The Taxonomy of the Lower Reaches of the Discordian Dimensions

Twilight felt like her head was swimming.

Starswirl's story had been a lot to take in, not least the part about Discord and Celestia once being lovers. But there was something that worried her a lot more than that. She had always looked up to Starswirl as a hero and mentor, but he had rejected Discord before the draconequus had  even known what friendship was. She remembered when studying had been all she cared about and she had spurned the idea of making friends. Discord had clearly ached for companionship and had lost it because he loved someone unattainable in Equestrian society. Not for the first time, Twilight felt guilt when she remembered what she had been like before moving to Ponyville.

Perhaps she and Starswirl were more alike than they realized.

“If you're wondering why I'm telling you all this, Twilight, it's because I'm worried at how fragile Discord is. Not that he'd ever admit it in a million years, but we know it's the truth. And I know he's upset that Fluttershy has a coltfriend. And now we are in a similar situation to where we were over a thousand years ago! Oh, why did I listen to Celestia? She always was too soft about these things.”

He buried his head in his hooves. Twilight was rather unnerved at seeing her hero fall to pieces. He seemed more like a frightened old man right now rather than a powerful mage.

She thought for a moment then said, “Discord has learned a lot about friendship since we freed him from the statue. I don't think things are going to get as bad as you think.”

“Are you sure about that, Twilight?”

Twilight thought about all the times Discord had overreacted to things.

“Not entirely...” she admitted. “...but from what you've told me I'm pretty sure Discord is a slightly different person to the one he was back then".

Starswirl sighed so hard that the bells on his hat rattled.

"Fluttershy, hey, Fluttershy. Wake up!"

The pegasus slowly opened her eyes and was met with the scruffy eyebrows and mismatched eyes of her friend.

"Discord?" she whispered.

He sighed with relief. "We have to stop meeting like this," he joked.

Fluttershy started to get up and then winced in pain.

The draconequus's jovial expression changed instantly as he noticed something about her beautiful wings didn't look right.

Her wings looked like they had been compressed. The normally gently rounded and convex shape of one of them was now concave. The other looked like the feathers had been crushed.  She winced as he gently prodded one with his paw.

"Fluttershy...what happened?"

She said nothing and looked at the ground and whimpered. Realization hit Discord like a ton of bricks and his eyes glowed red with rage.

"What did he DO, Fluttershy?"

She whimpered then the tears fell. "He tried to stop me from seeing you. But I want to see you, because you're my friend and I need your friendship right now, but I understand if you don't want it anymore." She was trembling and her eyes were squeezed tightly shut as if waiting for a blow.

Discord cocked his head at her like a confused dog. "What in monkey tartarus makes you think I don't want your friendship?"

"I...I thought you wouldn't want to be my friend anymore, because that's what some stallions do? Because I was going out with Scriptum and not you?"

"Is that what he told you?"

"You don't hate me for it?"

"Hate you? After all you've done for me, I could never hate you. I love you, Fluttershy."

He realized what he was saying before he had even finished the sentence, then noticed with surprise that the words were now much easier to say now that he knew she didn't love him back. There was nothing to lose. But he needed her to know, anyway. He quickly looked at the floor.

"Sorry," he said. "I mean, I'm not sorry, but I am sorry if I've made you uncomfort..."

"No. You haven't."

She moved to place her hoof on his paw and winced in pain.

Discord was now bristling with anger, and she knew it wasn't for her.

"Discord, promise me you won't hurt him."

"But he hurt you!"

"I know, but we need to focus on finding the monster to cure that sick pony and I don't want you to get in trouble. And we still need an archivist to record our descriptions."

"I'm not taking you back to the castle if he's there," said Discord with a snarl. "Not unless I can change him into a banana slug and set him up on a blind date with some chili salt."

"Good, because I don't feel like going back there right now," she admitted. "I want to help find the creature with you. But I need to let everyone know I'm alright first. Can we send a message?"

"We can but first I need to tend to those wings," he said. "Lie down on your stomach."

She did.

"Can you stretch em' at all?"

Fluttershy attempted it and cried out in agony as a sharp wave of pain overcame her.

Discord was trying very hard to focus on her wing and not the idea of Scriptum's head on a plate. He scanned her with his magic and noted that not only was the left wing badly bruised, but that the right one had a slight fracture.

"Okay," he said softly. "I think I can fix this, but you have to keep super still."

"Okay," she squeaked. He snapped his fingers and she sighed with relief. There was still a dull ache, but nothing like the agony she had been in before.

"You might still feel sore, but try moving the wing now."

She did, and it spread out to its full length without problems.

"Thank you," she whispered.

"Anytime, Flutter Nutter. Though hopefully I'll never have to do that again."

"We should send the letter," she said.

"Ah, yes. Okay, one sec." He pulled a pencil out his ear again and handed it to her along with a piece of parchment.

Fluttershy took it and wrote:

To My Friends,

I'm just letting you know I'm okay because I realize I left without explanation.

I am at Discord's. We've decided to look for the monster together. We'll be back soon.

I'm sorry if I worried anyone.

Fluttershy

She really didn't feel like talking to anyone in detail about what had transpired between her and Scriptum right now. Not Discord, and not her friends. Her wings were healed but her heart ached. She had thought he was different and he had hurt her. It just reminded her of when she had grown closer to Discord and he had hurt her too. Granted, Discord had not physically hurt her, but the pain was still there.

But Discord was still her friend.

She handed the rolled up piece of parchment to him and he sent it in a burp of purple flame.

"So," said Discord. "Ready to embark on the Good Ship Chaos again?"

Fluttershy smiled.

"Let's go," she said.

Once they were back on Discord's boat, he felt full of conflicting emotions. One of the main ones was extreme rage towards Scriptum. Discord's magic crackled as he tried to keep his hackles from rising. Normally Discord dealt with his enemies by either using magic against them or playing mind games with them, so he was surprised that most of the angry fantasies that were flashing through his head regarding the unicorn involved using his teeth and claws. Must be testosterone, he thought. He adjusted his hormones with a snap of the finger. Ah, that was better. A little bit of oestrogen never hurt. He still wanted to make Scriptum pay, though.

The other emotion he kept trying to keep at bay was hope.

Fluttershy was here, but that didn't change anything, did it? Just because she didn't want to go out with Scriptum anymore didn't mean she automatically loved him now. He really needed to stop thinking that he had a chance with her. Yet out of the two emotions, hope and anger, hope seemed the harder one to squash.

The Good Ship Chaos moved through the ether as flish swam through the air past it. Fluttershy had her notebook out and was taking notes on each one. Discord, in the meantime, was scanning the horizon. At least he would have been if there was a horizon in sight. Instead, he just tried to focus on whatever was in front of him.

"I think maybe we should take the river," he said out loud. "We haven't checked that part of the dimension."

"There's a river?" asked Fluttershy.

"Yeah. Hydaspis. I admit I haven't been down it in a while, but it goes on for hundreds of miles. Plus part of it goes past Smooze's place. Being a jelly creature himself, I'm sure it would be a good idea to ask him what he's seen."

Fluttershy didn't bother asking how a river could exist in an area that seemed to consist of crackling energy, but she was pleased at the prospect of seeing the Smooze again.

"How do we get there?"

"Shouldn't be long now, I think we're nearing the mouth."

And they were, quite literally. The entrance to the river was a giant row of sharp teeth.

"Um..." began Fluttershy.

"Oh, don't worry," laughed Discord. "It won't snap at us if I tell it not to."

"That's...comforting."

But they sailed through the open jaws without a problem, then Fluttershy realized that they were on a river floating in space. Like a normal river, it was made of water, but rather than being surrounded by banks on either side, it just hung in the ether and twisted and turned as far as the eye could see.

Fluttershy joined Discord at the bow of the ship and looked outwards. Her mane billowed around her in the chaotic breeze. Ahead of them, a large lump jutted out of the river. Small flish continued to swim past them

"What's that?"

"Hm? Oh, looks like a Hydappo. They inhabit this part of the Hydapsis."

The Hydappo lifted it great head from the surface of the water and yawned. Instantly this created a vacuum and flish were inhaled into its great mouth.

"Lazy things," said Discord. "All they do is eat and sleep."

He looked down to see Fluttershy scribbling the information down frantically in her notebook and he felt that familiar warm feeling in his chest. She looked so adorable when she was concentrating on her chosen subject of magical creatures. Fluttershy was smart, and her curiousity about the natural world was just one of the many things he loved about her. Nature and chaos were inseperable, so Discord very much enjoyed Fluttershy's reaction to observing it.

"And that one?" she asked, pointing with her hoof towards something that looked like a transparent, billowing, glowing sheet floating just above the river's surface.

"I haven't given that one a name yet. You can name it."

She gasped. "May I?"

Discord chuckled. "Go ahead. There's thousands of undescribed things in this dimension."

Fluttershy started describing the animal in her notebook then gave it a common name and a latin name. Discord looked down at the writing:

Ghost Fly

Spiritus discordia

"No need to name it after me you know. You could have named it anything you liked."

"It's what I wanted to name it," she said. "After my friend." And she smiled at him.

To Fluttershy's surprise, after a few hours of travelling the sky was becoming darker. She could see Discord standing on the bow, silohuetted in the fading light as he kept an eye out for creatures. She had been resting on deck. Her wings did indeed still feel sore.

The light faded entirely. After a while it resembled an ordinary night in Equestria, except the sky was pitch black and void of any stars.

Or was it? She thought she had seen something glowing in her peripheral vision and she squinted as she tried to seek it out again. Maybe she was just over tired.

A blue glowing light flew past her then vanished. Her head snapped up in surprise. Then she gasped as her eyes noticed the sight above her.

There were thousands of glowing blue lights, spilled across the sky like a living canopy of stars.

"What are they?" she cried out in wonder.

Discord looked over his shoulder at her.

"Oh! Sapphire Flies!" I forgot to mention those to you. They only live in the nocturnal part of the river".

"Discord, they're beautiful!"

He walked to the middle of the deck to join her.

"I admit I've not seen them in a while," he said. "Like I said, I don't come down here much, and not much surprises me anymore. But I'm glad you're enjoying them."

Fluttershy was too awestruck by the gorgeous sight to even record it in her notebook. She just stared in open mouthed awe.

Discord chuckled to himself and sat down next to her. She moved closer to him and leaned back against him, still looking upwards. He was surprised, but didn't complain.

The sapphire flies continued to move above them, like a slow moving cluster of stars. Discord's arms gently wrapped around Fluttershy as she leaned back against his chest, watching the display above them.

"I'm so glad you're here, Flutter Nutter," Discord whispered. His head rested on top of hers.

"Me too," she said softly. Her eyes began to close. It had been an extremely long day.

"I...I'm tired. I think I should get some sleep", she whispered.

He smiled softly in the dim light. "Alright," he said, running his talon gently through her mane. He helped her to her feet and saw her to her bedroom door in the boat's roundhouse.

"You sure you're okay, Noodle?"

She forced a smile. "I'm...fine." she said.

He knew she was hurting because of Scriptum and his heart sank a little. He couldn't let her know how much he needed her though.

"Well," he said, forcing his own smile, "let me know if you need anything."

Then he got up and left to go to his own room.

He had trouble sleeping that night. He felt so damn confused. He didn't want her to be sad, but he also didn't want to feel sad himself. He also couldn't help feeling excited that she was staying the night. For some reason her being close to him always made him feel safe. It was like when he used to sleep in the woods near Canterlot Castle, knowing that Celestia and Starswirl weren't that far away. He tossed and turned on the bed sheets and looked up at the ceiling. Sleep was probably off the menu that evening.

"Buck it," he muttered out loud, and conjured up some reading glasses on the end of his muzzle while turning on the bedside lamp. He may as well look over the notes for Starswirl.

Within 5 minutes he was nodding off with the notes in his hand and a line of drool forming at the corner of his mouth, when he felt a warm nose gently prod his shoulder. He came to with a startled snort and wiped his mouth quickly.

"I...I'm sorry," said Fluttershy. "I didn't mean to wake you, it's just I can't sleep".

Discord looked down at the pegasus. She still looked heartbroken and he could tell she had been crying. She was shivering slightly.

She feels the same way I did. Do.

It was a rather odd situation if he thought about it. They were both suffering from the same affliction, heartache. Though the difference was he had the object of his affections right next to him and she didn't. He needed to be a friend right now, not a coltfriend, but he was unsure of how to proceed. He wanted to hug her or put an arm around her, but she might miscontrue that, or worse, he might. Instead he went over to the wardrobe and opened it up. It was empty, but when he put in his arm and felt around, he pulled out a soft, warm throw and draped it over her.

"Thank you," she said. Then, "Discord? Can...can I hug you?"

He smiled and opened his arms and she snuggled into his feathers. His talon automatically stroked her mane tenderly.

"I know it's not my place to say," he said softly, "but...Scriptum is an idiot."

"Discord..."

"Sorry," he said sheepishly. "I thought it would help." He was bad at this.

"I don't want to talk about Scriptum right now," she whispered. "Just please hold me, and stay with me, even if I can't sleep."

He watched a tear run down her muzzle and felt his heart shatter.

"I...of course, Flutters," he said.

They lay down on the bed together and she snuggled under the throw and he stroked her mane softly until she fell asleep. They had shared a bed before, when Discord had gone through one of his episodes and she had comforted him. This time he needed to comfort her. Through the window, he could see the sapphire flies gliding across the inky black of the ether.

"But he is an idiot," said Discord softly, in the darkness.

Fluttershy awoke the next morning to the smell of scrambled eggs and fried tomatoes and a delicious smell she couldn't identify.

She wandered into the kitchen where Discord was fighting with the kitchenware. The eggbeater barked at him and he held it off with a wooden spoon.

She couldn't help but giggle.

"Oh, you're up," said Discord. "So much for surprising you with breakfast in bed, then."

"You didn't have to do that," she said.

"Well, I did. Much to my chagrin, as it's all over the kitchen now, and while normally I revel in mess, I was trying to get the breakfast on your plate, not the ceiling."

A fried egg detached itself from the ceiling and handed on Discord's head. His antler and goat horn pierced through it so that it looked like he was wearing a strange beret. He picked it off himself and swallowed it whole.

Fluttershy laughed. Discord's ears pricked up at the beautiful sound. It was the first time she had done so since he had found her unconsious in his front yard.

Suddenly a loud whistle went off on the ship's deck.

"What's that?" Asked Fluttershy. "Does it mean trouble?"

"Naw," said Discord grinning. "It just means we've reached the Smooze's house."