The Element of Chaos

It was past nightfall by the time Discord and the girls had found old hotel Sombra had holed himself up in. The building looked like it had once been a grand five star hotel, but now ivy curled up the paint chipped sides and all of the windows had been boarded up. A slightly graffitied No trespassing sign stood in the front lawn. Staring at the decrepit building, Discord tried to act confident, but, honestly, he was not sure if they could save Pinkie. All he knew was that he had to try. After all that had happened to them, even after she had abandoned him, all he could think about was her safety. It was irritating.

“So what’s the plan?” Rainbow Dash said suddenly. He glanced at her and then looked guiltily away. She raised an eyebrow. “You do have a plan right?”

“Of course I have a plan!” he spat. “It just may not be completely worked out at the moment.”

“Well you better hurry up and get one worked out or else Pinkie is gonna get killed and it’s gonna be all your fault!” Applejack said fiercely.

“So much anger,” Discord tsked. “You really should see someone about that.” He tried to seem nonchalant, but couldn’t quite pull it off properly.

“I’m sorry to interrupt,” Fluttershy said quietly. After her outburst in the gym, she had quickly became her usual shy self. “But why can’t we get Pinkie while Discord, um, well, distracts Sombra?”

Discord grinned. “That’s a brilliant idea Fluttershy! Far less convoluted and likely to fail than the plan I had thought of! You are now officially my favorite human… next to Pinkie of course!”

She blushed. “Oh, why thank you…I-I think.”

“I hate to poke holes in an otherwise magnificent plan, but we don’t even know where Pinkie’s being held,” Rarity pointed out. “How are we supposed to find her?”

Discord waved the question off. “Oh that’s simple! You’ve forgotten, my dear. I am the Lord of Chaos.” He snapped his fingers and a pair of googly eyed glasses appeared on Applejack’s nose. Rainbow Dash stifled a giggle at how ridiculous it looked on the usually serious girl. Applejack quickly removed the glasses and shot a glare at her. “These glasses will allow you to see and hear everything I do,” Discord explained.

“Really? Nuh-uh! That is so cool!” Rainbow Dash gushed snatching the glasses away from Applejack and trying them on.

“When you find out where Pinkie is, make sure you get to her right away,” Discord continued. “I’ll try to keep Sombra distracted for as long as possible.”

Discord began to turn towards the entrance of the hotel when he felt a hand on his shoulder. “I still don’t completely trust ya,” Applejack began hesitantly. “But good luck anyway. For Pinkie’s sake.”

Discord gave her a small grateful smile, before turning back to the entrance. Whelp, here goes everything, he thought.

Rainbow Dash, still wearing the glasses, walked up to Applejack. “You know, I’m not entirely sure what you overheard Discord and Sunset talking about earlier today, but he seems quite loyal to me,” Rainbow Dash said. “Especially when it comes to Pinkie. Maybe you should ease up on him a bit.”

Applejack watched Discord disappear into the building and didn’t reply.

The ‘throne room’ Sombra had sent Pinkie to was really just an old hotel restaurant with the tables and chairs cleared out. A large ornate red throne that looked like it had come straight out of a prop closet stood in the middle of a front stage that had originally been meant to hold entertainment for dinner guests. To the side of the stage, Pinkie sat miserably in a giant bird cage that swayed gently in the rafters. She was exhausted.  After Sombra took the fear spell off of her, Pinkie figured out pretty quickly that everything she had seen was just a dream. However, that fact did nothing to console her. The dreams were right anyway. Her friends had never seen her as anything other than comic relief. Something to shake their head and laugh at. Sure, she loved to see people smile, but was it so much to ask to be taken seriously every once and a while? No one had ever understood her. No one, that is, until Discord came along.

Pinkie was so happy when they became friends. Finally someone who could keep up with her randomness and understood the importance of being silly. Being around him was just so liberating. No matter how weird or random she was it only made him like her more. Too bad it was all a lie. Contrary to what some people liked to believe, Pinkie wasn’t stupid. She had a feeling that Discord had not always been a good person. Sometimes he would say or do something that made Pinkie think that he might have used his chaos powers for less than honorable reasons in the past, but she thought he had changed. She thought she had changed him. And now she was stuck in a cage with a sadistic wizard, all because she had decided to trust someone. Friends. HA! She was better off without them.

“And how is my number one slave doing?” Sombra said walking into the room with a dashing smile. Pinkie didn’t even look at him. He frowned at her. “Oh now don’t be like that. We’re going to have a guest soon. Aren’t you excited? I think you’ve might have heard of him. Does the name Discord ring any bells?” Her breath hitched a little at the name, making Sombra grin. “So you have heard of him? That’s splendid to hear!” He waved his hand and suddenly Pinkie disappeared from the cage and reappeared next to the throne wearing a long black cocktail dress. She looked down at the slinky material in alarm. “You like?” Sombra asked with a smirk. “I couldn’t stand your other clothes. They were too bright. Hurt my eyes, you see.”

Pinkie frowned, confused. “Why did you let me out of the cage?”

“Don’t you want to be out of the cage?” Sombra asked innocently.

“Yes, but – “

“Well then stop complaining,” he ordered. “Nobody likes complainers.”

“I think I’m gonna do whatever the heck I want,” Pinkie replied, folding her arms in front of her chest angrily.

Sombra laughed. “Oh I like you! So much negativity wrapped up in one little girl. You’re like a five course meal when I’ve been livin’ off of salads for days.” Without warning, his look hardened and he grabbed her chin with enough strength to leave a bruise. He put his put his face inches from hers so she had no choice but to stare into his dark green eyes. “Don’t be mistaken. Just because I let you out of the cage and put you in a fancy dress does not mean I’m going to go soft on you girl. If you hadn’t screamed out Discord’s name earlier I would have simply sucked you dry, and then put you in a dungeon somewhere where I could slowly torture you to death. I meant it when I said that I liked you, but that just makes me want to kill you all the more. There’s nothing quite like the rush you get when you see a person’s life drain out of them. The final fear they feel as they fade into the darkness is the most delicious thing in the world.” He grinned darkly, pushing her roughly to the floor. Pinkie rubbed her sore jaw and blinked away tears. “However,” he continued. “I can’t do that now. You have to look pretty for our guest. Now stand up and don’t you dare talk back to me again. He should be here soon.”

The moment Discord had stepped into the hotel, a dull looking windigo had bowed and pointed him in the direction of a large double door. Apparently, he was expected. That could not be good news. With his hands behind his head and a carefully crafted air of nonchalance, Discord floated through the doors the windigo had indicated to find a large fancy dining area. Sombra sprawled languorously on the dark red throne while Pinkie stood just to the side of him, staring at the floor. Discord’s heart sank at the sight of her. Not only did she look sad and defeated, but if she was here then there was no way the elements were going to be able to get to her. So much for simple, he thought. Faulty and convoluted it was then.

“Discord! How nice of you to finally join us!” Sombra greeted. “Here, sit. Have some wine. It’s quite good.” He waved a hand and a large table with ornate black and red chairs appeared in the middle of the room. A spread of fine foods covered the table along with two golden plate settings.  A dark red wine filled the ruby encrusted goblets next to the plates.

“Don’t mind if I do!” With a snap of his fingers, Discord suddenly disappeared, only to reappear at one of the plate settings. With a smile he sipped at the wine, letting the dry flavor lull for a moment on his tongue before swallowing. “Hmm…” he said thoughtfully. “Not bad, but its missing something.” He snapped his fingers again and a large dollop of whip cream fell from the ceiling and plopped into the cup of wine. “Ah! That’s better,” he said, taking another sip. “So Somby,” Discord began. The wizard twitched slightly at the nickname. “Why do I get the nagging feeling that you’ve been expecting me?” Discord went on. “I don’t like being expected. It ruins my reputation. I have an image to uphold, you know. Can’t have people thinking I’m predictable.”

“No, of course not,” Sombra agreed. “That was not my intention. You see, Discord, I think I may have found something of yours.”

“Oh?” Discord asked disinterestedly, plucking a ruby from his goblet and popping it in his mouth. He munched on it, magnifying the sound of the crunching jewels to be as loud and annoying as possible.

Sombra only smiled. “Do you recognize this girl?” he asked, motioning to Pinkie.

Discord snapped his fingers and was suddenly right next to Pinkie staring deeply into her face as if he was trying to recognize her. “You know, she does look kinda familiar,” he said, stroking his chin. Pinkie glared at him. What little hope at rescue she may have had when she first saw him had quickly been squelched. Of course he wasn’t there to rescue her. It’s not like he ever cared about her anyway.

Suddenly, he winked at her. It happened so fast, Pinkie wondered if she had seen it all. “Nope,” Discord said finally, turning away from her. “I’m pretty sure I’ve never seen her before. Who is she? Your new girlfriend?” He snapped his fingers, and suddenly he was in Sombra’s lap wearing a long blonde wig and a sparkly blue dress. “And here I thought we had something special!”

Sombra’s face broke out in a look of horror and disgust as he quickly pushed the demon out of his lap and scrambled away from him. Discord put a hand to his forehead dramatically. “Oh Somby! Why must you wound me so?” He glanced over at Pinkie, who had a small – very small – smile on her face that she quickly tried to hide.

With an irritated huff, Sombra dusted himself off and fixed his slightly mussed black and red suit. “Really? Then I supposed you have no idea who these five girls that were found poking around my castle are either?” He waved a hand and Rarity, Applejack, Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash, and Sunset Shimmer appeared on the floor, bound and gagged next to the table. They looked up at him a little apologetically.

Discord sighed. They just had to get caught, didn’t they. “Alright, I know them. So what? What do you want?”

Sombra smiled. “I want information. You see, I heard an odd rumor a while back, one about a certain collection of artifacts. At first I simply dismissed it, but when I learned that you had come here to find the same thing, I thought that the rumor might have some merit to it after all. Now I have to ask, why is the Lord of Chaos hanging around a bunch of school girls? It is odd isn’t it? They must be awfully important.” He walked over to Pinkie and softly touched her straight hair. Pinkie flinched, but didn’t move.

“Don’t touch her,” Discord warned with narrowed eyes.

Sombra smirked. “Oh I’m going to do more than just touch her, Discord. I’m going to devour her.” He kicked the back of her knees causing her to fall roughly to all fours. Discord growled angrily and was about to stomp over there and punch Sombra in the face when Sombra raised a glowing hand towards Pinkie. “Stop!” he warned. “Stop or I’ll kill her. It’s not my usual MO, but we all have to make exceptions once and a while.”  Discord ground his teeth and curled his hands into fists, but obeyed. “Good,” Sombra grinned. “Now tell me, where are the Elements of Harmony?”

Confused, Discord stuck a finger in his ear. “Hold on. I don’t think I heard that right,” he said, pulling a rather large and slightly squashed cupcake from his ear. “Ah! That’s better. Now what did you ask about?”

“Don’t toy with me, Discord,” Sombra warned. “This girl you seem to be so attached to has the most delectable emotions I have ever tasted. If you keep stalling I might be tempted to suck her dry right here, right now, so tell me where the elements are!”

“You mean, you really don’t know?” Discord continued. “You kidnapped Pinkie, lured the rest of us here, and you don’t even know where the elements are?” He laughed. “And here I thought you were being smart!”

“What do you mean?” Sombra asked, nervously.

Discord wiped a happy tear from his eye. “Oh poor, stupid Sombra, I don’t have the elements. Never did, and with the way things seem to be going for me right now, I don’t think I ever will.” He put his hands behind his back and gave a mischievous grin. “But I know who does, and you haven’t made them very happy.” He snapped his fingers and the ropes tying the girls up turned into blue and green bubbles.