Discord was out and about on his usual stroll, causing some minor chaos. Rolling around on skates made of soap, blowing bubbles made of chocolate milk, and the occasional chocolate candy cloud, you know, the usual.
On his stroll he came upon a little unicorn filly walking around with a blue balloon in her magic. What a wonderful opportunity! He thought devilishly as he came up behind the filly, ready to cause a bit of chaos. He quickly made himself attach to the balloon she was holding, the balloon now had his face on the side away from the filly.
He caused the balloon to float down to be directly in front of the filly, she looked on in confusion for a moment as it turned. The Discord balloon then stuck out his tongue and blew as hard as he could, which being a god, was very hard. Afterwards he promptly popped, leaving the filly stunned into silence.
He was now awaiting the wonderful sound of... crying? No, no, no, that wasn't right, she... she should be laughing. It was funny, right? Well of course, it was the oldest trick in the book, it HAD to be funny! Then... why was she crying? Was she just a spoil sport? No, fillies and colts usually loved his pranks more than the mares and stallions did.
He then started thinking...
And thinking...
Had I ever stopped to really see their reactions before?
That thought stopped him in his tracks... I haven't. This fact hit him like a brick, quite literally, I brick slammed into his gut with the thought written out on it... Well that wasn't funny, and more stupid then chaotic. But... he was chaos, right? Isn't chaos supposed to be fun?
This... this must be researched...
He promptly opened a door into nothingness and stepped through, except this nothingness gave way into an archive of all his memory contained. He then looked into the first folder on the left, which appeared to be a memory of him... crying... into the shoulder of his mother while he held a popped...blue... balloon, in my lion's paw...
No, nonono, I was just a cry-baby back then, looking back that was... hilarious! Yes... hilarious...
In his mind, he felt dams begin to crack, something in his mind was surfacing, and he didn't like it. So, he kept searching through the archives, looking, searching, for anything that could resemble joy or laughter caused by his chaos, but to no avail.
There was no joy, no laughter, his chaos wasn't as fun as he thought it to be... but then, what feelings had his chaos brought?
Pain. A voice seemed to speak to him, in these long halls that were the archives of his mind.
no...
Fear, panic.
no, nononono!
grief, sadness.
No! There had to be more than that! There has to be somepony who finds joy in my mischief!
There is nopony, only you!
I'm... alone?
... In a way...
The owner of the voice had finally made an appearance... Celestia. If he wasn't so lost in truth he would have cursed her for breaking the dams in his mind.
"Tia."
"Yes?"
"... What have I done? How could I not see this before?"
"Discord, we can all get lost in our fun as children, but then comes the time we must grow up, now, I believe, is your time."
"You didn't answer my first question, Tia."
"You have caused my ponies harm, made them cry, made them panic, and you have been punished for it already."
"One more thing Tia... am I a monster?" Celestia looked down upon him, Discord had quite literally shrunken. Celestia's calculating eyes stared at him for the longest time.
"You were, and you may still be." This was all Discord needed to hear, tears began to slowly drift down the side of his face. Celestia came to sit by him, giving him her shoulder to cry on. "You haven't let me finish, no matter how much of a monster you were in the past, you have done more than enough to make up for it, including showing remorse for your actions." Discord looked up at the white alicorn that raised the sun every morning.
It then clicked in his head: he needed this revelation! It wasn't something that should have made him cry. In fact, this should have come years ago.
"Thank you Tia... I needed this." The alicorn got up and gave a slight nod of her head before grasping the door in her magic, and leaving.
...
"Thank you..."
Everything made sense now, why they would think to trap him in stone. Why he ever only heard his own laughter, well, he heard Pinkie's, occasionally, that is beside the point though. Every horrid thing that had been done to him in the past, he deserved it. Every, last, bit. How the ponies ever came to forgive him, was now a mystery to him.
Tearing Ponyville apart with wicked plants, turning it into the chaos capitol of the world, what was he ever thinking?
Hmph, I suppose none of that matters now, does it? No, it didn't, all that mattered now was that he was going to change. He only wanted to make the ponies laugh, but now he had learned that he had been going about it in completely the wrong way. So how was he to go about making them laugh? Water-squirting flowers? No. Giant fly-eating plants? No. Nonono, none of his old tricks would work, now would they?
So, he'd have to try something new, something he'd never done before. Now he set out to figure out what he could do to make the ponies laugh.
After many hours of solitude and thinking, he figured out what he could do. It was something so terrifyingly funny that if I were to even try to describe it you wouldn't stop laughing for three days, and if I let that happen, well, that would just be sheer chaos.
After Discord had made his plan, he set out to make everypony in Equestria laugh. And if this didn't work, he would just keep trying.
Author's Note
Mk, my first one shot, it wasn't TOO horrible, was it? Eh, regardless of what you thought, it was fun to write, well, until remembered the minimum of 1,000 words in a story, then it became kind of tedious. In case you are wondering, past ""Thank you Tia... I needed this." The alicorn got up and gave a slight nod of her head before grasping the door in her magic, and leaving.
...
"Thank you...""
I was just trying to get the word limit without making it seem TOO forced. Seriously, the word limit is just annoying sometimes.
