The Long Way Home

by Sennerazen

Chapter 1: Family

The evening was starry and mostly clear, but for blue and silver raindrops softly falling outside, looking like tiny gemstones. Discord was bundled up in his favorite chair, a large, overstuffed and very worn green and cream pinstripe monstrosity that had seen better days. He was, at last count, an estimated 10,000 years old, and as of the last fifty his age had been showing both inside and out. His mane was completely white and sparse now, his eyelids drooped, and every joint in his body nearly always ached.

He hadn't even known he could grow old. Could a god die? Could a god die of something as mundane as old age? Somehow it seemed to be happening, regardless of universal laws, and without even consulting him, the victim. But he wasn't frightened. He wasn't even confused.

But during days such as this one, slow and dull and entirely alone, Discord reminisced when he wasn't sleeping or attempting to cook something. If he hadn't just considered that pony a fling and had actually wanted to be a part of his daughter's life, he might have somepony around to help take care of him. He had nothing against having a daughter. In fact, she often amused him, or at least gave him somebeast to harass which usually made him feel better, but he saw her at most twice a year. And now she had two dracon-foals of her own; he hadn't really expected them to show up again.

Before they arrived at his door, he could smell them and hear them, and when he heard the kick to his door he opened it with his magic from the comfort of his chair. An off-white mare with lion's paws in front and crystal pony hind hooves pushed her way inside, followed by two young dracon-foals. The mare dropped her heavy saddle bags on the floor with a tired sigh and shook her mane and tail, both a rich red swirled with strands of chocolate brown. Narrowed red eyes met Discord's own and they stood glaring at each other until the young ones spoke.

“Grandfather!” the smallest one said, a dracon-filly by the horrendous name of Ijma, with all the look of a pony except for two small horns on top of her head and a red and white dragon tail.

“Mama says we can stay here for Hearth’s Warming Eve!” the filly's brother, Tassel Flare, said, leaping around in a circle. He was slightly bigger than his sister, with a short, stiff brown tail and two gray bat wings, but no horns on his head at all.

A strange jolt coursed through every limb. Hearth's Warming, is it? That time again already? Discord glanced at the mare who was still staring at him, stony-eyed.

“You said you'd be delighted to join us for Hearth’s Warming,” the dracon-mare managed through gritted teeth.

“Did I?” Discord looked at the ceiling. “I must have forgotten. I'm so busy these days.”

What was family, anyway? He hadn't had much of one and therefore was not sold to its positive aspects. His attempts at fatherhood, lackluster at best, proved to everyone except perhaps Discord himself that he was unfit for the role. He looked at his daughter, busily unpacking her saddlebags with items for her foals, and felt the same faint affection for her he'd always had. He didn't hate her. He didn't even dislike her. But he wasn't sure he really loved her, either.

It has been awhile, hasn't it? The thought wormed its way into his mind. His grand-filly, Ijma, stepping on his cloven hoof brought him from his reverie, and he glanced in horror between her and his daughter. “You're not making them stay, are you?”

She didn't look up from her bags. “We talked about this, Discord. Tomorrow's Hearth's Warming, and you said you'd come this year.”

“I made no such promise, Caramel... Glaze.”

"You remembered my name," Caramel smiled crookedly, looking up. “And you did promise.” They were at an impasse for a long moment before she huffed, “You do this every year-”

“Well, how can I help not feeling chipper every time the holiday rolls around? I'm so old, you know. I can barely walk downstairs to water my tarantulas.”

“We agreed, months ago, that you would spend Hearth’s Warming Eve with them. They never get to see you and I have things to do, Discord, especially if you're not coming to visit this year after all.”

Discord smirked. “How could you have honestly believed I would attend when I never have?”

“I just thought you might care one day,” Caramel snorted. “Especially since we both know it's going to be your last holiday."

Discord sniffed and turned away from her. “Well, that's uplifting if I've ever heard anything uplifting.”

"And you're my father," she said with great despondence. "Whether we like it or not."

Discord shrugged. "Hearth's Warming doesn't even exist here. Don't you think it's time to stop celebrating? Your mother's long gone," he added, keeping one eye on her and another on his grand-foals, who were already busy playing with strings coming off of the lobster-shaped rug that lay under his coffee table. The dracon-filly was tugging so hard on a frayed string to unravel from the rug her teeth lost their grip and she flew back into her mother's saddlebags, throwing envelopes and formerly-contained grapes all over the room. My own flesh and blood, he thought tragically.

Caramel was busily picking up the grapes and envelopes and didn't look up when she said, “Thank you for reminding me. If you're looking for something to entertain them with, why not show them that box thing you have hidden away somewhere?”

Discord's heart skipped a beat. “Box?” he asked, the face of innocence.

“You know,” Caramel said, grunting as she attempted to lift one of the table legs to reach an envelope that had mysteriously ended up beneath it, “that crystally thing I saw here years ago. You said it was enchanted, but I never saw it again. You never did explain it, and it's going to be mine when we have to clear this place out, so you might as well talk.”

Discord had stopped listening, his mind abruptly re-focused on the item Caramel was speaking of. “Didn't I? How strange.”

Caramel heaved and pulled the envelope from beneath the table leg, stuck it in a saddlebag, and paused to catch her breath and brush strands of her mane from of her eyes. “Don't show them then. Entertain them all on your own; it's the one thing you're good at. I’ll be back by in a few hours. Please don’t let them fall into another dimension again.”

“Ehh, oh, yes... yes, of course. Hours. A few hours, just fine.”

“You could try to sound like you cared,” she said as she walked past him and into the living room to retrieve a stray grape.

“I do care,” Discord said, pretending to have tears well in his eyes. He eyed the wriggling dracon-filly staring up at him with wide pink eyes and his reactive smile was more of a grimace. He still hadn't quite gotten over the fact his own grand-filly was named as something as repulsive as Ijma, even though it did mean something like “solar gaze” in some far-off language. He winced when she jumped onto his lap and sat down.

Caramel fastened the saddlebags closed and looked back up at Discord. “So you're really not coming tomorrow? Is that it?”

He snaked his neck around to look her in the eye. “You only invited me because you feel sorry for me."

“I invited you because you're my father,” the dracon-mare frowned. “I invite you every year; you just choose not to come.”

“Grandfather, look. I'm learning to fly,” Tassel squealed, leaping onto Discord's chair and flapping his tiny bat wings.

Sickened, Discord lifted him by his scruff and set him back on the floor. "Call me in fifty years, young fellow," he told the foal. Brushing his paw and claw on the sofa as if to clean them, he returned his attention to his daughter. "I'll call up the, er, 'box' for them."

"So it is here," Caramel smiled.

Discord lifted his chin and snapped his claws together. He had initially hidden away the box in a small sliver of time and space, opened and marveled at only when he was feeling particularly wistful. Lately, however, his magical abilities had grown weak and he hadn't the energy or memory to keep things tucked away as they once were. The object was now locked away in the basement, a place he rarely visited.

“Eh, oh, now, let me see,” Discord yawned. “Hmm. That's right, that's right; I used to live in another place, you know. It's so far away it's in another dimension.”

“I've told them enough,” his daughter said. “Mostly from what my mother told me when I was young.”

“Did you, now?” Discord asked, the smile on his face not reaching his eyes.

“Yes. Like it's where you met your estranged wife,” his daughter said through clenched teeth. Discord noted that her teeth usually were, and that she might need to seek professional help at some point.

“Now how can she be my estranged wife if we were never married?” Discord said, closing his eyes. “And we didn’t meet there at all.”

“It's called Equestria, remember, dears?” Caramel told her foals. “I've still never seen it.”

Tassel leaped into the air, attempting to take flight, but only hovered for a second. “I know, I know! You always tell us about it."

Ijma jumped from Discord’s lap back to the floor. “Like there's a friendship princess there, and then about that evil bug-hag.”

“And there was some sun queen... Seashell... what was it?” His daughter looked at him quizzically.

“Celestia's on her deathbed, last I heard,” Discord said tiredly, but with a small twinkle still in his eyes. “Her sister's been lonely in the dreamworld for far too long.”

“And Princess Twilight?” Ijma squeaked.

Discord felt another odd pang in his chest at the name. “That old biddy's going blind," he said, "but she won't admit it.”

“Aren't we ever gonna get to see her?” Ijma whined.

Discord feigned offense. “Why would you want to see her? She lives in another dimension. You wouldn't even believe it if I told you, but she is just a pony.”

“A pony?” Ijma asked, absently grabbing hold of Discord's hoof as if it were a life preserver.

“Mama's half a pony,” Tassel argued.

Discord waved at them with disdain. “Twilight had her years in the limelight, and they're long since gone. In another hundred years she'll be as dead as Celestia and Luna.”

“Discord,” his daughter hissed, “stop scaring them.”

“Even I'll be an ethereal sparkling form soon,” Discord said dramatically. “Ugh. I suppose I should send her a letter.”

“Oh, please, put us in it,” Ijma said.

Discord shrugged weakly, the corners of his lips turned up. “Ponyville's a terrible place these days. Er, so I've read.” He glanced surreptitiously at his daughter, who was still frowning at him.

“None of us would know, since we've never been there,” Caramel said.

“Blame your mother. Anyway, there's nothing much left. And my magic is so feeble now, I couldn't possibly take you with me.”

A small glassy cube had arrived in the living room and now hovered in the middle of it, so shiny it reflected everything in the room. It was sharp-cornered and about the size of Discord's paw, and its mirror-like appearance faded the closer one got to it, revealing a strange moving glow behind white-frosted glass.

"Wow," Tassel said, unable to keep his eyes from it.

Ijma relaxed her hold on Discord's hoof. “Who gave it to you?”

“No one gave it to me; I made it. I’ll show them, but not until you’ve left," Discord added, nodding at his daughter.

Caramel rose onto her hind legs, put her paws on her hips. “What's so wonderful that you can tell my progeny and not me?”

“It's a matter of magic,” Discord scoffed. “You always were too narrow-minded, just like your mother.”

Caramel took hold of Ijma's shoulder and nodded at Tassel. “Come along, darlings.”

Discord rolled onto his side, his back to them. “All right. All right.”

“Do you even remember her name?”

“'Carbine Claws', wasn't it?”

“'Candy Claret',” his daughter scowled. “Would it kill you to remember her for once in your life?”

“Oh, I remember now,” Discord said, pretending to look guilty. “How could I forget her? It was a glorious three-day weekend, truly."

“You may have hated my mother," Caramel said, "but you aren't getting away with treating me the way you treated her. Eighty-eight years, and you still try to shut the door in my face.”

“Let's not confuse hatred with indifference. Besides, you've never let me do that,” Discord admitted, though he looked dejected. “And just look at you, with your lion paws and your glittery pony hooves, and that crooked horn on your head. Adorable.”

Caramel shook her head. “I need to get going. Are you going to write to that princess? Any messages for what's left of your friends? Wait, did you ever have any? Never mind. I can relay them for you, 'tis the season and all. And I remind you that if you turn your grand-kin into any sort of produce this time, it won't just be me you'll have to deal with.”

Discord smiled at her. “Of course not, no, no, how could I forget your darling husband, Hammer Head?”

She let out a strange noise which Discord could only describe as “frustrated”. "Your letter? Are you writing one or not?"

Discord closed his eyes. He would have stayed thus, pretending to be asleep, had Caramel not said, “Come on. There’s got to be some unfinished business out there somewhere. Knowing you.”

Discord let out a very long sigh, which made his grand-foals giggle. “That’s right. I can at least write an emotional good-bye to, er, Twinkle Sparks? Was that it?”

“Twilight Sparkle!” Ijma and Tassel said in unison.

“Ah, yes,” he mumbled, but gathered a quill and parchment. After thinking for a brief moment he wrote:

Dear Twi,

Long time, no see. Hold on; that's a bit cruel. Long time, no 'write'. Better?

I heard a rumor you were still alive, so if you are, good for you. I'm still kicking, too.

If you get this letter, I suppose Equestria hasn't crumbled to dust. Keep up the good work.

Discord

He used his magic to fold the letter into the shape of an alicorn and fit it into an envelope shaped accordingly. In sparkling gold ink he wrote on the envelope, Princess Twilight Sparkle, Ponyville, Equestria.

“There. Happy?” he asked his daughter.

“So very,” she replied, and took the letter in her mouth and nodded one last good-bye to her foals. “I'll let you know as soon as there's a reply.”

“There won't be,” Discord yawned.

“For your sake, I hope there is. I'll see you all in a bit.” She nearly slammed the front door shut.

Discord rather hoped when he turned around again his house would be empty, as he liked it, but when he faced his grand-foals his face bore a horrible grimace. “You're still here?” The dracon-foals were still seated on the floor before him, eyes bright with anticipation, and he moaned, turning on his side away from them again. “Why don't you two just run around outside and let an old beast like me get my beauty sleep?”

“Mama said not to let you kick us out,” Ijma piped, and with great effort jumped onto Discord's sofa and stamped her hooves into the cushion. “Like last time.”

“We wanna see the glass thing,” Tassel whined, stretching his pale brown neck out to settle his chin on Discord's claw.

Discord jerked away from him and sat up. “It's not a 'glass thing', it's a... well. Let's just see, shall we?” Rubbing his neck, he pulled his blanket from them and nodded toward the object which was still hovering in mid-air. “What do you think it is now?”

Tassel shook his short brown tail. “A glass thing!”

“A rain-globe box,” Ijma said, her own scaled tail swishing with excitement.

“Yeah!” Tassel jumped onto the nearest chair, nearly sinking into oblivion in its deep cushion.

Discord brought the object toward the dracon-foals. “It's not a rain-globe,” he said, using his magic to enhance the clarity of the glass.

“It's not?” Ijma asked, pressing her face against its smooth surface.

“Look closely.”

The dracon-ponies strained to see inside, Tassel teetering precariously off the edge of the chair. Ijma thought she saw something moving, but Tassel pushed her aside. “You did not!”

“I did so!”

Discord raised the shard to his eye level and stared into it as well. “There is something in there. What do you suppose it is?”

“A pony,” Ijma cried.

“A bugbear!” Tassel jumped up and down.

Discord rolled his eyes. “Maybe you're not old enough to see it. I used to spend some time in Equestria,” he said, stifling another yawn. “A land where all sorts of creatures lived, but ponies ran the lot of things. They had castles and royals and festivals, just like we do.”

“Hearth's Warming? Mama says you don’t like Hearth’s Warming, but I do,” Tassel said.

“No. It’s a sentimental, saccharine holiday, but I suppose the ponies enjoyed it." Discord rubbed his forehead, trying to remember. "Lots of snow. We traded presents and had feasts.”

"What's snow?" Ijma asked.

“I wanna go,” Tassel said. “Why didn't you go back? Mama said you haven't been there in ages and ages.”

“It's not really my vibe,” Discord said, but scents and scenes of Equestria passed through his mind; a table with a farm-baked feast; colorful wrapped presents with ribbons and bows nestled beneath pointed green trees; spiced-apple cider by a fireplace, and a quiet laugh.

And hadn't there been a song? Something they always sang...

“But why?”

Discord stretched his neck. “I'm old. And it's been very dull for a very long time.” He frowned, trying to remember details of that long-forgotten land.

“Really?” Ijma asked, looking sad.

“Yes. Now, are you going to be quiet and listen?” They nodded, and Discord nodded once in satisfaction. “I used to rule Equestria. Your mother doesn't know that. I did some unkind things and was banished for many years. It was cruel and ruthless and I was very bitter, but one day I was freed. And then what do you think happened?”

His grand-foals shook their heads.

"I became friends with a pony."

Author's Note:

I've taken the creative license to assume any of Discord's offspring would have much longer-than-ordinary lives.