A Discorded Journey

I sat in the back seat with Pinkie while Sunset drove. As soon as we had gotten on the highway, Pinkie placed orders on what she wanted to see me change into. I had always liked pony Pinkie because, out of everypony, she was the one who seemed to appreciate my chaos the most. Human Pinkie was no different and appreciated chaos just as much, but with my limited amount of magic I opted for only one change in outfit, for the sake of fitting in with those around me. True to my nature though, I couldn’t just go with your run of the mill clothing line. My new outfit was a light blue collared shirt, a vest with brown on one breast and mustard yellow on the other, a blue glove on my left and a black glove on my right, and even my pants were chaotic with one leg being black and one leg gray.

Pinkie laughed at my choice of style and said I looked dapper. We started to compare notes on chaotic outfits. I was surprised that, because humans wore clothing all the time, Pinkie had a closet full of random clothing that helped her create a variety of fun looks for her parties. We laughed at how she showed up to the Spring Fling in a chicken costume. It was nice to be able to laugh with someone for a change. Life after Tirek had become rather lonely and boring. Sunset glanced at the backseat through the rear-view mirror several times, but remained silent. The highway was empty so we made good time.

The building we pulled up to was made out of plain gray brick and was only three stories high. A man with a brown paper bag in his hand that was shaped like a bottle was curled up on the stoop, clearly asleep. Several of the windows on the first floor had cracks in them and all of the blinds were shut tight. Sunset parked the car and pulled out a steering wheel lock. She grunted as she secured it in place and then motioned for us all to get out.

“The locks on my car don’t work, so make sure you didn’t leave anything in here,” she said to me as I closed my door. I nodded my head and we all made our way into the building.

“Shimmy and I live on the third floor! Race you up the stairs!” Pinkie cheered as she bolted ahead. She was long gone before I had even made it onto the first step.

I looked at Sunset quizzically. “Shimmy?” I asked with a smirk.

She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, Pinkie likes to call me that. But she is the only one allowed to,” she added in a stern tone, pointing at me with a finger. I cocked an eyebrow and followed her silently up the stairs. I couldn’t help but hypothesize that there was more to their relationship than I originally thought.

We reached the top landing where Pinkie was waiting for us, a steel door shut tightly behind her. She spun in circles and tried to catch the end of her hair as it danced in front of her. “I didn’t bring my keys Shimmy!”

“PP, I have told you a million times that you always need to bring them with you! What if I’m not home?” Sunset’s voice dropped into a whisper. “You can’t sit outside by yourself, it isn’t safe!” she hissed.

Pinkie shrugged as she continued to spin. Sunset rolled her eyes and unlocked the door. The lock must have been huge because it echoed down the stairway. I walked in after them and felt my jaw drop. This level of the building was not what I had imagined. The stairwell had stunk of old smoke and cat pee and had discarded trash strewn about, but past the steel door it was immaculate. The carpet was a deep red and there was white crown molding along the hall. There were only three doors in the hallway, one on each side and one at the far end.

“Make sure you re-lock the door, Discord,” Sunset called as she moved to the door on the right. I quickly did as I was told and followed her and Pinkie into the apartment. The place was huge. It felt like I was stepping into Time Turner’s house, like it was bigger on the inside. The front door led into a small entryway with a bench and closet. The girls kicked off their shoes, or in the case of Pinkie, launched out of them. I threw mine off and followed them into the living room.

“I am going to run and change really fast before everyone else gets here. Make yourself at home, Discord,” Sunset said as she walked down an adjacent hallway.

Pinkie got a shit-eating grin on her face and she held up her hands in front of her, fingers wiggling as if they were itching to touch something. “Oh, let me help you with that, Shimmy,” she said under her breath. She stalked out of the room after her prey, as if she completely forgot I was standing there.

“Well, then, I’ll just get comfortable,” I said to myself. I looked around. Everything was in perfect order. Bleh.

I cracked my knuckles and went to work. The walls were the first to be changed. I fixed every painting and picture by tilting them slightly crooked. Larger furniture was next. I moved the sofa and loveseat to be more cumbersome to navigate around. The rug that was under the coffee table was moved to drape over it. I placed a vase of flowers on top of it, stems up, of course.

As I moved around the room I kept hearing a squeaky floorboard where the couch had been. The sound was off though. Not your normal run of the mill squeaky floorboard, but a I-am-actually-a-secret-compartment type of squeaky floorboard. I am an expert when it comes to making floorboards that squeak, so this was child’s play to identify.

Naturally, I had to investigate. I got down on my hands and knees and examined the board. The grain was running perpendicular to the rest of the floor. I ran my fingers along the edge until I found a little grove. The board popped up with no problems. A single book was crammed into the space. I took it out and pocketed it in my vest for later reading and placed the board exactly as I found it and continued with my rearranging. About twenty minutes passed when there was a knock at the door. I figured it was the rest of the group, so I answered it.

“Good afternoon,” I said with an old man voice as the door swung open to reveal the rest of the gang. “Welcome to the Sunpie Residence. May I take your coats?” I said, doing my best impression of a butler.

The girls stood there with looks of confusion on their faces. Applejack was the first to recover and quickly smacked her hand into her face. “Hey, Discord,” she drawled. “It’s the middle of summer and we ain’t wearing any coats.”

I made a half bow and moved aside to admit them. “No matter. May I offer you a little glass of water? Or a fresh pressed hanky in case you sneeze?”

Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes as they came in. “No, we’re good."

“Goodness!” exclaimed Rarity as she looked around the room. “What has happened here?” she motioned.

Pinkie and Sunset came into the room as I closed the door. Both had damp hair and flushed faces. Sunset looked confused as to why her living room was turned upside down. Pinkie, however, just rolled with it.

“I love it!” she shouted. From… somewhere… she pulled out a brown paper bag and started stuffing balls, whoopee cushions, and other assorted party favors in every nook and cranny of the room. “I have been telling Sunset for AGES that I needed more hiding spots for my things!”

“Pinkie, don’t just…” Sunset started to say, but changed her mind. “Oh, whatever.” Sunset cleared off all of the furniture and threw everything into a pile in the corner. Rarity elegantly draped herself onto the armchair, Rainbow sat on the floor with her legs under the coffee table and her back against the middle of the couch, Pinkie plopped into the loveseat while Sunset sat on the arm next to her, and Applejack and Fluttershy each sat on the far ends of the couch. Everyone looked very comfortable.

Since there wasn’t really room for me anywhere, I laid down on top of the coffee table. Rainbow and I were eye level and she gave me an annoyed look.

“Paint me like one of your french girls,” I said, striking a pose for her.

“Guh, gross. Don’t do that,” she said as she made fake barfing motions. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Fluttershy blush a little and stifle a giggle. I sat up and crossed my legs, leaning on my knees for support. We all sat in silence for a few moments before Sunset cut to the chase.

“So, you are the Lord of Chaos from Equestria.”

“Eyup.”

“And you are a friend of Twilight’s.”

“Eyup.”

“Why are you here?”

“Vacation.”

Everyone looked at each other before looking back to me. “Vacation?” asked AJ.

“Well, not exactly on purpose…”

“And that’s when Fluttershy and I came to see all of you.”

“Neat!” said Pinkie. “So you just want to get home?”

I pondered for a moment. Staying for a bit could be fun, but I really needed to get back and make sure Fluttershy and the others were OK. I hadn’t really stopped thinking about what Tirek had said, and I would have been lying if I said I wasn’t worried. “Yeah, I really should be getting back to Equestria. Especially since my powers seem to be on the fritz.”

Sunset had hardly said a word while I told my story. Her mouth was set in a hard frown, the kind that you could cut diamonds with. “I think…” she started to say. We all looked at her as she gathered her thoughts. “I think we need to get you back to Equestria as quickly as possible. Let’s get to the school.” I could tell she was hiding something, but I didn’t press it. The girls didn’t seem to notice, so I just made my way to the door as Pinkie chatted about how neat it would be to be a chimera.

We clown-car’ed it to the school. Having all of us crammed into one vehicle made the ride much more amusing. Sunset drove with Rarity and Rainbow Dash in the front seat. Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Fluttershy all sat in the back. Since the car only seated six, I laid across the girls in the back seat, my head in Fluttershy’s lap and my feet on AJ’s.

Fluttershy tried not to look flustered. She seemed hesitant when Pinkie suggested the arrangement, but Pinkie had pulled me in the car before either of us could protest. I had no issues with invading personal space, but I knew Pinkie was the only one that shared my feelings. So, I opted to do what I do best; act nonchalant like it didn’t matter and that I didn’t have a care in the world.

In reality, my stomach was doing flips for a reason I couldn’t fathom at the time.

After about twenty minutes of listening to Pinkie talk about being a little girl and a scary clown living under her bed, we pulled up to the school. AJ roughly shoved my feet off of her as she got out of the car. I sat up so Fluttershy could get out, which left me hunched down on top of Pinkie. She hugged me, pinning my arms to my sides and taking my breath away.

“I’m going to miss you so much, Dissy!” she squeed.

“I’m going to miss you too,” I said breathlessly as my face turned my favorite shade of purple.

“PINKIE! Space!” scolded Rarity as she pulled me out of Pinkie’s embrace and out of the car. I took a few deep breaths to oxygenate my lungs and get my barrings. The sun was setting and the sky was a boring muddle of maroon, pink, and blue. A little jungle green sprinkled in there would have made it pop. I let out a sigh as I daydreamed about what Celestia would do to me if I messed with her sunsets.

“Um, Discord? Are you coming?” Fluttershy pulled me from my thoughts as she touched my arm.

“Hmm? Oh, yes, coming!” Everyone had already assembled around a statue.

“Wow! The school hasn’t changed at all since we graduated! You guys remember when Shimmy redecorated the front of the school and then we had that amazing dance and then Twilight and Shimmy and I all went into the broom closet and murph murph murph,” she said through Sunset’s hand, which was covering Pinkie’s mouth.

“YEAH! That was some dance, Pinkie!” Sunset said a little too loudly, her face turning the color of her hair.

“Heh, that was the first time we really got to learn about Equestria. Can’t believe we are all still so close after so long,” commented AJ.

“Eight years sure goes by fast when you have good friends by your side,” said Fluttershy with a smile.

Sunset let go of Pinkie’s mouth and started fiddling with an open briefcase at her feet as Rarity attached suction cups with wires coming out of them to the smooth surface of the side of the statue. “What’s that?” I asked.

“This will make the portal open from our side. Twilight and I designed it when she was here last time. It runs on a crystal that she enchanted in Equestria. By applying it to the fracture points along the dimensional rift on this end, we can stimulate a spatial flexure to form starting on this end, rather than it starting on the other end.”

“You are such an egghead,” said Dash.

Sunset waved her off. “Yeah, well, this egghead needs to concentrate.” I couldn’t help but laugh at her. Sunset smiled to herself. I knew that Sunset had been Celestia’s student in the past, and I could see why. It was a shame that Sunset had left. Tia had wallowed in misery in her favorite spot in the grounds, lamenting on how she had lost a future Princess. She had been unaware at the time that I could hear everything she was saying, since her secret spot was near where I was placed in the garden. I actually had learned a lot about her because of that…

“Discord, come in Discord!” Pinkie waved her hand in front of my face. My eyes refocused as I started paying attention to the world again. “Hey there!” cheered Pinkie.

“Sorry, I wasn’t listening. What?”

“I’m ready to open the portal. But it’s only going to stay open for a few seconds, so you need go through it as fast as possible,” explained Sunset.

I started to run in place to get warmed up. “Alright, I’m ready!” Sunset hit the button and I took off toward the wall at full speed. “So long, coffin stuffers!” I yelled as I ran.

“Wait, no!” screamed Fluttershy.

I turned my head to see her arm reaching for me, a look of worry on her face. WHAM! I slammed into the unforgiving concrete. The wind was knocked out of me and I fell to the ground writhing in pain. Fluttershy darted over to me.

“You got what you deserved, calling a lady a coffin stuffer,” scolded Rarity.

“I don’t understand. Why isn’t this working?” said Sunset as she smacked the machine.

“No, I think I’ll have the waffles... bacon… and a side of mustard,” I babbled, unable to comprehend what was happening around me. I felt like I had been flattened by a steamroller. Fluttershy placed my head in her lap in an attempt to make me more comfortable.

“Well, now what?” asked AJ. “The portal isn’t opening.”

“I’m… I’m not sure,” said Sunset. “I need some time to run some tests. It’s getting late anyway and it will be too dark to try and figure this out here.” Sunset ran her hands through her hair and pulled it back tightly, pulling her eyes into slits for a moment before she let go. “Pinkie, let’s get everyone home so I can get to my lab.”

“Oki doki loki! But what about Dissy?"

"He can come stay with me. I have a lot of extra room since I adopted out so many kitties and puppies," said Fluttershy.

“Whoa whoa whoa,” barked Dash. “That guy snuck into your house and could have done who knows what to you before you even knew he was there! And you want us to leave you alone with him? Are you high?” she deadpanned.

Fluttershy looked at Dash seriously. “I don’t expect you to understand, just to trust my judgement. I know he means no harm.” She looked down at me and gave a weak smile. “We’ll be fine. Right, Discord?”

“The frogs are in the… ice cream…”

“Guh.” Rainbow rolled her eyes and threw her hands in the air. “I give up,” she said as she turned away. “I’m not carrying him though and he can sit on the floor.” She made her way to the car in a huff.

“Fluttershy, are you sure about this?” asked AJ.

Fluttershy nodded. “Yes, I’m sure. We’ll have fun. I know it.”

AJ sighed. “Okay then, I trust ya. Let’s get him to the car.” AJ picked me up and threw me over her shoulder like a sack of oats. My hands, being limp, smacked her butt as she walked. I think that’s why she dropped me into the car rather unceremoniously.

“Oh, those pillows are so soft. Thanks for bringing them to my room,” I babbled as I passed out completely.