Applejack

“Ahm tellin ya, Twi! This is Discord’s doing.” Applejack complained. “Ah know he’s chaotic an all, but this is just too far.” She continued pointing at her orchard.

“Applejack, why would Discord flatten out the land and arrange your trees in perfect rows, and change your apples to be almost perfectly round and the same size? It doesn’t make sense!” Twilight responded before looking defeated. “Oh.”

“Umm, even so, Twilight, I know from experience that Discord wouldn’t do something this ordered. It would literally make him fade from existence. Remember when I told you about the time I visited his home?” Fluttershy interjected. “He fades when he creates order. I’d like to think that even the Lord of Chaos has a sense of self-preservation.”

“Well, it still doesn’t explain how mah orchard is unnaturally tidy. No landmarks, signs, nothin. It has to be the work of Discord.”

Twilight’s horn started glowing as she tried to summon Discord. He popped into existence but before she could get a word in, he started to say some very odd things indeed, especially for him. “Hello everypony! This is your friendly neighbourhood draconequus here to tell you that Discord isn’t available right now. Due to some unknown reason, most likely due to a lack of chaos in the area, I cannot reach you. Please move to a more chaotic region of Equestria so that -” the rest faded with static, while the Discordant answering machine fell from existence.

“Well…that was certainly somethin’.” Applejack said.

Pinkie Pie

Pinkie was busy watching the Sugarcube Corner counter during the lunch rush. She sighed. Something was off today, something…unfun. She looked outside and didn’t see anything too obviously super-duper wrong, yet she felt…drained. She chalked it up to the party slump, where very few parties were happening this time of year. She clearly needed to plan a “Party Slump Party” to get out of the slump that the party slump caused by lacking parties.

Pinkie mindlessly took orders and thought about the supplies needed to make this an absolute doozy of a party, even thinking of inviting Cheese Sandwich and Discord to help plan it. Obviously if Discord was invited, she’d need to rent some unpopulated land from the Princesses and also ensure guidelines that prevented ponies from being moved to other dimensions and…

“Pinkie! Are you even listening to what I’m saying?” Asked Rarity.

“Nope!” Said Pinkie in a tone far too chipper to be polite, yet at the same time very clearly not impolite. Rarity looked at Pinkie quizzically while Pinkie fetched her scone. Almost immediately, Pinkie was back with a large cheese scone with butter that was still somehow warm.

Rarity paid Pinkie five Bits then walked off with her scone, to nearly be bowled over by Spike. “Hey, Rarity. Hey, Pinkie. Twilight said to meet at the castle as soon as possible. AJ and Fluttershy are already there.” He said before taking off in the direction of Rainbow Dash’s house.

“Well, that was…odd.” Said Rarity, before taking a bite out of her scone.

“You said it, Rarity. I’ve never seen Spike with wings before.” Commented Pinkie before telling Mr. and Mrs. Cake about Twilight’s call, then headed in the wrong direction to the castle. Nevertheless, she arrived before Rarity did, much to the unicorn’s confusion. Rarity decided not to question it and headed inside. Moments later, Rainbow flew in and nearly crashed into her throne, sticking the landing like a pro. Spike made it to the castle about a minute later. Pinkie started thinking about the “Nice Landing!” party she was going to throw for Rainbow Dash but was quickly interrupted by Twilight.

Twilight Sparkle

As each of the girls (and Spike, of course) settled into the thrones, Twilight began her presentation. “Good afternoon, everypony. While helping Applejack with her chores today, Applejack, Fluttershy and I noticed that each tree was exactly alike. Ordered perfectly and symmetrically, with no hills or distinctive markings. Normally I wouldn’t have a problem with this, but it seems very unusual. When I got back here to the map, I noticed this.” She pointed to the Everfree Forest. “As you can see, it’s not completely and utterly wild, it’s ordered.” She pointed again to the crystal mountains. “Here we can see that the Crystal Peaks are of the exact same heights. If somepony were to get lost in them, they would never be able to tell where to head.”

“So, what?” Rainbow Dash interrupted. “Just get Discord to change it back.” She finished.

“That’s the thing, Rainbow. We’re pretty sure it ain’t Discord.” Replied Applejack.

“But if it isn’t Discord then whomst’d’ve done it?” Rainbow asked indignantly.

“I’m pretty sure that isn’t a word, darling. It’s ‘whomst have.’” Rarity spoke up.

“Girls.” Twilight said.

“Whatever. You know what I meant.”

“GIRLS!” Twilight yelled. Spike opened his mouth before closing it on second thought. “We have to tell the Princesses about this. In fact, we can’t even summon Discord due to a ‘lack of chaos,’ whatever that means. We just have to figure out a way to – Spike?” Everypony turned to look at Spike before he finally let out a massive scroll.

“It’s a letter from the Princesses.” He sheepishly mentioned before Twilight started reading the scroll.

“We have to get to Canterlot. You too, Spike.” Twilight said. “Celestia needs our help.”

“Whatever with, Twilight?” Rarity asked.

Twilight looked at her as if she’d just said the stupidest thing in the world. It took Rarity a moment before she promptly got down. “I don’t know about…the rest of you,” she started. “But I shan’t leave for Canterlot without packing, first.”

Applejack raised an eyebrow. “We’re probably gonna go on a dangerous adventure. It ain’t worth it to bring all of this unnecessary gear. Just the bare essentials.”

Rarity huffed and trotted out of the room.

“I’m sorry, everypony, but we’re just going to have to leave ASAP. I’ll see you at the train station. Spike tell the Princesses that we’ll be right there.”

“On it. Princess Twilight, we’re going – “

“Alright, maybe I should have used better wording.”

“No kidding.”

Author's Note

From now on, I'll only be focusing on one perspective per chapter. Not only is this somewhat confusing for reading purposes, but it's also difficult to write. Alas, it's necessary for future reference in the story.