Just let her speak!
Spike moaned as he blinked open his eyes. As he did, the sunlight felt as if it were blinding them.
“Ugh…” he muttered, covering his eyes with his claws and turning his body away from the window. “Why does the sun have to be so bright? Can’t Princess Celestia just tone it down at least a little?” He rubbed an eye with a scrunched up finger and yawned.
Once he got used to the brightness in his room, he managed to keep his eyes open without shielding them in some way. He stretched his limbs, then hopped out of his bed and onto the crystal floor. The cold surface contrasted a lot to his warm mattress, making him shiver. He then turned back to his bed and unfolded the blanket so that it looked neater than usual.
“Hey… what about-” He took a step backwards, seeing that something was missing, followed by a quiet squeak.
He gasped and swung around to look at the floor, immediately spotting his Rarity plushie under his foot.
“Rarity!” he cried, before picking her up and laying her gently on the bed, laying his blanket over her. Who knows how long she was on the freezing cold floor for, at night, no less? She must feel so col-
“Oooh Spike!”
“Gah!” He jumped at the sound of a familiar, yet not too pleasant voice. The door behind him swung open, revealing a certain draconequus.
“Discord? What are you doing in my room? Again?”
Spike took notice that Discord was loosely dressed in his pajamas. He’d question why the Master of Chaos would come stumbling into the Princess of Friendship’s assistant’s room, but he’d seen weirder coming from the draconequus.
“Oh, I hate to bother you, Spike, but-” Discord paused mid-sentence, staring at Spike’s claw’s current position. “Err… what are you doing?”
Spike froze and glanced back to see himself tucking his Rarity plushie in. He blushed out of embarrassment a little.
“Uhh...” He gazed back at Discord, before noticing a white shape tucked under one arm, and a yellow shape tucked under the other. “Oh, because you’re one to speak.”
Discord raised a brow, before realizing what Spike was referring to. He immediately grabbed his Celestia and Fluttershy plushies and hid them behind his back.
“Tell no one,” he hissed, leaning forward slightly.
Spike gulped at Discord’s menacing tone, and was about to nod, however something else caught his eye. He tilted his head slightly to the side, spotting a purple plushie being held by the draconequus’ tail.
“Really, Discord? A Twilight plushie?”
“Wha-” Discord’s eyes widened as he looked behind him. As soon as the Twilight plushie was spotted, he growled through clenched teeth and watched them disappear with a white flash. “I get lonely in my pocket dimension, okay?”
Spike stifled his laughter. “Eh… don’t worry about it. I won’t tell anypony.”
“Good,” he grunted, folding his arms and pouting.
“Okay… with that over with, why are you here at-” Spike glanced at the clock on the wall. “-Nine o’clock in the morning?”
Discord’s irritated expression suddenly disappeared. “Oh! Yes, well, you see, I woke up this morning to the sound of a panda seemingly choking from swallowing a fan, which is completely normal. However, after sleeping in for a while, I realized that I had not yet returned a book that I had borrowed from Fluttershy on how to build a suitable home for Smoozey-”
“There’s a book for that?”
“Hey, if there’s a book for the rules of a Goof-Off, there’s a book for everything,” Discord retorted. “Anyway, like I was saying, I forgot to return the book, so I decided I might as well return it to her before I forgot again, and so I did. I teleported to her cottage and searched for her, but it didn’t seem she was awake as of yet, which was weird, since she’s usually awake early in the-”
“Could you just get to the point?” Spike asked impatiently, tapping his foot on the ground.
Discord gave an annoyed sigh and rolled his eyes. “Okay, basically, I went up to her room to see if she was sleeping or whatever, but she wasn’t there. I searched the room for any notes or whatever, but all I found was this.”
He finished his story by holding out a half-filled jar of green goo.
“I know very well that it’s none of her animal’s doing, and while it’s very close to Angel’s vomit, the brat’s bile doesn’t exactly glow, it just has big chunks of-”
“Erm, too much information, thanks!” Spike held out his claws, making sure Discord would stop describing a spoiled rabbit’s sick. Once he knew the demigod wasn’t about to carry on, Spike observed the liquid with curiosity. For some reason, it felt like he’d seen it before.
“Weird… and- wait, Fluttershy was missing?”
“Yep. I also took a peek through Twilight’s keyhole - she’s gone too.”
“Wait, what? But… we were going to Sugarcube Corner this morning!” Spike tried to think. Where had he seen green, glowing goo before, which followed one or more ponies disappearing?
...Of course.
“Discord, we gotta go to Canterlot!” he exclaimed, swiping the jar out of Discord’s paw.
“Wait, why?” Discord tilted his head.
“I’ll explain everything when we’re there. But do you think you can teleport us to Princess Celestia?”
“Er… sure.”
With that, Discord snapped his fingers.
Celestia yawned for the whatever-number-it-was time this morning. As every Sunday to Monday night went, little hours sleep was all she had. As she scanned over the documents hovering in front of her, she lifted her mug to her lips and swallowed the coffee that flowed into her mouth. Or, at least, the last few drops. She peeked into her mug, then sighed with disappointment at the sight of it being empty.
“Raven?” Celestia leaned over the side of her throne to look at the white unicorn. Raven glanced up at her.
“Yes, your highness?”
“Could you please get some more coffee, if that’s okay with you?” On Monday, it was hard for the princess to stay the kind and motherly figure she’s seen as.
Raven gave an uncertain look at her. “Erm… are you sure, your majesty? That was your third mug in the past hour-”
“Get me some more caffeine, Raven.”
The secretary blinked.
“...Yes, Princess Celestia,” she nodded, before galloping off as fast as her hooves could take her.
Celestia let out a sigh as she watched the mare leave the room, as well as leaving her all alone. She decided to stop staring at the documents in front of her and just relax for a few minutes. She leaned her back against the throne and closed her eyes, focusing on her breathing.
Breathe in… breathe out.
She felt her muscles become less tense as she counted each breath she took in and let go.
Breathe in… breathe out. Breathe in… breathe out-
“Princess Celestia!”
“Gah!” She choked on the breath of air she was breathing, before tripping over the side of the throne. “Ow…”
“...Oops.”
Celestia shook her mane out of her face, before searching for whoever had interrupted her meditation.
“Spike? Discord?” She raised a brow with curiosity. “What are you both doing here?”
“Erm… sorry about that, Princess,” Spike chuckled nervously. “But there’s something I have to show you.”
Celestia stood up on her hooves and trotted over to Spike, who was holding a jar of familiar green goo.
“...Spike, where did you get changeling droppings from?”
Before the baby dragon could reply, Discord gasped.
“Wait, that’s changeling droppings?!”
The alicorn nodded. “Why, yes it is. Where did you retrieve it from?”
However, the chaos spirit didn’t answer her directly. “Ugh! I picked that stuff with my hands! I had no idea it was even from a changeling, let alone dung! The one thing I did not want to research about them!”
“Eww… changelings poop out glowing green liquid?” Spike gagged as he moved the jar further away from him. “Gross.”
“Hey.”
The two blinked at looked back at Celestia.
“Where did you even get it?”
“Oh, right. Discord found it in Fluttershy’s room,” Spike explained, his tone growing more serious. “Apparently Fluttershy wasn’t at her cottage, according to Discord.”
Celestia raised a brow, then looked at Discord, who was squirting his hands with soap under a tap he had assumingly conjured up. “Is this true?”
“What? Do you think I’d pick up changeling poop just for a dumb prank?”
“I also don’t think he would’ve revealed he sleeps with a plushie of you, Fluttershy and Twilight if it were just a pra-” An eagle talon slammed on Spike’s mouth before he could finish.
“What?” Celestia widened her eyes, her jaw hanging slightly open.
Discord stared at her for a few moments.
“Uh…” The draconequus was about to come up with an explanation, but before he could, Spike began to gag. Discord glanced at him with an annoyed expression. “You know I washed my claws, right?”
Yet the dragon continued to gag, to Celestia’s confusion.
“Spike, what’s wrong?” She removed Discord’s eagle talon from his mouth. Spike attempted to respond, only to continue choking something up.
“Did you send him a reaaaaally long letter?” Discord asked her, only to be answered with her shaking her head.
“Maybe Luna’s playing a prank on him?” she suggested. “She’s upstairs in her room with Princess Cadance. Could you fetch… maybe both of them?”
“Okee dokee,” he said, before disappearing with a flash for a few moments, then reappearing with them both hanging from his mouth by their tails.
“...Discord?”
“Yesh?” he answered, his mouth full of blue and pink hair.
“Why are they in your mouth?”
“You shaid to fesh them.”
Celestia glanced at her sister and niece, seeing they shared the same expression - fairly irked.
“Put us down!” Luna commanded, angrily. Discord shrugged, then dropped them both onto the floor - both of them landing on their heads in the process.
“Ugh... “ Cadance groaned, rubbing the area just behind her horn with her hoof. The two alicorns stood up, blowing their manes out of their faces.
“Sister, what is the meaning of this?” Luna’s eyes narrowed. “I was about to beat Cadance in the game we were playing!”
“Hey, how can you be so sure about that?” Cadance snorted in annoyance, before peering over Luna’s shoulder to see Spike beating his chest with his claw. “Erm… Spike? Are you okay?”
“That’s why I’ve called you here. Are either of you responsible for-”
Before Celestia could finish, a bright green flash sparked from Spike’s throat, before a dark smokey shape exited his mouth and into the air. The three princesses, dragon and draconequus stared at the strange figure, as it began to grow into a large square shape.
“...Nevermind, I think I know who did this,” the sun princess said quietly, taking a step back so that the occasional green sparkes didn’t hit her.
“What is that?” Cadance gasped.
“Spike! What in Equestria has Twilight Sparkle been feeding you?” Luna exclaimed.
“Ugh…” the dragon was far too dazed to reply.
As they spoke, an even darker shade of grey - almost black shape - appeared in the square shaped smoke. Cadance widened her eyes as much as she could as the silhouette became even more clear by the second.
“Oh no…” she whimpered.
“Oh, yes…” answered a distorted-sounding voice.
“Oh, Chryssie. Hi.”
Everyone suddenly paused to look at Discord, who was confused by everyone’s reaction.
“What? You’re the ones who reformed me. I’m just being friendly.”
Celestia groaned and rolled her eyes, before realizing something. “Wait… how do you know what Chrysalis looks like?”
“Twilight had a book all about the changelings. You know, before her library got blown up.”
The sound of maniacal laughter interrupted their conversation.
“Aww, did Twi’s poor wittle book fort get blown up?” The now finished image of Chrysalis smirked.
“Hey!” A more familiar (and friendlier) voice was heard in the background of the Changeling Queen.
“Twilight?” Celestia gasped, before Chrysalis replied with yet more cackling.
“Indeed, my dear! And it’s not just her who I have,” she sneered, the huge hologram of her hovering only a few feet in front of them all.
“Oh, great. She has all of them, doesn’t she?” Luna planted a hoof on her face.
“Correct, little Lulu,” the queen chuckled.
“This is a gaming show? No offence, but you’d make a terrible host,” Discord snorted, floating towards the image. Chrysalis blinked.
“Okay, one, why exactly is he even free? And two, I think I’d make a fine host, thank you very much.”
“Why am I free? Geez, Chryssie, catch up with the recent seasons. I was reformed by my dear friend Fluttershy, whom you should have, if you ‘have all of them’, as you said.” Discord set his hands on his torso, pouting at the queen like a child. Instead of the Chrysalis answering him, however, another voice in the background did.
“Discord? Is that you?”
“Fluttershy?” The draconequus’ ears perked.
“Y-yes, this is me.”
“Hi, Fluttershy! How’s it hanging?”
Another mare’s laughter was heard.
“Teehee! Funny joke!”
Discord lowered a brow. “Erm… Pinkie? How was that a joke?”
Pinkie Pie giggled was heard again. “Because we’re all hanging upside down!”
“Would you please shut up?” Chrysalis snarled, looking somewhere offscreen, where the five candidates could not see.
“Ugh… Chrysalis is no fun!” Pinkie whined, before shutting her mouth completely. The three mares, dragon and draconequus looked back to Chrysalis, whose attention was now towards them again.
“Now, in case you’re wondering why I’m here-”
“Wait!” Cadance raised a hoof as she interrupted. “Okay, sorry for flanking in like that, and while I am indeed curious to why you’re here, I’m even more curious to how you’re still alive after been launched all the way across Equestria. Are you some sort of demigod?”
“Err… Princess Cadance?” Spike piped in, now having recovered from the hardship of vomiting up the Chrysalis hologram. “You’re a demigod. You’re all demigods. But I don’t think you could survive that fall.”
Cadance blinked.
“...Maybe she’s immortal?”
“Cadance, Celestia, Discord and I are immortal,” Luna pointed out. “We would not survive that fall.”
“Wha… Chrysalis, explain yourself!”
Chrysalis raised a brow, gazing down at the pink princess. “Hmm… I could. Just call me ‘Queen’, and we have a deal.”
Cadance paused. “Ahah… no. Okay guys, don’t bother questioning her. Not worth it.”
The Changeling Queen tilted her head. “Erm… what about if I told you how I captured Twilight and her friends?”
Cadance gave a scoff. “Yeah - nope, still not doing it.”
“What if I tell you how to defeat me?”
The Crystal Princess tapped her chin. “Hmm… nope.”
“Oh, just say the word, dammit!” Another voice was heard from behind Chrysalis - the raspy voice known as Rainbow Dash.
“To be fair, Rainbow, I think I’d be pretty annoyed if someone came and foalnapped me, threw me into a labyrinth of caves and attempted to marry the love of my life just so they could eat away at their emotions, slowly causing them to become completely mind controlled and unable to be aware of the world around them,” Rarity said, a lot more calmly than expected.
“Pretty annoyed?” Cadance echoed. “My level of annoyance is a lot worse than ‘pretty’.”
“Well, sorry, but I would like to be rescued!” Rainbow retorted angrily. “Just… somepony else call her ‘queen’! I’m getting bored of hanging around in sticky green stuff!”
“Hey, Queen Chrysalis, could you not attempt to make a comeback on any other day than Monday?” Celestia asked, taking a step towards the picture floating in front of her. “I’m pretty tired, if you haven’t noticed.”
Chrysalis just gave a low chuckle from her throat. “Oh, I realize that. I purposely arranged to make this call on Monday just to annoy you.”
“Oh, snap!” Discord yelled, a fist being held in front of his mouth. “Dang, Chryssie, that’s the most evil thing you’ve done so far!”
Cadance’s jaw dropped at the draconequus’ statement. “Most evil thing she’s done? Are you joking?”
Discord eyed her in literal surprise. “But of course! Have you ever tried waking Celestia up on a Monday morning?”
“Well… no, but-”
“But nothing!” An avian finger shut Cadance’s lips before she could get another word out. “Though, I must say, Chryssie-”
“Could you stop calling me ‘Chryssie’?” Chrysalis snarled.
“No, but thanks for asking,” Discord said, before continuing. “But like I was saying, you played pretty safe. Even after I was reformed, I still dared to wake Celestia up on Monday morning - at five o’clock! And yet you’ve arrived at, what?” He glanced at his wrist, which now owned a watch. “Twenty past nine? You need to step up your game if you want to be best villain.”
Chrysalis dead-panned. “...Celestia?”
“Yes?”
“Why did you release him?”
“That is a question I feel I’ll never know the answer to.”
Discord widened his eyes, his paw on his chest as he stared at Celestia melodramatically. “Celestia! We’re suppose to be friends!”
“I’m also meant to be honest,” she replied flatly. Discord scoffed, acting a lot more offended than he probably was. He then stalked behind the three ponies and dragon to sulk.
“Hey, didn’t I wield the element of honesty?” Luna raised a brow.
“Well, yes, but I did as well at one point,” Celestia said.
“What? When was that?”
“I had to wield all of the elements when I had to banish Nightmare Moon,” she explained.
“Hey!” Someone else caught the princesses’ attention, causing them both to jerk their heads towards the hologram again.
“Technically neither of you are the actual Element of Honesty, since I’m the living embodiment,” Applejack told them.
“Oh! Ooooh!” Pinkie called. “Princess Celestia and Princess Luna just got owned by AJ!”
“Okay, can everypony please shut up for one measly second?” Chrysalis suddenly snapped, creating a silence amongst the ponies.
Only the ponies, though.
“Sure, I think everypony can do that. I can’t, though,” Discord replied, a smirk appeared on his face.
“...You’re part pony,” Chrysalis pointed out.
“Yes, and I’m also part duck.”
Discord and Chrysalis tended to stare at each other for a while longer, before Celestia interrupted.
“Wait… you’re not part duck!” she pouted. Discord looked at her curiously.
“I think I know my own body, thank you.” He folded his arms, a brow raised at her. Celestia rolled her eyes.
“Oh really? Where exactly are you part duck?” A slight simper appeared on her face. Discord’s smug expression only grew.
“I can’t tell you - you’re not even at first base yet.”
Celestia, for a few moments, stayed puzzled, before widening her eyes at the draconequus, who was notably trying his hardest not laugh at her reaction.
The princess opened her mouth to comment, yet she couldn’t seem to find one. Luckily, Chrysalis ended the awkward silence between them.
“Okay, both of you stop flirting and let me actually begin talking, if that’s okay with you,” she snarled, her fangs now bared at them.
“No, no one is okay with you talking,” Cadance snorted. “No one here likes you.”
Chrysalis’ eye twitched as she glared at the princess. “You’re welcome to leave at any time, you know!”
“I don’t think I will. I’m looking forward to seeing you leave, so I think I’ll stay,” she told her calmly, before sitting down on the floor and folding her hooves, keeping a smug expression as she did so.
“I think I’ve got my letter to Princess Celestia already…” Twilight called from behind the queen.
“What is it?” Fluttershy asked.
“If you ever want to see Cadance win an argument with a love-sucking creature, simply anger her.”
“Simply… anger… her...” Spike was suddenly heard muttering to himself. As everyone glanced at him, they saw he was holding a paper and quill, just finishing off the last of Twilight’s words. “Okay, got it!”
“...Got what?” Twilight asked, rather confused, since she couldn’t actually see anything.
“The letter to Princess Celestia. We haven’t had one in a while, so thought that I might as well, and I think angering Cadance is a good lesson to take note of,” he explained.
“...Spike, we don’t write letters to Princess Celestia anymore,” Twilight said.
“...Oh yeah…”
With that, the baby dragon took a deep breath and blew out a green flame, disintegrating the letter. No one noticed Celestia’s ears droop with disappointment - aside from Chrysalis, who couldn’t help but snicker.
“Aww, poor Celie gets no love,” the changeling gave her a pout, her eyes shimmering to make them look as if there were tears. Celestia gave a snort of annoyance.
“You don’t even have the biological ability to get or give love, so sit the heck down.”
After she said that, Celestia almost jumped out of her coat as a loud horn pierced her ear drums, as well as everypony else’s.
“TOTAL DESTRUCTION!” Discord exclaimed, still blowing his horn.
“Discord, shut up,” Celestia scolded, knocking the horn out of his hand. Discord watched the blow horn drop onto the floor, his ears drooping with disappointment.
“Celie’s a real buzzkill.”
“Yes, very nice, now can I please speak?” Chrysalis bellowed at them all, causing another silence to fall upon them.
“Yeah, seriously guys, I wanna get out of this green goo,” Rainbow groaned. “What even is this stuff, anyway?”
“Changeling droppings,” Spike replied.
“Changeling what?” Applejack repeated, dumbfounded.
“DROPPINGS? AAAAAAH!”
“...Oops,” Spike cringed as he heard Rarity scream.
“Wow, way to go Spike! Rarity’s lost consciousness!” Applejack barked at him.
“One down, five to go!” Pinkie cried. “Oh gosh… who will be next?”
“SHUT UP!” Chrysalis screeched. “MY GOSH, IS IT THAT HARD TO SIMPLY TELL YOU WHAT I’M EVEN DOING HERE?!”
“...Wow, she hasn’t even said why she’s here yet,” Luna commented in awe. “That’s quite surprising, actually.”
“No, it’s freaking annoying!” the queen spat. “You lot won’t let me get a word in!”
“You’re meant to be a villain. Make them listen to you - even I managed that, and I became evil because no one listened to me,” Luna’s wings began to flap, lifting her off the floor. She then stayed in one place in the air, hovering at the same level as the queen’s enlarged image.
“Luna’s got a point,” Discord said, coming up to hover next to her, now with reading glasses on his snout and a book gripped in his lion paw. “In the ‘How to be an at least decent villain’ book, it states at rule number one that you always want to get everyone around you completely silent so that you can monologue about your evil plan.” He shifted his glasses further up his muzzle.
“Then I suggest that you listen to me!” she hissed, rearing herself up and shoving her face closer to the screen.
“Erm, we’re not just gonna listen to you because you say so. You’re the bad guy, remember?” Discord smirked.
“Well, if you don’t listen to me, you’ll suffer less than pleasant consequences,” the queen told them harshly, though it didn’t phase either of the immortals.
“Oh, what are you going to do? Cover me in your droppings?” Luna scoffed, a smirk also plastered on her face.
“Yeah, I can easily do that myself!” Discord said his glasses disappearing, his book being replaced by the jar from before. The lid then fell off by itself, before the draconequus tipped it over Luna’s head, the green slime dripping onto her mane. As the substance landed on her head, Luna’s snark expression turned into one of horror.
“GAAAH!” she cried. “I ONLY MEANT IF NECESSARY!” The alicorn kept uttering the word ‘ew’ under her breath as she attempted to wipe the goo out of her blue mane, yet to no prevail. If anything, she was simply rubbing the liquid even deeper into her mane. The princess stopped hovering, literally dropping onto the floor, only wanting to focus on getting rid of the dirt of a changeling.
“Err… what just happened?” Twilight asked.
“Discord just dumped changeling poop on Luna’s head,” Spike replied.
“She got off lucky! We’re literally floating in it!” Applejack remarked.
“AAAAAAH!”
“Hey, since when did Rarity wake up?” Applejack asked.
“Well, it doesn’t really matter now, does it?” Rainbow Dash replied.
“Oops…”
As Luna’s attempts kept failing, the snickers from her sister became louder and louder.
“SHUT UP, CELIE!” Luna barked. Celestia managed to stifle her giggles, but was still notably laughing on the inside.
“Erm… okay…” Chrysalis was anything but clear on the current situation. “So, as I was saying-”
“Wait, if your cocoons are your droppings, then does that mean Celestia came to my wedding covered in changeling dung?”
Celestia suddenly stopped her snickering and glared at Cadance.
“You know I washed myself afterwards, right?”
“You still kinda stank,” the crystal princess told her.
“Doesn’t that technically mean your entire wedding was covered in changeling po-”
“I WOULD LIKE TO SPEAK NOW,” Chrysalis interrupted them. They both turned to heratience - smoke almost flaring from her nostrils.
“Okay then,” Celestia replied politely.
“You may speak,” Cadance said cooly.
“Thank you!” the changeling muttered through clenched teeth. “So, as I was saying, I’m here to get my revenge.”
Since Chrysalis had somehow gotten all of their attention (apart from Luna, who was still half focused on the goo stuck to her mane) they all waited for her to continue. When she didn’t speak, they all leaned forward, anticipating for her to go on with her monologue.
“...Yeeees?” Discord urged her to carry on.
“Erm, what?” Chrysalis raised a brow.
“You were saying something about revenge?” Celestia prompted her.
“I know… do I need to go on?” She glanced at them in confusion. “It’s pretty simple… I want revenge for Cadance and Shining Armor flingling me across Equestria… I feel I don’t really need to go on.”
“Oh my gosh…” Spike slapped a claw on his face. “Is that seriously it? You didn’t think of saying that from the start?”
“Well, I was going to, but you all interrupted me constantly!” she argued.
“Yes, well,” Discord’s reading glasses appeared on his muzzle again, as well as the book in his lion paw. “As a villain, you’re supposed to make sure you have everyone’s attention. In your case, we’re supposed to be frightened or threatened by you.”
“I think the only pony who feels threatened is Rarity, but that’s because she’s swimming in changeling poop,” Pinkie chimed in. “No offense, Chryssie-lyssie, you’re still a pretty cool villain!”
“Maybe at one point,” Luna muttered, still fiddling with the sticky strands of blue hair. “But now she’s just a generic monologuing bad guy.”
“Okay, there’s no other way to settle this, but to vote!” Discord announced to everyone.
“Vote…?” Celestia tilted her head.
“Discord, what are you talking about?” Fluttershy asked uncertainly.
“Why, I mean we’re going to vote for best villain, of course!” He then threw away his book and glasses into oblivion. Behind him, Chrysalis lay her jagged hoof on her face and let out a groan.
Discord ignored her, however, and instead turned to Celestia. “Celestia!”
“What?” She blinked.
“Who’s best villain out of us three?”
Luna looked up from her mane. “Three?”
“You included,” Discord said.
“Wha- bu- ugh… fine!” Luna grunted, folding her hooves.
“Okay, Celestia. Who’s best villain?”
“Are you seriously- okay, you know what, fine. You’re best villain.”
“OH! Score one for Dissy!” A scoreboard suddenly appeared next to him with Luna, Discord and Chrysalis’ names. Below, Discord’s name, the number ‘0’ became a ‘1’.
“Wait, why is he best villain?” Luna protested.
Celestia shrugged. “Because he has the guts to wake me up and five o’clock in the morning on Monday,” she explained, before murmuring under her breath, “...and his cotton candy clouds taste good.”
“I heard that,” Discord chuckled, winking at her. The princess rolled her eyes.
“Okay, next up is Cadance. Cadance, pick your favourite villain!”
Cadance put a hoof to her mouth. “Hmm…”
“They’re seriously going along with this?” Chrysalis muttered.
“Er… I’ll just say Chrysalis, because she was close to ruining my wedding,” she told them.
“Oh! Chryssie, you have a vote! Doesn’t that make you happy?” Discord grinned at her.
“No.”
“Geez, you’re giving Celestia a run for her money for best party pooper,” he scoffed, before turning towards Spike.
“Spike! Choose best villain!”
The baby dragon blinked, rubbing his chin.
“Err… Chrysalis was pretty threatening, so…”
“On second thought, no one cares about your opinion,” Discord said flatly, before turning his back on him.
“Hey!” Spike gasped. “Yes they do!”
“So anyway,” Discord continued, ignoring the dragon’s protests. “Now we move onto Twili-”
“Wait!” Luna raised a hoof. “Can I vote for Nightmare Moon, since I’m technically not her anymore?”
“No, that’s completely biased. Do you see me not counting votes that aren’t mine?”
“Yes!” Spike growled. Though, Discord didn’t seem to hear him.
“Anyway, Twilight! Vote best villain.”
“You’re kidding,” she said dryly. “Okay, fine… I vote Discord, because he was close to defeating us if it weren’t for Celestia sending those letters.”
“Wait, what?” He pursed his lips, then looked at Celestia, who had her left foreleg casually hooked around her right one, along with her whistling. Discord gave a ‘hmph’ before turning back to the hologram.
“Pinkie? Who’s your favourite?”
“Uuuuuum… Discord, because chocolate rain!” she squealed. The scoreboard added another point for Discord.
“Applejack?”
“Uhh… I think I was most threatened by Nightmare Moon. Can y’all imagine the results if she won?”
“HA!” Luna grinned deviously. “Add a point on the board!”
The ‘0’ under Luna’s name obeyed her, turning into a ‘1’.
“Fluttershy?”
“Err… I agree with Applejack… I was really scared when Nightmare Moon first came to Ponyville.”
Discord’s eyes widened. “Fluttershy! We’re best friends, how could you not vote for me?”
“Because I don’t like you when you’re mean,” she told him.
“...Fair enough. Add another point on the board.” Luna’s ‘1’ became a ‘2’.
“Rarity? You there?”
“...”
“Nope,” Applejack confirmed. “Though, I think Chrysalis deserves another point, since she’s found a way to trap Rarity in her species’ dirt.”
“I suppose… Chryssie gets another point.” And thus, there were two votes for Chrysalis.
“And finally… Rainbow Dash! Best villain?”
“Uhhh…” she hummed for a little while as she decided. “Eh, screw it, Discord’s best villain.”
“WE HATH A WINNER!” Discord cheered, confetti exploding out of nowhere. “Discord is officially best villain! It was nice playing you, Luna, Chrysalis,” he floated down, shaking Luna’s hoof violently, then flying back up to Chrysalis’ level. “Thank you both for being such good sports!” He kissed his avian talon and blew it towards the changeling, who did not even flinch.
“Okay, you know what?”
“What?” Discord leaned on his limbs, gazing at the queen.
“I’m done. Have your ponies back,” she said flatly, her horn glowing her green aura, followed by the six missing ponies being carried towards them from offscreen, green goo still dripping off of them. They all were thrown from wherever Chrysalis was into Canterlot Castle through the screen, before Chrysalis ended with a final line,
“At least I’m not reformed by pastel coloured ponies!”
With that, the hologram was swallowed by the air, leaving the space to look like there was nothing there at all. The only evidence was the few green sparkles that floated down and faded into its surroundings.
The eleven friends (apart from Rarity, who was still unconscious) all stood there in silence for a few more moments, making sure that the queen wouldn’t return for a second round. Once about sixty seconds had passed, Discord burst out laughing.
“Hahahaha! I can’t believe that actually worked!”
Eventually, the rest of them joined in as well, apart from Spike, who was just confused.
“Oh my gosh... sh.... she couldn’t even get a… a word in!” Cadance almost choked as she tried to speak.
“I’m still pretty proud of that burn I gave her!” Celestia giggled.
“HEY!”
Everyone paused, all looking at Spike.
“Why are we all laughing?”
Twilight chuckled as she walked over to him. “Oh Spike, no need to act anymore, it’s all over!”
“Act? What do you mean, ‘act’?” He raised a brow and folded his arms. Twilight’s smile faded to a confused look.
“Y’know… don’t you remember the plan we all came up with…?”
“No. No I don’t.”
“Didn’t anypony ever tell you?” Rainbow flew over to him, just as confused as the lavender alicorn.
“Tell me what?”
“Y’know… that the next time a villain comes to get revenge we all improvise in the dumbest and most annoyin’ way we all can?” Applejack tilted her head.
“Err…”
“Wait, I think he might’ve been asleep when we were all talking about it,” Celestia suggested. “But, yes, we weren’t acting stupid for no reason, Spike.”
“...You weren’t?”
“Well… technically everything we said was true since we’re all bad improvisers,” Discord told him. “So… Rarity fainting was real, Celestia being absolutely terrifying on Monday mornings was real and of course, myself having a duck’s-”
Celestia slammed her hoof over his mouth before he could finish.
“Don’t do it, Discord. He’s just a kid,” she whispered. Fluttershy nodded in agreement, before flying over to the baby dragon.
“We’re all really sorry, Spike. We thought you knew,” she sighed. Everyone else nodded in agreement.
Spike glanced at each of them, before shrugging. “Eh… its cool. I just thought you were all acting dumb anyway, so I still got to join in.”
“Exactly!” Pinkie grinned.
“Buuut,” his smile dropped into a frown as he turned to Discord. “If everything that you said was true, are you saying no one cares what I think?”
Everyone turned to Discord questionably. The draconequus blinked and straightened up, wondering how to reply.
“Uhh…” he flattened his ears. “I… um… oh, hey! I hear my laundry calling! Listen!” He cupped his lion paw around his ear, listening for a distant sound. Turns out he was right - there was a roar echoing in the distance. “I better go see what it needs, ta ta!” With that, the draconequus was gone.
“Well… I think we should all go get cleaned up,” Twilight lifted her hoof, which still had sticky goo clinging to her violet coat. “Let’s go, girls.”
Her four friends nodded in agreement, while Rarity had to be carried by Applejack as they trotted out of the castle.
“...And I’m gonna get a shower,” Luna said, sighing as she stared at the now-dried changeling dung stuck to her mane. She then teleported off to her bathroom, leaving Cadance and Celestia.
“Well, I’ll go and finish mine and Luna’s game,” Cadance told her aunt, before also teleporting out of the throne room, leaving Celestia alone.
The solar princess sighed, stalking back to her throne so that she could finally relax. As she sat down, she ended up looking forward towards the door, thus immediately noticing it being open. There stood Raven, holding a mug of coffee with her aura. Though, no steam was coming from the drink. Celestia took note of her secretary’s expression; her eyes could not be more wider, and her pupils could not be more small.
“...Raven?” Celestia flattened her ears. Raven said nothing, just slowly shifted away from the door and out of view, before the door slowly closed.