Discord floated along as Fluttershy trotted on the forest path ahead of him. He didn't often accompany her on nature walks; knowing that she would disapprove of him using magic on the animals they encountered felt just a tad confining. Today, however, she had insisted that there was something he simply must see.
Confining or not, it was nice to see Fluttershy in her element. On these nature walks she brimmed with an admittedly infectious enthusiasm that Discord rarely witnessed, even at their relaxed tea parties. Prior to befriending her, Discord had paid little mind to the ways of mortal creatures, at least when they weren't under the influence of his chaotic antics. Under Fluttershy's guidance, he had to concede that the variety of forms and habits that living things could take was dazzling. Still, nothing that he couldn't spice up with a little chaos. There were few things that couldn't be improved with some additional chaos.
There was a slightly chaotic element to today's excursion. For reasons mysterious to Discord, Fluttershy had wanted to bring along a jar of pebbles, which he had helpfully offered to store in extra-dimensional space until such time that it was needed. Her saddlebag probably had ample room, but she had agreed nonetheless. Besides, offering to help was a thing friends do.
These walks normally proceeded at a sedate pace, with Fluttershy strolling along serenely while pointing out all the critters among the branches, inside logs, and under rocks on the side of the trail. She would stop and hold brief—and sometimes not so brief—conversations with most of them, too. There was no stopping and chatting today, however, and to keep up, Discord found that he had to speed up the lazy drifting that he usually adopted for these excursions.
"I can't help noticing that we're rather in a hurry today, Fluttershy," Discord remarked. "If we're in danger of running late, I can always snap us straight to wherever you are taking us." He rubbed his talons together in anticipation.
"Thank you, Discord," Fluttershy replied as she kept up her trot. "But I think we'll make it. In fact, it's straight through here!" She veered off the path and squeezed her way through some bushes. Discord, on the other hand, opted to turn intangible so he could phase through the foliage untouched.
On the other side of the bushes turned out to be a riverbank, and here Fluttershy sat down. "Watch carefully," she instructed, gesturing over the calm surface waters.
Merely sitting and watching was not one of Discord's favorite activities, but with Fluttershy's assurance that he wouldn't have long to wait, he obliged.
Soon, his sharp eyes spotted movement at the water's surface. It was the head of an insect, with short antennae and large compound eyes. Beating its elliptical gossamer wings and wriggling its long abdomen, which ended in three slender, tail-like extensions, the insect pulled the rest of itself free of the water and launched into the air.
It wasn't the only one. All across the visible stretch of river, more of the same type of insect were emerging from the water and getting airborne. There were thousands, then millions, so many that nopony could hope to count them all individually.
"Mayflies," Fluttershy explained. "They spent the last three years as nymphs living underwater, but have shed their outer skeletons to become winged adults and are now taking to the air to look for mates."
The swarm of mayflies swirled through the air, partially blotting out the light of the sun. Individual mayflies collided as they rushed to find partners.
They were soon joined by other winged creatures. Several small birds darted into the swarm with their jaws agape, snapping up mayflies in midair. The birds had sandy brown backs that contrasted with their white bellies. With their sharp, pointed wings they made quick turns, rivaling the agility of any Wonderbolt. As more birds joined the feast, Discord noticed that some of them seemed to be shooting straight out from the riverbank, from somewhere below where he and Fluttershy were sitting.
"Bank swallows!" Fluttershy chirped. "They nest in burrows all along the sides of this river. Some of their nests are right beneath our feet!"
The swallows weren't the only ones who had taken notice of the sudden abundance of protein. Large green dragonflies also zipped through the swarm and plucked mayflies from the air. In the river below, trout breached the surface. Some engulfed mayflies that had not yet taken flight, but others leaped clear from the water to capture airborne targets.
Despite it all, the predators left no visible impact on the mayflies' numbers. The mayflies themselves made little attempt to escape their pursuers, so focused they were on finding mates. There was a chaotic beauty to their frenetic movements, Discord admitted to himself. However, there could be something more. He thought about sending each mayfly through a portal right before a predator could grab it. Perhaps he could enlarge one, or five, or a million. Wouldn't that give those swallows a fright? The mayflies had no working mouthparts; it was not like they could actually hurt anything... well, not unless he gave them some—
Fluttershy's voice snapped him out of his reverie. "I hope you enjoyed that, Discord." Discord could have sworn that she sounded slightly choked up, and he turned to see her wiping away at her eyes.
"I'm fine," she said as she got back on her hooves and gave him a smile. "There is one more thing I need to do before sunset. Would you like to come, too? Unless you would prefer to... keep watching to the end, of course."
"This may be one of nature's great spectacles," Discord answered. "But the main reason I'm here is to spend time with you. Lead on, Fluttershy!"
Half an hour later, they arrived at a large clearing in the forest. Here there were a great number of stones strewn about on the ground. A couple at the far edge of the clearing were big boulders, but most were much smaller, around the size of building bricks. Some were stacked on top of each other to form piles of various heights, others were partly embedded in the soil.
Fluttershy turned to Discord. "Could you bring back that jar of pebbles from before, please?" she asked.
It took only a snap of Discord's talons to fulfill her request. With his magic he set the jar down gently in front of her. Fluttershy loosened the lid with her mouth before unscrewing it using her hooves.
"Those mayflies we saw earlier have probably all passed on by now," she stated solemnly as she tipped the jar over, letting the pebbles slide out into a pile on the ground.
"Already?" Discord said in disbelief. "The fish and birds couldn't have possibly eaten them all."
"They didn't," said Fluttershy. "But mayflies only live for a few hours once they get their wings, just long enough for them to mate and lay their eggs in the water. In a few days, the eggs will hatch into nymphs, and the cycle will start anew."
Fluttershy nosed the pile of pebbles, spreading them out. "I leave a rock here for every animal that passes away under my watch..." she explained. "And all of these are for the mayflies." She indicated the terrain in front of her as she spoke.
Only now did Discord notice the countless pebbles set into the ground at the edge of the clearing, forming a veritable pavement. Fluttershy started pushing the new pebbles into position, adding them to the pavement. As she did so, Discord considered the other rocks in the clearing.
"So every rock here... corresponds to an animal that you have lost," Discord contemplated out loud.
"Yes," Fluttershy answered. "That one"—she pointed a hoof at the nearest brick-sized stone—"is for Mr. Prairie Vole. He passed away peacefully in his sleep.
"But his mate wasn't so lucky." Fluttershy pointed at another stone, placed in contact with the previous one. "A kestrel caught her while I was out getting food for my critters.
"And that big one in the back"—she gestured to one of the boulders—"is for an old manticore I met in the forest. She was... she was already on her last legs when I found her. All I could do was bring her some bedding and water to make sure she was comfortable when she went."
"You remember all of them?" Discord asked.
"Every one."
Discord stroked his beard with his paw. "You must experience such sorrow every time."
"Of course," Fluttershy replied, returning to her task of arranging pebbles on the ground. "I've cried for them all."
"Doesn't it bother you that you have to go through all... this?"
Fluttershy looked up. "I suppose I've never considered that things could work any other way," she said. "I do my best to make sure that all my animal friends stay happy and healthy. But there comes a time for every one when nothing will keep them from death's door. When that happens... the most I can do is make sure they don’t suffer more than they need to."
“The most you can do, perhaps…" Discord mused, looking pensive, "but what if somepony could get rid of death altogether? Just... poof, and you'd never have to lose another friend again.”
"Not losing more friends would be nice," Fluttershy said as she furrowed her brow. "But I'm not sure... The world would be very different. We wouldn't have seen that extraordinary swarm of mayflies today without death. After all, the reason so many of them emerge at once is so predators can't eat them all.
"Those amazing acrobatics from the swallows, too. They only have such wonderful flying skills because they need them to catch insects to eat. And because of all the prey they were able to catch today, their babies will grow into strong young swallows, just in time to fly south for the winter. Death takes away, but it also... creates.
"I think death also encourages us to do right by other creatures," Fluttershy continued earnestly. "This"—she glanced around at the clearing—"is not just a memorial for the critters I have known."
She walked over to a nearby stone, the one commemorating Mr. Prairie Vole. She turned it over, exposing a small, bright orange salamander underneath.
"This is Newton," she said. "He's one of many animals that call this clearing home. He has left the pond that he was born in and is now spending some time on land in his juvenile stage, called a 'red eft'. In a year or two he'll return to the water, where he'll grow into a green adult newt and find a mate.
"His skin is poisonous, so that brilliant orange warns predators that he's dangerous to eat," she added. "But he prefers not to stay out in the sun for too long, which is why he spends most of the day underneath this rock." She carefully placed the stone back in its original position, sheltering the small amphibian in its shadow once more.
"Each of these rocks has become a home for critters," Fluttershy said pleasantly. "Oh look!" She pointed to some movement occurring near the pavement of pebbles.
A winged insect was hard at work, dragging one of the pebbles towards a hole in the ground. Its exoskeleton was an incredible iridescent green and glinted, metal-like, under the sunlight.
"A jewel wasp!" Fluttershy exclaimed. "She must have just finished preparing a nursery for her babies, and is using pebbles to plug the entrance to keep them safe as they grow. She—"
"Yes, yes," Discord cut in. "That’s a nice way of putting a silver lining to things." He conjured several silver streamers in the air behind him and let them spiral to the ground. "But somepony, say an all-powerful draconequus, could maintain all the things you love in this world, from sprightly swallows to gleaming wasps, without the unpleasantries of death. He could even throw in a few new life forms into the mix. His creativity would be no worse than death's, I assure you."
"Your imagination is wonderful, Discord," Fluttershy agreed. "But... a lot would need to change. Ponies and animals would continue having families, and if everycreature were immortal, those families would grow and grow. You’d have to constantly produce enough resources for everyone to keep on living."
"I could do that!" Discord declared, surrounding the two of them in a pile of cucumber sandwiches.
"Providing for the needs of every creature in the world would be a big job," Fluttershy pointed out. "Would we even have time for tea parties anymore?"
"Then I will make it so that no creature needs resources to live," Discord said.
"...But I like cucumber sandwiches," Fluttershy murmured, picking one up from the pile.
"And you still would!" Discord quickly responded. "But you would be able to eat them just because you felt like it, and not because you have to eat."
Fluttershy took a bite of the sandwich. "So everycreature would be free to take as much as they wanted, instead of just what they need? It sounds like you'd still have to spend a lot of time providing those resources. And some ponies might want a lot!"
"Ugh," Discord groaned. "Fine, I'll make it so that no creature wants more than a certain amount, as specified by me."
"For example, I would only want cucumber sandwiches once... a month, instead of every week?" Fluttershy wondered, gazing at her sandwich.
"Yes, yes!" Discord confirmed. "In fact, I could make it so that everypony only wants and needs chaos!" The very fabric of seemed to reality warp around them, distorting into a blurred, multicolored swirl.
"...I could make you like this new world!" A spark danced on Discord's talons as he prepared a snap, his eyes wild.
Fluttershy looked up, frowning.
"...But I suppose you wouldn't really still be you then, would you?" Discord lowered his talons. Their surroundings settled back into the relatively familiar form of cucumber sandwiches.
"I don't think I would be, Discord," said Fluttershy. "Besides, maintaining so many new rules about how the world works sounds... awfully orderly of you."
Discord sighed. "I don't know how you mortals cope. Having to permanently lose the other creatures in your life, again and again until you yourself cease to exist." His neck sagged. "I don't think I could cope," he added quietly.
Fluttershy set her sandwich aside. "It's natural to be worried about death," she said gently.
"Not for me!" Discord protested. "I've only ever been concerned about my own mortality under a few exceptional circumstances. And I've never paid much attention to the coming and going of mortals until, well, I came to know you."
"You've come a long way," said Fluttershy. "You learned about friendship. Maybe you can learn more about death, too. Maybe.... maybe this is a situation where, instead of changing the entire world, it's simpler to keep changing yourself. Even for an all-powerful draconequus."
"You may be right," Discord grudgingly conceded. He snapped away the streamers and sandwiches that he had summoned (except for the one that Fluttershy had been eating), revealing the night sky. "Shall we head back?"
Fluttershy took one final look at the clearing before she answered. "Yes," she said, placing her half-eaten sandwich and the empty jar of pebbles in her saddlebag. "Let's go down this path." She pointed to a narrow trail that they hadn't taken yet. "We'll be able to see fireflies on the way."
Discord spoke up as they started their journey back. "What if... I only extended everypony's lifespan by a tiny bit?" He chuckled mischieviously. "Say, by five centuries or so?"
Fluttershy shook her head, but turned to smile at him. "Just promise me you won't change everypony like that without getting their consent," she said. "And that includes the animals, if you're changing them too."
"You ponies and your proper societal etiquette," Discord grumbled. "But for you, Fluttershy, I promise," he assured her.
The two friends continued their journey in silence, illuminated by the light of the moon.
Author's Note
The inspiration for this story came to me while participating in the comments section of TCC56's "Glow In The Dark, Shine In The Sun" (go read that fic, it's good), namely realizing that both Fluttershy and Discord are likely to be characters who have interesting perspectives on death. One would almost never wish harm to any sentient being, but is probably a regular witness to death and is familiar with the crucial roles it plays in the lives of the animals she cares for. The other is an immortal who has only recently formed personal attachments to individuals whose existence is, from his viewpoint, fleeting. Numerous fanfics have been written on the subject of Discord dealing with the loss of Fluttershy, but I had yet to see one that brings their unique perspectives together.
A consequence of looking at death from the point of view of an immortal reality warper is that one can conceivably run into the question of "if you had the power to remove the very concept of death, would you?" This of course is a subject that cannot proceed beyond the hypothetical in the real world for now, but it may well be a possible reality in the MLP universe. It's a philosophical quandary that most likely cannot be resolved in one conversation (or one hastily written fanfiction), and this short story is not intended to depict a final conclusion of that discussion. It serves only to record one possible interaction between Fluttershy and Discord's contrasting positions. As their lives continue, I can see them revisiting the subject time and time again, paving the way for potential outcomes that have been so skillfully explored by other fanfics.
Also, if you're not acquainted with the life cycle of the jewel wasp, let's just say that it's probably a good thing that Discord interrupted Fluttershy before she could elaborate on that.
