What?

Sorry, just thinking about...things. Don't worry. Now, where was I...Right. Celestia's hall of past glories. Grey stones and coloured glass. Sunlight streaming through pictures of old victories and vanquished foes. Lionised ponies and demonised everything else. There was a theme there, I thought.

Celestia took her time getting back. Before she did, a strange beige and dark blue little thing walked in all bold and curious. I was later to learn that this was one of the children of the staff who snuck out of wherever she was supposed to be. Of course, the first thing out of it's mouth had to be-

"You're very tall." Classy, kid. You're going to go far with material like that.
"You're very small." I am a bastion of rapier wit. Yes, I would say something different now, but I wasn't this me at the time. Less grown, all fire and dust and no...regret. Moving on.

We stared at each other for a while. Circled like bored and curious sharks circling something that might have once been a painting of a seal. Moderately interested because there's nothing else here. I'm ashamed to admit that we ended up resorting to pulling funny faces to kill time.

So when Celestia, a half-dozen golden guards and a still pissed looking Luna walked in to see me pushing up my nose at a giggling filly it did absolutely nothing for my reputation as an evil tyrant-king bent of world domination and some kind of eternal constant. Another theme I noticed around here, the villains always wanted their forever. I wondered if that was their version of "happily ever after", having changed the boring status quo and living their dream life for the rest of their days.

Oh yes, I can see the gears turning in your little heads now. As hilarious as destroying your perceptions of the world is, which I could likely do with a few minutes, I have to get back to the story, my little ponies.

I don't care if you don't like how I'm smiling, let me get back to my story.

Now, Celestia and the clanky troupe brought gifts for the newly crowned king. I would have thought a country was enough, but no, clearly not. Each of the guards had with them a box. Now, these boxes were all the same, albeit different sizes. Perfectly lacquered finish, polished brass fixtures, intricate filigree. Another theme I was picking up in was the wonderful and not in my face at all "Everything we have is better than anything you'll have in fifty years" theme. Perhaps I should have called this part of the story Themes. Doesn't matter.

What matters is what was in the boxes. Except one, one was just a box. It was supposed to contain goodwill and sunshine but it just contained dust and the faint smell of something burning. Not even the good kind of dust that impedes magic, but the gray castle-y dust that builds up in unused boxes you want to get rid of. I'm not counting that one, but it was a good sized box.

The first actual gift was paper. Paper with writing on it, or what I assumed to be writing. At this point, I still relied on Sturdy to read things to me, and he was overseeing the ponies back home.

"As the second" Because the first one was crap. "gift to you, I present a copy of the letters sent by my sister and student, Twilight Sparkle. May they be your guide out of the darkness of Tartarus and into the shining light of Australis."

She imperceptibly cringed on the last word. I wordlessly thanked her as the box was set down, fixed on that little twitch, that crack in the mask. Well, good to know she's nowhere near perfect or accepting. Perhaps she just wanted to avoid the inevitable bloodshed if she refused my demand for my storm-wracked hole in the ground. Perhaps she just didn't want...

Let's not break you all just yet. The second gift was a circlet of gold and gems. Not as nice as hers, but in some opinions far better than mine.

"Very nice, I expect. Some of the best workmanship your little ponies have ever done as a gift for a new ally?"
"My third gift to you is a golden wreath." Oh, that's what the little pointy bits were. "May it show the new friendship between nations as we grow together into this coming age." I like how she never alters her speeches. Not a bit.
"I do like this friendship between nations thing, Celestia. It's a marked change for the unnatural disaster, mass genocide, and prison bit we used to do. But I already have a crown. It's, you know, on my head. Slightly singed in places and made of driftwood and shiny rocks but it's mine."
"My gift is yours to do what you will."
"I'll keep it in my bedroom."
"Your bedroom?"
"It's also the throne room. What? Building material is scarce. I'm thinking of putting it on the wall, next to a copy of our alliance treaty. Well, I say wall. I mean post."

Even the guards could see her gritting her teeth. I wasn't purposely antagonising her. Really, I wasn't. Just speaking the truth. Tartarus was so much sailcloth and boards. We didn't have the luxury of eons old palaces and a healthy economy. We had blood and dust. But I can still see it.

"I'll put it in that box. Should keep the rain off it."
"Regardless..." That's right, take a breath to steady yourself and keep going. "My fourth gift to you is this ring. Normally worn on a horn, it should fit one of your fingers. It will cause you to appear more majestic than you are-"
"Ergh, no. I'm practically worshipped now. It's creepy. I'll pass on your thoughtful gift, but it wound benefit someone other than I far better." I think I'm getting this florid speech down. I even just used the word 'florid'.

"What do you want?" Celestia finally cracked. Which was strange, because I didn't think this would be enough.
"Nothing. Well, nothing more than I already have." I was trying to calm her down. Not that it was working.
"You always come here and change things, you know? You and your kind. All throughout the last three hundred years, you've been coming here and changing everything I've worked for. You've started wars and ended them. Killed whole races out of spite and brought them back out of kindness and shame. What do you want from me?"

The silence hung in the room. There is nothing I can liken it to. An oppressive haze, perhaps, but that lacks the feeling of rage and sorrow. A bad smell, sure, but that says nothing of the sunlight filtering through, casting a mosaic of ponies and villains across the whole tortured scene. So the silence hung. And just for a moment, I could see the noose.

A breath of wind whistling a ghost's lament cast itself through the chamber. No echo to see it off, just the fading notes of it's entrance. That summed up the day. Without speaking another word, Celestia and I turned and walked out of our respective doors. I'd find no answers there. But perhaps I'd found a clue. Something as big as she described had to leave a mark on history, right? I'd been through the statue garden and if that told me one thing it's that these ponies like their heroes on platforms above them.

Back I went to the forest of stone and old triumphs. Most of them were ponies of various natures. Laughing, I think. Some stoic in their defiance. Some somber in their service. No anger, no rage. No love either, and little joy. The eyes were all silent as the rest of the statue screamed virtue.

"Well now, another one of you. In for some fun, are we?"

This was the strangest thing I'd ever seen. All bits and pieces. Charming voice, though. I mean, who knew this was the prince of madness? I know it's not his official title, but I like calling him that. Makes him seem more...something. I'll put my finger on it eventually.

"Yes, yes, another one of me. Ayre of Australis. You are..?"
"Oh, how rude of me. I am Discord, spirit of Disharmony and spreader of Chaos. How have you not heard me? I thought I made quite an impression on the history books. And the geography books. And the magic books. And the cookbooks. Oh, and the books on how not to turn evil and try to destroy the world. I wrote three." He held up four, each with his face on it. "You can have two if you like."
"Sorry, Discord, spirit of Disharmony. I can't read."
"Such a shame. Do you know how many worlds there are in a single book? How many variations derived simply from evaluating the text and changing the pronunciation of but a single word? Oh my. I have spent far too much time with Twilight Sparkle. I shall have to spend time with...Oh, someone else..."

He gave me a look. I didn't like that look. It was the look that promises mischief, mayhem and some kind of pie afterwards while surveying the carnage. On second thoughts, I did like that look, but you'll never get me to admit it.

"No."
"Oh come on. It will be ever so much fun. It's not every day another complete unknown just flings themselves halfway across the world to spend the day with old Celestia."
"It's not?"
"Oh no. No, this is a special day. Not even I dreamed one of you would come crawling out of that dust-pit."
"I keep hearing that."
"Hearing what?" he pulled an ear trumpet from nowhere and held it up to his nose. I'm not going to list the mannerisms or random things he did. There are too many of them and I'm sure you know them by heart anyway. He's been around a while.
"One of you. What am I?"
"Now, now. That would be telling. Celestia would be mad if she found out I told before she could bargain something out of your for it."
"Fine, fine. You going to answer any of my other questions?"
"Depends, what's in it for me?"
"A day with a complete unknown of a race that has the tendency to change the status quo and all the damage and havoc that the combined efforts of said member of said race and a spreader of Chaos could cause."
"Hmm...deal. But only if we do something with a giant moose."
"Done." Not going to question why, how we will obtain or what we would do with a giant moose, but, hey, a deal is a deal. "Now. The storm."
"Oh you can find that one out at the local archives. Just don't eat a few pages from the restricted section. The librarian tends to get twitchy and lie down."
"Can't read, remember? Just tell me."
"Fine. But remember your end of the bargain."

"Tartarus never used to be a barren waste. It had plants and trees and birds and even a native species. Wonderful things, looked like a duck and a half dozen other things all got together and had one too many nights with one too many pots of hallucinogenics. They were a race of jokers and generally very nice. Tended towards vulgar some of the time, but mostly harmless. Oh, and there were the giant jumping rats, and the tree-things and...well, you get the point. Full of life and joyously random.

"Which is probably why Celestia and Luna dropped the storm over them. Oh yes, it was those two. They weren't in their right state of mind, you see. I, well, I had just vacated the throne. They wanted to take their anger out on something that wasn't in the middle of a quite catchy musical number. Of course, to their eyes the entire island looked like it was some kind of strange army of mine. They didn't want to risk any of their little ponies, you see. Invasion would be an overt act of war when they needed peace and togetherness and all that friendship gag.

"So they just suffocated an entire civilisation. Anything that touched the clouds fried and everything trapped inside was used for fuel for the storm. Magic fuel, that is. Why do you think the dust absorbs magic? Because it's hungry for it. It's been empty for so long that it doesn't know when it's full. It was a long and probably painful death. I would have done something about it, but I was far too busy being decoration for a 'Down with Discord' party."

"Is there anything else you would want to know?"
"Yeah. How come the storm if self-aware?"
"It's not. Is it?"
"It spoke to me before I came. Wanted to know what it was."
"Oh. Well that's very interesting. Did it have a funny accent?"
"Kind of rumbley."
"Hmm. No. Leave the jokes to the funny draconequui."

Author's Note

Life. Stop getting in the way of the fanfic I started to procrastinate but then grew to like.