Mind of a Madman

by Botched Lobotomy

Comedy

“Like...this?”

Luna cracked open an eye. Nothing had changed. And yet, somehow...

“Where...where did he go?” asked Pinkie, wheezing to a stop beside them. “What happened?”

Luna grinned. Her face felt fit to burst. “You did it!”

“I...did?” Pinkie Pie looked just as shocked as she had.

“Yay!” Pinkie rushed up and squeezed her twin in a full-body hug. “You did it! Or...I guess we did it? How does that work?”

Pinkie Pie smiled, relief showing plain on her face as she sagged. “Does it matter? It was done.”

“Yeah!” Pinkie punched the air triumphantly. “It was done! Take that, Discord!” She paused. “Um, what exactly was it that we done?”

Pinkie Pie looked over at Luna, who only nodded. “We...” she turned back to Pinkie. “I picked a different book.”

“Right...?”

“It’s like...” she shot a helpless look at Luna, who sighed.

“It’s like a story. That’s all a dream is. Pinkie Pie just put down the book we were reading and swapped it for another one. She changed the type of story we were living—she changed the genre.”

Pinkie frowned. “So what genre are we in now?”

Luna looked in askance at Pinkie Pie, who only shrugged. “Haven’t the foggiest.”

“That’s an issue.”

“What is?” asked Pinkie.

“Normally, when I do it, I have some control. I can choose a genre to switch into. Mystery into comedy, for example.” Luna sighed. “Discord’s magic is so chaotic, though...we could be in anything. I’m not sure it would even be possible to control it. I’m amazed you can control his magic at all.”

Pinkie Pie chewed her lip. “I suppose that’s why you needed Pinkies.”

“That will be it.”

“So...what happens if one of us—ahem—kicks the bucket in here?” she asked. Pinkie gasped. “Some of those beams came pretty close, after all.”

Luna shrugged. “You’ll wake up.”

“So you’re telling me we should have let him kill us?”

“Look,” Luna stood, bringing her hoof down upon the sand. It failed to have the desired impact. She tried again. “We came here for a reason. Clearly all of us thought that whatever it was, it was worth risking ourselves for. We need to follow through.”

“What if Discord kills us?” countered Pinkie Pie. “Not in here, I mean, out there. The fellow didn’t exactly seem overjoyed we were poking around in his head.”

“Discord wouldn’t do that!” Pinkie said, jumping to her hooves. “I know he can be a bit mean sometimes, but he’s not a monster!”

“He is evidently a monster,” Pinkie Pie disagreed. “That is quite literally what he is. Species: Monster.”

“Species: Draconequus!”

“Have you ever seen any other Draconequus...es? He made them up. He’s a charlatan, a fluke.”

“Maybe he’s just really old! Maybe all the other Draconequui died a long time ago!”

“Pinkie!” bellowed Luna.

“Yes?

“Y-yeah?”

“I agree...” she paused, breathing in, “I agree with Pinkie. You. That one.” She pointed at the Pinkie with the buoyant hair.

“Not I?” Pinkie Pie looked mildly offended. “I just saved us all, one would think I’m owed a little loyalty.”

“Do you see Rainbow Dash around here anywhere? No, you don’t.” Pinkie stuck her tongue out at her sibling. “It’s nothing but laughter and moon...spirit around these parts.”

Luna held her head in her hooves. “Discord take me now.”

“Is that the sort of thing you should be saying in Discord’s dream?” wondered Pinkie.

“One never knows,” Pinkie Pie waggled her eyebrows conspiratorially, “maybe that’s the kind of genre I switched us into.”

Luna sighed. This was going to be a long, long walk.

---

“Are we there yet?”

She couldn’t help but wonder what would be more painful—this, or Discord’s laser. At the moment, this was winning.

“Nope. Are we there yet?”

It had quickly become extremely, horribly clear just what sort of genre Pinkie Pie had switched them into. The first rake Luna had stepped on had been strong clue, but it was the fourth that had really sealed the deal.

“Doesn’t seem so. Are we there yet?”

She was somewhat impressed she hadn’t snapped and killed one of them yet. As far as she knew, they only needed one Pie alive to reach the mountain.

“Why are we even going to this mountain in the first place?” Pinkie asked, scuffing her hooves along the path and neatly avoiding yet another rake. “What’s even in there?”

“It could be a dragon!” suggested Pinkie Pie, who had not nearly the skill as her fellow in the departments of rake detection and avoidance. “With a hoard of gold.”

“Could be a dragon!” suggested Pinkie, skipping merrily over another badly disguised gardening implement. “With some gems!”

“That makes more sense, actually, yes. Still! Gems are valuable.” She pursed her lips. “Mostly to dragons. And fashion designers!”

“If you found some dragon fashion designers, you’d really hit the jackpot. Maybe that’s what’s in the cave!”

“There’s a cave? Can you see it?”

“More of an alcove, really. And I’m just thinking out loud.”

That much was painfully, achingly obvious.

“Mountains do usually have caves,” said Pinkie Pie with a nod.

“Hardly a mountain at all if it doesn’t at least have an alcove.”

“The only question is what’s in it.”

Pinkie considered this, walking backwards as she turned to face Luna. “What do you think, Princess? What’s in the cave?”

Luna scowled. “Oh, I don’t know. Probably some great secret of Discord’s he wants desperately to keep hidden, but hovers, blistering, at the edge of his consciousness, bubbling through to his dream-world as a vast, nigh-impenetrable fortress he can’t hide even from himself—so his mind surrounds it in layers of rock, layers of psyche, until he’s convinced it’s hidden from almost anyone, except for the fact by this point he’s concentrated so distinctly on not thinking about it at all that it looms miles above everything else. An enormous, glittering vault containing something he really doesn’t want anypony to find.”

Pinkie stared, mouth hanging open, stopped in her tracks.

“Yes,” said Pinkie Pie, hurrying to keep up, “probably more something like that, now that I think about it.”

They trotted in silence for a few moments longer, until finally Pinkie recovered her voice.

“Are we there yet?”

Luna snapped to a halt. Please, merciful universe. “No! We’re not there yet. But you just keep on saying that, and maybe we will be!”

“Actually,” said Pinkie Pie, “I think we are.”

Frowning, Luna looked up, to see that mound of repressed revelation gazing back down at her like the sharpened tooth of some enormous beast. Actually, if she squinted, it bore more than a little resemblance to Discord’s tooth.

Finally. With a grin, she stepped forward again, and the rake snapped up to smack her in the face.

“Pinkie!” she yelled. “Change this genre now.”

Comments

[Celefin]

All of this chapter is delightful :)

[Yoshifan30]

Wow so luna and pinkie and her clone are trying to find a way out of here and what is discord up to