Chapters TCB: The Other Side of the Spectrum: Multiverse Journey
Of Gods and Monsters
Author:
Redskin122004
Editors:
Doctor Fluffy
DrawDex
Inquisitor-Awesome
TheClosetBrony
Guest Author:
Red Bomber
“All what is existing already existed. We are together for a while pondering in agile world.”
― Santosh Kalwar
The Void
“No...” *Snap*
“No...” *Snap*
“No...” *Snap*
“No...” *Snap*
Discord was on a mission. A long, incredibly tiring mission of starting a war. He wasn’t attempting to make an enemy by any means; what he was doing was finding where that enemy was located. And in the multiverse, finding a specific one is already a job of its own. So the easiest way was to register something unique to the multiverse’s additions.
This case being humans.
But now what Discord had discovered was the sheer amount of the little buggers humbling about the entire place. It was almost like the multiverse favored them for some odd reason. Given the vastly different worlds he had seen, even though each one held humanity as one of the leading species, they were far and apart from one multiverse to the other.
Magic being wide spread in one world.
Technology in another.
A mix of both.
No magic or tech at all.
And it was just the basics on which everything was designed. Thinking of what every single one was doing was a hell hazard. And trying to find a huMan multiverse that wasn’t on a war of some sort was as hard as looking at the stars in the universe with the naked eye and finding your favorite.
Blind.
And so he narrowed it down even more. Discord was thinking in the beginning, a human universe with magic and technology, but that was just adding variables to the search. So he aimed for things that he could recognize easily and assurance of simplification. That being humans fighting another species.
That narrowed it down to about fifty eight million.
A small number that was growing and quickly at that.
Everyone believes that parallel and alternate universes were separate from one another on a different plane of existence.
What an idiotic concept. Multiverse meant just that. Multiple universes reside in one big chaos filled void. All “could have”s, would be's, should have been's, and everything that could be applied.
He needed a new way to search because this was going to take time.
“No-- Ohh?” Discord was in his usual movement in between connections when he found one with the particular patterns of humans at total war against something not human, chaos magic, and many species in the interaction. “This feels promising.”
Focusing his power one one node of existence, Discord felt every molecule of his body being pulled in, and with a groan, he found himself slowly acclimating to it. Colors, senses and laws of physics changing in accordance with the laws in place there. Which by Marcus’s definition were likely equal to the Equestrians.
And once the pulling stopped he opened his eyes.
And then raised an eyebrow.
What he saw was something he would not think of involving... robot aliens?
Perdus Rift; Tau Empire Sector
But when he took a look of his surroundings he viewed a...very silly looking army of blocky soldiers with a circle emblem on their shoulder pads as they loudly march within the jungle. Curious Discord listened in to what exactly was going on.
“Commander? Why are we walking in this accursed jungle instead of flying into our destination?”
“Because we have the element of surprise on the humans if we flank their fighters in the east, and this way we could surround the Gue’la army into submission. And in order for this to happen we had to leave our transport vehicles and battlesuits in order to successfully go under their radar.”
“Ah, so what happens if we get found out Commander?”
“We won’t, our stealth scouts have recon the area and then reported back that this area is perfectly safe. There's more than enough foliage to fool the Imperials sensors,” the commander explained.
“Ha! It sounds like a great plan!”
“I believe so, I just wonder why we haven’t peacefully integrated these Gue’las (humans) into our society. They’re so… thickheaded, as a race. They rely on obsolete technology that we would see in history books, but sometimes they bring out a ludicrously overpowered weapon that puts us to shame. They shoot first and it’s rare if they ever ask questions… I don’t believe I’ve ever seen such a xenophobic race. To spread the greater good throughout the galaxy will be quite the trial.”
“I know commander, but still what would happen if we lost this sept(Star system)?”
“Then the Imperials would have a perfect staging ground onto our inner systems. But we won’t let that happen, this defense was planned by both our Ethereal and our commander Shas’O Brightlance, we will prevail!”
“So with this plan we can push the Imperials out of our territory?”
“Not by far, but it would be a start.”
“Very well, but quick question commander.”
“What is it?”
“Why do we have Gue’vesa’s(Tau human auxiliary soldiers)? I heard from my cousin that you can’t trust them… he once had a regiment surrender, just so they could get pulse rifles! And what about our kroot allies?”
“Stop being paranoid! These soldiers have sworn to serve the Greater Good just like you and I! Remember, Unity comes to all things in time, and for our kroot allies, they were needed to fight these Imperials on the east. We didn’t have any more to spare for this mission.”
“Ah, yes.”
It was obvious that Discord wasn’t in the correct place, but he was entertained with something new so he decided to stay for a moment. They continued to march for almost ten minutes before Discord got bored and was going to call it a waste of time. Until something finally happened.
Ka-BOOM.
“Wha-” the Tau commander exploded on the spot. What could make someone simply explode like that ?! Discord wondered. He’d seen human weapons in action, but this was a whole new level of mess. Human weapons tended to leave a hole on the way out, but that wasn’t a hole… by saying “hole,” that implied there was a back left for a hole.
“Its an Ambush!” yelled a fire warrior.
“Form ran-” Cried a Gue'vesa'ui(Human auxiliary sergeant) before being smashed by a hidden surprise.
“Surpwize wittle bwoks we want to play!” yelled a slab-faced humanoid creature, one of the many coming out of the foliage.
“Where are they coming fr-Oh no! Ogryn!”
“Tim to smash da litle dings for da Emphra!” Shouted the Ogryn commander as he lifted his “Brutalizer” Rippergun, a Cadian shotgun designed specially for Ogryns, and emptied it at the Tau fire warriors in front of him. Running at them, finger twitching over the trigger, quickly closed up into melee, smacking Tau soldiers left and right with the ungainly thing’s heavy stock.
“Charge you cowar-” yelled a Commissar leading the Ogryns, before he fell to the ground from a plasma blast. It could have been the Tau, or it could have been the Catchans. In the heat of battle, it was uncertain who did it-the Catachans could have hit him with their plasma weapon, and the Tau had plasma as standard armament. Not to mention, of course, that officers with black coats and very fancy hats make for delicious targets, for friend and foe alike.
“We sure he’s dead?” one Catachan yelled.
The response was a short burst of Imperial lasfire.
“Retreat! Retreat!” Shouted the ‘new’ Tau commander.
“But we’re surrounded!” one Tau protested.
“What was that about never getting close to you in combat?!” one Catachan sergeant laughed, unsheathing his Force Sword and trading his bolter revolver out for his Hellpistol. He didn’t feel like reloading.
“Gun em down Catchans! Kill them all!”
“This is easier than killing grox as a kid! Hahahahahaa!” A soldier laughed, emptying her autocannon at the Tau, its heavy rounds shredding them into hamburger. To say that the Tau were caught off guard would be an understatement, given their slow reflexes, and the fact that the were surrounded Ogryn and some of the more melee happy Catachan Jungle fighters... The Tau were in essence screwed.
After five more minutes of intense fighting, the battl-ehh, the massacre was over. Discord was left with a bloody scene and a understanding that these were absolutely not the humans he was looking for. Brutal, and able to win the Conversion War in a timeframe that would scare him but perhaps not the best not to think on it too hard.
“Quickly, move it Catchans! We are to be at the next ambush site by tonight! Move, move! Move it you sorry fething excuses of Catachans!” yelled the Catchan commander, especially to the Ogryn team as they tried to move as fast as they can to try and relocated to their next ambush site.
“B-But I want to smash da funy lokin choaz ding der!” The Ogryn soldier said as he pointed his stubby finger to Discord.
“WHAT!!!” yelled the entire army as they turned to where the Ogryn pointed. Discord was somewhat in the same place of thinking. He didn’t even notice his cover had been completely consumed by a recipe of bullets by the battle had been so brutal and onesided.
“Whhaaa-aahhhhh!” the Ogryns said as they charged in the way of everyones aim, but one leading the charge tripped on a dead tau body creating a chain reaction of trips until it turned into a pile of Ogryns wanting to ‘smash da funy lokin ding’. Only one Ogryn went around the mass of piled bodies and went inclose to Discord who was laughing at the so called warriors.
“Prepare to die funy ding! *Clikck-CLick-Click* Ahhhh! You please, waiti finich rewoading to kill you!” Discord couldn’t help but laugh harder as the Ogryn just took that as a yes, “danx and no taky backs.” The Ogryn quickly said the last part as he reloading in front of Discord.
“Frakking Ogryns. Just Smash the fething daemon!” the Catachan sergeant sighed.
“AHH I want to shot it width ma boom stick!”
“No! Pulverize him!”
“Wat?”
“This is truly ridiculous and comically brutal! I love it, it’s almost like vacation to me! But time is of the essence, and bullets give me indigestion.” With those very wise words, Discord slowly floated backwards away and over a small hill he had come to know as his ‘hiding spot’.
“Kill it! Kill it quickly before daemons pop out!” shouted another sergeant as everyone started to shoot at Discord. Unfortunately for Discord this are the Catachans which had a field of range upon him.
“Damn.”
Discord couldn’t help but give a small whistle as the entire forest erupted in gunfire and was washed over with enemy fire. So massive and powerful the force of fire, Discord couldn't get more than a couple nanoseconds without a new wound he needed to heal himself from. These humans definitely seemed to know their wounds… he was definitely experiencing a wide variety of them, though most of them amounted to burnt, or exploded from the inside.
“Ow-ow-ow-Ow I liked that finger you brutes!” Discord screamed at the Catachans who are still shooting him with everything they got. “Forget this, I hope you like being armless for the next couple of hours!”
Discord sent chaotic energy towards the Catachans. The Catachans would have turned into armless and helpless soldiers were it not for a certain individual who had a knack for gold items on himself.
“You won’t harm my comrades on my watch, daemon!” screamed the one who seemed to have a next generation style of sunglasses, or visor, or whatever he had on his head, as he blocked Discord’s attack. This surprised the draconequus to a great extent, his powers were blocked by this mortal? Interesting.
"Hello, now that is a very interesting ability you have there." Discord snapped his refixed claw and appeared before the human, shocking the human at his appearance. "How did you do that? I never met another creature that could control chaos, good for a mortal though."
“Begone daemon! I will not be tempted, for faith is my shield!” the strange human said as he tried blasting Discord with his psyker ability.
"Tempted?" Discord swiped the blast aside, shaking his claw at the burst of energy. Said blast slammed into an Ogryn and sent it flying.
“Owie owie owie! It hurtz. WAHHHHHHH!” cried the Ogryn while the Catachan commander repeatedly slammed his head on a tree muttering, “I fething hate fresh recruit Ogryn. Why didn’t you let the commissar live Staunt? I hate dealing with these Ogryns without ‘em. ”
Discord finally remembered where he was at, seeing the dozen of weapons being pointed at him. "Ah....eh...Toodles!" Discord vanished. But to the ‘warrior’s’ horror, he had taken the Psyker with him.
The Pysker, one named Teilos, found himself lying down on a comfortable lounge chair, staring at the ceiling with fluffy pink clouds painted on them.
“Now mister human what is wrong with you?” Discord snapped up a clipboard and glasses.
“Uh, where in the warp did you teleported me, daemon!” The poor Psyker had absolutely know idea what was happening at the moment.
“Daddy issues, hmm. Check. Anything else?”
“I’ll kill you!”
“Anger management...Needs Improving. Go on, don’t let me stop you.”
“RAHHHH!”
-
Outside a strangely colored building with a large name, Discord Psychologist, 'Where the crazy one is the doctor 'who isn’t certified in (99.9x10^19)% of all of the multiverse’, on its side and the Catachans had their sights on it.
“Alright, Ogryns go through the front doors and do what you do best inside of there, the rest of us will scale the building and try to find Teilos, understood?!”
“Yes, Sir!”
“Then what are you waiting for?!” the Catchan commander ordered, his men stormed the building to rescue their trusted psyker from possible corruption.
-
“Ok, last question. How did you get your powers?”
“Like I’ll tell something as obvious as that to you?!”
"Listen, to get better, we have to share something. I mean, you're obviously lack sexual driven urges. Repressing that can't be good for you."
"FETHING DEAMON! MY SEX LIFE IS NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS!"
-
“We’re here!” Roared the Ogryns as they charged through, only to find themselves in a slightly smaller than comfortable waiting room.
“Please take a number and wait your turn please,” said a female attendant looking Discord, filing her claw with a look of boredom.
“Oh, ok, sowey,” said one the Orgyns. The rest of his fellow proceeded to take a number and tried to sit on the too small chairs. Some looked at the pictures of magazines with ‘prety ladiz’ and other played at the children section doing ‘hard puzlez’.
All the Orgyns had just gotten comfortable when a door open and Discord walked through. "Alright Mr. Neo. I want you to take a long vacation and some rest. All this 'Hail the Emperor' and 'Hersey' nonstop can not be good for your mental health. I should know, I’m pretty loony myself. And don’t forget to also calm down when using your powers, it helps with the flow, and keeps your head from exploding! Good flow equals major chaos! Next!" Discord said to the psyker who was gagged and screaming, while being tied to a wheeled bed as Discord pushes him to the side for an attendant to take him away.
“Whoz next?” Cried one of the Ogryns.
“Number 2.”
“Wut iz da numbah 2?”
“This is the nu-” Discord was about to continue, but every Catachan soldier that could burst through the windows and entrances, their weapons ready to mow down daemons, only to see the sight before them.
“Uh, commander, best if you don’t come in here.”
“The Ogryns are being stupid again?”
“More stupid actually.”
“Why did you have to kill the commissar, Staunt?” The commander said as the soldiers clearly heard loud repetitive knocks.
"Gentlemen! I sense a lot of negativity with all of you, if you just take a number-"
"Kill it!"
Discord held up his arms, a torrent of bullets and chaos energy slammed into him, sending him through a door and obliterating the wall in the process. Several grenades were thrown in for good measure in the newly formed hole. The sheer force of the concentrated fire disintegrated the supports of the entire section, knocking it down.
“Is it dead?”
“That was quite uncomfortable gentlemen, real uncalled for, and you torn down part of my building, I’ll sue you for this!” Discord's voice echoed from beneath the rubble.
“Kill it! Kill it with Promethium!” screamed a Catchan pyrotechnician as he unleashed the flames of the Emperor onto Discord. “WE DON’T NEED NO WATER! LET THE MOTHFRAKER BURN!” he yelled. But what they heard was not something they thought would happen...Ever.
“I’m dancing in a infernoooo-- OHO, I’m dancing in a inferno!” sang Discord while the flames cover the entire office that contained him. When the flames stopped, Discord responded in kind,“AHHH!” Cried Discord covering himself with a towel as he only has his rubber ducky and a shower cap on himself. He stared at the soldiers and responded with, “Have you gentlemen ever heard of knocking? I swear this is more indecent than when I was going for beauty pageant queen and I had a wardrobe malfunction!”
Another salvo of rounds and grenades were unleashed, but with something extra. “Plasma time mutha-fetha!” Cried out a heavy weapons soldier who fired his plasma shot at Discord, hurtling him inside the already mushed up building. The groan of weaken wood and stone caught their attention, forcing the soldiers to flee the building.
"Bring it down! Bring the entire chaos cursed building down!" Commander cried out. Hundreds of guns went off, rockets flew through the air, making the building all but vanish from existence.
"Is it gone?"
"It has to be? I doubt even a Tyranid Carnifex could survive that!"
"Gentlemen." A dark voice came from the smoke, causing the entire army to freeze at the voice. It sounded annoyed.
And quite alive.
"I am annoyed now." Discord walked out of the smoke, his arm at an odd angle, but he simply snapped it back into place by flicking said arm like a whip. "And I don't have time to play games with you lot anymore. But this offence can not go unpunished."
Discord watched as several of them intensified their glares, but remain where they stood trying to reload as fast as possible. He gathered his chaos, his eyes narrowing at them as the chaos floated off him in waves. 'Wonder what they would do when I change their boots and pants in high heels and dress?'
Discord held out his claw, a smile on his face as the energy around him concentrated on his extended appendage and thoughts molded their purpose. And with a final sinister grin he snapped.
Nothing happened.
The Catachans had tensed, ready for anything the daemon would unleash on them. But nothing happen, they watched as the creature looked at them strangely, then its claw and proceeded to repeatedly snap his claw several times before he look around in annoyance.
"What's it doing?"
"Playing some mind game perhaps, Emperor guide us."
Sanctioned Psyker Teilos, who was rescued surprisingly enough by the Ogryns when they fled the building, glared at Discord with all his hatred. He focused himself, attempting to perceive what the daemon was doing.
Teilos smiled viciously, which caught the Commander's attention.
"Teilos, what is it? What do you see?"
"I see a daemon without chaos. As mortal as any of us."
“The Emperor is with us men, quickly kill it while its weakened!” Commander cried out, Discord’s eyes wide in surprise before he focused and snapped his claws, vanishing from view.
Only to appear next to the smoldering ruin of his creation.
"After him!"
A bullet grazed Discord's shoulder, causing him to hiss in pain, he drop to the ground and race into the jungle, the sounds of explosions and gunfire right behind him.
By Mother, he’d actually been HURT! It wasn’t closing up! It was physical feeling!
"Okay, not good not good." Discord muttered as he raced away, the humans and Ogryns right behind him, whooping and hollering as they chased after him. Discord snapped his claw several dozen times, but only managed to teleport several feet ahead of him.
"Something is blocking Chaos from me." Discord gasped. But who or what was strong enough to stop his powers from functioning? It was something that Discord worried greatly and for good reason, chaos was everywhere, and now he couldn't even feel it.
After some more time running, Discord look behind him to see several figures crash through the brush and aim their weapons at him. Discord only spread his arms, closed his eyes, and beg for forgiveness for failing his duties when he reached the afterlife. There was silence, no sound of a weapon going off, no screams of daemon and Hersey, just silence. Discord open a single eye, then opened both to squint at the scene before him.
“Looks like I am in the mind of a hippie again!” Discord groaned as he looked around at the random amounts of colors that swirled around him. “I did NOT like the last one…”
“Well, well well who do we have here, thinking they can do my job?” Discord heard a raspy voice echoed out from behind him. He turn around to see a massive bird like creature behind, looking down with a curious look on his.
“And who are you?” Discord asked, holding down his lunch, the thing was extremely ugly, like a wax model of a bird that had been shoved in an oven, and it took all of Discord’s self control not to vomit. He might as well try to see what's going on, but he was kind of hoping for a better looking person to speak to.
One without the screaming faces fused into his skin.
“Who am I? Oh I am Tzeentch! The Lord of change! The Changer of Ways!” The creature replied, waving a putrid hand as he stated his title.
“Ok?” Discord grimaced slightly at what he said. “What kind of change?”
“General Change.”
“What is general change then? It can be change that leads to order, which thus cannot make you a chaos god or whatever you call yourself, so you can’t be that powerful.” Discord said with a wave of his paw at the bird creature that was just silently staring emotionless at the mix match creature. "If you're for evil change, then you are just a psychopath on a power trip, which means you are really... powerful... You're the latter aren't you?"
“Ah, then you are a creature of thought, already you are smarter than Khorne and Slaanesh, hehe.” Tzeentch chuckled with some amusement, “Not ones for intellectual conversation, those two. So why don’t you introduce yourself creature?” Tzeentch said as he continues to stare at Discord, not missing a detail on his new ‘Friend’.
"Great..." Discord muttered under his breath. "I am Discord! Lord of Chaos from my neck of the woods! Sometimes called The Deceiver, and Lord of Change and Chance from time to time, Oh and lets not forget Disco champion as well, I am quite proud of that title really." Discord said with nostalgia.
“Neck of woods? Ah, then you're not from around here then, are you? Do tell, where are you from really?” Tzeentch said with interest as he looked at Discord trying to tell if he was telling the truth.
"Ha ha... You never kiss and tell on a first meeting, now do you?" Discord frown as he felt the chaos gently float just out of his reach, the longer he stayed, the more uneasy he felt around the large bird man thing. "Tell you what? How about we part ways like friends because I have a schedule to keep. Don't want to let them down…I have friends who are at the mercy of a dark power that you can only-" he stopped. “Wait, nevermind. Given what I’ve seen so far, the word for what I’m talking about is probably a normal Tuesday for you, but it’s still very bad!”
“I don’t think it would be in your best interest to do that right now.” Tzeentch calmly explain as he showed Discord a small battle scene of some golden clad man fighting a red-armored technoorganic monstrosity, with weapons bursting from every surface of its body.
"Oh...that's..." Discord watched as the golden clad man eviscerate the corrupted being with a sword on fire. Discord swallowed before looking back at Tzeentch. "I got the feeling you will throw me at the guy..."
“Yes, definitely smarter than Khorne.” Tzeentch gave him a small vicious smile. “You see, this man here, hates chaos creatures. He absolutely despises them, and looking at you, he wouldn’t hesitant to pull out your spine and beat you with it.”
Discord was starting to regret choosing this universe. He was also getting irritated by the being, but kept his mind full of chaotic thoughts, no need to give the guy a free peep show. "Alright, alright. Doesn't take a genius to figure out its you blocking my powers. What do you want?"
“Now to answer my previous question, where are you originally from? What are you?” Tzeentch said a little more calm than Discord liked.
"For me? I am a science experiment gone wrong, you know the Colonel has to stop using those new spices." Discord told him bluntly with a grin on his face. “As for where, I come from beyond your means of travels and comprehension.”
“I do not appreciate jokes Discord, now give me a REAL answer and I may not let that man tear you apart.” Tzeentch calmly told Discord as he again showed him the same man, killing a pus-filled daemon with eagle like talon claws.
"That is a real answer... Okay so the Colonel thing was bit much, but its has much truth to it as well." Discord yawned, looking at the scene with a disinterested glance. "You got anything else to watch? This channel is boring. Beheadings and gore is so ancient history. Where are the lasers and huge battleships? I liked that part!"
The bird creature eyes twitched as if having enough of Discord’s explanations.
“This. Is. Your. Last chance before I just let the man kill you, where did you come from!” Tzeentch yelled angrily at Discord, the threat of the armored man was becoming less terrifying... And repetitive.
Discord looked at the golden man, before looking at Tzeentch, and finally decided he just had to push the last button. "Does he get better channels? I'll gladly change for someone else, because you are just so rude! I mean really! I'm a guest and this is how you treat guests?!"
“You know what? I had enough of niceties.”Tzeentch snapped its talons and Discord ended up in a table extremities strapped to length. “If you won’t volunteer to give me my answers I’ll just get them.”
"Hmmm... Kinky." Discord smirked a bit, but inside he was panicking, he was desperately trying to find himself out the situation and needed one fast. "When will it be my turn to play the dominator?"
“HRGHRAHH!” Tzeentch yelled as he forcibly entered Discord's mind.
Only to find himself surrounded by inane thoughts and fluffy pink clouds. He growled in annoyance as he attempted to push them away, but found himself unable to locate the true thoughts of the little chaos creature. Finally, a stray thought passed him, speaking of some matter of importance, he latched on and followed, only to find himself outside Discord's mind, with said draconequus giving him a small smile.
"Had fun?" Discord smiled up at the disgusting bird creature before the Tzeentch roared in anger and tried again.
“RRR! I WILL UNLOCK YOUR SECRETS DISCORD, NO MATTER HOW LONG IT TAKES!”
One Hour later, though time is rather abstract within the warp so really, it’s anyone’s guess
“How are you repelling my mental attacks! Only the corpse Emperor could do it!” Tzeentch yelled in frustrations as he repeatedly tries to force Discord’s mind open.
"What was that? Did you say something?" Discord asked, blinking at the enraged chaos god. Discord couldn't help but chuckle a bit. Tzeentch did get inside, but the poor fool got lost until Discord ejected him by tricking him into believing he was entering his mind. When he was actually leaving.
“Hahaha this is fun! You amuse me, some powerful ‘chaos god’ can’t even get in my mind. Bad show, my good sir, bad show! HAHA!” Discord laughed as Tzeentch was going mad in repeated failed attempts to get his information. Thank you Mother!
"Who is Mother?" Tzeentch said in Discord mind, apparently that one thought managed to catch Tzeentch’s attention. Discord felt him get a foothold within his mind, and Discord was helpless to stop him as he followed the trail to his center.
"Ah...crud." Discord said before his entire mind felt like it was on fire.
Several Abstract Hours Later
After hours of constant fighting, tricks, and insults; Tzeentch was surely winning as Discord's mind breaks, slowly and painfully as possible. Tzeentch had to admit, for a chaos youngling, Discord was able to thwart his attempts early on, a powerful mind indeed. Even now, with his mind breaking, Discord was resisting his attempts, even if he wasn’t fully aware of what he was doing.
“Hehehe, just a little more!” Tzeentch began to salivate as victory grew near, the very world he saw within Discord’s mind was perfect, easy to corrupt and spread his ‘change’ onto it. All he needed was to find out where it was located at and he won. Well, he would have, if there wasn’t a loud and very destructive sound resonating in the area. Tzeentch turned to find two beings standing behind him.
The one with gold armor, the other in armor some unremarkable, unpainted shade of gray between bone-white and dark gray with a banner on his back. Tzeentch growled in anger at the interruption, bearing his claws at the intruders.
“Is this the one we are supposed to help my Emperor?” The white grey armored figure asked. “All I see is Tzeentch playing with a pawn.”
“Aye my son, tis the being we seek. He alone holds many secrets beyond our world and the Warp. If Tzeentch breaks him… it does not bear thinking on. Free the being, Tzeentch is mine.” The Emperor said as he charged at Tzeentch while the bone white armored dashed to Discord.
Tzeentch's eyes widened in shock as the Emperor swung his sword. Cursing, he jumped away, his wings flaring as he launched a warp spell at the Emperor, only for it to be batted away.
“So this is where you hide, Tzeentch?” The Emperor growled as he sent a blast to Tzeentch bared himself against it before roaring out and attacking him.
"Look mommy... A knight in shining armor." Discord mumbled, his eyes caked with tears as his nearly shattered mind began the process of building itself back up. "I can be a knight too and defeat the evil freak, right?"
The ‘Knight’ frown somewhat at this, shaking his head as placed his hands on Discords and muttered some words, after some time Discord was finally getting more sane.
Well... Sane for Discord.
After some time, the white-grey armored figured stepped away as Discord finally recollected himself and looked around him.
“Who are you people?” Discord asked as the ‘knight’ frees Discord from the table. His mind was scrambled and flambéed, his movement sluggish but his natural healing ability was taking care it.
“I am known as Draigo of the Grey Knights, and that is the Emperor of Man fighting Tzeentch, come let us finish this.” Draigo said as he unsheathed his sword ready to charge into the fray.
"Sorry, but I have to leave." Discord said, cracking his neck.
“I assure you, you won’t leave the warp with an angry chaos god on your tail. It will be in your best interest to stick with us.” Draigo simply explained to Discord as if telling a child.
Discord chuckled a bit, snapping his claws as Draigo's sword appeared in his claw, much to Draigo's disbelief at the bold move. "Believe, me, Sir Draigo. I am quite capable now that Tzeeny is focused on your leader."
"Wait?! What are you-"
Discord snapped his claws once more, appearing right before Tzeentch, the flaming sword stabbing it directly into Tzeentch‘s left eye. "How does that feel, feels good huh?!" Discord yelled as he swirled the flaming weapon in the socket. Tzeentch screech in anger before teleporting away, knowing he is outnumbered and not having the advantage. The corpse Emperor was too strong, the trapped Knight too skilled, and Discord... Discord was just crazy. Who knew what he could come up with if he fought with them against him. Even all the time he had ripping into his mind, he didn't even have a clue what Discord could pull off. It was like he was trained with a madman on a power trip and serene goddess at the same time with his mental defenses.
Discord popped back next to Draigo, handing him his weapon back. "OK, now I can leave."
“No, We have answers for you to hear. Answers that can help you find what you are searching for.” The gold clad person explain to Discord.
"What I am searching for doesn't exist here." Discord explain patiently. "Listen I am glad you helped me and NOT turn me into a beef patties, but I have to leave."
“Yes and I know something that might be useful for your search.” the Emperor stated, giving him a small playful smile. "Avoid worlds like this one."
"Gee, what a wonderful fountain of information you are." Discord deadpanned, Draigo bristled at this slight, but the Emperor only raised his hand to stop him, chuckling somewhat.
"I wouldn't have come if it wasn't for the heavenly voice begging me to save you." The Emperor told Discord.
"Heavenly...voice?" Discord blinked at that, confusion apparent on his face.
"Indeed. You have someone looking out for you. She begged me to save you from Tzeentch, before Tzeentch learns of the secrets and powers of the Multi-verse, powers that can topple even myself." The Emperor stated, Draigo looked stunned at this, before staring at Discord in new light. "What you search for is beyond the mortal realm, even beyond the Warp. My powers allows me to see these other universes, but I can never be there in person. One day, when I vanquish the chaos gods for good, I may construct a means to visit the other realms and even help out my own counterparts, perhaps create the Imperium of which I originally dreamed, or even… or even be a better father like Roboute would have wanted,” he sighed. “But until then I remain.”
Discord blinked several times as he thought over what the man said, Mother? Did you... Discord look to the Emperor as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a medallion.
“Take this.” Discord grasped the odd medal, looking it over with its strange symbol etched onto it. “If you ever find yourself in a world like this one again, this medallion will signal my counterpart to it. Since you are holding it and not screaming in agony, you are worthy being to be known.”
“Uh… Thank you.” Discord decided to wrap the medallion around his wrist. “Thanks for kicking Tzeeny out.”
The Emperor chuckled at this. “Not many beings can survive what you went through. Or even have the gall to call Tzeentch, the Chaos God of ‘Change’, Tzeeny.”
“My Emperor, Tzeentch will come soon.” Draigo respectively cut in. “And he will bring an army with him. He must go, and go now.”
“Of course, my son.” The Emperor agreed. “Go Discord. Find the world you seek. You may be a chaos creature, but from what I can see, you are the only one worth anything to Fate. We will hold them back.”
“Thanks…” Discord turned around, focusing himself. Ok, lets see where I am...Ah, a different realm. Oh goodness, I hate multiple realm universes. Let see, all I have to do…
“NO! HE IS MINE!” Tzeentch roared out as he appeared, his army was massive in size as they all rushed as one to the three.
“You must go!” Draigo yelled. “We cannot defend ourselves and you at the same time against this horde!”
Discord gave a look of annoyance at Draigo, before snapping his claw. The veritable tide of daemons and corrupted beings found themselves slipping and sliding across the ground as the floor become slick with soap. The Emperor laughed out loud as even Tzeentch slipped and crushed several of his minions.
“In thousands of years, I don’t think I have enjoyed myself so!” The Emperor laughed, using his Psyker powers to explode several daemons with the force of his mind.
“Thanks.” Discord snapped his claws as a portal open between the universes. Tzeentch found himself staring at the portal, his eyes trying and failing to understand what he was seeing.
“Sayonara, Tzeeny! Stick a flaming sword up his rectum and give it a good twist! For the Emperor!” Discord shouted as jumped in and closed the portal, but not before he snapped his claw and a giant black ball with a fuse burning appeared over his head and landed right on Tzeentch.
Tzeentch barely had time to grasp what he seen before the large black ball slammed onto his head and exploded, covering his face in pink bubble gum. Tzeentch roared in anger as he tried to wipe it off, only for it to spread. This in turn caused the entire horde to pause as they tried to avoid their flailing leader.
Draigo and the Emperor could only watch as Tzeentch stomped around in the growing pink stuff, slipping from the soapy ground, and either crushing his minions or gathering them up in the gum.
“My Emperor..”
“Yes?”
“I…Should we attack?”
“Hmm… Let Tzeentch suffer this humiliating venture a little longer. I find this amusing.”
“Of course.”
The Void
Discord closed the portal, giving a small grimace as his head exploded in pain. He gave a groan as he floated in the void, he summoned a red paint can and simple threw the can 'onto' the 'wall', marking the world off with a clear X.
"I'm hungry." Discord muttered. "Also in pain."
Discord raised a claw and snapped, summoning a tub of popcorn and glass of chocolate milk. Discord took a swing, only spit it right back out. "Bleh! Tastes like dirt!"
Discord sniffed the popcorn before tossing that away as well with disgust. "Great. My powers are not up to speed just yet. Guess I'm going to a world then, better avoid ones like the last one."
Discord searched for while, finding a few worlds, but lacked a diverse species for him to blend in. After a couple of other unfit search’s, Discord finally found one to rest and recover in.
Sammy Bar/Grill/Hotel!
Discord walked through the doors, finding well over a dozen species inside having a good time. There was even a few scattered humans with them as well. Discord walked by, not a single person paid any attention to him as he sat at the bar. The multiarmed bartender raised an eyebrow as Discord slammed his face onto the bar.
"Rough day buddy?" The bartender asked, looking at Discord with amusement.
"Oh, you wouldn't believe the day I had so far." Discord muffled voice from his planted face. "And my brain is killing me."
"Ah... Ran into a telepath?" Bartender began to mix some alcohol together, not even looking away from Discord and still cleaning the glass in hand. “I'm amazed you got away. Must have a pretty strong will to resist them.”
"Sort of." Discord looks up with a small grin on his face.
The Bartender laughed as he set the glass before Discord. "Name’s Sammy. Owner of this here Bar/Grill/Hotel. Take a drink my friend, on the house. Telepaths run rampant in these parts and they abuse their ability. Bastards have their robots running about causing havoc for the good folk around. This place, my pride and joy, is a safe haven for these people. Keeps them hidden from their wandering minds. I concocted this drink to help those that had their minds' being thrown into a blender."
"Thanks." Discord took a sip and started coughing immediately, thumping his chest with surprise. Sammy laughed as grabbed a notepad and began to jot down several dishes.
"Careful there, old man. Quite strong drink, but it works. Now, let's get you something to eat." Sammy chuckled as he ripped the note and sent it to the kitchen.
"I don't have anything to pay with." Discord rubbed his head, somewhat embarrassed with his conduct so far. Here he was, Lord of Chaos, and he couldn't even handle a drink. Maybe he was still off his game.
"Ah, no worries. I can see you're busy man. Its in your eyes, very important to you. Eat, drink, sleep and be on your way." Sammy gestured as he poured another drink for a customer.
"That's... Quite kind of you." Discord tilted his head in confusion.
"Mmm." Sammy nodded his head. "Kindness can go a long way, with Aku spreading misery everywhere, its important to know that helping others will get us by."
"Aku?" Discord muttered to himself, wondering who this Aku was. He shrugged, wasn't his deal and these people were making it by.
Sammy had just served him a bowl of miso soup, somewhat spicy if the smell and taste was anything to go by, when the place turn silent. Discord had just began to scarf it down when he looked up from his bowl, noodles hanging from his mouth as he turned to the side and glanced to the entrance to see whatever caused the silence.
Standing at the door was a human, wearing a white kimono, a straw hat, and a katana strapped to his side. Discord immediately took note of the sword, the pureness it radiated felt so similar to Harmony that he nearly drop his bowl in shock.
"I can't believe it." Sammy whispered as the human slowly made his way to the bar. "He's here."
"He?" Discord looked to the human taking his seat next to Discord.
"Samurai Jack." Sammy whispered in awe. "It is an honor to be your presence."
Jack merely gave a warm smile and nodded his head. "Water please." Jack requested, before looking to Discord, more specifically, his bowl. "Is that... Miso?"
Sammy nodded his rapidly. "Yes sir! Would you like some!?"
"Tell me." Jack looked to Discord, a warm smile on his face. "How does it taste for you, Dragon."
"Dragon?" Discord blinked at the name before looking at his bowl. "Taste pretty well made actually. Somewhat spicy, but that gives it a good kick rump for weary travellers."
"I see. Yes. I shall have one." Looked to Sammy and placed several coins on the table. "A room as well if you have any to spare."
"Oh no! You don't have to pay, sir! Its on the house." Sammy waved his multiple arms wildly.
Jack only blinked before placing his money back into his pouch. Discord had decided to take the time to savour the flavor of his food, slowly making Miso his favorite dish with every bite. Discord looked to Jack with a question in mind.
"Who are you? Why do these people revere you so much?" Discord asked, pointing his chopsticks at Jack.
"My name is Jack, although it is not my birth name, I simply took as my own for the people of this world to call me by. And you my odd dragon friend?"
"Name is Discord. Just passing through on my way in a search for something," Discord stuck out his claw and Jack gave a small shake.
"A quest?" Jack asked, giving Discord a once over. "Of what kind?"
"A simple search. Nothing more," Discord gave him a small smile. "Just taking a break at the moment."
"I see. I pray yours is a success then," Jack answered, nodding gracefully as a warm bowl of Miso was placed before him. "As for the praise, I fight against Aku, I have come close several times in slaying the demon, far closer than anyone has before."
"Huh. Well how long you been trying to do that?" Discord asked as he raised the bowl to drink the flavorful remains.
"Hmm... By my estimation. Several thousand years." Jack answered, calmly eating while Discord spat out his drink on a passing robot waiter, causing it to short out. The robot beeped out a warning, eyes blinking as it raced out the door before sound of a muffled explosion and an arm sailed back inside.
"Wow, really?" Discord blinked as he looked closely at man. "You look good, I aged horribly on the other hand." Discord pointed to his face, wrinkles spontaneously appearing on his face.
Jack have a small chuckle. "I am accounting all of history into this. In reality it has only been a few years. Aku, in an effort to save himself, threw me into the future where he was at his strongest."
"Whoa, wait wait wait!" Discord stared at human in surprise. "This demon just ripped open time to get rid of you? Why didn't he just throw you into space or under the sea?"
Jack shrugged. "Aku believed in facing off against me when he was at his most powerful. To cast me down at the futility of my mission to stop him."
"That's... That just stupid. That's like Evil Overlord mistake number... Hold on." Discord snapped his claw as a book appeared in his claw, causing Jack to raise his eyebrow at the title.
'Evil Overlord List'
"Six, thirteen, forty one..." Discord muttered as he flipped through. "Huh... Well, I wouldn't really call myself an 'Evil Overlord', but I made couple mistakes myself. Eh, I'll be sure to look through it again if I really need to."
Discord banished the book as he looked back to Jack. "Still, you had to be a thorn in his side to be causing this kind of reaction?"
"I find it more troubling that you reference to such a book in the first place," Jack said quietly as he took a bite.
Discord gave a small chuckle as he looked to the ceiling. "Let's just say my job back at home requires me to be a fair hand at dealing chaos. At least it was until I was stoned and placed as a garden ornament for a thousand years or so. So I wasn't exactly happy when I was freed."
Jack gave him a long look, which caused Discord to grimaced slightly as he ran the last few sentences in his head. "Oh. Well that might appear bad, but I defend that I was created by accident and was later tasked in making sure certain parameters were followed. I didn't go around in spite... Not initially anyways. Something or a certain someone got too uppity for their own good and I paid the price for it."
Jack slowly nodded his head, calmly eating as he listen to Discord's tale. "And your job entitles you to cause wanton destruction?"
"No." Discord grumbled as he answered. "My job was to regulate to weather, make sure certain aspects of the world function as normal as possible. Things like that."
"I see." Jack calmly drank his water. "And did anything happen to cause this person to see you in bad light?"
Discord open his mouth to answer, his scathing reply cut short as he remembered something Celestia had yelled at him sometime ago.
'I was there Discord, I saw you bring the storm the day the Wendigos appeared!'
Discord had initially ignored what she had said in a fit of anger. He never willingly brought any creature that could hurt his mother's people. But now to think on it, it made some sense. The storm was weakening far too quickly and Discord had to keep the balance of the world in check. To make sure that ponykind strived beyond themselves.
Perhaps this was his fault to begin with. He just pushed the storm a little further before leaving. Had he know the Wendigos had manifested within the storm he would have banished them without thought. The storm may have united ponykind through hardship, but it was Celestia who capitalized on it and demonized chaos.
Essentially blaming him for it.
When Scribe demanded Discord to retrieve Celestia and Luna, he was confused to see the sisters in charge of a growing country. It infuriated him to see the two pass knowledge without the ponies learning through trial and error. He appeared and demanded they leave, and was attacked on the spot by pony guards.
Discord sighed, rubbing his head. "I guess. Wouldn't be the first time I did something without thinking it through or seeing the results."
"Hmm." Jack only hummed at this. "Even the most wisest and elder beings can make mistakes in a moments folly. All you can do is grow beyond it."
"Kind of hard for me." Discord groaned as he rubbed his face in annoyance. "They all think I'm this super evil creature of death and darkness."
"Are you?"
"What?! No! Of course not. I'm fair! I can perform good deeds if I tried, but I don't because its not what chaos do. Its neutral, it doesn't side with anyone or anything." Discord sighed as he looked to the mirror of the end of the stall, seeing his aged and withered face looking back at him. "But I can't be evil. I seen evil first hand, it killed my Mother, nearly destroyed my world. But... I have to do bad things to keep the world turning."
Jack said nothing to this. He saw the conflict of emotions running through the odd being's eyes, but let it go as it’s not his place to dig deeper. On his grim reminder, Discord's eyes fell once again onto the sword of the warrior, the feeling of harmonious power in such simple steel rising his curiosity once again as he asked.
“And what of you, man out of time? For what I can sense you are not holding a sword of steel only, are you?” At the mention of his sword, Jack’s palm touched it’s handle, Discord for a moment thought he had said something wrong, but it appeared to be only a subconscious reaction.
“Yes, this magic sword is Aku’s weakness and fear. Passed through many evils, corrected many wrongs, all in search of a way back to correct the evil Aku has unleashed.” Jack’s words were sturdy, and eyes determined. His mission was going to be complete, eventually.
“Huh, so how do you find these ‘evils’? You just go about your merry way and they find you?”
“No, I search for a way to return to my own time, but once I do there’s innocents captured, villains in rule. I can’t let them be. It’s in my duty to help those in need, even if it means to lose my only way back.” Jack’s determination didn’t even witter, but his eyes sadden, probably by the sheer amount of times it has happened.
“Huh...” Discord was about to note that if Jack did go to the past, all of his actions and all the ‘evils’ he corrected would have been for nothing.
He would essentially erase them from history, not just the evils either, but the people he saved as well.
But telling such a thing would make Jack, a warrior that apparently holding the equivalent of a weaponized Element of Harmony on his waist, react rather poorly, if not traumatize the man. He needed something to believe in, and to tell him that would be…. well, that would be truly evil. Discord didn’t know much of the human, and he was not going to take that risk. “Just for curiosity has there been any stunningly good looking ‘dragons’ like myself in your travels?”
“Well, I have seen many creatures of various sizes and looks, I could tell you about the dragons I have met, if you share the same about anything of anything that could help me on my quest for a way back.”
“Deal.”
Several Hours later
Discord couldn't help but be amazed so far at the stories Jack told him. This human was the pinnacle of the human body and spirit, and he only got better as time went on. If he had to guess, in a fight between him and Marcus, Jack would win with pure skill alone.
No offense to the Colonel, Jack fought monsters the size of buildings and robots in droves and still came out on top.
Still…
Marcus was growing in skills and he survived this long, that along with his runes to back him up, so maybe he shouldn’t be counted out just yet.
Discord had just finished weaving his own tale of his journey to find the human world that Marcus hailed from. Jack held his cup in his hands, his face filled with regret and sorrow.
“I find it disturbing that such a pure being fell into corruption.” Jack murmured softly before taking a drink.
“The Bag of Tirek is a powerful artifact of a jealous being.” Discord tilted his head back as he looked to the roof. “His grab for power and his envy of my mother created the monster I know. I can bet even this Aku character would have a hard time in defeating him, if even that.”
“Aku would no doubt try and hold a partnership with him” Jack tilted his head, but Discord only gave a dry laugh while shaking his head.
“Oh no, there is no ‘partnership’ with Tirek. Either you fall in line or be drained of everything you hold dear, becoming a puppet for his anger.” Discord's eyes held a haunted look before he shook his head. "No matter. I just need a good rest before I leave once more."
Discord pulled on odd looking pocket watch and took a peek at it. Jack couldn't help but stare at the confusing clock face. It made little sense and Jack couldn't help but blink away tears that began to pour out. Discord look at him with surprise before shutting it closed. "Sorry."
"Uh..." Jack held his head, blinking rapidly. "What was that?"
"A watch linked to my original timeline. Tells me how much time has passed in my world. Only a chaotic mind can make sense of it." Discord put the watch away before looking around in confusion. "Hey, why did it get quiet all of a sudden?"
Jack and Discord turn around to see everyone staring at the entrance, looks of fear on their faces as they stared at the three very short humans looking back at them with vile grins on their faces.
"So Sammy, thought we couldn't find this hole in the ground eh?" The middle dwarf called out. "You should know better than that."
Sammy gritted his teeth, his hands slowly reaching for a hidden weapon beneath the bar, only for the wall to explode and three large robots step through. "Damn you Jarrel. Leave this place."
"I don't think so, Deserter." Jarrel sneered, pointing his finger at him with disgust. "You hid our prizes from our minds, but not our eyes."
Discord looked around to see everyone tense up, the fear surrounding them escalated, some even bursting to tears. Sammy roared in anger as he pulled out what appeared to be a heavy machine gun and fired. The three heavy duty robots were standing before the midgets by the time Sammy took aim, taking the rounds with ease. "Curse you and your slaver partners."
"Slavers..." Jack voice echoed out, slowly standing from his seat, his eyes zeroing in on the three. "You enslave people?"
"For money, power, heh, even pleasure." Jarrel chuckled darkly, causing Jack to draw his sword. "Oh, watch out fellas, he has a itty bitty sword."
Jack scowled before rushing to them, sword trailing behind him as he neared them. Discord watched on, frowning as his conscious began to poke at him, demanding that he interfer.
Jack swung his sword at the approaching robot, only for the robot to jump back in mid swing, barely grazing the metal chassis. By the time Jack realized what happen, the robot was swinging its own punch and took the punch to the chest, sending him flying backwards.
Discord watched as Jack flew through the air, flipping around until he landed gracefully on the ground, a scowl on his face. Jarrel and his cronies began to laugh at this.
"Alright hero, what makes you think any moves you have is going to work when facing against a telepath?" Jarrel smirked as his robots pistoned there arms, jets of steam flaring from their ports. "Our minds are linked to the machines and our mind is far faster than your reactions."
Discord stirred his drink, looking to Jack as he stared hard at the robots before a smirk appear on his face. Discord couldn't help but smile as well. "What a bunch of idiots." He whispered as he drain the rest of his drink.
Jack jumped off, racing back into the fray. Jarrel roared out in laughter as Jack neared them. "Idiot! I said you can't win against a telepath, we know your every move before you even-!"
Jack swung his sword, slicing through the robot with complete ease. The robot on the other hand seemingly punched the air for no reason, missing Jack completely. The second robot raised its arms to crush him before it rotated its entire upper half and slamming the ground behind it. Jack swung the blade upwards between its legs, cutting it half as it tried to turn around to grab him. Jack rolled to the side and sliced the third robot's leg off while it raised its leg up to crush Jack before it lost its supporting leg and toppled over.
Jack stood back up and slammed the blade into its chest, deactivating it before placing the sword away. He turn back to Jarrel and his cronies, his eyes narrowed into slits as he made his way towards them.
"But...But how?!" Jarrel spluttered in shock. "We saw what you were going to do?!"
Discord couldn't help but laugh out loud at his shocked face. "Because Jack here is a trained warrior, he cleared his mind while thinking up false movements to trick you. And you fell for it, like he knew you would. Some 'great' telepath you turn out to be."
Jarrel took several steps back before giving an evil grin, causing Jack to pause at this before he ducked a swung chair. He turn back in shock to see a women with four eyes staring at him with a blank look. Jack looked around to see a dozen of the bar occupants grabbing weapons and made their way to him. Another few stood before Jarrel and his sleazy friends.
"Jarrel!" Sammy roared in anger as he pressed his index fingers to his temple and tried to break his customers free from their control, sweat beginning to bead on his forehead. "Release them!"
Jarrel ignored him, smiling sinisterly at Jack, gripping his sword uselessly. Jack couldn't hurt these people with his sword, but maybe with his martial skills he can put them down.
"Thinking you can knock them out? Won't happen. We're in complete control of their bodies, they won't fall until they die. What you are going to do now hero?" Jarrel lean back and gave a bark of laughter, only to freeze in horror as Discord stood before him. His face hidden in darkness and his eyes glowing with sickly yellow light.
"I've done bad things in my life." Discord's voice was soft, but held a large amount anger. "I am not innocent of taking a beings mind and tinkering with it. But I just ramp up a single emotion until its the only thing they feel. I'm guilty of such a thing, but in the end, I paid for it, still am."
Discord looked down at them. "But I don't enslave a mind. Controlling a thinking, breathing being against their will is the most heinous thing a living being can do to another."
The three attempted to subdue Discord with the mental powers, only to freeze in horror as they felt Discord snap up their consciousness like mere paper. Discord couldn't help but give an evil smile to the three telepaths, holding their minds in his grasp.
"You think you can control me? I don't think so. For this insult, let's take away the one thing that makes you special." Discord gave a dark chuckle, the three telepaths’ faces grew from horror to pain as they screamed in agony.
Jack watched as the enslaved civilians blinked as one, their eyes filled with fright at what had almost happened, immediately apologizing to Jack. He looked back to the three telepath, now falling to their knees, their faces filled with horror and pain as they snarled at Discord. Discord held up a single claw, a small glowing orb held within.
"This is the power you love to abuse so much and enslave others with. " Discord stated calmly, as if he was talking about the weather. "This is what happens to your abilities when you go against someone who can take them away from you."
The three yelled in denial as Discord cracked the orb in his grip, it gave a flare of light, vibrating, and then exploding, vanishing from sight. "Good luck. You have a lot to answer for."
Discord walked away, his eyes trained on Jack, ignoring the civilians as they glowered in anger enclosing the three former telepaths. Jarrel spluttered out mercy, but realize none were to be had as they were grabbed and dragged outside.
"Cruel." Jack said once the yelps of pain from the three became part of the background.
"But necessary." Discord closed his eyes before taking a small huff of annoyance. "The gall they had, trying to control me."
Jack said nothing to this, only to blink as Discord held out his claw to Jack. He looked to Discord who had a small smile on his face. "Yes?"
"This is where we part ways." Discord said, his smile becoming a wide grin. "It was good to meet you, Samurai Jack. Have a safe journey and a successful quest."
Jack gave a soft smile in return and took his claw and gave it a single firm shake. "And you in return Discord, Daimyo of Chaos."
Discord turned to Sammy, his multiple arms wringing nervously before the human and draconequus. "Thank you... Both of you."
Jack stood straight before bending on a dignified bow to the alien bartender, while Discord gave a salute before snapping his claw, a swirling white portal opening behind him. Both Jack and Sammy watched as Discord floated off the ground before flying into the portal and snap shut.
"Good luck, Discord." Sammy said quietly as he turn to walk, only to struggle to not fall from something he tripped on. Sammy look down, his eyes nearly popping out of their socket to see a stack of gold bricks at his feet.
Jack reach down and pulled the note attached to them, giving a quick read before smiling and handing the note to Sammy.
Sammy blinked in confusion as took the note and gave it a read.
Dear Sammy,
This pile of bricks made of the Element Au is the illicit funds for the three short stacks. I know of your past, thanks to the little mind rush I had with them.
You grew beyond them and helped many people. So in return for your brave deeds and helping yours truly, I give you this stack on the floor before you.
Oh yeah!
One of your robot waiters should be freaking out now because they found your office filled to the brim with the rest!
Your friend, Discord
P.S. Give Jack some gold bricks, tell him he might need it later.
The Void
“Hmm...This maybe?” Discord muttered as he vanished into one world. A few scant seconds later, Discord reappeared, snarling as he fought off the biped that was grasping him.
Discord attempted to kick the humanoid off of him, but the black tendrils exploding from the being’s back latched onto him.
“Let go of me, dummy reject!” Discord snarled at the blighted thing.
The white faceless being only grasped him harder, attempting to pierce his scales with his claws. Discord growled, and with a snap his claw, vanished from the strange monsters grasp, only to appear behind him and lash out with his tail. Discord scowled as he held out an arm and magicked up a bat. But then looked at the bat, then back at the thing.
“...Bigger.”
The bat grew in size to about the size of a small tree.
“Bigger.”
Now it was as large as a redwood tree in its prime.
“Bigger!”
Discord smiled as his bat was now the size of a supertanker, giving the vile creature floating helpless in the void a rather vicious grin.
“Coming up to the home plate, is number 16, Discord!” Dozens of Discords -and a few Qs who just happen to be moseying about came to see the spectacle- cheered in the distance, waving flags and number #1 hand foams. Discord could only chuckle as he pulled the absurdly large bat back.
“The wind up!” The tall, faceless monster tumbled through the void, unable to regain its bearings in such a voidless existence.
“The pitch!” Discord stuck out his tongue, squinting at the floating monster.
“Discord swings!” The large bat swung forward with an impossible speed belying its size. The slender being barely had time to react to the massive bat before being slammed and sent flying across the white expanse at nearly supersonic speeds.
“And it going! And going! Aaaand it’s outta here!"
Discord raised his arms as the crowd of Q’s and Discord's cheered before he snapped his claw and vanished the summoned Discords. Several Q’s waved goodbye to him as they made their way back to their worlds, all but one.
“Very impressive." Q said quietly, giving a small bow to him. “I say he might be regretting with messing with you.”
“Q, you flatter me, you really do.” Discord said with a smile. “Its been too long.”
Discord gave him a humble hug, which Q return with equal familiarity. Even though there was multiple universes along with other Qs and Discords, this Q and Discord knew each other due to one solitary being.
“Faust contacted me.” Q replied quietly. “Wanted me to check up on you.”
Discord lowered his head, rubbing his head. “Ah Mother, even in the Eye of Harmony, she still looks out for me.”
Q looked out to the white expanse, remaining silent for a moment before looking back to him. “She is ashamed how your life turned out.”
“I’m fine.” Discord said, but Q held him by the shoulder and looked directly into his eyes.
“No, you are not. You suffered, not just being called a monster, but you saw a version of yourself die. I doubt even I can say that and not be somewhat squeamish about seeing your own self die in the most agonizing way possible.” Q closed his eyes and gave a frustrated sigh. “And now you are roaming the multiverse, facing monsters that would give me trouble. Discord, your mother worries about you. You are her child, even if you started off as an experiment. She loves you and will never be far from you.”
“Is that the reason you are here? Because you worry for me? Where were you when I was trapped in stone?!” Discord scowled angrily. “I was turned to stone and I couldn’t even sleep. I was forced to be awake for over a millenia, do you know how hard that is for a being such as myself. To never sleep, to never dream. To always be aware and unable to move!”
“You know the reason. I cannot interfere with a world outside my own. The Q Continuum had barely allowed me to help train your abilities with Faust’s constant prodding and pleas. She even begged them to allow you under my care at the time of Tirek’s rampage.” Q lowered his head. “I am glad they didn’t. I wasn’t the best person to be around. So full of myself and my own ego.”
Discord gave a frustrated groan, before letting his head slump to his chest. “Sorry. I’m just…”
“I know.” Q gave him a small smile. “I understand. However, there is another reason to why I am here.”
“Oh?” Discord perked up at this, seeing a mischievous smile on his teacher’s face.
“I want to say that this will be the last time we meet. As teacher and student, I mean. I wish to part ways as friends.” Q said quietly, giving him a bright smile. “I have a son to look after, and I have to be sure he is on his best behavior. Can't leave any regrets before I do this.”
“You… Have a son?!” Discord stared at him with shock. This was definitely news to him!
“Yes. He has passed a test, but the Q Continuum is not to sure about his character. So they directed me into keeping an eye on him, to be sure he is on the right path.”
“So… This is goodbye then.” Discord said sadly, frowning even more as Q gave him a sad smile.
“But, not forever, I should think.” Q walked off, giving a small skip as he turn back to Discord. “I’m also passing some information to you as well. There is a world filled with Ninjas that may hold something interesting for you.”
“Really… Ninjas?” Discord couldn’t help but quirk an eyebrow at this information.
“Oh believe me, these are not the ninjas you are thinking. One of these worlds hold a hero with a certain skill that may help you in your quest. Just keep a look out for blue eyes, blond hair, loves Ramen noodles, and has an unhealthy love for orange.” Q said with a smile on his face before leaving, causing Discord to shake his head but smiled none the less.
“A world filled with ninjas, huh.” Discord said as he opened another world. “That will be one to look out for.”
-Equestria, Canterlot-
-Third POV-
Discord frowned as he appeared in the middle of Canterlot, he turned to see dozens of ponies freezed in place as they took note of him.
"Eh. Did I go back? No, this is a different Equestria. Ponies look a little larger. Oh well, lets try this again." Discord held up his claw to return to the void, but a spinning black portal appeared several yards in front of his person, much to his surprise. "Well... This is new. A multiverse transition portal?"
Discord raised an eyebrow as a human tumbled through. His odd clothes made him appear to be some sort of hero. Discord watched as he dusted himself off before tensing at the sight of him.
-Jarel POV-
Its been a while since the portal spat me out like this, I usually land on my feet... and it's the first time I've appeared so publicly. The ponies are bigger here than the ones in the last dimension, if there's one inconsistency that's consistent between each Equestria I've been to, is that the ponies' sizes are always different. It's like each version has their own definition of "little pony" and now these guys are closer to my chest than my stomach.
But I better get out of here before... And Discord is right there staring right at me with a raised eyebrow. Aw nuts, I need to get away from him. I better make a quick and soft escape. Yeah, that's right, walking away in fast pace and not looking back won't totally make him interested in me to mess with me... right?
I fought a Discord before but that's only because that one was playing a game with me. He's the only one capable of physically stealing the orb that allowed me to harm powerful beings like him and Celestia and granting me immunity to some of their powers, mainly just telekinesis and transformation magic. Especially transformation magic, since those will kill me instead of changing me. While I read and heard about some Discords turning people into things, I really don't want to find out what this Discord is like.
-Third POV-
Discord watched as the human tried to walk as robotically possible away, sadly this human couldn't win a game of poker with a bag over his head and a voice scrambler if his life depended on it.
Discord snapped his claw, porting right in front of the human’s path. The odd man slammed into him and tumbled to the ground, rubbing his nose in annoyance before looking up to Discord.
Whatever the human was going to say apparently died on the way out if the small squeak he coughed out was anything to note.
Discord lean in close, his eyes narrowing at the suspicious dimension hopping human. "And who, pray tell, are you, my odd dimension hopping human."
-Jarel POV-
"Oh! Um... Hi Discord," Crud, I don't think I was supposed to say that because now he is looking at me with more interest. Darn, too late now.
"I'm a dimensional traveler, well more like a journeyman or something like that now, and I'm trying to find a way to go back home through specific portals and stuff." My nervous laughter isn’t helping, trying to look away from Discord isn’t helping either, stop it brain! I feel very afraid of him and the only thing I can think of right now is to not tick him off and use his powers on me, or at least not ‘powerfully’.
-Third POV-
"Hmm..." Discord walked around the human, his paw to his chin as he examined him. The human journeyman gulped as he gripped him from the scruff of his shirt and lifted him to his own eye level.
The surrounding ponies had all but fled at this point and replaced with a dozen guards. Discord had ignored them in favor of the human in his grip. Slowly searching for something only Discord could see. After a moment, he gave the human a confused look.
"What an odd dimension traveler you are." Discord quietly mutter. "Whoever put you on this journey really hates you."
Discord took a one last look on his face before dropping him on his rear. "Eh, its this world's current problem. Good luck fighting the white blood cells."
-Jarel POV-
I rolled my eyes and nodded as I felt inclined to agree with him on a guy really hating me, after all, the one who started this dimension hopping adventure found out I have the potential to stop his evil plans.... Wait, what was that about white blood cells?
"What is he talking about?" I asked before noticing the guards surrounding me. I really hope he just meant the guards. "So, um hey guys... I guess I'm under arrest now, huh? But um, under what charges?" I tried to give a small smile while hoping the guards will at least listen to reason first.
-Third POV-
Discord smirked slightly as he heard the human’s question. He stood perfectly still, ignoring the guards as they arrested the confused traveler for no apparent reason. He closed his eyes and focused himself, only for that to be shattered by a bellowing voice.
"DISCORD! WE WILL STOP THEE BEFORE YOU RAIN DESTRUCTION ON THIS FAIR CITY!" Discord rolled his eyes as he watched Luna racing towards him from above.
Possibly looking for some impressive landing to endear her to the guards and populace, adding more regalness and powerfulness to her already alicorn standing. But all Discord saw an opportunity to be a pain.
Discord snapped his claw and stepped to the side at the same time, watching Luna land before him, only to slide wildly out of control towards the human and Royal Guards.
The crash of bodies and shouts of surprise nearly brought a tear to his eyes. Discord watched with amusement as Luna found herself on top of the human, a flustered look on his face for his closed proximity to the Lunar Princess.
Discord laughed out heartily as a spinning white portal open behind him. An evil prank idea just appeared within in his mind. Oh, he couldn’t pass it up! As for the human, Discord believes he can talk himself out of it. He felt like a goody two shoes and all. "Good luck human! Do everything I just told you as planned! You can rule the world with an iron fist! The pony princesses are just some weak fools! Make them your concubines if you are feeling randy!"
Discord jumped through, laughing the entire time while the portal closed.
-Jarel POV-
No... Discord did not just say what I think he just said. There’s no way Luna would- Oh no, why is she looking at me like that?
"SEIZE HIM!" Luna screamed in her Royal Canterlot voice. "THOU DARE MAKE ME YOUR CONCUBINE FOR YOUR PERVERTED FLESH! WE SHALL SMITE YE TILL NOT BUT ASHES REMAIN CUR!"
And this is where I start running and screaming, “BAD DAY! BAD DAY! BAD DAY!”
-Grand Temple; Turin, New York-
Deep underground, Desmond swallowed nervously as his father, Rebecca, and Shaun trailed behind him, making their way deeper into the Temple. But as they walked Desmond paused, causing the others to stop as well.
"What is it, Desmond?" William muttered, gripping his pistol while Shaun and Rebecca tensed up, ready to fight.
Desmond looked around, a frown on his face as he searched the cavern. "I... I don't know. I feel like I'm being watched."
"Perhaps it’s Juno?" Shaun tried to answer cheerfully, "After all, she absolutely loves us- ugh! Really?!"
"Shut up, Shaun." Rebecca said, retracting her elbow as Desmond shook his head at Shaun.
"No... This is something different. But..." Desmond frown and shook his head. "Nah, its nothing."
William reached over and clamped his hand on Desmond's shoulder. "Son... What is it?"
Desmond couldn't help but rub his head at the gentle prodding. "It sounds stupid, but it feels familiar."
"Excuse me, did you just say it 'feels' familiar?" Shaun couldn't help but place a hand on his forehead. "Maybe you are just a little lightheaded. We can take from here."
"No." Desmond brushed the hands away. "Come on, we don't have much time."
Had Desmond concentrated to use his 'Eagle' vision, he would've taken note of a human figure standing off to the side, staring at him. The invisible figure smiled as the group walked on by, his eyes giving a faint yellowish glow as they made their way deeper.
"Finally. Its about time this little side trip is over."
TCB: The Other Side of the Spectrum: Multiverse Journey
The Unexpected Guest (revised)
Desmond frowned as he looked at the two glowing figures before him, fighting each other as they both dragged skeletons from their ancient decrepit closets.
"She would sacrifice you -Sacrifice the world - for no other reason other to deny me vindication!" Juno looked to Desmond, her eyes filled with anger, almost as the entire concept made her ill.
"They will enslave your kind, Desmond!" Minerva pleaded with him, begging him to see reason. "Is this not why you fight? Is this not why you came here? To ensure more than just your race's future, but its freedom?"
Juno rounded to Minerva, scowling to those words."What future? What freedom? Billions dead and the whole cycle begun anew? This world has known nothing but heartache and horror since we left it."
"Our gift to them, and you'd see it all returned." Minerva said quietly, but for a single moment, Desmond saw what appeared to be a sign of... hope?
"Enough!" Desmond had enough of the squabbling between the two holographic future-like from the past women. He didn't have time for this and he needed to act.
Minerva closed her eyes, and yet Desmond felt something was off. "You must not do this."
Desmond shook his head, he knew what he needed to be done, but first he needed to ensure Minerva that they still had a future, even with Juno mucking around. "Whatever Juno's planning – however terrible it might seem today – we'll find a way to stop it, but the alternative, what you want... There's no hope there."
"If you free her – you'll be destroyed." Minerva said quietly, almost as she was going through the motions instead of trying to stop Desmond from making a horrible mistake.
"It will happen in an instant. There will be no pain."Juno held herself in front of Desmond, all but ignoring Minerva, a smile on her face to indicate that Desmond had made his decision. Desmond turn to Minerva, expecting her to say something, but all she did was give him a look, one that almost appeared pleased?
"It's done, Minerva. The decision's made." Desmond turned back to her, Juno standing by him with a look on her face that all but screamed that she has won.
Only for that look to be wiped off a millisecond later as she saw the peaceful expression on Minerva's face. "I understand, Desmond."
"Oh...?" Desmond expected more, but the look on Minerva's face threw him off. "Well... okay then. Uh... Dad! You need to go. All of you. Now. Get as far away from here as you can."
"Come with us. We'll find another way." William couldn't help it. His son was going to sacrifice himself for the world, and no one will ever know.
"There isn't time!" Desmond couldn't help but be annoyed that his father was attempting to be a father now. Still, it touched Desmond that his father still cared for him rather than just sending him out like a soldier.
"Son... "
"You know it's true. It's already started. I need to do this now. So go! GO!" Desmond turned around to walk to the pedestal, only to freeze up when he saw a man sitting on top of it. The reaction not going unnoticed as everyone else just caught sight of the man himself, their slack-jawed expressions evidently causing the man no end of amusement.
"Damien?" William blinked in confusion, staring at the brown sweater wearing man with utter surprise. "W-w-what are you doing here?! Get off of that!"
"Nice to see you too, Miles." Damien chuckled out loud. William only scowled at his comment, only to raise an eyebrow as Juno got in his face.
"Get off of that!" Juno growled as the man only smiled and lean down to her.
"Make me." Damien chuckled at the look on her face, only to turn to Desmond walked up to him.
"Listen, we don’t have-" Desmond started, only for the man to scoop him up and swung him around.
"Des, my boy! Look how you grown! It’s been... what, eighteen years since I last saw you?" Damien exclaimed, turning to William with mock hurt on his face. "Miles, you finally found him! I could have thrown a big party and everything for him!"
Desmond shrugged the man off, a look of irritation on his face. "I don't have time for this. I have to activate the device so I-?!"
"Bah, no worries about that, my dear boy!" Damien exclaimed, grabbing Desmond by the shoulder and whirling him right around. "With a simple snap of my fingers, everything will be okay!"
William's eyes shot open, horror morphing on his face. "Wait, Desmond stop-"
*Snap*
Desmond’s eyes widened as the entire facility began to shake, sounds of ancient machinery moving and groaning as they began their task. Juno stared around her, her face filled with horror as information that only she could read passed her eyes, before she rounded on him.
"WHAT DID YOU DO?!?" Juno screamed at Damien, who was waving his arms around as if he was conducting an orchestra.
"Me? Oh nothing much." Damien sang out as he waved his arm about. "Just bypassed a couple millennia of coded data and system links that you installed onto your prison to allow you freedom. Let me tell you, learning all that was such a pain in the rear if you ask me. Then again, it was all Minerva's idea."
Juno looked back to Minerva, her face filled with horror. "No..." she whispered at the small look of victory on Minerva's face. "No that's impossible. You can not learn such details of our systems, even with the items we left behind! Your mind wouldn't be able to handle that kind of information, its touch is too much for a mere human!"
Damien stopped, looking back to Juno with an unsettling smile on his face. Juno's image took a step back, her eyes focused on Damien's own, which glowed with a sickly yellow light.
"What....what are you?" Juno whispered as Damien raised his hand.
"Me?" Damien smirked as he looked to Juno. "I'm plan B."
*Snap*
Desmond took a step back in surprise as Juno seemingly fell apart and the swirling lights that made up her form were sucked up by the glowing controls. Damien smiled as he turned around to the others, bowing to them in a extravagant manner.
"Dad... You know this guy?" Desmond whispered to his father, who only grimaced at the question.
"Yes. Unfortunately." William muttered. "His name is Damien Divisive, the last name should clue you in on how he functions with others."
"Miles, you wound me so!" Damien called out as he walked up to the group. "I didn't hear any complaints from you when it was my rear end in the line of fire while you and the other assassins escaped. Oh so great, Grand Master."
"You have a tendency for theatrics and explosives... more on the latter than the former." William deadpanned, which only caused Damien's smile to widen.
"Details, details..." Damien waved off before marching up to Minerva with a large smile on his face. "Well, the job is done, is it not?"
"What are-" Desmond started, but fell silent as Minerva gave a small smile and shook her head.
"Yes. It is. Although you could have left at any point for the last few centuries." Minerva answered, causing the entire room to mull over her words.
"The last..." Rebecca stared at Damien in utter shock. "Few centuries!"
Damien turned to the group, a frown on his face, as if he just remembered he wasn't alone in the temple. "Ah...right. Forgot you four... Hmm... how to say this, how to say this?"
Damien smiled as he snapped his finger, a sign with dozens of flashing neon lights appeared over head, only to shut off after a moment or two. "What the?! Stupid chaos, work with me a little here." Damien growled as he began to hit the sign above him before it flashed back on...
Before falling top of him.
"Discord?" Shaun blinked as he watched Damien struggled to get the sign off of him "What is that suppose to mean?"
"It is his name." Minerva answered, a small smile on her face as she watch the being struggle for a moment longer before she looked back. "My people have seen and created many things, but an extra dimensional being is a first for us. For whatever reason, the Nexus that allowed me to see our future showed him arriving on this world. I hid the results from Juno and Jupiter, given that the results shown an even higher chance of success than just you alone, Desmond. Still, a being from beyond our universe arriving on this world is hard to take in, let alone understand. Neither would believe it and question all the results, but I believed it to be true. So I planned and waited. While trying to find ways to save this world, I created a device that would keep Discord here on this plane of existence."
"Yeah, you’re so lucky I don't really age all that much since I’m more attuned to my world instead of this one." The newly revealed Discord muttered, giving a popping sound with his neck before looking to Desmond. "Imagine my surprise when I was locked in this world thanks to her. I have own mission to get to, not this side quest you have me on-"
"And I apologize for that Discord, I truly am, but... would you have really stood by and watched the world be enslaved?" Minerva gave him a long look. "If not by the Templars, then Juno herself?"
"Don’t forget, I have another world I need to save from being enslaved," Discord waved her away as he walked through her to Desmond. "I‘ve been following your family line for a long time, Des. Let me tell you, your family is one stubborn group."
"Um... Thanks?" Desmond wasn’t sure how to take that, rubbing his neck at his statement.
"Either way, its done. I spent all this time on this world, and when I felt the barriers of the world once more, I found myself wanting to see this through to the end." Discord rolled his eyes, giving Desmond a big grin. "And your family is a real hoot to watch. Especially Edward Kenway and Ratonhnhaké:ton. Boy were those two rather brutal fighting, much more feral than Altair and Ezio’s subdued style. It’s amazing what a difference several pistols, a rope and knife, and a tomahawk can make..."
Desmond took a step back as Discord snapped his fingers and a familiar tomahawk, wrist bracers, and a pair of odd-looking swords with triggers on them appeared before him, floating in midair. "Make use of them. Ratonhnhaké:ton asked me to give his personal weapon to you on his deathbed as I performed his people's last rites for him. Ezio just told me to give you his bracers for the one called Desmond. As for Edward, he said an assassin of his line can make use of them. Sadly, I couldn't save him from his fate that night, but he seemed content with his death. Too bad about his son though, dropped the ball on that one."
Discord snapped his fingers, seemingly melting apart and reforming into his original appearance. Desmond took a step back in shock at it, along with everyone else sans Minerva. Discord waved his arm, causing the items moved to Desmond and secured themselves to him.
"Told them the truth about me, like I did with every ancestor of yours. Well, except Haythem, that would be a headache I just didn't want to deal with. The others though… they wanted you to succeed, even though they haven't had a clue of the meaning behind your very existence." Discord chuckled, a small frown grew on his face before he looked up in pure horror. “And-HEY LOOK OVER THERE!”
“Wha-”
Dark, acrid black smoke spouted from the area where Discord used to be, leaving Desmond coughing.
When the smoke cleared, he could still see Discord standing off in the distance, an exasperated expression on his face, a bag labeled “smoke bomb” in his grasp.
“...I swear, it usually works better than that!” Discord protested as he looked at the bag in claw. "Guarantee cover my hoof, bah! Anyways, before I go and return to my duties elsewhere. I leave one nasty surprise left for our dear Templar friends."
"What’s that?" Desmond coughed out as he cleared his chest.
"The world's spotlight," Discord smirked as he snapped his claw, a swirling colorful portal opening behind him. "And the Truth shall set them free! Goodbye Desmond, happy hunting."
Rebecca stared wide-eyed at the swirling mass before her laptop chirped up. She open it to read the notes, only for her jaw to drop at what she was seeing. "No way!"
"What? What is it?" Shaun blinked in surprise at Rebecca's shout.
"The Templars just found themselves being outed on a global scale! Within seconds, even!" Rebecca read the reports racing across the net. "Every dirty secret from now to the Middle Ages is being spread!"
"What?!" William shouted out in alarm, rounding back to Discord, only to see him disappear through the portal. "What about-"
"Nothing about the Assassin Order, sir. Just Templars, and there is a ton of data backing each claim! Hell, there is a list of names of known Templars, even some we didn't even know were Templars!" Rebecca exclaimed as she went down the list. "Government, religious, scientific, almost anyone with influence within the Templar Order is being thrown under the spotlight! Along with their crimes in plain view."
Minerva smiled as she saw the group react in shock and awe, she was glad she didn't throw the results away. Discord knew what he was doing, he made sure to keep the Templars away from positions of power while gaining all information on them, but still made it seem like they were in control. The Templars would know first hand just how little control they actually had. Especially with their list of dealings being spread everywhere. They no longer had to contend with the Assassins alone.
William's phone rang, causing him to blink in surprise at the unknown number that his caller ID displayed. "Hello?"
"Is this the Grand Master of the Assassins?"
"Who is this? How did you get this number?!" William demanded as he clutched his phone.
"The President of the United States." The voice replied easily enough, causing William to pale instantly. "I have a need of your services. A man named Damien Divisive appeared in my office a week ago. Told me everything about what is going on. He said to look out for a sign of big changes and call this number. I believe you have seen the changes now."
"I do..." William answered, nerves on edge.
"I need your Order to clean house, so to speak. No repercussions. After all, who would go after you after all the evidence being thrown out. No doubt your Order is going to be busy in the next few weeks… Have to go, my daughters want me to see the planet wide Aurora Borealis. You have a good man on your side, Grand Master. A little looney, but a good man."
"Yeah..." William muttered quietly, watching as the portal closed with a pop. "A little looney..."
The Void
Discord drifted along the white expanses, ignoring the worlds nearby. Most realms tended to be similar to one another in most ways. Pocket universes, so to speak. There were few, if any differences between worlds. Most clustered near one another due their similarities, so it was wise to skip some worlds for the time being.
*grrrrrrrrr *
Discord blinked, putting a claw on his stomach in confusion. "Seriously? We just hang about for a couple of centuries and you want something now? Alright, just let me summon up-"
*GRRRRRRRRR *
Discord rolled his eyes at this, his stomach can be so picky at times. "Fine, let see here. How about this?"
Discord ripped open a portal, changing into his human form to blend in as he passed through.
Konohagakure
Discord stepped through, taking in that his entrance was hidden in a dark alley.
"Well, isn't that convenient." Discord mused out loud with a small chuckle. He took several steps towards the main street, stopping to take in the inhabitants of this world.
Humans? Check.
Common clothes? Big uncheck.
Discord closed his eyes, his brown sweater and pants melting away and reforming into a comfortable shirt and shorts similar to the humans milling about, combinations of one or two that seemed the same gender, but with a different color scheme and variations of his own. Discord smirked, donning a pair of sunglasses as he stepped out into the crowd and blended within, confident that he remain unseen. A familiar scent drifted past his nose and he immediately turn to find the source of the delicious scent.
Ramen. Oh Goodness check!
Discord made his way through the crowd, unaware of the various eyes following him.
Hokage's Office
The young man pen his name on the scroll, his crystal blue eyes filled with mirth as he looked at the seal he placed at the corner of the document.
"Hope Mei doesn't mind the late gift I sent her. Then again, she always liked Hinata's honeyed rice balls." The man chuckled out loud, summoning a small toad and handed him the scroll. "Can you take this to Mei Terumī?"
"Got it boss!" The toad croaked out, saluting before vanishing from sight.
"Yes, sensei?" The man said out loud, not even looking at the man’s direction as he appeared from the wall. The ninja chuckled a bit, his smile hidden by his mask.
"Mah, still calling me your sensei, even though you are my boss now, Hokage. Or do you still prefer to be called Naruto?"
"Doesn’t change the fact you trained me, Kakashi. Nor do I mind you calling me that." Naruto chuckled, looking to the man. "What’s up?"
Kakashi single eye narrowed, showing Naruto the serious nature of his visit. "We have an intruder within the walls. We still trying to figure out how he got through without setting off your seals."
"I see." Naruto stood up to his full height, which now rivaled his former sensei.
"Do you want me to send out the ANBU, Hokage?" Kakashi bowed as he awaited for the answer.
"Where is he now?" Naruto asked as he looked over the city.
"He is heading towards Ichiraku's."
Naruto blinked once before raising his brow and looking back at Kakashi to see if he was joking. He was not. "Eh, its almost time for my lunch break too. I'll head out to find something to eat. Want to come, Sensei?"
Kakashi only nodded his head once, his eye filled with amusement at Naruto. "Only if you are paying."
"Eh! Don’t be like that, it can be like old times again!"
"I remember being broke after taking you to Ichiraku."
"Oi! I'm your boss! You pay!"
"I’ll tell Hinata you are going to Ichiraku against her wishes."
"You don't play fair, sensei. Ratting me out with my wife." Naruto deadpanned before grabbing his iconic cloak and jumped onto the window sill. "Alright, lets go then. I might get something to eat before we start our questioning."
“I can only hope he doesn’t share your appetite.” Kakashi sighed as he made to follow.
TCB: The Other Side of the Spectrum: Multiverse Journey
Naruto Uzumaki, Master of the Kage Bushin and Rasengan techniques, Sixth Hokage, Sage of Fire, Hero of Konoha and the Ninja World at large, was nervous. No, that wasn’t quite the right word for it. He wasn’t nervous, more like… anxious. That was a better word. Naruto Uzumaki, son of the Fourth Hokage, Student of Toad Sage Jiraya, and one of the new order of Sannin, was anxious.
And the reason for that was someone or something was in his home without his permission, possibly planning on enacting something horrible against for some past decision he made, or for the honor of some friend he had beaten down. It was his job as Hokage to protect his village, by virtue of being the strongest ninja of the entire village, after all.
And so, here he was, with an ANBU team and a contingent of Clones backing him up. It had taken a while, but they had finally managed to pinpoint whatever this shifting energy signature was. Naruto was scowling, seeing as the energy source was apparently sighted near the Ichiraku Ramen Stand by one Kakashi Hatake. Naruto was more than sure that Kakashi’s report was accurate; the Sharingan and years of experience were hard things to doubt. Eyes narrowing, scenarios of both Mr. Teiuchi and his daughter Ayame dead and strewn about the Ramen shop they ran, along with other, equally unpleasant images flashing through his mind, Naruto concentrated.
His fears were quickly dispelled, however when Naruto activated his Sage Mode. He could feel both of them alive, which was a relief. The source of the constantly shifting energy was there as well; this close to it, Naruto had a pretty good lock on it. Whatever it was, it wasn’t escaping this time.
Although… something seemed weird. When he was examining the energy, he could have sworn it… The best way he could have described it was that it ‘cocked an eyebrow’ at him. It wasn’t even a feeling or something like that, it literally looked like the energy cocked an eyebrow at him. What the hell was he dealing with?! Even when he was this close, he couldn’t get a proper ‘feel’ on the energy, it could literally be anything from a demonic chakra beast in human form, to a divine spirit or some crap like that! How he knew what a divine spirit’s chakra felt like was a different story altogether, for now though, Naruto motioned towards the shop, and an ANBU member ripped back the screen and found…!
Naruto blinked as the odd man stared back on him. He was a foreigner, that much was for certain. The odd, seemingly patched together clothing looked like it should have been made of rags or something, but it actually seemed like pretty high quality materials. It was simply… Odd. There wasn’t really another word to describe it, save for maybe ‘eccentric’. He was sure Ino would have flipped at seeing it, and made a mental note to see if any of the security cameras installed around Konoha had caught it on tape.
The strange man’s build wasn’t strong or anything, he looked kind of skinny if Naruto was honest with himself. No, that wasn’t the most unusual part about him. The strangest thing was most definitely his eyes. His cornea were white, his iris’ were red, and his scillia were yellow. He was also sporting a nice hat, in Naruto’s opinion, but the eyes were really striking. Of course, being who he was, and who he was friends with, Naruto was well aware what kind of power the eyes could hold. Unquenchable black fire, being able to see in every direction, obscenely powerful illusions, mastery of every singular Element… Yeah. That could be a problem.
“Ah, Naruto! My favorite customer, how have you been lately?”
Mr. Teiuchi’s voice snapped Naruto out of his apparently slightly self-inflicted daze. Those eyes were just creepy. He was beginning to think he could see them changing shape, even as he looked at them, but a quick glance proved him wrong.
“Uh…” Naruto chuckled, his hand hidden behind his back as he waved back the ANBU, “Doing great Mr. Teiuchi, you just can’t keep me away from your ramen!”
“Oh, is that so?” Ayame teased as she brought out a large bowl and set it in front of the strange looking man. “Not even your wife can stop you?”
Naruto paled at that moment, not because he was afraid of his wife, but because he was afraid of the disappointed look she would give him.
Letting Tsunade or Sakura punch his face in, full force? No problem.
Sparring with a drunk Lee? Bring. It. On.
Fighting Sasuke for no other reason just because? Weekly event.
Seeing the hurt and saddened look on his beautiful wife’s face? Might as well kill him then and there, because he would never forgive himself for doing that to her.
“Ah ha ha, no no!” Naruto rubbed his head, sweating and begging forgiveness for his future actions to his wife in his head. “She let me have some today.”
Teiuchi and Ayame could only raise an eyebrow at their Hokage, an imaginary arrow slamming through Naruto’s chest, the words ‘LIAR’ painted on it.
“Forgive me Hinata… It’s for good of the village… ’ Naruto thought-wept to himself as he set himself down on the seat next to the strange man, who only chuckled a bit as he ate his bowl. “Alright! Time to eat! My usual!”
Ayame laughed as walked over to the pot and poured three large bowls for their leader. “Here you go, Naruto.”
The strange man raised an eyebrow as Ayame set down the three bowls, watching Naruto as he slapped his hands together, bowing his head before giving her a large smile. “Let’s eat!”
The man paused in his meal, staring wide eyed as Naruto polished off his first bowl in mere seconds and moved on to the second. Naruto turned to see the man grab his bowl and begin to guzzle it down as quickly as he could in response.
Naruto didn’t know why he did it, but he passed the third bowl to the man just as he finished. The man smiled and took it. “Mmmmm…. this is delicious! Ommmm… It’s so hard to get good ramen where I’m from.”
“Where’s that?” Naruto asked.
“Very… very far away,” the strange man replied cryptically. “Across the oceans, the mountains, the desert… You’d never know.
“What do you mean? Are you from some strange new continent that ‘appeared’ in one of the oceans?” Naruto asked
"Well, I'm trying to destroy one of those..." The strange man said thoughtfully. "But no! I'm from somewhere else!"
Naruto’s eyes narrowed a bit at the strange man. So he was possibly seeking to destroy the Land Hidden in the Mist… maybe something else possibly? This requires more information... “Where exactly? If you're seeking Asylum in my village, you might want to give me some more information to work with.” Naruto persisted.
"No, not asylum! Though I've even told I belong in one multiple times," the man said. "No, I'm looking to relax for a short while. Recharge, then leave."
“Hmmm alright then,” Naruto began. “What exactly does ‘recharging’ entail?”
“I stay around awhile, likely go on some whimsical adventure, then leave.”
“No village-destroying antics? No damage to the village? No destruction of property?”
“I’ve been told that I should stay away from that, so no. And… seems pretty peaceful here, so I think I’ll just kick back-” A set of bizarre sunglasses appeared on his face. “And reeeeeeeelax. Say… this stuff’s pretty good.”
“Used to come by here all the time,” Naruto said, a slight smile flickering across his face as the memories passed by.
“I could eat this all day!” the strange man declared, practically drinking out of his ramen bowl. A strange look crossed his face for a moment, before a wide smile practically split is head in two. “...Ramen eating contest?”
“I don’t know about that,” Naruto said, half laughing, half choking. “My wife wouldn’t be happy… she’s a great cook, you see, and-”
“Live a little! Besides, how can you say no to this!?” the strange man asked, shoving the golden broth in his face.
“I guess I could have just one bowl.” Naruto said. “What’s your name anyways?”
“Call me Fury. Nick Fury.” he said with a smile.
‘That doesn’t help me in deciding your fate with a name like that...’ Naruto thought as he placed a forced smile on his face.
“THEY’RE GOING ON BOWL THIRTY!”
“GO HOKAGE! YOU CAN BEAT THE CRAZY FOREIGNER!”
“Mah, Naruto, I have a rather large bet on you. Gai betted against you in this match.”
“Neh! Kakashi, don’t spur him on! Do you not see the YOUTH in Fury’s eyes! GO FURY, BEAT HOKAGE WITH YOUR POWER OF YOUTH!”
“OI, I PAY YOUR MISSION CHECKS!”
‘Well,’ thought an oddly dressed man who was watching the events from afar through a pair of binoculars, ‘I wonder why a version of Discord is doing this? Maybe he’s just looking to take a break like #1 said; I guess it isn’t anything to worry about.’ He thought before leaving undetected.
“BOWL FIFTY!” Teiuchi called out, causing the crowd to roar in approval. Seeing their Hokage act like this caused a lot of the villagers to relax and enjoy the competition between the two gigantic eaters.
“I’m not going to lose Fury, this is my element!” Naruto gave him a dark chuckle, only for Fury to give him a dark smile of his own.
“I won’t lose either! Ramen is a gift from the gods themselves! It shall not be wasted!”
Both men grinned as the next bowl was placed before them before they began to eat, the cheering exploding as they began.
Before Naruto could react he suddenly got a sense of dread… someone was coming and it was possibly the worst timing ever. The Hokage just knew when his lovely wife Hinata was around the corner and he had fifty something bowls of ramen! Acting quickly Naruto used a quick henge to ‘disappear’ once Hinata came into view.
Hinata watched as the strange looking man finished his bowl, looking around for his opponent. “Hey, where did he go?”
“Lady Hinata is here!”
“Oh boy.”
“L-l-lady Hinata!”
Hinata said nothing as she watched as many of the group backed away, before she slowly trained her eyes on an old man hobbling away.
“Naruto.” She called out softly, causing the old man to stiffen up.
“Eh?” The old man shakily turned in place. “Who now? Naraka! Thats my name alright!”
Hinata continued to stare at the old man, Fury staring in confusion as she said nothing, but the old man began to sweat bullets while laughing.
“You are sleeping on the floor.” Hinata said quietly. Fury blinked as large smoke burst from the old man, Naruto in his place, on his knees, and kneeling as low as humanly possible before the woman.
“AH! NO! HINATA! MY LOVELY WIFE! MY GRACIOUS AND KIND WIFE! I’M SORRY! FORGIVE ME!” Naruto cried out, almost appearing to try and bash his skull into the ground, and succeeding to some degree.
‘Fury,’ as the strange man called himself, was desperately trying to keep his chuckles under control. He failed. Spectacularly.
“OI! SHUT UP BASTARD!” Naruto screamed at him, watching as the man fell off his stool, rolling across the ground holding his side. “I’m sorry, Hinata, I’m just keeping an eye on this guy.”
“What?” Fury stopped laughing, hearing this. “Keeping an eye on me? What’s that suppose to mean?”
Fury blinked as Naruto waved his hand, and found his arm latched on by several animal masked men. “What?!”
“You are an unknown person that infiltrated the Hidden Leaf Village.” Naruto started off, “Somehow bypassing scores of defenses we set up to stop such a thing. Your chakra is far too different from normal humans. So tell me…”
Fury blinked as the man’s energies shifted, something from deep within welling up and bursting out like a bomb. Discord closed his eyes, before opening up to see the young man changed before his eyes.
No longer wearing a black and orange jumpsuit, his entire form was changed into flaming energy, black writing covering his body, even forming a cloak to his surprise. If he had to gauge to his power, Discord would range it was close to that of Cadance’s own magical might, maybe even a little beyond it.
“Who are you? You stand before the leader of this village, the Hokage, strongest ninja in the entire region. My name is Naruto Uzumaki, Son of the Fourth Hokage, Toad Sage of the Mount Myōboku, Jinchūriki of the Nine Tail Fox Kurama, Hero of the Fourth Ninja War.”
‘Fury’ blinked. He blinked again, eyes widening a little bit, before something unexpected happened. Something unexpected for the ninja, anyway. He began to smile. Then chuckle. It eventually graduated to a full on belly-laugh, streams of tears running down either side of his face.
“Y-You humans! You never, ever fail to amaze and amuse me, pfff-! L-li-like right now! What you’re doing is simply insane! It’s brilliant! Brilliantly insane! I-I mean, haahahah! If you mess up once, just once, you’re stoned! Taken for granite! Chucked in some old lady’s statue garden to be beset upon by endless hordes of pigeons! But-but the best part!? The way you’re combining your own energy with that of the natural energy in the air! Hahahaha! It’s so harmonic, yet primally chaotic at the same time! Oh, oh, this is the best! Haaahaa! Ahh.. Aha, if-if only she were here to see this…”
‘Fury’s face fell a bit at that, but the flash of sorrow was gone in an instant. Back to chuckling, ‘Fury’ smiled widely at the burning yellow young man.
“Who am I, Naruto Uzumaki, Son of the Fourth Hokage, and current Hokage of the Village Hidden in the Leaves? Well, as a ‘man’ of action, I think this speaks for itself!”
The sound of snapping fingers filled the air for the briefest of moments.
Immediately after, the very feel of the air around the area changed dramatically, becoming disordered and rampant with chaos, banishing the quaint and peaceful feeling the village normally gave off. Immediately, the ANBU Black Ops that had accompanied Naruto tried to draw on their chakra, only to find that whatever ‘Fury’ was doing was completely blocking them off from it, or, in other cases, made it do something entirely different. Some struggled to stand, while others curiously began to float in mid air, unable to affect their position in any way, shape or form. Another, attempting a Wind Style technique, only produced a flurry of feathers from his mouth, coughing to dislodge some of the more persistent hangers on.
Those present with ocular Kekkei Genkai could literally see the chakra in the air sway and shift, vastly different than what the normal chakra in the air looked like. Order turned to disorder, chaos replacing the normally ‘quiet’ sea.
Discord couldn’t help but be impressed that Naruto still stood tall in front of him, unaffected by his meddling. In fact, he seemed to grow in power, his eyes narrowing, and took a fighting stance. Normally, one would be cowed by such a display of power, and yet the young man didn’t even blink at the change around him. Discord hummed softly before snapping his fingers once more, reverting the world back to normal. Discord held up his hand, bowing his head slowly.
“I think it may be best if I introduce myself, truthfully. My name is Discord, Lord of Chaos. I walk beyond your world in search for a world in need of dire assistance. I have no desire to fight you, Naruto. I feel like you and I would leave a rather large mark across this beautiful village, and I happen to have grown fond of this village’s quaint appearance.” Discord raised his head, looking directly into Naruto’s eyes. For the first time, he saw an aged appearance in the young man’s eyes. “I am doubly impressed that your very power resisted anything I did. You have power, yet you do not abuse it. You stood calm as the world changed around you, I doubt anything I do next would really surprise you at all.”
Naruto continued to stare at him before slowly slipping out of his stance, giving him a small nod. “I see.”
“Hokage…” an ANBU member stood next to him, still tense at the man’s power. He felt something similar once before, when Naruto unleashed the power of the Nine-tails during Pain’s attack on the village. This man held that power and unleashed it on a whim before reeling it in.
“Go. I will take care of it.” Naruto waved him away.
“But-!”
“Go!” Naruto glared at him, a soft touch of killing intent behind the glare.
“Y-y-yes Hokage!” The ANBU stuttered out. They and the other villagers left the area, leaving only Naruto, Hinata, Teiuchi and Ayame. Naruto turned back around, looking at the newly revealed Discord.
“So…”
“So.” Discord said quietly, looking back to the two Ramen store owners, he snapped his hand, a small stack of gold bricks appearing on the counter. “For all the wonderful Ramen.”
Amaye promptly fainted, and Teiuchi turned pale remarkably quickly, tentatively touching the golden bars, to make sure what he was seeing and feeling was actually real.
“Perhaps…” Hinata spoke up softly, looking at her husband and then Discord. “It be best if we talk away from prying ears and ears. Over tea sounds nice, right Naruto?”
Naruto blinked, turning to look at Hinata before giving her a beaming smile. “Yeah, that sounds good. Follow me, no funny business.”
“But I’m all about funny!” Discord pouted and crossing his arms like a child.
Discord looked down at his cup, the sounds of the wind flowing through the trees and soft chirping of the local birds was rather soothing.
Also kind of boring.
“I see.” Naruto whispered as Discord finished his tale, with visual que’s, his fist shaking as in fury until Hinata gently placed a hand onto it. She gave him a small smile before looking back to him. “Even though it all sounds crazy.”
“Do you require our help, Lord Discord?” Hinata asked with a kind smile. Discord was rather put off by the question.
These people just finished their own war, lost hundreds, if not thousands in the war.
He couldn’t put them through that, even with their powers of chakra at their disposal for their fantastic abilities. They would be overwhelmed by sheer numbers even with Naruto’s ability to clone hundreds of himself, something he copied for himself once he saw it, it would be too much.
“I can’t ask you to do this. You or your village.” Discord said quietly, putting the cup down on its plate. “If the Tyrant finds out about you or this world, she will do everything she can to weaken it. She will go after you, Naruto.”
“Heh. You forget, you’re in a village filled with ninja.” Naruto smirked, only to frown as Discord shook his head.
“And she will send millions to overwhelm them just to get to you. She will turn everyone you care about to her little minions, take their powers for herself before finally changing you, then move onto another world until her army has so many powers that they’re impossible to defend against. ” Discord muttered. “No… I can’t take you with me. Besides, I am still searching for that world. It might be years before I find it.”
“How long have you been doing this?” Naruto asked.
“Sheesh, I lost track of time, almost two thousand years now. Though the flow of time differs for each world. So as far as I know, only twenty minutes passed on the world I am searching for.” Discord muttered.
“Damn…” Naruto said, looking away. “Shit, those new foals sound like some sort of Edo Tensei Jutsu.”
Hinata nodded her head with this, refilling Discord’s cup. “Yes, it does. But this is on a much worse scale.”
“Yeah.” Naruto gave Discord sad look. “Hey, before you go. I want you have something.”
“Naruto…” Hinata gave him a warning look, but he just gave her a bright smile.
“Here!” Naruto pulled out a large scroll and tossed it to him. “I like to think of it as my back up scroll of tricks and kunai.”
Discord stared at the large scroll, his eyes shifting before giving him a bright grin. “Oh, very clever. I think I know a pony that can use this. Oh, and some instant Ramen cups as well! Thank you!”
“Heh, forgot about those. Good to know.” Naruto chuckled, “Besides, I think you’re topped off now, eh?”
Discord blinked before giving him a bright smile, “Yup.”
Discord jumped to his feet, popping his neck as he stretch, he turned to the two, bowing to them. “Thank you.”
“Go, Lord Discord. Defend the Realms and know that we pray for you and your allies victory.” Hinata softly said as she bowed to him.
“Eh, don’t be afraid to come back for me. I can use a bit of practice.” Naruto chuckled.
Discord allowed himself a sad smile as he opened a portal to the void, looking back at the two. “I really hope that doesn’t have to happen.”
“Don’t worry, Discord. We got your back! Believe it!”
“You did it again.” Hinata chided him, a mischievous smile on her lips.
“Damnit!” Naruto cursed out loud, causing Discord to laugh as he jumped through, giving the two a small wave as he did.
“Well. That was quite fun!” Discord said to himself, as he floated through the multiverse, between node after node. He floated around one spherical universe, this one, from what he could tell, a world where humanity was stuck at the same level of technology as the ponies in his native Equestria. “It’s a nice break after-”
“After what?” he heard himself ask.
And he stopped, seeing another version of him, floating just by the same universe. He looked confused.
“What are you doing?” his counterpart asked.
“I’m looking for another universe!” Discord said.
“Branching out, getting away from those annoying Elements?” his counterpart asked. “I like that! I’ve been doing the same thing. I found this demon-”
Discord drew in a sharp breath, hoping it wasn’t what he thought it was.
“-And he has such wonderfully chaotic plans! Maybe we can join forces?”
“Actually… I don’t think I can do that,” Discord said. “I’m not actually trying to cause chaos in another universe! I’m trying to save it!”
His counterpart looked at him, and fell over laughing. “Oh… save a universe? That’s… that’s rich. What are you going to do? Lure them into a false sense of security so you can-”
“No,” Discord said. “I have responsibilities!”
“You sellout,” his counterpart said disgustedly. “Next you’ll even tell me that you’re working with those alicorn princesses!”
“Well, excuse me for not wanting to throw my lot in with Tirek!” Discord roared. “Bloody hell, was I ever this selfish and obstinate?”
“...Tirek?” his counterpart asked, shrinking in fear and shuddering, to the point that he would be on eye level with a large earth pony, perhaps the Element of Honesty’s big brother. “Your Tirek’s back?”
“No,” Discord said. “Another universe’s is.”
“Oh, that’s normal,” his counterpart breathed out. “Still, I appreciate-”
“Except,” Discord interrupted, “he pierced the Odd and breached the multiversal barrier, but not before possessing his world’s Celestia using that damnable bag of his, and killing off most non-pony races, and… the Celestia he possessed? She’s stronger than me. And she ate her Discord’s magic, and all that remained was his memories, which my ever-so-sexy twin managed to implant into Twilight, which would blast a human into another Equestria without Tirek. Oh, and that Celestia ate Luna’s power as well.”
His counterpart drew in a gasp.
“I have memories of being trapped for years in Twilight Sparkle’s mind, while she was taken over by some… thing. I suppose the Element Bearers wouldn’t have agreed with Celestia, so she made Elements that would.”
“Do… Do I want to know?” his counterpart asked.
“NO ,” Discord vehemently said. “On top of that… the Celestia he possessed is leading a genocidal campaign against a human universe, turning every human into zombie-like ponies with no higher brain function that will never be able to create anything remotely chaotic, and destroying any evidence that they ever existed! And worst of all… once he destroys that world, the multiverse is next!”
“Can I just ask you one thing?” his counterpart asked. “Why… in the name of all that is chaotic… Does your Tirek’s plan involve TURNING EVERYTHING INTO PONIES?!”
Discord paused. That… was actually a good question, come to think of it. “I… don’t actually know. I think the bag preyed on Celly’s love of order?”
“That makes sense,” his counterpart agreed. “I may be involved in something that my Celestia might not like… but far be it from me to stop myself from stopping Tirek! There’s a universe over there-” he pointed in a direction that was not up, right, down, or left, marking one other spherical universe that way. “-That has humans and ponies. I think that might be a safe bet. Oh, and…. if you see the Elements, especially Pinkie Pie and a tall human wizard in a leather duster, carrying a staff and a magnum revolver…”
“Yes?”
“They’re looking for me for what I’m doing, and they’ll think you’re me. Stay out of their way, alright?” his counterpart asked, and he was gone. “I’ve seen that universe, by the way. Don’t worry-I’ll give you a disguise. Now go! I think they’re on my tail!”
Well… he appeared to be giving good advice. This time. So why not? Discord flew at the universe he’d described, fast as he could, only to find himself…
Sitting down in a seat in a dark room, in his human form. As his eyes adjusted to the gloom, he saw a wall burst into light, to find that… that...
I’m…. in a movie theater? Discord wondered to himself.
Why a movie theater?
He wouldn’t get an answer as to why exactly the hole he’d opened up in the multiverse would lead him to a movie theater, with him sitting down in a chair, in human form, dressed like Raoul Duke.
And even if something in the next couple minutes could have answered that question, he was overcome by several more by the time the movie began. Like “Why,” or “Oh Mother why?!” and “Who directed this?!”
Discord saw to his surprise that there were both humans and ponies in the seats at the theater. Curious, very curious-though neither of them appeared to have an overwhelming desire to kill and/or ponify each other.
The title scrolled across the screen, in huge letters a shade of red that assaulted the eye, proclaiming the movie to be called THE CONVERTERS
“It is the year 2045, ” the onscreen narration droned. Not any one of the more interesting verbs, no. It droned. In the tone of voice of one who was drunk during filming, and just could not be bothered to care.
2045?! That was way off from what Marcus had described. And… that appeared to be a zebra in this theater as well. Nope. Wrong world. Interesting world, yes… but not what he was looking for.
“Equestria has made contact with humanity, ” the narrator continued, showing a desolate, bombed-out No Man’s Land. Huge, oily planes, almost a caricature of human machinery, flew overhead, and the battlefield was littered with poor CGI skeletons and casings. “Unfortunately, its magic has proven impossible for humans to survive, lethally irradiating humanity. ”
A movie. He found another Earth, one that had made contact with another Equestria… that made a movie that so coincided with his friend’s struggle.
Evidently, he wasn’t the only one that thought it was absurd-though everyone else in the theater did for different reasons. “BULLSHIT!” yelled one pegasus, floating near the ceiling.
“The only solution for humanity is for them to accept ponification- ”
No no no...
“Allowing them to survive the outbreak of magic. And yet, some of them could not accept the… ” at this point, the narrator seemed to have been regretting the role he’d taken, “Gift of ponification, and thus, they resist.
“You have got to be kidding me…” Discord stared at the screen with a deadpan stare.
“This is fucking disgusting,” said a young man with dirty brownish hair, sitting next to a young black woman. His accent was rather weird. “Reel Action could not portray Princess Celestia for the life of her, and that’s the least of our worries!”
Now there was an understatement. Saying it had been ‘disgusting’ would never truly be able to encapsulate all the ways it was bad. The costumes had been good, the battles were well-choreographed, and the sets were very well-done as well.
Unfortunately, nothing else was likeable about the movie.
“You don’t have to tell me that,” Discord said neutrally. He supposed he could be obvious... but showing up in his full draconequus form would likely be more trouble than it was worth. Besides, given the population of ponies, it was extremely likely that the human military might have countermeasures of some kind.
Like some sort of prototype weapon they’d hidden away for something like that disaster movie he saw. A world with humans and ponies would likely lead to some interesting cross-pollination between tech and magic.
“I mean... that was literally the most racist thing I’ve ever seen,” the young man said. “I’ve seen some bad shit, but... fuck! I’m gonna vlog about it when it’s over.”
“You a movie critic?” Discord asked.
“With a reasonably popular viewer base,” the young woman sitting next to him said. “I’m Tania. And this is Peter.”
Ah, what the hell. Discord could reasonably expect his old alias to work-though the ‘Divisive’ part might draw a few questions. “Damien.”
“So, you... wanna come back to my place? Me, Tania, and my friend Savannah-” he pointed to the pegasus who’d cried out ‘bullshit!’ earlier- “-and I are going to review it, and we could use some help,” said Peter. “How bout it?”
“I don’t see why not!” Discord said. “I’m looking forward to tearing into this!” Besides, he needed to do something fun while his power recharged.
As the car drove onwards through the city-which, from the newspapers, he’d gathered to be Cape Town, South Africa-he couldn’t help marveling. It hugged several small yet craggy hills, it had a wonderful view of the ocean, and the architecture was beautiful. It simply screamed ‘lush and summery’.
But that wasn’t the most beautiful part. No, he barely noticed the architecture, or whatever else there was to love on the way from the movie theater.
All the species of Equus walked alongside humans. Minotaurs, ponies, griffons, buffalo, zebras… there were advertisements in all kinds of languages!
He supposed that made the universe taken over by Tirek all the more tragic. This world might not be in harmony, judging by the subtle tugs of chaos he felt (and what he saw on newspapers lying around) but it was infinitely better than that possessed puppet Celestia’s ideas.
“This your house?” Discord asked as the car drew to a stop.
“Nah, it’s my dad’s,” Peter said. “I’m up visiting him and all my cousins, though he might be busy.”
“...The Converters was painful to watch!” Savannah yelled.
“Oh Lord, yes,” Peter groaned. “Every four seconds something would piss me off. You could get a stopwatch and time it.”
“Only four?” Discord asked. “You’re lucky. For me it just lasted one…”
“Every second, Damien?” Tania muttered.
“And you’re surprised?” Discord asked.
“...mmm. Fair point,” Tania agreed. “This… is so blatantly racist I felt physically sick! I think I’m gonna need to see your dad, Peter.”
“He’s not that kind of doctor,” Peter sighed. “...Unfortunately.” He slumped, then straightened up a bit. “Anyway. This… this is the most insulting thing I have ever seen from the Purehooves, and that’s saying a lot. See, the movie is about Equestria manifesting on Earth and… get this. Apparently, in whatever bizarre universe the director is creating, magic is harmful to humans. And it will destroy all that they have ever made, erasing cities, artwork, thousands of years of culture! Now, for those of you that didn’t watch the movie… guess what? Guess who the heroes in this movie that will end with the annihilation of the human race are? Go on. Guess.”
“Equestria,” Savannah sighed. “...All the wrong.”
“Should we mention the…” Discord suggested.
“No, we need to keep the twist,” Peter continued. “So, according to this movie, the only way for humans to survive the magic that’s washing over Earth is to turn humans into ponies.”
There was the sound of three synchronized facepalms, and one facehoof.
“It… could have been interesting,” Tania said. “Buried somewhere, deep in all this, is a good premise. But no-they go to so many extremes to make it virtually unwatchable. ”
“You name an offensive human stereotype, it’s in here!” Savannah said. “Name one.”
“...Almost cannibalistic humans?” Tania suggested.
“Yup,” Savannah said.
“Humans as bloodthirsty, downright stupid brutes?” Peter added.
“They barely portray humans as different from apes,” Savannah agreed. “They barely talk in anything other than complete sentences or grunts…”
“How about… insult to Daisy Jo Martinez?” Tania suggested.
Who was that?! Discord asked himself.
“That’s a stereotype?” Savannah asked.
“What, you think the Purehooves would leave her alone?” Tania asked. “Both sides of this hate her...”
“Mmm. Okay,” Savannah said. “You win this round.”
“And they play the human world as a wartorn, violence filled… they portray it like there’s nothing good about it!” Discord fumed.
“Now I know what you’re thinking,” Savannah said. “Are they trying to make humanity look like they deserve this? And the answer is yes.”
“And… when they get turned into ponies, they instinctively turn their backs on everything human, and smile incessantly!” Discord added. “It’s just not right…”
“Did I hear someone reviewing the remake of The Converters?” someone asked, walking in. He was a tall, well-muscled, straight-backed man. Well, he had something of a potbelly under a downright ancient Kill La Kill t-shirt, but that was the only sign of muscle atrophy. “Awful, awful movie. Just disgusting.”
Standing next to him was a woman with fine black hair and green eyes.
“Mom and dad!” Peter yelled, standing up and hugging them. “Haven’t seen you all day!”
“Just wish it was a happier time,” the woman sighed. “Honestly… I’d rather have seen a good movie before meeting all of you.”
“Wait, you saw it too?” Tania asked.
“We both went to see it,” Peter’s dad sighed. “And… I regret it so much.”
“Why?” Savannah asked. “What would you rate it a-”
“Consume-your-own-penis out of ten,” the man said. “Even worse than the movie it was based on! And that’s saying a lot.”
“I really can’t blame Soren Almaya for quitting in the middle of production,” the woman sighed.
“So that’s why his character got ponified so suddenly,” Peter realized.
“Rating?” Savannah asked.
“Awful, awful, awful,” Peter said. “No stars out of ten. Nothing redeeming at all.”
“I got a rifle butt to the face once from some asshole cop in Joburg when I was seven,” Peter’s dad said. “I’ve seen so many old films where the black guy dies first. I went to college in America. I was in the army and I once had to take down some Earth First assholes who hated ponies or something, and I’ve shot plenty of Purehooves. But this is literally the most racist thing I have ever seen. There is not a moment in this movie where something isn’t racist. And the horrible irony is, the Equestriani are supposed to be the heroes, but they’re so poorly written and so racist against humans-”
“Princess Celestia even indulges in this!” Savannah interrupted.
“Yeah, and it makes her look horrible!” Peter’s dad continued. “But THIS! This is the most racist thing I have ever seen! It’s as if it goes out of its way to be offensive to everyone! It’s... I feel dirty for watching this!”
“I just feel sick,” Peter’s mother sighed. “Ugh… Why did we see that?”
“A good laugh?” Peter’s dad suggested.
“...That was a terrible idea.”
“Agreed.”
“You know what I think about this movie?” Discord asked. “I’m not giving stars. I’m not... that man there, he has the right idea. Because this is beyond disgusting. Celestia is so out of character that it hurts, and she’s... I’m gonna put this lightly. She’s EVIL! I’ve met Celestia before-”
“Wait, you have?!” Peter asked.
“How?” Peter’s mother asked.
“It’s a long story,” Discord said. “I… didn’t get along with her very well, but this is the most disgusting piece of crap I’ve ever seen! Even worse, they portray all of this, all the cultural obliteration, as a good thing! Worst of all, it turns out the whole plot of the movie was intentional! Celestia meant to turn humans into ponies and everything!”
“The only thing that gets me is… WHY?!” Savannah added. “They act like it’s Equestria’s natural state to be racist against humanity, but… it’s never shown why, and the movie has to resort to just…” she sighed, facehoofing once more. “So many levels of wrong.”
“It’s insulting beyond belief is what it is!” Discord yelled, shaking. “I’ve… you can’t imagine what I’ve been through, how much this insults me!” he started shaking, contorting.
The room around him shook in time with his body, everyone staring at him in concern.
He blinked, his sclera turning yellow, the pupils becoming red. “This is… AAAAAARGH! I try so hard to find a world where this actually happens, I find a world with humans and ponies in peace, and some of them actually support this?!”
It was as if a miniature windstorm had entered the room. Posters blew on the walls, the camera fell to the ground, and Peter’s father, falling back on military training, went for a pistol he’d been keeping… somewhere. Nobody knew where he’d been hiding it. Nor did they know where Peter’s mother kept her own pistol, either.
“Where did you get those?!” Tania yelled over the inexplicable racket.
“Picked the hobby up in America,” Peter’s father explained.
His teeth shook in his mouth, one tooth lengthening. “I-”
“...Discord,” Savannah whispered.
“I found a world that can spit in the face of the Tyrant…” Discord growled out, his arms lengthening and lanky, golden fur and scales covering them both. “And yet it still exists!”
“...Why is Discord here?!” Peter asked Savannah.
“How would I know?” Savannah asked.
“She causes so much misery! SO much DEATH!” Discord roared, his eyes twitching in growing rage. In the back of his mind, he was confused on where this rage was coming from.
“No! Please stop!”
“IT HURTS MOMMY!”
“GOD PLEASE! ”’
Discord eyes twitched, focusing on the four before him, the screams and begging that he unconsciously buried when the memories of his counterpart transferred to him.
Discord looked down at the four, fear on Savannah’s face, while Peter’s parents stood tall before him, pistols in their unwavering hands. Discord stumbled away from them, leaning against the wall as he worked on his memories, ignoring the others as they watched him warily.
“Don’t worry. We will bring perfection to you all! ”
“I’m sorry.” Discord whispered, snapping his claws rearranging the room back in order. “Lets just say… I have first hand experience. Before I go, though… you might very well ask yourself something. Actually, two things. First, where’d the potion come from? Second, when did they test it?”
Peter’s mother appeared to mull that over a moment. Horrified realization came a second later. “Oh… Oh God. You can’t just pull untested drugs out of nowhere so…”
“What?” Peter asked.
“Goodbye,” Discord whispered. “I was here, but I left midway through. There was… There was an emergency. Don’t worry, you won’t remember any of this.”
With a puff of smoke, he vanished.
“...What the crap just happened?” asked Peter’s sister, running up the stairs.
“Something just happened, Anka?” Peter asked. “Can’t imagine wha… hey. The camera fell over. How’d that happen?”
“I heard this awful racket! There was someone yelling!” she protested.
“Oh… Damien,” Tania explained. “He was this guy we picked up to review this movie… had to leave. Said he had a…” her eyes clouded over. “Family emergency?”
“Yeah, Mr. and Mrs. Kraber got worried about him… he looked pretty crazy when he got the phone call,” Savannah explained.
“Guess we did get a bit worried,” Peter’s mother sighed. “Honestly, I feel… kinda silly. My husband can be quite the hothead, after all…”
“Agreed,” her husband sighed. “It’s a problem, I admit it. And please, just call us Kate and Viktor.”
Well.
That did nothing for him.
Irritation ran through him as he thought on how to purge of himself of these growing terror. A small smile crossed his face as he jumped into another world, feeling a bunch of terror filled chaos in the pizzeria before him.
“You know what I need,” Discord smirked as he walked towards the man dressed in a security guard uniform. “I need to annoy something. Hey! Wait up!”
Seventh Night
The ripped up fox-like robot ran down the hall, his feet clanking as he rush down the West Hall towards the security room at supernatural speed. His malfunctioning jaw bounced up and down as he ran.
Foxy ran up to the open door, screaming madly. He slid into the room and spun the chair around…
Only to see a mannequin with a large painted smiley face on it, a single sign sitting in its lap.
COME AND FIND ME! :D
LOVE, DISCORD
“PSH! ”
All the animatronics looked up in the areas they were in as the ceiling speakers turned out.
“HELLO!? IS THIS THING WORKING? Yes? Good! Now that I have your attention, good evening my killer robots, how are you doing this wonderful night? ”
The animatronics shook in place, staring at the ceiling as they listen.
“I have to admit, when I took this job from that guy, Mike… something or another. I wasn’t sure what I was getting into. I decided to play by the rules for the time being, seeing how wonderfully terrifying you four can be! ”
The animatronics quickly began their search, trying to find where the human was hiding.
“And really, you have that old school vibe going for you. You don’t do the whole bloody gore stuff most of the evil beings go for. You go for sheer terror! Letting your enemy’s sense of fear do all the work for them! I applaud you! Very good sirs and mam! BUT! I really have to stop you now. ”
The animatronics froze in place as the building began to shake, a dark chuckle coming from speakers.
“Now we are going to play my game… ”
The walls fell away, revealing an un-ending darkness surrounding them.
“Lets see you try and survive my maze… Rules! Keep running, keep fighting, survive! Never stop moving! ”
Walls shot up between them, scaling upwards in unbelievable heights.
“Those that survive… get to live as a normal… everyday robot…. ”
Screams and roars began to echo out through the maze.
“Those that don’t…. well, they don’t, “ Discord said. “Hmmm. That sounded a lot more threatening in my head. Oh I know! ”
An image popped up before the four, of a giant machine crushing an inanimate robot, only to get rebuilt seconds later, just to go through the process once more.
“You go through my own creation for the rest of time itself! I almost forgot, there can only be one winner. And the coming morning cannot save you. Your are in my little bundle of terror-world now. Time has no meaning in here ”
Each Animatronic looked down the seemingly impossible hallway.
“And believe me, I know terror. ” A dark laughter spread all around them, the sounds of screams and horror growing around them. “Start running, my little puppets. ”
Discord chuckled as he tapped Foxy on the nose, it took some time to figure out how they worked, but he managed to figure out how to trap their main programing, so they would never be free. They would constantly die in the maze and restart back in the Freddy’s, none the wiser of being trapped within their own CPU systems. It was impressive that they even function like that, but Discord was beginning to think this world held a little bit more darkness than most of the inhabitants even knew of. What kind of sadistic imbeciles allowed a place like this to keep running? Were they ignorant? Were they doing some kind of ritual?
Still, doing this was much much easier than learning an alien species millennium-old computer system, compare to that, this was a cinch.
“Hey, Mike?” Discord asked, dialing on the phone.
“Whoa! You?!” Mike gasped when he picked up the phone. “Had me real scared when caller ID came up. So, what’s this about?”
“I got you some… payback,” Discord said.
“Good,” Mike said. “That was a horrible job.”
“Why did you even take it?!” Discord asked.
“...Needed the money,” Mike admitted.
“How…”
“America…. isn’t exactly a good country to be poor in,” Mike said sheepishly. “Got a job interview down the street for selling stuffed ponies. So, what’d you do?”
“I put their CPUs on infinite loop,” Discord said. “They’re running around, screaming, getting crushed… Ah, I wish I could see the looks on their faces!”
“The last night watchman woulda loved it,” Mike said. “Say… can you check all five of the costumes? He said he wanted me to... check in there.” He breathed outward, raggedly. He sounded like he was shivering.
“Five?” Discord asked. “No… no, there’s… there’s four, right?”
Mike was silent for a moment. “Oh, son of a * fuck!***”
Discord felt the presence and reacted before he could fully understand what was happening. He tossed off the golden suit, eyes wide in surprise when he realize that there was something seriously wrong with this one.
For one… It didn’t have an endoskeleton inside of it. There weren’t even any eyes inside. Just a black void.
Two… there was feeling of dread filling the room.
“Found it.” Discord said as stared at it. “I’ll be back Mike, give me a few minutes.”
Mike made a meep ing noise. “I’ll… be clutching a couple stuffed animals to my chest. Possibly also a shotgun. Or that grenade launcher...”
The golden bear suit stood up, the dark eyes staring at Discord in silence.
“Fuck it, I’m getting both,” Mike said.
“Well, showed up because I took your toys away?” Discord eyes narrowed, his chaos magic brimming at his finger tips. “Too bad. So… what are you? A spirit? Demon? Extra planetary being?”
“WE ARE DARKNESS! ”
“How cliche.” Discord growled out, his power coming into full power. “Let’s show you the light then!”
Freddy’s was up in flames.
Mike stared in shock as the blaze stood against the firefighter’s best effort to put it out.
“It…. maaaayyyy not be the best idea to put the fire out,” Mike said, Discord nodding in his human form as he stood next to him. They watched the owner of the place screamed out as he saw the place burn down to the ground. “By the way. I got a termination notice. I think they planned on firing me even before this happened.”
“Why?” Discord blinked in confusion as Mike handed him a note. Discord snorted as he read the termination notice. “Tampering, general unprofessionalism, and odor…. huh. Looks like they added burning the place down as an afterthought. How’d they even write it so fast?”
“Eh, after awhile you don’t question these things. Why is he even getting mad? They’re tearing this place down in a year anyways.” Mike muttered as he crushed the paper and tossed it into the fire.
“I think it was due to whatever the hell was in there.” Discord muttered, eyes narrowed on the panicked owner. “The bots may have just been bots, but that golden suit thing had some darkness in it, feeding off… fear and death. Growing stronger with each night until you died. If you survived… well… there is a good chance you would have figured out a way to stop them on your own.”
“Yeah right.” Mike muttered, shaking somewhat as a thought crossed his mind. “They were probably going to sabotage my efforts, make the doors jam or something.”
“Probably.” Discord conceded, his eyes narrowing as the owner glared daggers at Mike, who promptly flipped him off. “Listen… Mike.”
“Yeah?”
“Let me do you a favor.”
“YOU RUINED MEEE!” the manager screamed, running at Mike, who silenced him with a kick to the balls.
“That’s for paying me four bucks an hour, bitch!” Mike yelled, then turned back to Discord. “So what kind of favor?”
“It’s a surprise,” Discord said.
Discord smiled as he jumped back into the Multiversal void, the beach air and seawater smell trailing after him. He wiped Mike’s identity from all of forms of government filings, and remade him anew. He couldn’t do much about the few people he did know personally, (Mike hadn’t had many friends, and he speculated that was part of why he’d been hired) but placing Mike as far away from the owner from exacting vengeance upon him was the only thing Discord could keep the brave, if crazy, man alive.
He'd also set him up somewhere tropical while giving Mike the money he'd ‘found’ in the register while fighting the golden suit. Mike was now miles away from any animatronics, a very happy bartender on the beachfront, enjoying the sights of beautiful women and living a relatively calm life.
That didn’t stop Discord from searching up dozens of protection sigils and secretly etching them onto his bones while he knocked him out. Whatever that Darkness was, it was going to be looking for him.
But honestly, considering the very special kind of crazy Mike happened to be, he wasn’t sure whether he should be worried about Mike or the Darkness.
“Hmm… I should check up on him later… for now… on to the next world!” Discord exclaimed as he searched, before coming up on a very strange one. Discord’s smile grew, excited at the strangeness of seeing two different worlds connected to one another. “And we have a winner!”
Megan’s Ranch
Megan smiled as she served Twilight some home style tossed salad, rubbing Spike’s head as he ate a gem. She gave a quiet sigh of content as she watched as her family sat down to eat outside, along with the few soldiers that were there to ensure no one messed with the portals, namely the Decepticons.
There was a loud pop and Megan turn to the noise, expecting to see Celestia or Luna arriving for their lunch, only to freeze up at the sight of a familiar and unwelcomed guest.
Discord smiled as he looked around, only to frown as he saw that he appeared before a family gathering… with trained soldiers and Twilight Sparkle with them. He blinked several times before looking up, seeing a large colorful portal floating serenely in the sky above him.
“Pardon me,” Discord said quietly, looking at frozen Twilight with some anticipation. “I don’t suppose you are here to overtake the world and turn all humans into zombie ponies by Celestia’s orders?”
“WHAT?!” Megan yelled.
“Excuse me?!” Twilight yelled.
“I take that as a no.” Discord sighed with relief, only for the blond to give him a furious look. “You have no idea how good it is to end up in a world like this! The last one had some horrible racist ponies- not that they were all bad, that’s just silly...Uh… Can I help you?”
“DISCORD!”
Discord clutched his ears as the woman screamed at him with fury, opening his mouth to yell back at the woman, only to fall silent as a shadow cross over him. He looked up to see a very large and robotic being raising his foot above him.
“Oh dear…” Discord muttered out loud before the foot crushed him. The large foot raised slightly before lowering once more, impacting against Discord once more.
Even as the robot continued, Megan reached behind her and pulled out her favorite rifle, a Marlin 1894 lever-action rifle. She aimed it at the draconequus even as other soldiers rushed over. “Twilight,” she barked out, “get the other Elements! He’s out… again!”
Twilight’s horn glowed, but Discord snapped his fingers between stomping. Twilight teleported away, only to end up sitting in a chair, a banana daiquiri tucked into her foreleg and a sun hat balanced over her head. “What the hay?!”
Megan squeezed the trigger, but a well-timed snap of Discord’s fingers and a bouquet of flowers shot out to land at his writhing form. She fired again, this time actually shooting him with a bullet. She ejected the spent cartridge and stepped forward, her face twisting with rage. “You… you… YOU!” she snarled out.
Discord rolled to the side, evading the giant foot. He looked up at the yellow robot. “I’ll give you courage and loyalty,” he said before snapping his fingers. The robot flashed, suddenly changing into a bumblebee. Discord grabbed his chest and flapped his flat body out, gaining substance once more. “Okay, now I’m a bit perturbed!” he cried out, rounding on Megan and Twilight. He looked to several of the soldiers as they raised their weapons. Discord raised his arms, snarling at the group, only for a woman to shout at them.
“No! Stop! It won’t do anything to the bastard!” Megan swallowed as she looked to the soldiers, members of the United States Army and the Earth Defense Command. She dropped her rifle to the ground and held out her arms. “Okay, you bastard. You want me again? Fine! Leave them alone, you hear?”
“No! Megan!” A man stepped out, grabbing the woman around the waist and holding her back. The soldiers refused to lower their own weapons, keeping them trained on the draconequus with a look of defiance on their faces.
“Mom!” The two girls cried out, being held back one of the soldiers, trying to drag them away from the fighting.
“Uh…” Discord stared at the woman in confusion, scratching his head as he awkwardly looked around before looking back at her. “Who are you again?”
Megan stared at him, unable to fully comprehend what Discord had just said. “Who am I? I’m -- you know who I am!”
Discord shook his head. “I am afraid, young lady, I’ve never seen you before in my life.” A photo album appeared in front of him and he began leafing through it, glancing at Megan every once in a while. “Done any modeling work?”
Twilight pawed at the ground. “I don’t know how you got out, Discord, but you’re going right back into the Canterlot Gardens, you hear me?” Her horn lit up and she shot a beam of magic at him, but he held up a claw and it turned into a light breeze.
Discord finally shut the album. “Okay, that’s it!” Megan suddenly disappeared, then reappeared, floating next to him in midair. “I tell you right now, I don’t know who you are.” He motioned to Twilight. “Present pony excepted, mind.” His head suddenly flew back as Megan threw a fist at his head. “Will you stop that?! You’re not going to hurt me!” He chuckled slightly. “I’ll admit you’ve got spunk, though.”
Several of the soldiers moved forward, weapons still trained on Discord. Megan struggled in midair. “If you’ve got the shot, take it!” she shouted, “Take out the eyes!”
“Oh they are not going to shoot-” Discord snapped at her, only to receive a laser to the face, much to his surprise. “What the? Lasers! Seriously?”
Two more shots hit him, one in each eye, blinding him before Discord snapped his claw.
“No!” Megan looked to the soldiers, expecting something horrible or chaotic to happen to them. Only to see them looking at their rifles in confusions, seeing them changed into toy rifles.
“Hey! You can hurt someone with those! You should-” Discord shouted in irritation, his eyes rolling back into their socket. He then felt his jaw get hit, not really doing anything to him, but enough to get his attention. “Alright thats it!”
“I WILL DESTROY YOU!” Discord roared, his eyes burning and flames building behind him, only for the woman to look up at him in defiance, not even batting an eye at the flames around her. For a single moment, Discord continue to loom over her, flames building and the ground dead at her feet, before Discord sighed and reverted the land back to normal. “Nothing? Not even a tremor? How is that even possible?!!“
The woman only scowled, her eyes hard as stones, and yet to Discord, those eyes looked awfully familiar to him.
“Okay. Just tell me who you are suppose to be so I can back away in fake terror.” Discord muttered, looking at the spiteful woman floating next to him.
“Fine then! Perhaps getting hit with the Elements scrambled your mind more than I thought! Perhaps one more should make you a vegetable!” The woman growled, glowering at him with hatred. “My name is Megan Richards, I raised Luna and Celestia for the first nine years of their lives! I fought and killed Tirek and stopped Squirk, Lavan and the Smooze! I helped the scattered tribes and nation-states of the Ancient Kingdom of Ponyland reunite and wielded the Rainbow of Light! I’m the Mag’ne, the Giver of Gifts, Defender of the Stable and Wielder of the Spear of Fire!” She jabbed a finger at the ground. “And that is Twilight Sparkle, Element of Magic and the one who turned you back into Equestria’s largest paperweight!”
“Yeeah….” Discord rolled his eyes. “I know no one by the name of….Megan…”
Discord froze up, his mind racing to the meeting that happen a few day/years/millienas ago.
Spykoran focused on the pictures, before looking back to Marcus. "Your mother's name is Megan."
"Megan Renee," Marcus answered, his eyes falling to the ground.
"Her maiden name! Was her last name Williams?!" Spykoran pleaded, his eyes filled hope.
"Uh... yeah! How did you..." Marcus felt uncomfortable as the elder dragon was now looking at him with new light. He turned around and thumped his head against the post he was leaning against. "Oh, goddammit."
"You... you are her child. Megan's son is here on Equus. Then... then there is a chance for us to win! Only your mother could wield the locket!" Spykoran looked excited, his tail wagging as it knocked over statues and pillars.
‘You have got to kidding me. ’
Discord stared at the woman in new light, “Was your name ever… Megan Williams.”
“So you do remember!” She said with a smug smile.
“No… Not that. I just.. Wait… where’s Sparkle?” Discord looked around to see that he was short one purple unicorn. He looked to see the pleased smile on the woman named Megan’s face. “Aw crud.”
Megan held out her arms. “Only a matter of time, Discord. They turned you to stone once, and they’re gonna do it again.” She paused as he stayed silent. “What, no cursing or raging?” She leaned forward. “You look thoughtful.”
“I… I know your son…” Discord said quietly, “And he needs help. There’s a whole world on the line.”
Megan scowled, eyes narrowed as she looked over him. “I have no son.”
“What did he do that was so terrible?” Discord asked, curious.
“I mean, I never gave birth to a son, idiot.”
“Oh… strange. Well, I guess not in this world you didn’t.” Discord whispered.
Megan stared at him, eyes wide. “‘This world’?” she repeated. She closed her eyes and shook her head. “Could you… please explain to me what you mean by that?” she asked, almost spitting out the word ‘please’. “This had better not be some trick-”
“Don’t worry. I didn’t get out of the garden, because I’m not this world’s version of Discord. And it would be quicker if I show you.” Discord said quietly, putting his paw on her head. "You wouldn't believe me if I just told you."
Megan couldn’t react quick enough to back away before the paw engulfed her head. The shouting of the soldiers, her family, and the new arrivals of Celestia, Luna, and the Elements drowned out as she fell into a memory.
Some part of her wanted to protest, to scream that she was being inverted of all her traits. 'Discorded’, as some ponies referred to it.
And yet, she wished he did do that, if only to save her from the horrors shoved into her mind.
“You here will be the first, and the whole world will see and rejoice with you in your salvation.”
And she began to scream.
