Today, Discord Truly Cares About Your Opinion
Fluttershy stomped her hoof. "Instead of using your chaos powers to amuse yourself at other creatures' expense, why don't you think about OTHER creatures' feelings?"
Discord pursed his lips for a moment...until he smiled. "Why, Fluttershy. What an excellent idea!"
Fluttershy's head tilted slightly.
Discord grinned. "I'll go ask some OTHER ponies what they think I should do with my powers of chaos. Surely there's no way this could possibly go wrong."
"Discord! You stop that right now!"
But as she spoke, Discord was already gone.
***
As Twilight Sparkle tipped her teapot to pour, a tiny 'genie' floated out through the spout. His front end looked like a pony's...but where his backside and rear legs might have been, he was vague and blurry, more like a cloud.
"Kind mare! You have freed me from my prison! As a powerful genie who you have liberated from his captivity, I now owe you a wish!"
"You're a genie?"
"A powerful genie, with the power to grant wishes. Genie law REQUIRES me to grant a wish for you. If you won't make a wish, I'll have to go to genie prison, and spend my days making tiny license plates to bolt onto grains of sand." The genie shook his head sadly. "It's a miserable fate."
"And why should I trust you?"
"Because I'm a genie? Genie law! Because I might be grateful? Because if you don't tell me what you want me to do, I might just come up with ideas on my own that would be even worse than anything you might think of?"
Twilight eyed the 'genie' suspiciously. "Well...what if I come up with a wish that's so difficult to grant, even YOU can't grant it properly? Then will you give up, and not cause any trouble?"
"If your wish is to try to flummox me in that way...then yes. Give me the hardest wish you've got."
Twilight pressed her lips together, thinking hard. Finally, she said, "I wish Rainbow Dash was at least a LITTLE bit smarter."
"That's...vague."
"And I'd like Rainbow and I to have a little more in common, too." The purple pony scratched her chin with one forehoof. "Ok, here's my wish. I'd like Rainbow Dash to love at least ONE book series. How about...Daring Do?"
The 'genie' crossed his front legs and nodded. "Can do."
"And what if she becomes just enough of a nerd to secretly sneak out to Daring Do fandom conventions?"
The 'genie' snickered. "Hilarious. I like it."
"And one more thing! Don't forget to make sure she knows how to read."
The 'genie' shuddered slightly. "That sounds..." He thought for a moment, then recrossed his forelegs and nodded. "You know what? That's not easy, but it's worth doing to help a true friend. Literacy IS fundamental. And besides, she'll need to be able to read and write properly when she's director of the Wonderbolts."
"What was that last part?" Twilight asked.
But she was speaking to empty air.
***
"Sometimes I resent the way that Twilight Sparkle was specially tutored to become a princess ever since she was a tiny foal...but all the Equestrian education system ever did for ME was to take away my best friend."
"Oh? Tell me more, Starlight." The 'genie' grinned as he leaned upon the lilac unicorn's desk. "Because I care. I want to help you."
"But if Twilight WASN'T a princess...a lot of things might have happened differently. I might never have met Trixie. Or been appointed headmare of a school. As headmare, I get to run a school MY way. Instead of taking foals' friends away, I teach young creatures to KEEP their friendships, and also to believe whatever else I tell them. Or..."
"Or what?"
"Never mind. But when I think about how Twilight acts so high and mighty sometimes...I just want to take her down a peg. Just a LITTLE bit."
"I like the way you're thinking."
"Here's an idea! Give her an absurd phobia that makes her look ridiculous."
The 'genie' blinked. "ANOTHER ridiculous phobia? But she ALREADY has...I mean, have you ever tried to take her out to a Mexicolt style restaurant to celebrate a special occasion? If you do, don't order the cheese platter."
"I know what I want. Make Twilight afraid of something perfectly harmless and cute, like...ladybugs. I mean, irrationally terrified. Complete with a backstory she can tell about how she's been terrified by them ever since she was a little foal. Make it her brother's fault somehow."
"Which brother, Shining Armor or Spike?"
"Shining Armor. That big, smiling twerp doesn't deserve to be a prince, by the way. He's just so...annoyingly wholesome and boring. Why does HE get to marry a princess?"
"You know, if YOU wanted to marry a princess--"
"Tempting. But no, making Trixie an alicorn princess would be asking for SO MUCH trouble. Better stick with my first wish, to make Twilight terrified of ladybugs."
"Your wish is my command."
***
A light blue, rainbow maned pegasus said, "You might think this is weird, but..."
"But what?" The 'genie' grinned.
Rainbow Dash whispered, "I want a complete set of first edition Daring Do novels. And a first class ticket to the next Daring Do convention in Manehattan. Do you think that's weird?"
The 'genie' smirked. "Not at all! I understand completely." He crossed his forelegs, and nodded. "Your wish is granted."
A bookcase appeared against one wall of Rainbow's bedroom.
"Hay," Rainbow rasped. "This is two thirds empty!"
The 'genie' nodded. "I left room for books that A. K. Yearling will write and publish in the years to come."
"Oh. I guess that makes sense." A piece of paper fluttered down, landing on the floor in front of Rainbow. "Hay!"
"What?"
"This ticket says it's for CaballeroCon, NOT for DaringCon. It's the wrong convention!"
The 'genie' shrugged. "Oops. Who knew you could read?"
In a flash of light, the 'genie' vanished.
***
"Ah like apples," Applejack said.
"Excuse me?"
"Ah already got everythin' Ah really need. And besides, ain't askin' a genie for wishes just askin' for trouble?"
"I RESENT the insinuation--"
"Buzz off, genie. Turn yourself into a bug and fly away."
"Well, if you INSIST." The 'genie' transformed into a horsefly, and flew off into the distance.
***
For nearly a minute, Mayor Marigold Mare's laughter echoed through her office. Finally, she stopped to wipe her brow with one forehoof. "Sorry. It's just...all that laughing makes me tired."
"Why did you laugh so hard?"
"Because I already have what I want. Power. And the opportunity to play hardball political games to keep it. If that power was just HOOFED to me by a genie, without my having to work for it? Then I'd miss out on most of the fun."
"You're weird."
"Says the creature who floats in the air without hindlegs."
The 'genie' looked down his nose at the politician. "Hmmph. You don't deserve a favor from somecreature as powerful and amazing as me." He vanished in a puff of smoke.
Mayor Mare turned her attention back to the paperwork on her desk. "Blue copy...blue copy...where's that blue copy?" She sighed. "The genie is gone already, just when I know what I'd want to wish for."
She sighed again. "This reminds me of what happened twenty years ago, when a tarnished old Saddle Arabian lamp turned up in City Hall's lost and found. Mayor Mayonnaise grabbed it and wished to be Queen of Tartarus, so she could make parking ticket scofflaws push chariots back and forth all day."
A tear trickled down Mare's face. "SUCH a bittersweet memory. Sure, that evening Mayor Mayonnaise was taken away to Tartarus, but at least she rules the Infernal Realms now. And because she lost her job as Mayor of Ponyville, I got a promotion. I still receive letters from her sometimes, about how she's working to get Tartarus in proper order, and whip those evildoers into shape."
She looked up from her papers, and saw the 'genie' had reappeared.
The 'genie' asked, "Tartarus has mail service?"
"Certainly. It's right in the Equestrian Postal Service's credo. 'Neither snow, nor heat, nor gloom of Tartarus--'"
"I think you're misquoting."
"...will stay these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds," Mare insisted.
"How absurd. Balderdash! You've been fooled by the propaganda of Big Alicorn. Especially Princess Luna."
Mare opened a drawer. "Who are we going to believe, a genie who's probably spent the last thousand years shut up in a lamp and fallen completely out of touch with current events? Or somepony who has letters like THESE?" She slammed a stack of envelopes down on the desk.
"May I?"
"Please. Read a few. See how wrong you are."
The 'genie' riffled through the envelopes, and opened one. "Hmm. So THAT'S what happens to ponies who create magically cursed chain letters. What a fitting punishment. And Tartarus has a special section to punish literary critics?"
"Yes. Mostly for creatures who write fanfiction."
"What? What does writing fanfiction have to do with literary criticism?"
"Every time a creature writes a fanfic, their story's differences from the original implicitly...OR EXplicitly...CRITICIZE whoever wrote the original source property. That makes fanfic writers..." Mare shuddered. "...CRITICS. Blech!"
Discord scratched his head with one 'hoof.' "Oh."
"Write even ONE fanfic, ANY fanfic," Mare explained, "and when your day of judgement arrives, you'll be put in the literary critics section of Tartarus FOREVER."
Discord remembered doujinshi manega he'd seen in his friend Fluttershy's collection. Each and every doujinshi was a comic book style fanfic crafted with love and care, complete with beautiful artwork on every page. He said softly, "How unfortunate."
Another question occurred to him. "But what about creatures who write ignorant, mean spirited, cruelly dishonest, or even irresponsibly incoherent reviews OF the fanfiction?"
Mare smiled. "As long as the reviews are mean spirited enough, those creatures are fighting AGAINST fanfiction, which means they are AUTOMATICALLY fighting the good fight, on the side of the angels." She nodded. "Every time some creature writes a review like that, another angel gets their wings."
"Let me check the rest of these letters for myself," Discord said, opening another envelope.
Mare's visitor skimmed letter after letter, sometimes slowing to read sections more carefully. After the final envelope, he admitted, "I've really learned a lot. These letters give me so many ideas about ways I could entertain myself. Maybe I'll even do all these evil things right here in Ponyville! To make sure that if I ever get put in Tartarus, I'll really deserve it!"
"What? I didn't mean that you should--"
But the 'genie' was already gone.
***
"Hello," said a creature who was half pony, half cloud. "I'm a genie. I'm here to grant you a wish."
Rarity looked up from her sewing. "How did you get in here?"
"Genie. Magic."
"As a unicorn, I have magic, but I don't go just barging into ponies' homes without asking."
"What does that have to do with anything?"
"Go," Rarity pointed at the front door. "Or else...I'll wish to use you as a pincushion."
The 'genie' sighed, and vanished.
***
Pinkie squealed, "I figured out what I want! Tell me your birthday, Mister Genie!"
The visitor's face paled. "What?"
"Tell me your birthday, so when that day comes, I can throw you a party. Because I don't know if anypony ever bothers to celebrate a genie's birthday, but if nopony ever does, wouldn't that be sad? So I'll bake you a big cake, and hang streamers, and--"
After describing the party for at least fifteen minutes, Pinkie laughed. "Waitaminute! Discord, is that you? I already KNOW your birthday is the first of Haypril."
"Who--who told you when my birthday is? HOW did you know?"
Pinkie giggled. "Party planner pony trade secret." She reached out with one hoof, and gently touched Discord's nose. "Boop!"
***
"I went around town, and I took other ponies' feelings into account. That was pretty much all I did, asking ponies how they thought I should use my chaotic powers."
Fluttershy stared at Discord skeptically.
"Really! That's what I did all day!"
"Are you sure you didn't do ANYTHING naughty?"
"Well...I did read somepony else's mail."
"Discord!"
"She told me to. She INSISTED I read those letters."
"Discord..."
"I'm not lying. It's the truth. She wanted to use them as proof to win an argument."
"And how did this argument start?"
"Umm...I might have helped start it."
Fluttershy shook her head. "You naughty little draconequus."
"Maybe I've been a LITTLE bit naughty. How about I clean out all the animals' litter trays, as my punishment?"
"I suppose...you may clean the litter trays."
"And afterwards we can take a bath, and when we're clean I can comb your mane and tail out? And I'll brush you and kiss you and give you well deserved compliments, while I tell you about the rest of my day?"
"Maybe. We'll see."
Addendum
The next day, Discord sat down to write a letter.
Dear MLP:FiM writers,
Twilight Sparkle canonically thought ladybugs were nice and cute in "It Ain't Easy Being Breezies," s4e16. Later, when you wrote the mini-episode "Starlight the Hypnotist," you somehow FORGOT or UNDID that fact...because you thought it would be funny if Twilight had hated and feared ladybugs ever since she was a filly?
You wrote a FIXFIC of MLP:FiM.
See you in Tartarus!
