world... I didn't if should continue or not. It's not a bad idea, but... two things come into mind:
1.) It's kinda cliché
2.) It felt like... Everything was going according to plan. It felt like everything was going to become one and there wouldn't be differences between the Pony world and the Human world. Like earlier in this story: Everyone trying to get H-Twilight to be friends with the Human Elements without her say-so.
But the one thing that always make me wait until the next chapter is release: Mr. Disc.
Not only we get the difference on seeing between the two Discords, but can be more relatable to the Mr. Disc on the account of him being more... Humane. A being with faults, but not done over the top. A more relatable person.
And important fact too is that you got us back on Mr. Disc and his life. No dooms-day events, no end of the world if X done X, etc... Just a simple slice-of-life with a hint of action in the mix.
So... I have to say for this story... This is one of the best Slice-of-life stories I have read in awhile. ^_^
P.S. - I wish we get to see on what happen to Human Twilight. It would be interesting if Mr. Disc help H-Twilight makes some friends, but not the Human Elements... Since Pony Twilight did took Human Twi's role...
6014506 To be honest with Human Twilight, I was actually thinking, perhaps as a future Epilogue that she starts to make friends not with the Human Main Six, but with the Human Crusaders, I don't know why, it just made sense to me.
wow...
6014348 That last part deserves a sequel.
You do love torturing yourself don't you?
6014716 That's it! No more soup for you!
6014740 Sequel?
6014774 No.
6014780 Aww... Spiritual sequel in this world though?
6014980 I'm with you man, but I don't really want a full-blown sequel. Just a one-shot would be good enough for me. I believe that it would deliver a sort of...umph that the whole thing is ending and that it was a beautiful story that will be here forever.
6015322 Like who is the mystery lady at the end!
Best one I've read yet and your lucky because to my knowledge my little Dashie isn't on this site.
Check this out.
I enjoyed this story and the one before it.
6014780
Is that a yes?
JK
I have to say, I loved it a lot. Can't say how much is "a lot", but trust me, it was pretty good.
Thank you for the lovely read
6015569 Uh, did you even check? In fact, I think this is where My Little Dashie originated. Not sure, but it is in here.
Can somebody put in some beautiful ending music to end of this?
6015499 Maybe Fausticorn? Meh, that's the only thing I can think of.
6022771 But who, for sure?
6022764 well your right but I still like this one a bit more
One of the best things I've ever read
Tysm for making this, I loved every second of it. !!!
I got this song stuck in my head and could not help but think that the lyrics kind of describe mr. disc
maybe it can be his theme song