Diamond Tiara enters the Running of the Leaves. She wants Rainbow Dash to coach her. She gets Discord instead.
Set a year or two after the main series, but contains no spoilers. An entry to the Season 10 Bingo Contest. Prompt is in the author's note at the end.
Big thanks to RCharge for editing and Gingerquill for a pre-read!
Awarded a "Judge's Choice" in the contest! Hype!
Out Of The Running really expands on The Running Of The Leaves... Add that with kirin beginning to mingle in Ponyville, Diamond Tiara wanting to run, a drought, and Discord, and you have a winning formula... Overall, I absolutely adored this story and I'm glad that it was entered in this contest.
—MyLittleBronyDude
Cover art: https://derpibooru.org/images/1944253
Chapters (1)
This is super cute. I gotta know, how did that prompt get generated?
Also, would love to see more of this story, or just more DT and Smokey.
10078149
Hey, thanks! Appreciated.
Talk to Shrink Laureate about the prolpt, he's running the contest:
https://www.fimfiction.net/blog/879098/season-10-bingo-writing-contest
This is great on so many levels.. great job!
10078651
Hey, big thanks!
Huh, that's a pretty twisted prompt. Ya did a good job with it!
Rainbow Dash: "Couldn't you just, clawsnap her leg OK?"
Discord: (Sighs) "I'll try to put it in Ogres and Oubliettes terms so you can understand it. I am a Chaos mage, not a White mage: I don't do healing spells. I can reverse my own magic, and I could give her a better leg - say, a cool robot leg, with lasers - but I can't just return her leg to - ugh - normal."
10079183
LOL, right?
I added the beat where he commented on Scootaloo's disability in order to plant the idea he wasn't fixing anything.
10079123
Thanks! The "is thinking about" made it difficult. At least I only had one setting tile – the folks with two far-separated settings had no choice but to write epics!
10079512
Kinda hypocrite for Discord to punish Tiara for being a bully to the Crusaders as a child, when he got away with worse things like treason. And several times.
"She specifically threatened to have Star Swirl help, and if you know anything about that stallion, you'll know you want him as far away from the timestream as possible."
I'm a bit disappointed that Smoky Water's sister isn't named Sky Fire.
Boo.
Delightful stuff. Always nice to see some good work done with post-reformation Diamond. Thank you for a great read, and best of luck in the judging.
10079183
"Do you want tentacles? Because this is how you get tentacles."
10079759
Hahah!
Thanks for taking the time, I appreciate it!
This is very well put together and a very nice little bit of character development for DT. Discord was handled very well too.
The fact that it was from a random prompt makes things all the more impressive.
10080583
Thank you!
Love that this is not only a great story, but it makes use of comics canon as well!
We noticed.
10079576 Total hypocrite, even though he tried to disguise it as "training." Which is why Fluttershy punishes him with one of the things he fears most, boredom.
10080607
Yeah, the comics are fun. I Read them to my daughter as bedtime stories. I've read them all out of order, though.
10080607
For the scale of Discord to be held his punishment should be getting stoned-then turned into gravel.
Least redeemable villain in the show but some how everyone likes him.
10080679 Yeah, but then they'd have to do that to Luna, and Starlight, and on down the list. It's why forgiveness and redemption are the core of the show.
10080682
Series finale says otherwise in spades.
Plus, lets be honest, they've given Luna and Starlight special treatment.
10080688
Touche sir.
10080688
Not quite: villains that won't reform and/or aren't sorry almost never get forgiveness, so the series finale just followed that trend. If Cozy, Tirek, and Chrysalis showed at least some remorse, but they got turned to stone anyway, then it would be a different story.
The chief exception is maybe Discord in season 3, with Celestia wanting to free him and give him a chance to reform. And even then, it was because she thought his magic could be a great help to Equestria, or he wouldn't have gotten it. Ironically, he's never used his magic to do it; he helped save the mane 6, Spike, and the Princesses in the season 6 finale, but he had no magic in the Changeling hive.
Sunset Shimmer in RR could count in way too. And even then, it was people that didn't want to forgive her at first.
10081308
Not much of a reason to reform, and why would they feel sorry when his tail gets to do everything he's done without consequence?
When he lied to them and is rewarded for it.
When he basically committed the same crimes and got slaps on the wrist comparatively.
When Celestia gave him special treatment.
When non of the issues they have are addressed and are shelves for 100+ years for some of them.
People like to say that "they don't feel sorry" but if they don't have a reason and you aren't pointing out the flaws in their logic or helping them see reason they never will.
Really nice story! You would've expected Diamond Tiara to take like, private yoga lessons to stay in shape, making her a good runner, but guess not. I really enjoyed it though!
10081308
Huh, Never really thought about that.
Nice story.
This story is really nice! Yellowed leaves is running out, and the old negative memories too.
Really well done with the use of the prompts. Also, it's a treat to have some good character development for Diamond - and Discord on a more malicious note is also well done.
I could see this as a show episode.
10179541
Thank you!
10080613
Awe, that's so sweet!! Back when I used to tutor elementary and middle school kids in English, a few of them I helped learn to read with the My Little Pony comics, and one of the kids is a high schooler now and still loves Pony and reads fanfiction on this site and we still stay in touch. Friendship is Magic!
I found the Kirin!
In all seriousness, great story. I love the characterization in this, and how you turned positive Tiara's manipulation into a good talent.
10263871
Thanks! I appreciate the read.
Did the Pegasi ever figure out the rain situation at least?
I wondered where such a random combination if elements came from - bingo makes perfect sense. And you wove it together well.
This was a delightful little read
You really don't get too many stories about Post-Reform DT!
To be honest, This is one of my favorite CMCs with Diamond Tiara for ever!
Nice job on it!
10601595
Thanks!
Discord has become my least favorite main character on MLP:FiM.
Because most of his antics really boil down to him being a dick but it always getting explained away by "Well, he's Discord."
10703617
I don't usually write Discord for that reason, but I was glad the bingo prompt forced me out of my comfort zone,
Excellent little story! Running of the Leaves is a cool element of the setting, and the characters are excellent here. Smoky is a cool addition, but I really like enlightened, post-bully Diamond. She's got that ambitious streak to herself still!
Let's hope she can find a better trainer for the next year. (Maybe AJ has some time?)
10894828
Thanks! This DT was a joy to write.
Is that from Also Sprache Zarathustra? It's gotta be.
11249306
it is!