An Appletini For Your Thoughts
In a small pocket of black space, there is a singular building that floats around in the inky mess of universe. Made of something that couldn’t possibly be wood, it has no doors, no windows; it seems to be an impenetrable box with a sign outside that denotes its name: The Crossroads Tavern.
Inside, it’s a bar. It’s got a counter with a tall man made of stars who seems to be cleaning the same glass over and over, wiping the dirty cloth in and out, hour after hour. The ceiling, floor, and walls show how it is possible to enter this place.
Doors. There must be hundreds of them, all containing a label right over them, each showing to where they lead. The Crossroads Tavern is where all of the universes come to meet. Denizens come from all across the planes to enjoy a nice drink, but it also has another use; you can get from one universe to another, just as long as you find the correct door.
The door labels change constantly, since there are an infinite amount of universes, and a finite amount of doors, so anything wishing to get to the tavern must pick the right frame of time. Some universes are more connected than others, showing up time after time to deliver travelers; some only get one shot.
The door marked “Equestria” showed up on the ceiling of the bar right above the stove. Falling from the door was a being that seemed like a drunk god had tried to create a being forged from a thousand animals and gave up halfway. Laying on his side, skin, fur, and scales sizzling, the creature groaned lethargically, as though it didn’t even care about the burning body parts or the it had ruined the current batch of cosmic crab cakes that were cooking on the grill.
The barkeeper, however, did care about this. Screaming something in a language that can only be described as being made of sounds one might associate with a collapsing star, it picked the interloper from the grill and flung him over the bar. Landing on a table where two frog-like beings were enjoy roasted faces, the creature yelped in pain. Dusting a nose off of himself, he stood up and walked, somewhat disoriented, to the bar stools.
“One Appletini,” he ordered in a tone of complete confidence. The barkeep, sensing the security of the order, did not give him any flack about the drink and went off to prepare it. In the meantime, the customer took a look around the bar to see who was around.
Seeing a pale, scraggly human with one eyebrow sitting next to him drinking straight from a vodka bottle, he introduced himself.
“Hello, I’m Discord, lord of chaos; you can save your bows for later.”
The man shot him a look that contained both contempt and amusement, and took another swig from his bottle. Discord noticed that the man was fingering a matchbook, flicking the red tip of one directly in the middle.
“I’m glad the drinks are cheap here,” the man said, scratchy and villainous. “I’ve recently run out of money.”
“That’s good to know,” Discord noted. “You seem like the type who loves to spread treachery, misery, and generally have a good time. What do you plan on doing with those matches?”
The man looked down at the matches in his hand, dirty fingernails digging into the cardboard of the cover. “Oh these? Saving them for later...”
“I do enjoy a nice fire,” Discord said. “What do you usually burn?”
“Oh, you know,” the man said, “Mansions, evidence, hospitals, secret headquarters... the usual.”
Discord was just about to ask another question when a very odd person evicted the man he was talking to from his seat. She was built like a human, but had a large head of orange and yellow striped hair; her skin was also a light orange, and she seemed to have a very thin build even for a human.
“Beat it, scraggly,” she ordered the matchbook man, who was now laying on the floor.
“You can’t do this to me! Don’t you know who I am?” the arsonist yelled from the floor.
“I don’t give a crap; get out before things get hellish,” the girl ordered. Discord raised an eyebrow. She didn’t look older than a high school student, but she had the demand and power of a trained army general or someone equally as sadistic, like a gym teacher.
“One Rat Bile, please,” she ordered the starman, who had just returned with one fine looking appletini for Discord’s consumption. The bartender nodded, and ducked under the counter.
“Interesting name for a drink,” Discord said coyly.
“Not really,” the girl said with a shrug. There was a horrible retching noise from under the counter, and the bartender emerged with a shot glass full of a sickly yellow-green substance. The girl grabbed it rather rudely, and downed the drink.
“Rough day?” Discord asked. The girl turned her head and nodded, a tired yet still clearly agitated expression gracing her features.
“You have no idea. I’m Sunset Shimmer, by the way,” she said. “And before you introduce yourself, I know who you are. Back when I was still a pony, I studied you. You’re Discord.”
Discord grinned smugly. “I see my reputation has preceded me.”
Sunset Shimmer held up her hand, and the barkeep delivered another glass. “Better make that five,” she told the bartender, who walked off to retrieve more drink. Sunset took a quick shot, grimaced and turned to Discord. “That’s not a particularly good thing, you know.”
Discord felt himself deflate a bit. “Oh yeah? And why is that, may I ask?”
“You’re a tactical joke!” Sunset said loudly. “Seriously! First, you try and take over Equestria in the Chaos War with only one nation backing you while the Equestrian Alliance had seven, then you fall back into one of the most heavily concentrated areas of enemies once you start losing. You had what was coming to you.”
Discord snorted. “Well, once I got back out of stone, I was able to make Ponyville my own personal playground. I even managed to corrupt the Elements of Harmony!”
Sunset shuddered. “Ugh... those damn Elements have caused me more trouble than anything else ever has. It sickens me just to think about them,” she gagged, downing another shot of delicious rat bile. “Impressive though. Still, since that purple bitch Twilight Sparkle managed to get to me and use said Elements to fight me off, I know that at some point the elements returned. How long did you have them corrupted?”
Discord stared down into his Appletini. “Six hours...”
Sunset laughed so hard she nearly dropped her next shot of rat bile. Calming herself, she downed the shot, rocking slightly in her chair. “Strong shit...”
Discord balanced his appletini glass on one talon-tip and tipped it elegantly into his mouth, taking a small sip. “To be fair, they used that fruity ‘power of friendship’ schtick on me to break free, and then the elements did the rest. I got out again though, as you can plainly see.” Discord closed his eyes and smiled, gesturing to his mismatch body as he said those last words.
Sunset looked over him. “Well, I’ve been gone from Equestria for nearly a decade. I don’t know what happened after that, fill me in.”
Discord levitated a Rat Bile shot over to himself, and downed said shot, trying to play it cool. The horrendous taste caused his face to shrivel up a bit, Sunset shooting him a livid look in response to the thief of her drink.
“Well,” Discord began. “The fools unfroze me again after I was shoved back in rock. Then they tried to get them to reform me!”
“Did it work?” Sunset asked.
Discord was silent for a moment. “Kind of?”
“Kind of?”
“Well,” Discord said, blushing slightly. “One of them became a good friend. Her name is Fluttershy, and I don’t think I could go back to my old ways; she’s the only one who bothered to make an effort and be my friend.”
“Didn’t you completely fuck them over though?” Sunset pointed out.
“Shut up.”
Sunset laughed. “I’m no perfect villain either. I had to apologize in front of the whole school because of those damn elements! I put on the sobby face and pretended like I cared that they caught me, but I’ll be back.”
“What’d you even do in Equestria?” Discord asked. “Since you know of me, you must have had access to the Equestria lore analogues, or were an elementary school teacher.”
“I was Celestia’s personal student, right before Twilight Bitch came along,” Sunset explained. “I was fifteen when that new filly showed up and destroyed half of the school building. Celestia said she had amazing potential, so she would have to start personally training her immediately. I still had about five years left, so Celestia said we would share her.” Sunset smiled, her nails digging into the bar counter. “I’m not good at sharing.”
Discord looked over her and said, “Still doesn’t explain how you got all...” he gestured at her chest. “This.”
“Oh, my new form,” Sunset said, looking down. “Well, after Celestia proposed I share with Twilight, I threw a magical hissy-fit and left. Went into the forbidden wing of the magical archives and found an ancient tablet that was covered in weird runes. A few spells later, and I was in the grasp of demons.”
“Oh no!” Discord clapped his paw and claw to his cheeks in mock horror. “However did you escape?”
“I made a deal with them. I would help them take over Equestria, which has powerful magic reserves that they can feed off of. They sent me to a weird place full of oddly colored humans, and gained popularity there. Everything went fine for a while, then Twilight showed up and ruined everything.”
Discord shot Sunset a weird look. “You criticised me of having a bad plan? Yours sounds like the worst one I’ve ever heard!”
“I wasn’t just gonna stick to a high school,” Sunset Shimmer growled. “I was gonna branch out, get that whole damn world on my side, then lead an army to conquer Equestria! Break Celestia for what she did to me!”
“What, suggest you share?”
“Did I ask for you opinion?”
“So, how long were you there for?” Discord asked, humoring Sunset.
“A decade or so.” Sunset took another shot.
Discord opened his mouth, then closed it again. “Wait, you were in high school for a decade?”
“The populace was surprisingly dumb.”
Discord tilted his head. “Why did you bother with the high school first? What could a bunch of horny teenagers do to help you conquer Equestria?”
“What could having the most notorious backstabbing nation to side with you in your hostile takeover of Equestria do to help you conquer Equestria?”
Discord took another dainty sip from his appletini. “I suppose we’ve both got our own follies that felled us.”
Sunset shrugged. “I guess. All I know is that I’m gonna get a whole new place to sway with my charm and finally get back at that damn Princess who runs the place.”
“Princesses,” Discord corrected.
“Oh, Luna came back?”
“Yeah, Twilight and her friends’ first big achievement was converting her from evil when she returned. Fluttershy told me about it.”
Sunset Shimmer grit her teeth, and downed her last shot. “Well, I’ve got one final trick up my sleeve. Spending so much time with those demonic powers have allowed me to turn into a demon occasionally, normally when a magic source is in direct contact with me. Kinda the reason I wanted that stupid crown in the first place.”
“Crown?” Discord asked.
“Long story, too lazy to tell you.” Sunset hopped off her stool, swaying slightly. “Gonna go hop off to another dimension and recruit whatever’s in there. Shouldn’t be too hard.”
Discord frowned. “Well, it’s been a rather rude experience talking to you.”
“Fuck you too,” Sunset said with a smile, flinging open a door marked “Zamonia”, and stepping off into it, disappearing from sight in a flash of light.
Discord sighed, and downed his appletini. The bartender walked over and pointed at the empty shot glasses, giving the lord of chaos a firm look.
“What? Oh no, those are that other chick’s glasses?” The starman rubbed his fingers together, making weird, cosmos rending noises. Discord swallowed hard.
The starman picked him up, shoved an apron on the draconequus, and moved him to the back, where a sink full of overflowing dirty dishes greeted him. The starman pointed towards them, mimed scrubbing, screamed something in his horrible deep space voice, and walked away to go serve another customer. Discord groaned as he picked up a dish covered in some sort of green glowing gunk that seemed to be eating the plate.
“I’ve gone soft.”
