In the Year of Our Lady and Discord
For the first few moments, Discord wanted to scream.
The sensation of being turned into stone was uncomfortable to say the least, but far more terrifying were the implications. As beautiful a sculpture he could make, spending his existence immobile was far too orderly a vocation for his liking. This couldn't be happening – he had rendered the Elements of Harmony useless against him. Yet there they were, their magic actively imprisoning him once more.
How deliciously unexpected.
The last time he had been imprisoned, he had at least seen it coming. That night had been one of his best, up until the pony sisters had cornered him. He had teased them as they slowly gained the upper hoof, hoping to turn them against each other. Unfortunately, he only managed to sow the seeds of what would eventually become a larger conflict between the two before his defeat became inevitable.
He remembered posing for it: paw on his chest, claw outstretched. Serpentine form elegantly curved, mouth open, and eyes closed in solemn acceptance of his fate.
It was closing his eyes he had regretted most. The centuries upon centuries that had passed with him only being able to hear, the boredom had been unbearable! The black emptiness of the inside of his stone eyelids was too much – what he wouldn't have given just to be able to look at something. Or someone. Even when placed in the Canterlot sculpture garden and visited by thousands of people per year, he still felt alone. Not because no one wanted to see him; not because his identity was lost to time as he gradually became only a rock that represented discord – but because his favourite sense could give him nothing but orderly black.
That was not a problem, this time. He could see, despite being frozen with a silly look of terror. Even not having anything particularly interesting to look at could bring down his spirits. This certainly had the potential to be much more interesting than last time.
It had only been a day when Princess Celestia wandered into Discord's view. He wanted to make a witty comment about her coming to visit him, but settled for remaining absolutely still instead. He was unable to do anything else, but remaining in his current state suddenly became much more enjoyable when picturing it as another way of annoying her.
Celestia's magic glowed, lifting Discord off the ground. Her magic was yellow now for some reason, and this caught his attention long enough that it was several seconds before he realised ponies were talking around him.
"What do you plan to do with him, Princess?" Twilight Sparkle was asking.
The voice of the other unicorn, Rarity, replied. "I do hope you aren't going to return him to the sculpture garden," she said. "He doesn't match the harmonious theme of the place at all."
He saw Celestia shake her head. "I cannot return him there," she admitted. "I should never have done so in the first place. It is not safe for Discord to remain in Equestria, not when the prison which holds him is capable of being broken."
"Where do ya plan to send him?" asked another voice.
"Oh, are you going to banish him? I've never seen a banishment before! Do you send him away by magic? Does he get to say goodbye? Wait!"
Discord chuckled. Pinkie Pie was always the funny one.
"Pinkie, calm down," said Rainbow Dash. Discord felt a stab of disappointment. "Princess, where are you going put him that he won't be able to cause any more trouble?"
Celestia smiled. "Pinkie Pie has the correct idea, Rainbow Dash. I am going to be sending Discord away with magic." She placed him upright on the grass, his face staring directly into hers. She was evidently unaware he was completely conscious. Her expression became one of concentration.
"You should all stand back," she warned.
Her horn slowly began to glow, increasing in brightness until Discord couldn't see anything but her magic. He felt his prison growing stronger, and then, without warning, starting to weaken. It was as if the Elements of Harmony were far, far away.
For a few moments, he felt almost free.
And then, he was falling.
Within moments, he found that he was still his immobile self, situated in a grassy field not unlike the one where he had spent his previous imprisonment, overlooking what appeared to be a wedding reception.
It appeared as though three women attending the reception were starting to argue over something.
A deep laugh escaped from Discord's chest as he realised what he was witnessing. His prison began to crack.
The girl glanced furtively to her left and to her right. Assured that no one was looking in her direction, she dashed between the shrubbery, expertly avoiding being seen by any participants of the wedding party. She crouched behind a large, stylised bush and peered eagerly through the branches at the display of strife she had incited.
"Well, well, well," came an amused voice from behind her. "What would a lovely young lady such as yourself be up to, remaining apart from such a decadent banquet? Something mischievous, no doubt. Can I have in?"
She turned to stare at the bizarre amalgamate creature behind her. It was elongated and snake-like, with limbs which appeared to be from a variety of different animals. At the moment, it was crouched near the ground, its belly pressed up against the earth, but if it had been standing up straight it would have been at least twice her height. It had a very mismatched face, with two horns of different styles, two eyes of different sizes, two bushy eyebrows and a beard made of thick, grey hair.
"I am not a mortal lady," she sniffed in disdain. "I am a goddess."
The creature grinned widely, exposing one sharp fang. "Oh, a goddess? I've heard that before – first class, second class, all those dreadful rules. What makes you a goddess, might I ask? Did you create the world?"
"I am an immortal. And I should warn you, anything that I say cannot be taken at face value." She eyed him sceptically. "What are you, a chimera or something?"
"Are you a brunette?" he replied cheekily.
"No," she lied. "I'm a redhead."
At this, the creature laughed openly. "I am known as Discord, my blonde divine associate. And you are?"
She grinned at him, beginning to enjoy herself. "I am Eris, Goddess of Pranks and Troublemaking and whatever negative thing the rest of the pantheon doesn't want to be saddled with on any particular day of the week. You look absolutely hideous."
"Why thank you," Discord replied arrogantly, brushing his left-hand appendage, an eagle's claw, through the neatly trimmed mane which ran down the back of his head. "You look horrifically homogeneous yourself."
"What I lack in looks I make up in reputation," she informed him. "Although I never intend to determine what I want that to be. Right now I'm making it up as I go along."
"The only way to live," her visitor nodded. "I'd offer you my own expert tutelage in the unexpected, but you seem to have that well covered, whatever your divinity happens to encompass this particular day."
Eris only shrugged enigmatically. "Why make it easy for anyone? Where would the fun in that be?"
Crawling up to the bush beside her, Discord nodded. "You're speaking my language, Eris. You have no idea what I've gone through, the absolute bores that I've had to endure the presence of."
"I take it you likewise have had difficulty with the establishment?"
"Tell me about it – only this time, make it interesting. No, wait, I'll explain! I was vanished here."
Eris looked through the bushes at the rapidly escalating argument. Much to her disappointment, the three women had not yet stooped to the level of physical violence. Sighing, she turned back toward her unexpected companion.
"Vanished?" she prompted
"Oh yes. A fancied goddess such as yourself – I mean," he corrected himself at the glare she gave him, "an immortal such as yourself – tried to use her magic to remove me from existence. Surely you can see the futility of trying to destroy chaos? Non-being is the very apotheosis of order! No, that could never work. Instead, I appeared here, where I've met you."
"That makes a disappointing amount of sense," Eris remarked, not impressed with Discord's high opinion of himself. "To think I initially had such a favourable impression of you."
"Sense?" Discord spat, indignant. "Such language from one so young!"
Eris giggled at his consternation. "You sound like my sister."
"Yes, the less discussion about family, the better. Tell me, what are you up to? Those three fighting... you planned that, didn't you?"
"It would be against my principles to admit to anything, and a demonstration of foolishness on your part to accept my word for it."
"Is this a guessing game?" Discord asked gleefully, sitting up straight and rubbing his paw and claw against each other.
Eris nodded.
"Let me see then... Those three ladies, are they goddesses as well?"
"Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite. I'll give you a clue: they are all excessively vain."
"Of course, of course. I take it by your crouched posture that you have not been invited to this wedding party?"
Eris shook her head. "I have not. Peleus and Thetis are the couple in question, and if you ask me, they are completely unsuited for each other. Go on now, guess why I came anyway."
"Because you want to break up the couple for their own future happiness!"
The two stared at each other in silence for several seconds before both bursting into uncontrollable laughter.
"That... was the absolute... funniest thing I've heard in ages!"
"I've had precious... precious little to laugh about myself!" gasped Discord. "I've been out-of-sorts lately... Spent several thousand years stoned... then came back and was completely taken for granite!"
The couple continued laughing for several minutes, before Discord suddenly adopted an alarmingly serious expression. Eris calmed herself, but didn't tone down her chuckling at all.
"You rolled an apple into the crowd, I saw that," he continued. "It was a golden apple."
"Taken right from under the noses of the Hesperides themselves," Eris confirmed.
"Why would you do that?" he asked. "It seems such a minor gesture."
"Subtlety, my chaotic friend," she chided. "It was intended as a gift, you understand. Simply because I wasn't invited doesn't mean I cannot exercise generosity, does it?"
Discord was gazing at her with admiration in his reddish-coloured eyes. "You did something to it, didn't you?"
Eris blushed under his focused attention. "I addressed it to the prettiest," she admitted. "Is it my fault those three cannot determine who that is?"
"Yes," replied Discord. "And I would have been unable to free myself without their assistance, so I suppose I owe you my thanks in that regard."
She peered back through the branches. "Well, it looks like the dispute is over. I had hoped for a food fight, though. What a disappointment."
"Did they decide?" Discord asked. "Did they choose who the prettiest is? Be honest – was it me?"
"Not between themselves," said Eris, "but it looks like Zeus is making an announcement – hush for a moment..."
Discord obliged, folding his arms behind his back respectfully.
"No..." Eris muttered. "You are not going to believe this! He's going to have Paris make the judgement! How delightful! How delicious!"
"I take it you know this Paris fellow?"
"I know of him. Paris, the prince of Troy. He's fair, but also gullible. Those three won't play a clean game, you can depend on it. Do you realise what this could lead to?"
Discord pulled away from her, removing his arms from behind him and covering his ears. "No, no, no! I have no stomach for politics, my dear. You can have your intricate sort of chaos, I'll keep my simple, immediately satisfying kind. Watch this." He summoned a cotton candy cloud, and caused it to rain chocolate milk over their heads. "That's one I've been particularly fond of recently."
Mildly amused, Eris snapped her fingers. The cloud zipped away toward the wedding party, expanding in size as it travelled. Within moments, all of the invited guests were soaked in chocolate milk. The panic died down slightly after Zeus, with a look of bewilderment on his face, summoned a lightning blot to clear the sky.
"War," she intoned.
"War?" Discord asked, completely disregarding her solemnity. "Sounds like a dangerous amount of work to me."
"But don't you see?" she exclaimed, jumping forward and wrapping her arms around his neck. "This would be the first war ever! The opportunities, the strife, the embitterment and the discord – no pun intended, if you are indeed a personification as I suspect."
Discord raised one astonishingly large eyebrow. "Are you suggesting a partnership, milady?"
Eris merely smiled. "Would you care to partake of a hot dog with me?" she asked innocently.
Discord smirked. "I don't do buns," he told her.
"Neither do I," she replied.
The End?