A Letter

Dear Princess Celestia,

I know that you don’t believe that I’ve reformed. Its not exactly a surprise, I suppose; how could you trust the being that threw Equestria into chaos during his reign? The monster who you battled for all one hundred of those years, you and your sister, who destroyed the lives of so many of your precious ponies, and who twisted the mind of your sister against you. A creature so evil that you believed the only suitable punishment was to turn him into stone, and force him to watch and listen as one thousand years of order passed under your iron hoof.

But I have reformed, Tia. You don’t have to believe it, but I have changed. One thousand years trapped in a stone prison can do that to you. I promised that I would only use my powers for “good,” rather than “evil,” although I must say you ponies have such a narrow perspective on life. What you consider to be evil and despicable, an abomination against order, I consider to be nothing more than a little fun. But I will change, dearest Tia, and I will use my awe inspiring powers to help your little ponies... for the most part.

And yet, I know you still don’t believe me. I’m hurt, Princess. I really am. What about innocent until proven guilty? Benefit of the doubt? But then, I suppose that only applies to your ponies, not enemies of the nation.

I had thought, for a moment, that you really had decided to see if I could be reformed. But statues have ears, you know, and I heard you talking to your little sister. You thought it might be funny if you released me in Ponyville, let me run around rampaging for a while, and then lock me back up with the elements of harmony. Maybe you’d let me out once in awhile, see if I couldn’t be helped by the powers of friendship, and then shake your head as each time it failed and the baddy was turned back to stone once more.

That could be it; I don’t really know what your plan was, and frankly, I don’t care. Maybe it was a sick joke, maybe it was a lesson for your student, but either way, I want to make something very clear to you, dearest Tia. I am NOT YOUR PLAYTHING!

I’m sorry, I let my emotions get away with me. Why don’t I tell you a story instead?

A long time ago, in a world quite different than the one today, a creature was born. This creature was not, to begin with, evil, but he looked so different than everyone else that they all shied away from him. Everything he approached cowered or ran away, and he felt lonely, so very lonely. But then, one day, he saw the most magnificent sight; two regal alicorns, descending from the sky, beings of infinite grace, beauty, and wisdom. So the creature came towards them, reached out to them; but they looked at it with disgust, and attacked it with words and magic.

So the creature, hated by the world, slowly grew to hate the world in turn. And it found in itself the magic of disorder, of chaos, of discord. So it took that name up like a cloak and attacked the world, raging back at the world that had raged at it. And the defenders of the world, they came and fought him back, always fighting, with their words and their magic, and they trapped him in stone as they changed the world, and ruled over it. The creature was stuck in their garden like an ornament, forever to be looked upon with disgust.

And as the years passed, he despaired, for he believed that he would be trapped forever, and his anger turned to sadness. Such was his mood that when he was released, he summoned barely a fraction of his power, did little more than play tricks, and when he was sent back to his prison he almost went willingly.

Can you guess who the creature was, Celestia? It was me! The creature forsaken by the world, by its people, and by its gods.

And then, yesterday, the most extraordinary thing happened. When you let me out of my stone prison, I met somepony, a Miss Fluttershy, and she didn’t call me evil, or hate me, or try to throw me out of her home. She accepted me, despite everything I did to her, even when I was destroying her home, even when I tried to drive a wedge between her and the other Elements of Harmony. She accepted me, she befriended me, and she went as far as to stand up for me in front of the Elements. And that, Tia-- that touched my heart, and despite your best intentions, that did indeed reform me.

I don’t hate you, Celestia. I know why you did what you did; I even respect you for it, to some extent. I just want you to know that everything I’m going to do for your nation, I’m not doing it for you; I’m doing it for the first pony who ever looked beyond the mismatched parts and the chaos magic to the creature within. And I want you to know, to feel, that everything that happened between us-- the battles we had, your misery as your sister turned away from you, the time when you were waiting for her to come home-- all could have been avoided if, when you first saw a little draconequus staring at you in wonder, you had just said hello.

-Discord

Princess Celestia, the Ruler of Equestria, Former Bearer of the Elements of Harmony and Goddess of the Sun, felt tears slipping down her cheeks for the first time in a millennium. Quietly, she rolled the scroll up and set it to the side. She lay down, her tears continuing to fall, the only sound in the silent room.