Chapter The Only: Worst Time to Be a Historian.
Canterlot Castle was the greatest magical stronghold of Equestria. It was the first pony city to rise, and it would be the last to fall. So it had been written, so it would be.
Of course, so it had been written after Celestia’s third edit of the history books, more specifically the edit that removed the monkeys.
“Again?!” A cry, almost a roar, rattled the suits of armour in the historical section. Everywhere else, it rattled the ponies in them.
Silence fell. Deafening silence, even more so than the cry that had shaken up the castle. All around, Royal Guards tensed at the disturbing quiet of the night.
The silence was soon broken by the sound of stomping. Delicate, regal stomping, but stomping nonetheless.
“Honestly, every single time, the trouble I have to go through just for that… gah!”
The source of the commotion was easy to spot. The Royal Canterlot Voice was, after all, invented for the sake of convenience, so ponies would know when their liege needed them, and, more importantly, what distance was considered proper.
“I swear, if she pulls this one. More. Time…”
The proper distance was currently ‘far, far away, preferably holed up in a closet and with a croissant at the ready just in case your liege stumbles across you.’
Truly, the voice had the Royal Guard in a panic. All around, the pitter patter of hooves and the nervous rattling of armour could be heard. No sensible pony would want to go anywhere near a crisis of this magnitude.
“Princess Luna! What’s all the commotion about?”
The alicorn growled at the figure who’d so unceremoniously interrupted her very important and entirely justified fuming with his silly star-ridden apparition. He was neither a pony, nor sensible. “Discord. Good evening to you, too.” She marched on, lowering her voice to a grumble as she went.
Discord floated in the air, pondering. He could just leave her be. Princess Luna was obviously very upset about something. Upset enough to possibly curse some poor Royal Guard or chuck him into the park fountain. Clear night like this? If the wind was right, she might even punt one of her bat-winged guards all the way over to Ponyville.
He wasn’t about to miss a sight like that.
“Hold on, Luna, what’s the rush?”
Luna stopped and raised her head high, ceasing her royal grumbling for the time being. “What is it you want, Discord?”
The draconequus cleared his throat. “Well, an answer would be a good start, Your Highness. What’s got your stars out of alignment this time?”
Luna groaned. “My sister asked me to clean up. Again.”
“Really?” Discord blinked in confusion. “Clean up? Clean up what?”
Luna furrowed her brow. “You mean you didn’t know? You haven’t felt anything?”
Discord shrugged. “You’re going to have to be a little more specific than that.”
“The shifts in magic, the cutie marks being stripped?”
“Oh, that? Of course I did. I told Celestia all about it as soon as I noticed. I’ve even been to the source myself five times now. Nasty business, if you ask me. I mean, a pony taking away all hope, joy, and colour in other ponies?” He harrumphed. “You leave for a millennium and you get outsourced. That’s gratitude for you.”
Much to his surprise, that got a chuckle out of Luna. “Yes, I suppose that is a sentiment you can relate to.”
“So has it gotten worse, then? Last I checked, that village was back to normal again. Everyone’s got their cutie marks back, no harm, no foul. No need to break out any other artifacts in the vault?” Discord leaned in with a cautious smile on his face, the kind he usually put on when he’d done something wrong and wanted get out of his punishment. It never worked.
Luna shook her head and cantered on as Discord set down on the ground and did the same. “No, no, your loyalty is not mine to question, Discord. You’ve no complaints from me, aside from the obvious.”
“I did apologise for that whole Tirek business. And my little spat at the Gala. And, well, everything else.”
“And you never led Tirek to any children. By my account, your apologies thus far have been acceptable. You may consider them accepted, still.”
Discord afforded himself the tiniest of smirks. “Glad to hear it. So, what does this ‘cleaning up’ have to do with those magic shifts, then?”
“It appears the unicorn responsible for stripping away cutie marks found a way to travel through time.” Luna cast a grave look Discord’s way.
He recoiled. “What? Don’t look at me; I don’t fiddle with time magic.”
Luna squinted. “You don’t have that power?”
“Oh, I do, I just don’t particularly like it. You never know what sort of freaks you might run into in the time stream,” said pot of kettle. “Last time I went in there I got hit in the head by a telephone booth. Good thing there was a doctor nearby.”
“Right. At any rate, this unicorn, Starlight Glimmer, she travelled back through time and stopped Rainbow Dash from performing the Sonic Rainboom, thereby altering history and preventing Twilight Sparkle from ever meeting her friends.”
Discord scratched his head. “And when you say she ‘stopped’ Rainbow Dash, you mean…”
“Starlight went back more than once and redid it a few times. Standard physical restraint, talking the alleged bullies into not bullying Fluttershy, spreading that dreadful ‘equality’ gospel I thought I’d burned out of them back in its heyday.”
He furrowed his brow and stroked his goatee, pondering. “Strange. As I recall, Rainbow Dash did that Rainboom when she was a little dashing filly, no?”
“She did. Apparently that map in Twilight’s castle has some… catalytic properties for time travel. Starlight hijacked it and went back a few years.”
“Huh. And here I thought that place was built by the Tree of Harmony.”
“It was.”
“So why didn’t the tree stop it, then? No one knows anything about that old shrub’s magic.”
Luna rolled her eyes. “I honestly do not know how it happened, nor do I particularly care. I have a hard enough time accepting that a fellow Princess would take orders from a tree, of all things. Not even a talking tree; I could understand taking orders from a talking tree. A talking tree trying to give me orders would have my undivided attention.”
Discord cleared his throat, not wanting to set off another royal ramble. “So the Tree allowed this Starlight pony to go back in time and interfere with the past, which included the use of force on Rainbow Dash, before she was an adult?”
“Yes.”
He nodded. “I see. And, ah, Fluttershy?”
“Starlight Glimmer tampered with her timeline as well. Repeatedly.”
Discord grinned wickedly at that. “Oh, now I follow. So when you say ‘cleaning up’, you mean-”
“Going into the timestream directly, reconnecting the untampered continuity to ours to preserve status quo, and mending all the frazzled timelines so they don’t interfere with ours. Now that the threat is dealt with, I only need to undo the damage.”
Discord’s grin faded at the speed of wall, to be replaced with an annoyed expression he usually reserved for royalty asking favours, relatives nagging about his bachelor status, and lawyers with a degree in physics. “Oh. Of course you do. Well, at least that Starlight Glimmer is getting the punishment she deserves. What was it this time? Turned to stone, buried alive, stuck in a crystal, ooh, did Twilight rip her cutie mark off? No, wait, don’t tell me, she’s turned her into a filly and now Starlight is a Cutie Mark Crusader.”
Luna’s mouth hung open. “Fine ideas, but no. Actually, Starlight is quite well. Twilight Sparkle has made friends with her.”
For a brief moment, a twitch went through Discord’s left eyelids. When it passed, unbeknownst to Luna, the suits of armour in the history section all mashed their hooves against their hollow foreheads. “She’s WHAT? After all I’ve had to do, after all I’ve given up, she gives me such a hard time, and then she-” Discord swallowed his words when he remembered whom he was talking to.
Luna smiled. “Thank you, Discord, I’m glad I’m not the only one.”
“Beg your pardon?”
“I mean, really, it’s bad enough Princess Twilight even has that accursed map without any security present-”
“Speaking of which: where would a normal unicorn even get a time travel spell? Don’t you lock yours up?”
Luna groaned again. “She didn’t steal it from us, no. I have no idea where she got it, but I can guess. She probably just marched into Twilight’s castle and ripped a page out of something my sister sent over. But that’s not the point, the point is that Twilight Sparkle kept travelling back and forth between the past and present, and the spell was boobytrapped to keep sending Starlight back along with her. So rather than just leaving well enough alone or calling me, or even calling you-”
“Your vote of confidence is most endearing, Princess.”
“-She ended up making matters worse by leaving the original present day in the first place. Twilight’s left the continuum ragged and she’s formally excused a pony who’s committed multiple crimes against the nation and the world, as well as breaking an oath to the Order of Medicine.” Luna stopped and blinked, confused. “Discord, are you crying?”
Discord sniffed and wiped away a tear. “Oh, little Twilight Sparkle, who knew you’d grow up into such a beautiful avatar of chaos?”
Luna leered at him, before resuming her angry march towards the central courtyard. “Not to interrupt your leaking of liquid pride, Discord, but I have a job to do.”
“And a lot of complaining to do while you’re at it.”
“And-” Luna stopped herself mid-sentence. “Well…”
Discord didn’t press the issue right away. He knew that slump in the wings all too well. Back in the old days, that used to mean ‘playtime’s over’. “So, if I understand you correctly, you’ll be travelling back in time to all the alternate timelines to make sure none of them intrude on this current one?”
“Yes. I’d rather not have a repeat of the mess Twilight Sparkle caused right before her coronation. I don’t think the status quo can take another pummeling like that, not to mention what might happen if the villains of alternate timelines show up here, strengthened by victories they never got in our version of events.”
“Ooh, sounds like a lovely field trip. Mind if I join you?”
Luna would have dropped her jaw had it not been for a few hundred years’ worth of etiquette training. “Whatever for?”
“I want to see what I look like in the other timelines, of course. I think I’ve lost weight, but it’s hard to tell when you’re already as handsome as I am.” Discord struck a pose and inflated his biceps, before letting the air out with a most unbecoming flatulent noise.
“Starlight prevented the Sonic Rainboom Rainbow Dash did as a filly, Discord. The unifying event of the current bearers of the Elements of Harmony.”
“Quite a mouthful, I know. Your point?”
“We’d be going into timelines where the Elements of Harmony never returned. Timelines where you escaped without consequence. Timelines where other evils went unopposed.”
“I know, that’s precisely the point. I want to see how my old kingdom of chaos measures up. Besides, it’s been ages since we did anything together. We never did catch up when I got out. Well, any of the times I got out.”
The alicorn sighed, but she managed a smile, nonetheless. “I suppose I could use the company. I’m losing my sanity doing this all the time.”
“You do realise whom you’ll be travelling with, don’t you?”
Luna chuckled as she resumed her pace. “I do. We’ve had our differences, but, as I recall, as cruel and conniving as you once were, you never attempted to destroy us outright.”
“Oh, Heavens forbid, no. You and your sister were far too entertaining for that. Not like those ghastly trolls or, yegh, changelings.”
Luna’s ears perked. “Oh, you don’t like changelings? We’ll likely be seeing a few very soon.”
“I adore changelings, they’re the funnest bunch I ever met. At least, they were. I suppose they still are. Most of the time. But they’re like words, you see: hideous when they travel in swarms, and boring when they’re all the same.”
“We’ll make that stop quick, then,” Luna said, taking a moment to enjoy the sight of the Canterlot gardens they’d entered. A full moon, a clear starlit night, it was a joy to behold. Shame she’d be spending it with such dreary matters as continuity.
“You still haven’t answered my question, by the way.”
Luna shook her head to clear it. “Haven’t I? Sorry, what was it?”
“What’s got your stars so out of alignment? Why are you so upset?”
She let out a heavy sigh that spoke of sleep missed and of worries weighing her down. “Because all of this could have been avoided so easily. If only my sister would listen every once in a while.”
“Ah. Twilight’s response time really isn’t up to royal standards, I know.”
“That too. I was referring to the catalyst to all this. My sister needed something to adjust the state budget.”
Discord squinted, confused. “I don’t follow.”
“A royal wedding can certainly hide a lot of expenses, but it’s truly amazing what one can hide in the numbers of a coronation.” Luna lay her head down and curled up into a little ball.
“Oh. You mean to tell me Twilight’s coronation and ascension to princesshood…”
“Was decided and timed purely based on financial reasons.”
“Hmm. You know, it’s odd, but I’m not even surprised.” Discord arched an eyebrow at the prone pony. “What are you doing?”
“Time travel, of course.” Luna closed her eyes and yawned.
“But you’re lying down. And going to sleep.”
“You didn’t seriously think I’d be attempting physical time travel, did you? That’s what caused this damage in the first place. You do know how to follow me, yes?”
“D’oh, yes, yes, of course I know. Spider in the web and all that, Nancy in the middle, I know, been around that proverbial block a few times.”
“Then why are you not lying down? You know you can’t do this while conscious.”
“Eh, well, it’s just that…”
“What?”
He idly twiddled his thumbs. “I rather like being awake, is all.”
Luna rose up. “Discord, do you mean to tell me you do not sleep?”
“Don’t be ridiculous; of course I sleep. But, much like time travel, I’m not very fond of it.”
“Whyever… oh. Oh, of course. Your powers are rooted in chaos. I suppose sleep can be rather traumatic, then.”
“I’m sure I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t play coy with me, Discord. You weren’t the first individual I’ve come across whose mind was wracked by chaos. I just didn’t think it mattered for a being of that sheer power.”
“Good. You’ll be glad to know it doesn’t.”
“So will you be joining me, then, or not?”
He huffed and waved his arms around. “Out here? In the middle of the park, where anypony can see? What if someone decides to ambush us?”
“I have guards stationed here, Night Guards I know I can trust.”
Discord looked around and squinted. “Are you sure? I don’t see any Night Guards.”
“Hence the title ‘trusted’. You’re welcome to stay behind and see if you can find them, but I can’t predict their reactions if you do.”
“Fine.” With a snap of his fingers, he conjured up a bed and blitzed himself in it, complete with nightcap, peejays, and what looked like a stuffed version of a hominid with a squid for a head. “But if this makes it to the tabloids, on your head be it.”
“Fair enough.”
“I will swallow your soul!”
“Did your doll just threaten me, Discord?”
“Oh, relax, it’s only a toy.”
“That’s what you said about my little ponies once.”
Discord grumbled. “As I recall, they weren’t yours at the time. They were mine by right.”
“Shall we continue this conversation outside of our bodies, please?”
“Another time, then.”
“I don’t see why we have to bother with all this. Can’t you just use a tracking spell or a mending spell or something?” Discord asked as their astral bodies fell down into a black, starless void, homing in on the strands of an infinite web that was attached to nothingness.
“You can’t affect objective reality without objectively moving your consciousness there, you know that. And I am using a tracking spell. Sigil, actually, I’m surprised you don’t use it more often.”
“I already told you, I don’t like the traffic around here.” Right at that moment, the two spirits dodged a silver car that had flames trailing behind its tires. “It’s murder.”
“We’re not even corporeal here, Discord, stop whining.”
“I am not whining; I am complaining. Do you want to hear me whining?”
Luna let her ears droop. “Yes, actually, I think the sound of you whining would do wonders for my mood. But not while we’re working, please.”
As much as he wanted to keep going and grumble, Discord couldn’t help but notice the tone of Luna’s voice there. Something felt off. “Later, then. So where do we go first?”
“We go here. Mind the blue box.”
Luna tilted her head just right to duck out of the path of a blue box hurtling through space. Discord shook his head. “Sunday drivers. Why can’t they just drive a Thursday like everyone else?”
Luna rolled her eyes and set down on the web. “Let’s see, our continuum is here, and the timestream starts to unravel… here.” She shrunk herself down to take a closer look, Discord following suit.
Out here, size was mostly relative, but the threads of time required concentration to spot, which meant shrinking down. At the edges of the real, even the basics of mass and volume were fluid, all the more reason to avoid entering the place with a physical form.
“So, here we are, the first unraveling. Are you coming?”
“Only if you promise to stay until morning.”
“Very funny.”
When their spirits resurfaced into some semblance of non-symbolic reality, they were up in the clouds.
Discord ooh-ed at the sight of Flight Camp, with all the foals flying around over the cloud-made barracks. “Oh, goodness me, isn’t this adorable? There’s Fluttershy struggling to get off the ground. How precious!”
Luna nodded as she set her astral form down on a nearby cloud. “Indeed. Standard lack of confidence holding her down. I really must look into getting some more griphons here; they deal with this sort of thing so much better.”
“Do they? Can’t say I’ve noticed,” Discord replied.
“Really? I thought you and the griphon kings were on good terms during your reign. Which reminds me, did you have anything to do with that business in Griphonstone?”
“What business? The stolen relic? Oh, yes, heard about that. Sad state of affairs, really. Here I thought Celestia got all her subjects some social security, but I guess it doesn’t hold up for Equestrian griphons. Wouldn’t have happened on my watch, at any rate.”
“No, you would’ve turned the treasure into a jellybean.”
“Oh, come now, I was never that bad.”
“That’s not how I remember it.”
Discord grumbled as they hovered above the clouds, spirit forms haunting the past. “That’s not how any pony remembers it, no.”
“You didn’t answer my question. Did you have anything to do with that theft? You didn’t, perchance, encourage a bit of chaos there?”
He huffed. “Are you accusing me of committing a crime while I was prison?”
“Wouldn’t be the first time, now, would it? Those Plunder Seeds managed to make you the first criminal to commit a crime whilst technically innocent.”
“Oh, this again? How many times do I have to tell you ponies? I couldn’t control those seeds, okay? I thought they were dead already. Why wouldn’t they be? Everything else I ever had fun with was.”
“What?”
“What? Oh, nothing. Say, I just realised: Starlight and Twilight should be here any second to upset the timeline, yes?”
Luna paused, then shook her head. “Not in this one, no. This is the main one, the original. I’ll reinforce this, make sure it connects back to the status quo properly, then we’ll go to the ones that are upset.”
“And you’re just going to pull down some soul string to put this timeline back where it belongs?”
“That’s the plan. Simple connection of souls and destinies, I only need a few significant individuals to mend this, get the branches in order. Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy should suffice, then it’s off to the other continuities. Just another night of pulling strings in a nether realm on the border between Will and Perception.” Luna let out a weary sigh. “As if my sister can’t rewrite history on her own.”
Discord nodded. “Then I don’t suppose you’d begrudge me checking out the past while you work?”
“You want to go see yourself while you’re in stone.”
Discord’s mouth hung open for a split second, his answer caught halfway his throat. “Yes, I’d like to go see myself.”
“No harm in that, you’re excused. I certainly shan’t make you watch a friend of yours be harmed during their childhood. I’ll attach the string after the rainboom. You know what to look for.”
“Most generous of you, Princess Luna. I’ll be sure to put up a soul string of my own, just in case.”
Luna waved a hoof and he was gone. Probably for the best.
Right on schedule, a pair of boys approached Fluttershy and made fun of the little girl for her lack of flying skills. And like clockwork, a young Rainbow Dash stepped in to stand up for Fluttershy’s honour.
Typical pegasus behaviour, as far as Luna saw it. Their race had never outgrown their warrior instincts, that nagging little distaste for the meek. A thousand years and it hadn’t changed one bit, not even in the young.
Luna afforded herself a little smile. At least some things remained comfortably stable.
The challenge was set, the race was on, and there wasn’t a responsible adult around to supervise for some reason. The hairs on the back of Luna’s neck stood on end. Even in the status quo, this timeline was stressed; too many inconsistencies that might pile up. She idly wondered if she might run into her sister’s apparition here.
Wouldn’t that make for an interesting dinner conversation?
“Say, sister, did you go back in time and twist history to make absolutely sure the Sonic Rainboom would happen?”
“No, but now that you mention it, that’s not a bad idea. Be right back, Luna.”
Luna rubbed her throbbing head, even though there wasn’t any blood flowing through her spirit body. Phantom pains, in every sense of the word, plagued her at times like this.
Still, the race was interesting to see. Both boys were knocked off course, either by their own adorable clumsiness or by Rainbow Dash’ sudden burst of speed.
Then it happened: the explosion of colour that had decided the fate of Equestria. Rainbow Dash’ own fate, that of Twilight Sparkle, of Spike.
Luna only vaguely realised that Spike had been hatched during Twilight’s entry exam. She’d heard her sister mention it in passing. Hibernating egg, according to Celestia, barely alive, possibly dying before the magic surge had hit it.
Starlight Glimmer stopping Twilight from completing her exam would have stopped Spike from being born.
And if Twilight’s account on the matter was correct, as well as what she’d told the Canterlot Royal Guard, Starlight would have known about that entrance exam bringing Spike into the world. Starlight Glimmer knowingly stopped Spike from being born.
Would that count as premeditated infanticide or abortion? Or would it constitute animal cruelty?
Once it was done, Rainbow Dash soared over the camp site, leaving a rainbow trail in her wake, flank adorned with a cutie mark.
Luna smiled. Pride made the pain of astral travel so much lighter.
“Rainbow Dash! What did you do?!”
And there came the blunt weight of reality. A stallion, a grey, gruff-looking gent with a whistle around his neck and a black cap on his head, shouted at the girl.
“Umm, we sort of had a race,” the filly said, smiling proudly. “And I got my cutie mark! Isn’t it awesome?”
“What were you thinking? Did you crash into a cloud?”
“Umm, n-no,” Rainbow stammered before the imposing stallion. “I did a Sonic Rainboom, sir. I beat the-”
“The Sonic Rainboom is just an old mare’s tale, Rainbow.” He prodded the girl’s sides, getting a painful ‘yelp’ out of her. “Aw, geez, what have you done to yourself? Can you fold your wings back down?”
The little filly winced in pain as she struggled to move her wings at all. “A-ah, no.”
Luna shook her head as the stallion put the girl on his back.
“Come on, we gotta get you to a medic before your wings start spazzing out. Where’s Fluttershy? Where are the boys?”
“Umm, the boys went off course. I’m not sure where Fluttershy is.”
With a gesture and a sliver of magic, Luna called down a string of light towards the girl. A simple soul string, to attach this Rainbow Dash’ fate to that of the agreed-upon history. A quick hop off the clouds and she found Fluttershy, to do the same to her.
Luna didn’t even flinch when Discord reappeared.
“Is that… oh, my, she looks even worse up close.”
“Worse?” Luna furrowed her brow.
“Look at her! Those legs, that mane.” He gagged. “Are you sure we can’t intervene here? I don’t think Fluttershy would begrudge me putting some weight on her. Just a tiny bit of meat on those breadsticks she calls legs.”
Luna pressed a hoof to her forehead. “Please don’t, Discord. You know I’ll just have to undo it.”
“Egh, fine. Let’s go see how Twilight made a mess of things.”
“Yes… let’s.”
Discord watched as the kids went to the starting line. “So this is where everything falls apart, is it?”
Luna nodded. “T’is indeed.”
Right on cue, a unicorn came flying by the two spirits, unnoticed by the ponies who were actually there.
“Starlight can fly?” Discord asked.
“She’s a medical graduate. She has to be able to fly to tend to certain pegasus patients,” Luna replied calmly.
“Ah. That’s where the she got that reformation spell as well, I presume? The same one Twilight would have tried on me if I hadn’t eaten it?”
The slightest hint of a grumble escaped the Princess’ lips. “Yes. The Night Guard has already done a background check. And returned the children Starlight had absconded with when she founded her little village.”
“Oh, the Night Guard did? Not Twilight?”
“No. Twilight did not think that far ahead. I doubt she even realised the children were out of place.”
Their conversation was interrupted by something blue and vaguely filly-shaped zipping past them.
Discord’s neck hair crawled, and Rainbow Dash froze in mid-air, held by a unicorn’s magic.
“Poor girl,” he muttered.
Luna nodded. “Poor girl.”
There was little Rainbow Dash, flying one moment, and next thing she knows she’s stuck. Her wings can’t move, and yet she’s up in the air. Up in the air, without the sensation of wind on her wings. Up in the air, with gravity pulling her down, and paralysed. Up in the air, with a long drop, and not even able to fall, with no way of knowing how or why, or even what was happening.
As Luna could attest to, it was the stuff childhood trauma was made of.
“Are you alright, Luna? You look a little darker than usual,” Discord said.
The princess didn’t reply. Truth be told, sometimes Luna hated her job. Things were so much easier back in the old days, when ponies who abused a cutie mark-stripping spell - a marvel of medieval medical magic that mended many a madness, even in the modern era - were simply tracked by the Night Guard, inquired, found guilty, and then tossed into the furnaces.
Although, while the Night Guard were still fond of using charcoal and incense for perfume, Luna had always had trouble washing out the smell of burnt heretic. Her little ponies had a way of making their mark like that. The addition of exotic spices to the bonfire helped a lot, but that required making pacts with the Eastern unicorns, and everypony knows how that turned out.
She wasn’t sure how long she pondered before Discord snapped her out of it. Time travel, or any travels out of the physical body, had a way of upsetting her senses.
“Are you sure we can’t intervene here?” Discord asked.
Didn’t he ask this five seconds ago? Or is my perception of time skewed again? “Yes, Discord, you know we can’t. This needs to happen if status quo is to be maintained.”
Twilight disappeared, then Starlight did. Discord grumbled. The damage was done. “So, where to next?”
“Ponyville, the present day, in this timeline.”
Luna closed her eyes and concentrated, seeking out the alternate timeline caused by this intrusion.
Their dream bodies fell through the portal, and after a wave of vertigo they found themselves on the ground again.
The barren, battered ground. The houses of Ponyville were all battened shut, as if preparing for some battle, or perhaps recovering from one. No pony was out on the street. No pony was out clearing the skies, either, which was a shame, because the clouds really needed to be cleared to let some light in.
Discord growled. The town he’d built, the chaos capital of Equestria that the royal sisters had so carelessly destroyed and ponies had so thoughtfully erected back up - and with the addition of democracy, no less, something that took so much work off his claws - all of it was reduced to this? “Oh, great, they broke it again.”
“Indeed. Ponyville certainly suffered in this timeline. Let’s find Rainbow Dash and be off.”
Discord licked a finger and stuck it up into the air. “Rainbow Dash is… due north. Quite far away, too. That’s not like her at all.”
Luna shrugged and moved them both further along through the dreamspace.
Discord groaned, then gagged once they resolved again. “Oh, goodie. A battle.”
The plain they’d landed on was a mess of hooves and magic. Royal Guards rushed towards what looked like ponies enslaved by some sort of dark magic. Judging from their movements, the enslaved ponies felt no pain. They fought ferociously, mindlessly pounding away at the Royal Guards who were still encumbered by simple burdens such as fear and fatigue.
“There’s your sister.” Discord pointed to the great white alicorn leading the charge. “Where are you?”
“No Elements of Harmony, Discord. I do not exist in this timeline.”
“What do you mean, you don’t exist? You’re the one attacking Equestria, aren’t you?”
Luna rolled her eyes and sighed. “Look at the helmets, Discord. They’re a crude and clumsy means of controlling ponies. I never used that kind of magic, even as Nightmare Moon.”
“Then who-”
“Crysss… tallls…”
Discord’s ears drooped. His nose curled, his wings flared. “No.”
“I’m afraid so.”
“Sombra? Really? Of all the things, Sombra has declared war on Equestria? And he’s winning?”
“Never mind that,” Luna said. “We’re not here to change this, we just need to find Rainbow Dash. Look for a Royal Guard with blue wings.”
“I don’t see any-wait, is that her?” He cocked his head towards one of the Guards who had just lost her helmet. “Oh, dear. She lost a wing? How did that happen?”
“There’s a war going on, in case you hadn’t noticed.”
“Yes, but it’s against Sombra.”
“The Crystal Empire has powerful magic, Discord. You know that. Sombra is not to trifled with, he never was. Twilight Sparkle managed to defeat him before he could regain his full strength. This is his full strength.”
“My point exactly. He was never an issue when I was around. I’d sooner steal his lunch money than let him set hoof on my turf.”
“I’m sure you would. You were not always around, though,” Luna argued.
“And whose fault was that?”
“You know full well we had to.”
“No, I don’t, actually.”
Luna let off a resigned grunt. “Let’s just clean this up and attach the soul to the correct continuity.”
“As you wish, Your Highness.”
“You know, it just occurred to me: if the Elements of Harmony weren’t charged up again, why weren’t you the one attacking Equestria instead of Sombra?” Discord asked as they exited the time stream.
This time they landed in the middle of a jungle.
Luna looked around furtively. They were right next to the tablet, so this had to be where Twilight had re-entered. “Ponyville seems to have suffered from a weed problem in this timeline. Your doing, I imagine?”
Discord sniffed the air. “No, I’m quite certain I don’t plant things like this. The ponies have just let it get overgrown, I suppose.”
“Just checking. And to answer your question: Nightmare Moon was locked away by the Elements of Harmony, then purified by them. There are, as I’m sure you’re aware, other avenues of attack.”
“Avenues Celestia isn’t using against Sombra in that timeline.”
Luna nodded. “You’d be surprised how squeamish my sister can be, all things considered.”
A black shape rushed past the spirits. It was quickly followed by other black shapes closing in on a makeshift village in the middle of the jungle.
“Huh. Looks like Ponyville has gone native,” Discord said as they entered.
Luna furrowed her brow as the battle broke loose. “Discord, please. Ponies are overrun in this timeline, it’s an attack. Can you at least pretend to care about their wellbeing?”
Discord chuckled. “Why? It’s not like they’re real, not to us. And it’s not like this is the first time they’ve gotten overrun by evil hordes or tyrants.”
Luna sighed and cantered on into the mess of ponies and changelings, even as the changeling queen entered the fray to do battle with what looked like a very combative zebra.
“Oh, changelings,” Discord lamented, hovering next to the queen. “What happened to you? You were fun once.”
Luna rolled her eyes, looking for any familiar faces. With the ponies having covered themselves in mud, not to mention the motions of battle, she couldn’t quite track any individuals for long enough. When she finally did find Fluttershy - the right one, not a fateless changeling - she couldn’t get a hold for long enough to attach the string. “Somehow, I don’t think ponies would agree with your definition of ‘fun’, considering where these changelings come from and what they’ve done in the past.”
Discord just hung there, admiring the show of Chrysalis getting into a hooficuffs with a zebra. He wasn’t sure who to root for. “More of Celestia’s version of history, I presume? The version where there were only three pony races present during Hearth’s Warming, rather than six?”
Luna froze. “How do you know about that?”
“I did mention I don’t travel through time much. But I still do it on occasion. You can never be too careful with history books nowadays. There’s no telling what’s been rewritten.”
Luna snorted, a futile gesture as an astral creature, before gesturing to this universe’s version of Fluttershy and attaching the soul string while the pegasus was pinned down. “Let’s just keep moving. And don’t mention Hearth’s Warming again, please.”
“As you wish, Your Highness. I’ll not mention the unfortunate erasure of Princess Patina of the Crystal Empire. Or the gender switch of Commander Hurricane.”
“Discord…”
“Or that unfortunate curse that gave Agent Pansy feathered wings instead of the bat wings she was born with, or the one that turned poor little Faerie Cake into an Earth pony.”
Luna grumbled as she opened another portal.
“Although I suppose for a changeling, that wouldn’t have been much of a curse.”
Luna sighed. “You know, technically, that one was a different species from today’s changelings. Different origins.”
“Oh, of course, huge difference. Not that anyone would know.”
Discord looked down at the thing before him. “Well, that’s a mood killer.”
Luna let head hang and sighed. “I’m so sorry, Discord. I did warn you.”
Behind them, a titanic centaur was rampaging across the landscape. Tirek had grown to full size, Ponyville was deserted.
And Discord lay dead in the centre of his former chaos capital. Not petrified, not sealed away, dead. His eagle talon and tiger claw were curled up, his mouth was open, his beautiful goatee was singed, the antler on the left side of his head was snapped off, and the horn on his right had been torn clean from the flesh and tossed into the bird’s nest on Sugarcube Corner.
There was no breath, no pulse, just blood staining the ground. Somehow, neither of them had thought this would be what he looked like when outside the realm of the living.
“He killed me?” Discord asked. “Tirek honestly killed me? How?”
Luna tilted her head. “If I had to guess, he snapped your neck and twisted it in a direction that cannot be pointed to. And judging from the bruising on your body and the instabilities around your corpse, I’d say he literally beat you into next Thursday.”
“I can see that, thank you. I mean how did he get powerful enough to do that?”
“Preying on unicorns while you were still captive, I suspect. Without your powers to find him, he was free to bide his time, gather strength and information. Why do you think we asked you to track him in the first place?”
“Yes, yes, I know that, but, still, to kill me? Just like that?” Discord shivered. “I don’t think I like this reality very much.”
“Then we’d best make sure it stays out of ours. This one is closer to the status quo than I would like.”
“Hrm. By all means.”
Luna led the way to this reality’s version of Rainbow Dash; a nervous nailbiter who’d hidden herself among the roots of Golden Oaks Library.
As Luna attached the soul string, she sighed. “I wouldn’t have treated you that way, you know. I was against it.”
He nodded. “You didn’t trust me to fight Tirek. I guessed you wouldn’t. You were always smart like that.”
Luna shook her head as they floated back up through the ceiling. “I mean I was against sending you to fight him alone. Tirek is a demon. If he’d gotten hold of any sort of magical artifacts-”
“I would have snatched them from him before he could use them on me. You underestimate me, Luna. I just… followed my gut, is all. No need to keep dragging it up. I’m dead here, remember? And no pony is mourning for it.”
“In this world, no one knew you well enough to mourn.”
He snorted at that. “You think they do in ours?”
“You know what I mean. We have forgiven you. I have forgiven you. Tirek manipulated you, I am well aware. But my sister did the same, and I am sorry for that. It wasn’t fair to you and we wouldn’t have done it if there’d been any other way. But my sister felt that sending more ponies would have-”
“Given Tirek more chance to feed, I know. I’m not dense, you don’t need to remind me; I can see the end result well enough, thank you. And for your information, I was not manipulated into anything, by either of you. Celestia asked me to do her a favour, I ended up not doing it, that’s all. When she got Fluttershy to ‘reform’ me, she only did it to make me a deal. I took the deal and I kept it as long as I felt like it. Tirek’s deal seemed like a better one at the time. Turns out it wasn’t. Nothing more to it,” Discord said with a resigned grunt and a shrug.
Luna sighed as they departed the reinforced timeline, glad to be gone. Of all the possible presents, Tirek suddenly popping up undefeated was the most likely and least agreeable. “Why did you do it, then, Discord? Surely you knew you’d be betrayed?”
Discord frowned. “Did I? How? Even my worst enemies, my sworn nemeses, the sisters of legend, never caused me any real harm. That is, until they stoned me. I’ve been surprised plenty of times, Princess Luna, but I’ve only been betrayed once. You knew what betrayal was. You wouldn’t have fallen for it.”
“Neither should you,” Luna argued. “You knew Tirek would turn on you the moment he could.”
“No, I didn’t. I honestly didn’t. It’s not my fault, I tell you.”
“Not your fault, is it? Whose, then? Whose fault was it? Mine? My sister’s? Was it something Fluttershy said or did, or did you just not like Twilight Sparkle enough?”
“Well… I suppose that’s between me and the ones to blame, isn’t it?”
With a grumble and another force of will, they moved through the different canons.
“So, which one is it this time?” Discord looked around and admired the castle they’d landed in. “Goodness, whoever’s in charge here has a wonderful sense of style. Strange that we landed at night, though.”
Luna gulped. “It’s always night here.”
“How do you kn-oh.” He gasped when he saw the rugs on the walls. “This is Nightmare Moon’s dominion. I don’t suppose she’ll be able to detect us?”
“She might, but she can’t interfere. She wouldn’t, even if she could. To her, this is the status quo, and she has every reason to keep it established as it is. Let’s just find Rainbow Dash or Fluttershy and-” Luna looked left, then right, and found herself missing a spirit of a spirit of chaos. “Discord?”
She found him quickly enough. She needed only to follow the sound of childish giggling.
“Oh, my word, would you look at this?” He pointed to one of the castle guards and doubled over with laughter. “Rainbow Dash… has bat wings! And that hair!” He pointed at the short buzzcut the mare had been saddled with and doubled over with a laughing fit. “Really, Princess, you’ve been holding out on me. I didn’t know you could do this to your little ponies.”
Luna clenched her jaw. “It’s not something I’m proud of.” She quickly called down another soul string to attach to this universe’s Rainbow Dash.
“Whyever not? Just think of the pranks you could pull! Why, Nightmare Night alone would be-”
“You are excused.”
Discord’s ears twitched. For a second there, it almost sounded like Luna’s apparition was behind him, rather than facing him, as his eyes told him. When he turned, he found a different Luna standing there. One with fangs, a darker fur, and possibly an eating disorder.
“Nightmare Moon, I presume?” he asked.
The mare waited for her guard to leave before talking to the two ghosts. “Discord. It’s been too long.”
He felt his nostrils flare despite his best efforts. “Has it, now?”
“In this timeline, it has. Tell me, are you the one who made friends with ponies, or are you the one trying to find a way to kill Tirek?”
“He’s the former,” Luna replied.
Nightmare Moon bared her teeth in a wide smile. “Ah, and there’s my better half, Princess Luna. What’s left of you, at any rate. What is your business here? Sightseeing? I noticed you were admiring my little guard there.”
“Oh, well, that, I-” Discord looked away.
Nightmare Moon chuckled. “She would have borne an Element of Harmony, you know, if they ever returned. Element of Loyalty, if I foresaw correct. Seemed like poetic justice to recruit her.”
“Oh, I agree, most fitting. I was wondering, though, that pony, didn’t she used to have, err…” Discord flapped his wings for effect.
“Pegasus wings? Oh, yes. I had a lot of fun turning that one. Made a wonderful guard, too. She’s stopped five assassination attempts on me already. Granted, none of them would have worked anyway, but you know what they say about assassinations, eh, Discord?”
“It’s the thought that counts! Ahahahah!” They both broke out into laughter.
“Ah, yes, she is a fun one. In her prime now, too. Definitely putting her out to stud when her time is up,” Nightmare Moon said. “My purebreds seem to like rainbows for some inexplicable reason.”
“Can’t argue over taste, I suppose,” Discord replied.
“And why are you here, little Luna? Business or pleasure?”
“Strictly business,” Luna replied. “Which is now concluded.”
“Hmm.” The dark mare nodded. “Very well, then. My regards to Celestia, Discord, if you see her. Do hop in around these parts when you feel like it. I’ll give you the recipe for those wings, just in case you feel like trying it.”
Discord cleared his throat. “It’s a date. But, just out of curiosity, where am I in this timeline? I’m not dead, am I?”
Nightmare Moon frowned. “Dead? Good question. I think you’re still out in the royal gardens of Canterlot, honestly. It’s strange, I never thought to pick you up.”
“Minor oversight, I’m sure. I think I’d best be going now, her Royal Highness is getting cranky.”
“Why not stay, then? She does become such a glorious creature when she is cranky.”
“We have other obligations. Thank you, Nightmare Moon,” Luna said.
They left in silence, floating through the timestreams again, checking which ones needed reinforcing and which ones were too illogical to intrude upon consensus reality.
Eventually, Discord broke the silence with a sigh. “I would have said something, you know. If I’d been there, I mean.”
“Been there for what?”
“For you. Turning into a mare like that, letting your little ponies be corrupted and, brrr, studded like it’s nothing, I don’t think I care for it one bit.” He shuddered.
“Odd, coming from you. I should think you’d have enjoyed my going mad.”
“Of course I would have, but not that kind of mad. We had such fun together.”
“You mean you had fun.”
“And you didn’t? Tell me, why do you ponies always act like I’m the greatest evil you’ve ever faced? I’m the mightiest, I’ll grant you that, but not the worst. I gave you something to do, I gave you both purpose. I gave you something to fight for, to fight against. I raised the Sun and Moon so your precious ponies didn’t have to do that awful sacrificing anymore. I did it at random, sure, but I did it. You never would have gotten the Elements of Harmony in the first place if I hadn’t been there.”
Luna stopped on the edge of another timestream, leaving them both hanging in the void. “You’re twisting history, Discord.”
“Oh, of course, pardon me, Princess, I didn’t mean to intrude upon your jurisdiction. After all, that’s why we’re here in the first place, isn’t it? Rewriting history?”
“We are writing it as it should be,” Luna argued.
“You mean as Celestia says it should be.”
“...Yes.”
“The same Celestia who wrote the story of Hearth’s Warming.”
“If you’re still upset about how we treated you, I apologise. We did what was necessary to uphold the peace. I don’t expect you to understand that.”
Discord harrumphed. “You mean overthrow a ruler and lie about it so things go your way. I understand that better than you think. And does Celestia think I shouldn’t get any praise for what I’ve done for my little ponies? Is that why I don’t get my own holiday, but you do?”
“Is that what this is about? You wanted your own holiday?”
Discord snorted. “Maybe not a holiday, but some recognition for all the things I did would have been nice. Even if nopony else knows about it, you and your sister do.”
“Yes, we do know about the things you did, all of them. You treated ponies like they were your toys, Discord, what did you expect? Have you no remorse?”
“For what? I never killed ponies, I never enslaved them. I never let a child go hungry on my watch. I took good care of my toys. If anything, you were worse than I ever was. So why did I get the short end of the stick?”
“Are you crying?”
“No; my eyes are leaking.” He took out his eyeballs and wiped them on some cloth before putting them back in. “And so what if I am? Don’t I have a good reason to be crying? Ponies were the only real fun I could have and you took that away from me. You stoned me, shot me with magic when you didn’t even know what it did, when you didn’t even know if it might kill me. Here I thought all the others were as petty as I was, but no, they were worse, every last one of them. And yet I’m the only one you honestly almost killed.”
“Sombra is dead now, too.”
“Vanquished by the Crystal Heart, I know. The Crystal Heart, that ponies knew would destroy him. You could have killed me by accident.”
“Oh, and Tirek wouldn’t have?”
“He would have decided on it, because he’s evil. At least Tirek had a bit of decency about it. But you? I thought we had an understanding. You put me in a stone shell and just left me on display like some relic. Nopony ever spoke to me. I didn’t even know what you were doing. We never even fought that day, not like we used to. You hardly spoke a word, after all we’d been through. I thought we were just going to have some more fun that day. I would have let you win once if you’d just asked.”
“There was no way to win, Discord. Surely you realise that.”
Discord grunted. “You don’t win a game of hoofball by breaking the other team’s legs. You think mourning for me because Tirek killed me counts for anything? You could have killed me just as easily, in the middle of a good laugh. And why? Just because ponies wanted their houses the right way up?”
Luna let out a huff. “You really want to do this here and now? Fine. We didn’t stone you because ponies wanted their houses the right way up, no. We did it because ponies were going mad from the torments you stacked upon them. And whether you wish to admit it or not, they were dying because of you. You made children suffer.”
“Oh, please. You know me better than that. I never harmed children.”
“Do you truly believe that? Not directly, perhaps, but that doesn’t excuse your part in it. Parents digging their way through the soil thinking they were gophers, granaries filled with sour cream, houses ripped from the ground while the ponies were still in bed, does that sound like a pleasant childhood to you?”
“It was all in good fun.”
“What about the Plunder Seeds? You deny that caused any suffering?”
He grumbled with some modicum of resignation. “Some inconvenience, I’ll grant you that, but nothing more.”
Luna hissed and bared her teeth. “So you did not see it, then. You didn’t see that poor unicorn girl in Canterlot screaming in fear because her horn had gone out of control and she was starting fires everywhere. You didn’t see that pegasus boy who fell out of the sky over Froggy Bottom Bog, clutching his chest and choking on a lungful of pollen. He would have drowned if the Weather Patrol haven’t stumbled upon him. You never targeted children, Discord, and I respect you for that. I always have, you know that. But do not think you get one inkling of sympathy from me as a so-called protector of ponies.”
Discord threw his arms up in the air, shouting. “How many times do I have to tell you? I didn’t control those things!”
The Princess didn’t flinch, or even budge. “Exactly my point. You had no control over the Plunder Seeds, or the Bugbear, or any of the other abominations you conjured up because you thought they were ‘fun’. You just throw in some chaos and let things run their course, that is how you act, how you’ve always acted. And that is why we took away your toys, Discord. Not because of what you were doing to them, but because of what you were making. You say you killed none, but how many did your Bugbear kill?”
“W-well, I…”
“How many?”
He looked away, barely holding back a whimper. “Would you believe I lost track of that silly thing once it went towards Hoofington?”
“There we are, then. Stop saying you took good care of your toys. You didn’t.”
“They were fine under my rule,” Discord argued, “They would’ve lasted another five hundred years, at least.”
“Five hundred years of torment is not fine.”
“I took good care of my little ponies. You can’t deny that.”
“If you really meant that, you wouldn’t have called them ‘toys’.”
“How’s that?”
“Toys are something you play with, that you take out when you feel like it and put away when they are no longer needed. But ponies are living things. They eat, drink, sleep. Toys break, Discord. Ponies die. They come with responsibilities. My little ponies were never toys, even when I was at my worst. The lowest they have ever been under my rule was pets. And I take good care of my pets.”
The two immortals locked their gaze for a brief moment.
“Why?” Discord asked.
“Why what?”
“Why bother? Why bother giving them peace at all?”
Luna scowled. “Because they are living creatures, they have a right to live.”
“Then why take that away from them, hmm? You think I’m the one who tormented ponies? Fine, while we are being honest with each other, consider this: who ever threatened ponies while I was there? How many of them were sent into battle on my watch?”
“None, I’ll grant you that.”
Discord smirked. “And how many dictators showed up during that dark, forgotten period of history that was my glorious rule?”
“Just one: you. Is there a point to this?”
“How long did it take for Sombra to attack after I was gone? How long did the Crystal Empire last once you got rid of me? Two months? Six?”
Luna sighed. “A year, give or take.”
“How long before the changelings started attacking again? How long before you started getting reports about greedy politicians teaming up with those ghastly alchemists?”
The princess growled. “Don’t.”
“Oh, is that a sore spot? I wonder, why aren’t there are any faerie tales about those anymore? So little foals wouldn’t get nightmares about them? Tell me, does Celestia still moan about those tragic boy bits she’s got stashed in her vaults?”
Luna fell silent.
“Don’t pretend you don’t understand me, Princess. You know exactly what I’m trying to say. Protect and save ponies, and they’ll just be attacked or conquered again, or some half-wit will abuse magic to abuse them. How long do you think it will take before another little colt or filly is turned into a lifeless gold statue by some heartless, greedy monster, or better yet, by a heartless, greedy pony? It’s been a thousand years since it happened last, since those wretched things were sealed away, give or take a few decades. They’re due to come back, and you know it. Even if they don’t, even if you somehow managed to burn all the books, some pony’s bound to find out about that brand of magic eventually. Look at what Starlight did, and she was using lawful magic. And she’s new! You don’t even have to worry about the old devils, the new ones are just as bad.”
“I know. Save ponies, and you’ll never stop saving them. Conquer them, claim them, and no one will dare take them away from you. My little ponies.”
“They were mine. I fought for them. No one ever took my little ponies away, except you. For all your talk about friendship, you ponies don’t care about my wellbeing, not really. Not one little ‘thank you’ for the things I did, even from ponies who would know, Princess. I was never as bad as the others, as bad as Starlight Glimmer. Yet you honestly made me think I was, and for my crimes I get a thousand years in stone, while Starlight gets ‘friendship’ for hers, just because little Twilight’s guns have recently run out of ammunition. How is that fair?”
Luna shook her head. “Concerning Starlight, it isn’t. And at some point, she will have to face trial and accept a fair punishment, no denying that. Community service and a revoked passport, not to mention her license, that would help square that matter. But regarding you, there is one point you are forgetting.”
“What’s that?”
“We still let you have a few ponies once your sentence was up. Back then, perhaps no one would mourn your death. Whether you believe I or my sister would is irrelevant. What matters is that today, Fluttershy would. And so would Twilight Sparkle.”
Discord gulped at that.
“You do have a point; we did take away your powers, imprisoned you for a thousand years. But we did so by right, and we could have done a lot worse. We might have killed you, but we didn’t. We never so much as scratched the stone that held you. And correct me if I’m wrong, Discord, but your statue was never left to disrepair, either. You were never moved to the basement, no vault, no final resting place a thousand leagues under the sea, just a quiet spot where ponies would walk by and admire the craftsponyship. You inspired artists, even today you can still find lamps shaped like you at the trading fairs. The others were worse. The others, we sent to oblivion, but not you. We never sent you to Tartarus. We never extracted the secret to stealing magic from Tirek, or any of his demon brethren, so we might be rid of you for good. We never even planned to kill you, should you return.”
“Is that supposed to make everything better?”
“No. But it should make it more bearable than the alternative. As good as you think you were, you were still a threat. And as bad as you think we are, we still let you return to pony society. Think about that next time you try to judge us.”
Discord squinted. “Are you…”
Luna hissed and wiped away some astral dirt in her eyes. “Am I what, Discord? Crying? No. I left all my tears in my prison. You think you were so good you didn’t deserve punishment? You think you didn’t deserve being wiped from the history books?”
“I never minded being wiped from history, honestly. I rather liked being a little surprise for all those historians, not to mention high school teachers having to adjust their curriculum on such short notice.” He snickered.
“Everything is a joke to you. But then, why wouldn’t it be? You got off easy.”
“Easy, compared to you, you mean?”
Luna stood on the precipice of the final timeline. “It does not concern you.”
“Perhaps not. But, correct me if I’m wrong, you have a terrible track record with keeping things bottled up. And aside from your sister, I am the only immortal outside of Tartarus who might listen. So, while we’re still being so wonderfully honest with each other: what’s got you so down, really?”
The alicorn shook her head. “When I came back, I found ponies had moved on. The tasks I had committed to, my sister had taken over. All except the task of controlling nightmares. My Night Guard, they… they took over for me. My little ponies, my pets, they’d kept everything just as I’d left it.”
“Oh. Oh, Luna…”
“They told me what nightmares plagued ponies in the modern era. Confidence, cutie marks, social pressure, the fear of poverty, the old devils of legend, those I could handle. Those I could face and banish. But not her.”
“I’m sorry. I forgot about that.”
Luna chuckled mirthlessly. “No, you are not sorry. You never took responsibility for your actions, and it’s clear to me you never shall. Do what you will, Discord. But if you think you deserved to be remembered by history, know this: we did you a favour. You got to start with a clean slate. Whereas I, I got to see my actions play out again and again. I got to see my legend mix with that of the very monsters I helped defeat. I got to see what ponies thought of the legendary Mare in the Moon, what terror she still inspired after a thousand years of obscurity. Even now, the scars on their dreams are still there. And I am reminded every night that I’m the one who scarred them.”
“No wonder you made that Tantabus thing.”
Luna snarled. “You may think you understand me, but you don’t. I understand you all too well, though. All power, no responsibility, no remorse, and no one to tell you how horrible you were. Your punishment lasted as long as mine, your crimes were just as grievous. Yet you never had any sense of guilt, and as unfair as Starlight’s treatment might seem to you, it is exactly what you got: no need to own up to your own actions, no consequences, just a clean slate. And yet you have the unmitigated gall to complain about it. I wish I could be treated as unfairly as you.”
With that, she hopped into the last timeline.
“Oh, I don’t know, Luna. It could always be worse.”
Luna felt the blood drain from her face. “No.”
Discord hopped into the world right after her. “Did we take a wrong turn?”
They were in a wasteland. Open, flat plains as far as the eye could see, interrupted only by the occasional mountain.
“How did this happen?” Discord asked.
“I do not know,” Luna replied. “None of the other timelines are probable enough to happen, but for some reason, this one is. And I can’t see any ponies, either. Great. I’m going to have to reinforce this one the hard way, then.”
“Hold on, Luna, hold on,” Discord said, patting her on the back. “I think I might be of service here.”
“How?”
“Well, I did attach one little soul string in the original timeline, remember?”
“How is that supposed to help?”
He took a step and nudged her, and next thing they knew, they were on top of a mountain. The waterfall behind them was the only point of reference, but for Luna it was enough. “There aren’t any ponies here, Discord. Canterlot has fallen. Nothing to attach to.”
“Oh, but Pierre is still here. Well, his family is.”
Luna furrowed her brow as Discord led the way. “Pierre?”
She followed, and stood dumbfounded when she saw Discord call down another string of light. It was tiny, hardly any significance to the fate of the world, but for some reason it held.
It made no sense.
“You wanted to know who I blame for my ignorance. Honestly? I blame the pigeons.”
Luna walked closer. Even in this broken world, there was still some semblance of life, and the pigeons that had once inhabited Canterlot were still there.
“Silly things, you know, pigeons. They have very good eyesight, but only when in motion. They can’t see things that are standing still, unless they themselves are moving. That’s why they keep bobbing their heads back and forth like they do.”
Luna let her head hang.
“I played with my little ponies for centuries. I only started being friends with them for a little under a year. You had a life with ponies before your crimes. So did Starlight. You had time to think about your predicament, look up at the stars. My eyes were frozen, fixed on the same spot.” He rubbed his eyes. “I was frozen in the middle of a blink. All I could see was one blue line, and it’s still all I can see when I close my eyes. You got to look every way you wanted, you had your memories to keep you company. All the company I had for a thousand years was pigeons. Think about that next time you decide to judge me,” Discord said.
“Discord. I am sorry.”
Discord rose up with a creak in his ghostly back. “No, you’re not, but I appreciate the lie. Let’s just leave this wretched place. Think the string will hold up?”
Luna smiled and nodded. “Think it will. Thank you. We can leave now.”
“Strange, though.”
“What?”
“We never saw any timelines where I became despot again.”
“I suppose those are just too unlikely to be an issue now.”
Luna snickered. Discord gagged.
The two awoke to the sounds of clicking tongues and excited chitters.
“My liege,” a burly bat-winged stallion said. “You are alright?”
Luna rubbed her throbbing forehead, trying to fight off that awful sense of déjà vu. “I am. Why would I not be?”
“You were tossing and turning in the trance. Five more minutes and we would have sent someone after you.”
Luna chuckled. “Thank you. I appreciate your concern, but really, I am fine. I just had a… very interesting conversation with an old friend.”
Discord poofed his bed and cephalopod plush away and stretched out, creaking what bones he could. “That she did. And I think it’s only fair I leave you to ponder it on your own.”
“Discord, wait. Could you excuse us for a moment, please? I have a private matter to discuss.”
“As you wish,” the stallion said.
As one, the swarm disappeared into the shadows.
“Creepy little things, your Night Guards,” Discord said.
“Yes. I like them, too.”
“So what is it you want to discuss now? Another cult leader to watch while Twilight prepares the welcoming committee?”
“What you said. What we said, to each other. I want to apologise.”
“I’m quite sure you already did.”
“Then I’ll do it again, in the timeline that matters. You are right, you know. You and I, we’re not so different. We both have our grievances, with each other and with the world. We both deal with it in our own way.”
“Your point?”
“Of the two of us, you are the one dealing with it on your own.”
Discord snorted. “If you’re going to offer me counselling, Princess Luna, I think you’ll have a hard time finding anyone qualified.”
“No counselling, no. But at least accept my invitation.”
“To what?”
“To anything. The Gala, any royal weddings, diplomatic affairs. If you promise to behave, I can get you acquainted with some like-minded individuals.”
“You and I both know that’s a promise I can’t make.”
“Not now, no. But in the future, at least consider it. I usually only go to such gatherings with my contingent. They’re not all bad, my little bats, and in all fairness, I’m willing to share them. I’m sure there are a few you’d grow fond of if you got to know them.”
“I rather doubt that.”
“They’re a bit old-fashioned, you see. They still communicate with carrier pigeons.”
At that, Discord let out a low grumble. “Doesn’t change the facts.”
“No, I suppose it doesn’t. We overthrew you, and the history books haven’t mentioned you since. Honestly, between myself, you, and the Crystal Empire, it’s a terrible time to be a historian.”
He chuckled.
“But you are indeed a former ruler of Equestria, you were sentenced for your crimes, and your sentence has been served. I, for one, hope to treat you as such, and not be disappointed for it in the future, if you catch my meaning.”
“Meaning caught, Your Highness. Now, if you don’t mind, I have dishes to undo.”
“One more thing, though. About your other remark, regarding Starlight Glimmer.”
“She’s mortal, I’m not. I’ll spare you all the -isms I could throw into that debate.”
“Twilight will have to take responsibility for how she treated Starlight, bypassing the legal system like that,” Luna said. “And Starlight did rewrite history.”
Discord stroked his goatee, pensive. “What are you saying?”
“Saying? I’m not saying anything, Discord. I am implying that if any shenanigans are to happen in the near future, we shan’t have the Elements of Harmony to cope with them anymore, and we won’t even be sure if it’s not Twilight’s fault in the first place. Curious thing to consider, isn’t it?”
“Hmm… curious, indeed.”
“Princess Celestia! It’s terrible! Ponyville is under attack!” Twilight shouted as she burst in through the palace doors.
“Under attack? By what?” Celestia replied.
“Monkeys!” Starlight Glimmer called out as she teleported in right after the princess. “Apes, simians, monkeys are invading Ponyville!”
Celestia growled. “How many have they captured? Are they using collars? Do any of them have a wand?”
“No,” Twilight replied. “It’s not exactly that kind of an invasion. There are two factions, it seems. They’re not targeting ponies, but they are fighting each other.”
Celestia’s march towards the vaults was summarily aborted. “Oh?”
“One of them answers to the name Silverback, Dark Lord of the Ooze. He’s got this goo that’s making a mess of Ponyville.”
“But no one is being captured or held?”
“Well, no.”
“And the other one?”
“The other one is black, and calls herself the Lady of the Cheesy Orb in the Sky. Her minions are, well, flying monkeys, bat-winged ones.”
Celestia sighed.
“Do you know them?” Twilight asked.
“Yes. Very old, very primal opponents, but no enemies of ours, thankfully. I expect they’ll have their little spat and then return to hibernation. Assuming they don’t declare war on us, which they might.”
“T-the monkeys are going to declare war? Why?” Twilight asked.
Celestia rolled her eyes. “Well, the last time the monkeys showed was around the Best Young Flyers Competition. They were going to hold their battle in Rainbow Falls, but the spectacle of the competition made them rethink it.”
“Oh, no.” Twilight gasped.
“What?” Starlight asked.
“The Best Young Flyers Competition was the second time Rainbow Dash did the Sonic Rainboom.”
“And they were witnesses at Shining Armour and Princess Cadence’s wedding,” Celestia added.
“The third time she did the Rainboom.”
“I don’t get it,” Starlight said.
“It’s the same as with Discord. We tried to set things back exactly the way they were, but they’re not. We were there, Starlight. Our presence changed the course of events.”
“Hmm.” Celestia nodded gravely. “A pity we cannot undo the damage with more time travel. Still, I’m sure there will be no consequences for you, my fellow Princess.”
“So what do we do? The monkeys are covering Ponyville in cheese and ooze!”
“I suspect it will have to be cleaned up at some point, then. Wait out their assault, see what happens in the morning. And try to keep the children indoors; you wouldn’t want any of them to think it was all a game.”
“Okay, Princess. I guess I’ll go tell the rest of Ponyville, then.”
“Good. By the way, have you decided on getting any Royal Guards stationed at your castle?”
“No, no, I don’t think that’s necessary, thank you. I’ll just be off.”
And not a second later, she was, with Starlight.
“Hmm. Pity.”
“What is, sister?” Celestia came trotting by.
“Oh, nothing, nothing,” Luna changed her shape back to her normal form. “Just another random crisis in Ponyville. I dealt with the matter on your behalf. No objections, I hope?”
Celestia let out a mighty and regal yawn. “After today? None whatsoever.”
“Good. I’ll leave you to rest up, then.”
“Where are you going?” Celestia asked.
“To have some fun with an old friend.”
“Anything I should know about?”
“Oh…” Luna smiled petulantly. “There is one minor matter, trivial thing, really, won’t take more than a minute.”
“Luna…”
“Just thought you might want to consider delaying publishing the new history textbooks. There are one or two edits to add, still. Like putting the monkeys back in. And giving Discord his own holiday.”
“Discord wants a holiday? Why?”
“Technically, he was a ruler of Equestria. At the very least, him being overthrown the first time could be a holiday.”
“I’ll see what I can do. Anything else?”
“Oh… just one teensy, tiny little thing, sister. Can you declare tomorrow a new national holiday, too?”
“Commemorating what?”
“Cleaning up the biggest mess Equestria’s ever seen.”
With that, the Dark Lady of the Cheesy Orb in the Sky rejoined her bat-winged minions, shunned and forgotten as they were by Equestrian history, and exacted her well-earned revenge on her nemesis.
Pinkie Pie closed the book.
“And that’s how Bathing Day was made.”
Ginger Pie, the little pink filly in bed, shook her head.
“But that doesn’t make any sense.”
Pinkie shrugged. “Oh, what fun is there in making sense?”
The End.
Author's Note
Lots of random brainfarts in this one. Some things to clarify:
-"Nancy in the middle" is a reference to Ananse, the spider in the centre of the web. The whole means of astral time travel was taken from 'The Invisibles', which mentions that spider by name. In the original version, Ananse would actually greet both immortals, but I skipped it because it would have been even more confusing. If you've read 'The Invisibles' or 'The Filth', or even the early 'Animal Man' reboot, you'll see the resemblances.
-'Celestia's Boy Bits' is a currently trashed idea revolving the concept that ponies, especially unicorn colts, could be turned into gold. Originally it had to do with some form of extreme flattery, like how the boys were turned into donkeys in Pinocchio, simply by letting them behave so badly. Likewise, the idea is that if a boy is made receptive by making him think he's 'golden', it'd be easier to literally turn him into gold. Like, actual currency. Sounds grim, but that's the same reason Gargamel wants to get the Smurfs, remember (though I think he only needs their skin, honestly, not sure). I changed it to be unisex and removed additional mentions of it in this story, mostly because it was needlessly political. Blame YouTube.
-To anyone wanting to quote the extended universe on me to say I'm dead wrong, like the comics or novels or whatnot: the recurring theme in this story is that historical records are questionable at best, partly thanks to having immortals actually writing and rewriting history as it happens. No one knew Luna existed, yet she's now on the entrance exam for the Wonderbolts. The Crystal Empire was gone for a thousand years, yet there's a traditional headdress that must be shown for the inspector. You have unreliable narrators here.
And besides that, I'll thank you to note that the biggest influence on my writing, the very story (or character) that got me into writing in English in general and into fan fiction writing specifically, was 'I, Jedi', basically an official EU fix-fic of an equally official Star Wars trilogy (which I only read after the fix, incidentally). My fanfictioning started with Corran Horn, who now no longer exists. I also used to be a fan of Digimon. So let's just say that while I enjoy Extended Universes, I don't consider them canon unless stated on screen.
-Celestia did say Discord ruled over ponies when he's introduced. So they overthrew him, technically. In a coup, technically.
-This story is tagged Random for a reason.
