Well, Ponyville was exploding again, and as usual, there was nothing Berry Punch could do but watch.
Half the town was on fire, the thatched rooves burning up like tinderboxes. It would probably be worth investing in some more sturdy materials with the rate of possibly world ending events that occurred around here. The Golden Oak library was a pile of cinders. She was honestly surprised it had survived this long. Scorch marks were scattered everywhere, and ponies were running screaming from building to building. It was mass hysteria.
Berry Punch sat on a hill outside town, overlooking the chaos. She could see her house all the way down there, a quaint little hut. It was of course, on fire. Any personal belongs that meant something to her had long since been burnt to cinder in the previous years. She would rebuild her house, then it would burn down or explode, and then the cycle would continue.
She was laying down on a white plastic lawn chair, facing the distant town. It was flimsy and weak, the plastic thin from exposure to the sun, but somehow it still remained standing. Everything she owned had either exploded or been burnt down, and yet this lawn chair somehow survived every time. She almost hated the thing for that reason, why couldn't her family scrapbook have survived for once? She had already made three of them! Or at least her wine collection, that would be nice.
Speaking of wine, she had a drink to attend to.
Berry Punch popped the cork on a ludicrously expensive bottle of Red Dragon Crush with her teeth. An ancient classic, made of berries from the land of bat-ponies. It took practically all her bits to buy the thing, and it was time to see if it was worth it. Supposedly the bat ponies were masters of their craft, she would be the judge of that.
And what better to drink it to than an exploding Ponyville? The massive red centaur smashing through the town certainly wouldn't care. What was his name again, T-rex? Well, Berry Punch didn't particularly care. He was just another on a long list of villains that wanted to destroy Equestria. He was nothing special and would probably soon be forgotten. He looked to be winning right now, the fight having ended between Twilight Sparkle and T-rex, but Berry Punch just had to have hope it would turn out alright. What else could you do against such threats?
Berry Punch took a swig of her wine. When your calling in life was wine, you tended to experience a wide variety of tastes. It was surprisingly good. It was fruity and had an almost somber taste. Strange, but what else could you expect from bat ponies?
That was when she saw something a little out of the ordinary. Not the exploding town of course, it was who was walking up the hill.
"Discord?" Berry Punch couldn't help but wonder aloud.
The first time she met Discord had not been pleasant to say the least. He made her sneeze with such force it caused Ponyville to collapse. That was a strange day, maybe stranger than the rest. Not as strange as that time a horde of Pinkie Pie's ravaged the town, but strange, nonetheless.
The draconequus looked downtrodden. His hoof and dragon leg dragged on the dirt road; his long-serpentine body hunched over. He also wasn't flying or spitting out cotton candy clouds that rained chocolate milk. The last she had heard, Discord had betrayed Equestria, intent on stealing all the magic with T-rex. She had expected him to be flying around causing chaos already, so why was he all the way out here?
Discord walked, staring at the floor. Then, his path abruptly changed. He walked right in front of her chair, and just stood, watching the town.
He hadn't even noticed that she was there.
Berry Punch huffed. Her view was blocked by the impossibly tall Discord. Who just blocks a pony's view like that?
She grabbed the popped cork of her bottle, then threw it at the back of his head. "You're blocking the view!"
It bounced off of his head with a plink. For a moment he didn't react, just staring at the town. Then, he slowly turned around, a look of disbelief on his face.
"What?"
"You're blocking the view." Berry Punch took a swig of her wine, resting her face on a single hoof as she was laying down.
Discord looked between her and the burning town. "Aren't you supposed to be running and screaming for your life? What are you doing out here?"
"Enjoying the view." Berry said.
"The town is burning, and your drinking wine." Discord raised an eyebrow. "How... chaotic."
"Aren't you the spirit of chaos? If anypony is chaotic, it's you." Berry Punch shrugged.
An explosion went off in the distance. There goes Sugarcube Corner.
"I'm afraid I'm not anymore. I've been stripped of my powers." Discord sighed. "And it's all my fault."
Berry Punch huffed. The dragonequus looked miserable, his shoulders slumped and wings drooping. His amber eyes locked onto her, watery with unshed tears. She looked down to her bottle, then back up at him. It was expensive, but maybe he needed it more than her. "Need a drink?"
"I betrayed Equestria and you're offering me a drink." Discord shook his head. "And aren't you the pony I tormented? Why are you doing this?"
"You looked like you needed a drink." Berry shrugged.
Discord frowned, a sight that was unnatural on his face. Without the constantly changing reality around him, he really did seem weird. Which was strange, because it should have been the opposite.
"Alright. Woe is me!" Discord sighed dramatically and snatched the bottle from her. "I'll just drink my woes away!"
"Thats not how it works." Berry Punch snatched the bottle back with a growl like an angry dog. "Wine should be enjoyed, not guzzled down."
The two glared at each other. Berry Punch leaned back in her chair, bottle in tow, then crossed her hooves.
"How did you lose your powers?" Berry Punch asked.
"Tirek. He betrayed me, just like I betrayed my friends." Discord shook his head. "Now all of Equestria is doomed, and it's all my fault."
Berry Punch wouldn't consider herself a psychologist, but even she could recognize that Discord was feeling guilty. She didn't know the whole story, but that look on his face told her everything she needed to know. She stayed silent, and he went silent as well. To be honest, she didn't know what to say to that. Some ponies made the mistake of knocking over a glass of water in the morning, maybe forgetting to turn off the oven or not waking up for work on time. Then some made the mistake of trusting an ancient evil centaur that drained all of the magic in Equestria for lunch.
"How are you just sitting out here? Watching the chaos?" Discord snapped his fingers. The spark of chaos that was once there was gone. "I mean, I'm an enjoyer of such a fine art myself, but this is different. This place means something."
"What can you do?" Berry Punch shrugged.
"What?"
"What can you do? There is nothing us normal ponies can do about it. My talent is liking wine, how far from heroism can it get than that?" Berry Punch said.
"So, what, you're just going to sit here and watch it happen?" Discord looked confused for once in his life.
"Yep."
"That is stupid."
"I know."
Discord's gaze narrowed. "Then why are you doing it?"
Berry Punch sighed. It was hard to say how she felt. It wasn't really how other ponies felt about the world. It was her own view on it, one she never really shared. But the look on Discord's face made her think maybe it was time to try. She felt a little sorry for him, even if he did betray Equestria and torment her. A little bit. A tad even.
"What is the point in worrying about something you can't change?" Berry Punch said. "There is nothing I can do to control it, so I'm not going to spend time worrying about trying to."
"Then you're saying it should just be left to rot." Discord scowled. "A villainous remark if I say so myself."
"That is not what I'm saying." Berry Punch said with a heavy sigh. She took another swig of her wine and looked back out over Ponyville.
T-rex, or Tirek if Discord was right, was raging across the town. He was massively tall, a behemoth of a creature. When he stepped the ground shook and buildings collapsed. It was truly a living monster, unstoppable in very way to a pony like Berry Punch. She should have been running away to safety, screaming her head off. And yet, she didn't. There wasn't a point to it. What she could do against him was limited, but she could do something. And if that something was sitting on a lawn chair and waiting for the destruction to be over so she could pick up the pieces of the town, then that is what she would do.
"Sometimes, you just have to focus on what you can control." Berry Punch said after a long moment.
"I'm the spirit of disharmony! I can't control anything!" Discord shouted, his booming raw voice a testament to wrath and sorrow alike. "Everything I touch turns to nonsense, everything I love ends up spinning out or orbit!"
He pointed a crooked finger to the sun. "That is control! Celestia and Luna, spinning the sun on a cycle. THAT is what control is!"
"Then control what you can." Berry Punch gestured to his legs. "You're walking, Aren't you? Thats something. Your breathing, your alive, that's a start if nothing else is."
"And then what? What next? What if Equestria is ruined because of me?" Discord snarled. "How can you just sit there while the world is burning!"
"Because it is what I can do." Berry Punch said. "If I spent all my time worrying about what I can't control, then I wouldn't be able to see what I can control that is right in front of me."
"And what about my friends? The ones I betrayed. I can't control how they feel about me." Discord's eyes watered. "How Fluttershy feels about me."
"Then take it one day at a time. Hope for the best, hope that eventually everything is going to turn out all okay." Berry Punch lifted the bottle back towards him. "Do what you can. Do what is right. That is all anypony can ask of you."
Discord eyed the bottle, then grabbed it. He took a sip and handed it back to her. After that, they stood in silence, watching the burning town.
Berry Punch wondered if she had said the right thing. Discord was an ancient spirit of chaos; he wasn't bound by the normal laws of everyday ponies like her. Maybe the rules of ponies like her simply didn't apply. However, looking at him now, she had a feeling that just maybe, they did.
Six distant forms rose in the distance. She recognized them, the elements of harmony. They had changed, their manes glowing bright with untold power. They faced Tirek, flying in the air above him. At this distance, Berry could only imagine what they were saying.
"Something, something, magic of friendship." Berry Punch laughed. "It never gets old, and it never fails."
"What are you on about again?" Discord huffed.
"Look. Your friends are fighting Tirek. I'm sure we are in for a good show." Berry Punch said.
And they were.
Magic swirled around the six elements of harmony until it formed a globe of untold power. It was a pure embodiment of harmony itself. Tirek launched a blast of magic at the swirling globe only for it to bounce off like a limp pool noodle. In return, threads of intense magic latched onto him like chains. The multicolored threads snapped together, forming a rainbow of potent magic. Tirek started to shrink, then vanished entirely beneath the tide of embodied harmony.
The globe of harmony began to seethe then, virulent and powerful. It rose high into the air, rising above the clouds like an ascending alicorn.
It shook with potent magic, then, it exploded.
A nova of rainbow energy blasted outward. Where it touched, magic was returned to the land. Trees bent in its wake, and grass was blasted backwards with such force it was almost ripped out at the roots.
"Discordance!" Discord cursed, ducking his head.
It came towards Berry Punch, who leaned back in her lawn chair lazily. Then, it hit her.
The blast instantly restored her drained magic. The flimsy lawn chair shook, its legs digging into the dirt as it was pushed backwards with Berry Punch still sitting on it. She instantly felt revitalized and let out a chortling laugh in the face of the blast. A thrill filled her, vibrant and full of life.
It seems that everything had turned out okay after all.
There was one more explosion to have though. A massive, towering castle took the place of the burnt down Golden Oak Library. It rose from the earth, roots growing thick and deep like a world tree from a fairy tale. Now that was going to raise property taxes for sure.
"My magic! Its back!" Discord snapped his fingers. A fish materialized in the air, before flying off spitting dart boards into a tree. "Oh goody! I'm me again!"
Berry Punch chuckled and went to take a swig from her bottle.
"Wait! Let me get that for you." Discord snapped his fingers again, a wide smile on his face. "On the house."
Her drink turned from a bottle into a keg of wine. It fell into her lap, smacking into her and driving the breath from her lungs. She winced. "What was that for?"
"Sorry. Sorry!" Discord shook his hands. "I just can't believe they did it!"
"Well they did." Berry Punch said. "Thanks for the keg. This stuff is really expensive."
"No. Thank you." Discord bowed, his face pulling into a frown. "I... I was going to leave after this. I just wanted to get away from them after what I did."
"What changed?" Berry asked.
"You changed. I mean, what you said that is." Discord kneeled before her, sending a shock through her body. The spirit of disharmony, kneeling?
"You can get up. No need for that." Berry Punch coughed awkwardly.
"I just wanted to say thank you. I was going to leave all this behind. But maybe... maybe I'll try again. Ill regain their trust, starting with what I can control." Discord said. "I just wish I didn't make that mistake. I don't have many ponies who like me, as you can tell. It's hard for me to make friends."
"What do you mean?" Berry Punch asked. "You just made one."
Discord's frown pulled into a wide grin. "Us? Friends? Even after I tormented you?"
"Why not?" Berry Punch shrugged then extended a hoof. "I'll be the first to forgive you. From there, you can work your way out."
Discord grabbed it, then pulled her into a bone-crushing hug. "Oh my! I made another friend today! How exciting! What should we do? Skiing on Mount Everhoof? How about a trip to the chaos realm?"
"Well, I think the town needs to be repaired." Berry Punch wheezed, the arms of Discord driving the breath from her body. "Best get to that first."
"Oh. Right." Discord snapped his fingers, and half of the town was suddenly repaired. "How's that?"
"Leave some for me." Berry Punch grumbled. "How about you go on ahead? I'll meet you there."
"I could just teleport over there." Discord said.
"Oh alright. Give me a moment." Berry Punch said.
She turned to look at her lawn chair. It was weak, frail, and falling apart. And yet, it had survived everything so far. Just like her. Just like everypony. It was impressive really that it hadn't fallen apart. Did that make it strong then? If something weak survived all of this while the strong failed, then what was really strong?
Maybe that it how it had survived, existing day to day, and never giving up.
"Alright. I'm done with my introspection." Berry Punch said. "Port me over."
"Oh, an unexpected comment on your psyche. How chaotic! I'm liking you more and more with every moment." Discord snapped his fingers, and the two vanished to the winds.
What Berry Punch didn't realize is that she just changed the course of history. In another timeline, Discord left, leaving Equestria to face the coming nightmares alone. This was not that timeline though, and that future never came to pass.
What was left of their departure was that old lawn chair, standing on frail old legs against the strong winds. No matter what storm approached, it would endure. It would stand strong against the tides that came its way, the tides of change and life. The surging winds of chaos could be weathered with just four frail legs.
For that was what it could control.
And it would take every moment as it came.
One day at a time.
