RoMS' Extravaganza

by RoMS

May. 21 - Grounded

“How patronizing of you...”

Entropy slapped Discord's paw out of her pink and black mane.

“I'm your father, Dear,” Discord said.

She rolled her eyes and plopped down in a puff of dirt next to the cliff edge her father had brought her to. Dragged her to, to be exact. It overlooked a large prairie the color of gold, the sun setting on the horizon casting each patch of grass with auburn shadows.

The view was neat, true, but she wouldn’t be remiss to let her father know that.

“And,” Discord said, lifting a claw to tap the large fang sticking out of his grin, “I am, after all, a god.”

“Well,” Entropy snickered, mimicking to the best of her ability her father's bravado, “so am I!”

“Oh come on, daughter,” he said with a smile, a paw laid on his chest, “You still have a long road to travel.”

“Not thanks to you,” she gruffed, then smirked. “And, at least, I’m enough of one to be as annoying.”

“Touché, kid.”

Discord raked his claws through her daughter’s disheveled mane; through her screech and punches of her tiny yellow hooves.

He sprung into the air, a longiline dash of lightning arching over Entropy, only to morph back into himself on her other side. Entropy hated when he tried to make a point.

“Stupid adults,” she growled.

Discord smiled and sat, his legs and tail dangling off the cliff.

“Teenagers,” he said with a smile.

She answered in her own way. Silence. She picked a stone and threw it.

Discord pinched his fingers together in anticipation, ready to snap the stone out of existence was an unlucky pony within range down below. But at the edge of emptiness towering over the fields of inner Equestria, Entropy and he were truly alone.

Relaxing, Discord glanced at the horizon towards a massive mountain far past the great plains. A myriad of windows shone there, lit by the twinkle of evening sunlight. So tiny they were that not a single silhouette of a building could be seen. But the reflections still carried through the distance and the late summer haze that warped the air. Discord didn’t have to see the far marble walls of Canterlot to know the city still lived, despite gone-by centuries. Like him, the castled city was a monolith. It endured.

As he reminisced about Canterlot, he smiled. Sky and castle lights would come with nighttime, pinpointing the towns around the old land of Equestria. As many places to visit, already visited in his case, and as many pranks to be hatched.

It showed there was still life here. New life that had long overtook old memories like ivy. But life nonetheless.

With a sigh, Discord stretched and lied back, elbows dug into two wilted patches of grass. Twilight was the best time of the day.

He snickered.

“Whatcha laughing at?” Entropy asked, accusatory.

“A horrifying pun,” Discord said, picking at the crook of his eye with his pinkie. “Nothing of importance.”

He gave her a tired look and she groused, crossing her legs across her chest, not missing to flare out her leathery wings in anger. “You’re... annoying.”

“Parents often are.”

“No, just you.”

Discord sighed again and sat up again, only to deflate and lay his head between his arms and knees. “I’m sorry. Even after all those centuries, I miss her too.”

Pinching his lips to a thin line, Discord lingered on the heavy weight in his chest. Cold, a void that sometimes overtook him, when the memories of the past clashed with the incertitudes of the future, and the precarities of the present. Even he, a god, sometimes felt the march of time. To be stuck in a current at the entry of a culvert pipe. Able to see everything at his back, and nothing through the darkness of the tunnel at his cloven hooves.

“How was she like?” Entropy asked. “You know that I… I don’t remember much. And I mean. You often talk about her. I just… I like when you speak about mom.”

“She was wonderful,” Discord said, not skipping a bit with a smile on his lips once the knot at the back of his throat wrestled. He scratched around his brush mane, pepper-and-salt rather than the other way around these days. “Wonderful… She made me feel grounded.”

Entropy laughed.

“What?”

“You make it sound like it’s a good thing.”

“For you, at this time of your life, maybe not. But you’ll understand.” I’m sorry you never got to be with her, or her friends really.”

“Well,” Entropy puffed, crossing her legs, “except Twilight?”

“Well, she’s… Twilight,” Discord said, a finger on his chin. “She’s more of an… eh, aunt.”

“I’d like it if you didn’t treat me like a child. I’m old!”

Discord flicked at her muzzle and she batted at his paw again. “For a pony, maybe. But you’re my daughter. And well, you age… differently.”

“Tell me I’m broken while you’re at it.”

“No, that’s not what I meant. It’s just that you grow so…”

“Slower?”

“Very much so.”

Silence held for a time.

“I grew up alone across the ages, Entropy. And I was hurting because of that. I just don’t want that for you.”

“So you keep me locked up. Away from the rest of the world.”

“No. No. I’m just trying to be a good father but I was never taught that. And you have and will outlive any carer that can help you or me. You’ve outgrown school, but not hit puberty yet. You’ve outgrown lifetimes yet nopony takes you seriously.”

“So I’m a freak?”

“You’re a goddess!”

“And yet I don’t have any power. And gods don’t know much, given you. And you’re not much of a god of chaos anymore too. Softy.”

“What’s chaos if it consistently happens. It just becomes stale and expected. No essence to that. Chaos, I’ve learned, champs at the bit.” “As for your power, you did get a cutie mark today.”

“After three hundred years!” “Fi-bloody-nally.”

“We will inscribe your name in Twilight’s book of records.”

“Which one?”

“Anyway, I don’t even know what it means. It just… appeared. Do you?”

“No, I… Gods don’t get cutie marks.”

“You’re not a really helpful father.”

“Family is a team process.”

“You were mentioning chomping at your bit. What are you planning?”

“Well, you wanted to know about your thing. So who better to ask than your Aunt. And it’s been such a long time! I would fancy some mayhem. Wouldn’t you?”

“You’re the god of chaos, not me.”

“Yeah, and you’re the god of grumple.”

Comments

[Starlight Nova]

In Which one of these stories does the cover art happen?

[RoMS]

10825152
None. It's just a fun picture a friend made. They have a story that may capture that feeling, you should check it out.