After Fluttershy quite literally drops out of Junior Flight Camp, she decides to stay on the ground instead of going back to Cloudsdale. Her new friends lead her to Ponyville and help her find a beautiful little cottage to live, not realising that she has a very unusual neighbour living right next door in the Everfree Forest.
3rd and final chapter of my prequel story, Into the Woods! A little late; sorry everypony!
Chapter 3: A New Neighbour
Living next door to the Lord of Chaos, Fluttershy soon learned, was something of a challenge. If he wanted to visit, he did so by popping up behind her at random times, usually causing her to let out a scream of fright and drop whatever she might be holding.
He was completely unpredictable; his magic was so strange, especially to a pony who loved peace and quiet as she did. Fluttershy thought she would never really get used to the sight of Discord taking apart his body, as he sometimes did.
He could also be quite sulky, and when he got sulky, he got mean. Several weeks into their strange friendship they got into an argument which ended with Fluttershy dissolving into tears and Discord poofing away.
To her surprise, however, he turned up again several days later and apologised.
The gentle pegasus melted at once at the expression on his face. It was nervous and unsure and so, so sad. "Of course I forgive you, Discord."
The draconequus' whole demeanour perked up and he gazed at her with undisguised shock. He had obviously not expected her response. Fluttershy wondered when was the last time anypony had spoken kindly to him.
On an impulse, she flew forwards and hugged his neck.
He went rigid at her touch, and took a step back when she released him. "What was that for?"
"Because," she smiled, "you're my friend."
He blinked at her as if he didn't understand the word. "We're friends?"
"Of course we are!"
The idea still seemed entirely foreign to him. He glanced away, waving his tail nervously. "Um, Fluttershy...would you...like to visit my home today?"
She wanted to say no. The thought of venturing back into the Everfree Forest still terrified her. But Discord sounded so hesitant – so unlike his regular brash self – that Fluttershy instead found herself nodding. "I would love to."
Discord beamed, and next moment, the two of them were standing in a completely different spot.
Fluttershy gazed around, wondering if they were actually in the Everfree Forest. If so, she had certainly never got to this part on her last few trips. She was in a bright meadow surrounded by trees, all bearing strange fruits, such as polka-dotted pears. Flowers quite literally smiled at her on all sides, or else were encrusted with gems and glittering in the sunshine, and each blade of grass seemed to be a different colour.
"It's...beautiful," she gasped.
Discord looked slightly hopeful, and Fluttershy suddenly realised he was nervous. "R-really? Even with all the Chaos?"
The young pegasus nodded eagerly. "Really. I think it's lovely, Discord."
The draconequus positively beamed at her, and she blushed, hiding behind her long mane in embarrassment.
"Um..." Discord looked away and snapped his fingers, conjuring a table, two chairs and a tea service. "Tea?"
The pegasus nodded, and the two of them began a very awkward sort of morning tea. Very soon, however, Discord decided to impress his guest with some more magic, summoning a bowling pin, a chainsaw, a watermelon, a kitten and a flaming torch into his hands and starting to juggle.
Fluttershy immediately objected to him tossing the kitten in the air, so he let her hold it while he juggled the rest. The filly applauded wildly when they all exploded into confetti at the end and Discord shouted, "Ta-da!"
After that, they began talking more naturally, right up until it started to get dark.
"Oh my goodness," Fluttershy exclaimed, looking around herself. "It's so late! I should get home and feed the critters!"
"Not to worry, my dear," Discord said graciously, lion paw poised to snap her back home. "But, uh... do you think we could do this again?"
Fluttershy smiled shyly. "I-I'd love to."
Discord smiled and snapped his fingers.
The morning teas became an almost-daily occurrence for the two friends.
Discord was absolutely thrilled to have a pony who wasn't scared or disgusted by his chaos magic, besides being quite taken by the beautiful filly. She was so sweet and thoughtful to every creature, and he couldn't help but fall under the spell of her charm.
Fluttershy admired the draconequus for his brash confidence and his incredible powers, which gave an odd sense of security to the timid little filly. He was also fascinating and funny, and brought a spark of adventure to her otherwise peaceful life. After a while – with Discord's repeated assurances that she would never come to harm within the trees – she had enough courage to be able to walk through the Everfree Forest, and often visited her quirky neighbour.
She still tried to avoid venturing into Ponyville as much as possible, though her cottage was so close to the little village that ponies had come calling to see the new inhabitant. Discord was never around for these occurrences, and Fluttershy often gave in to her desire to hide under her bed when it happened, particularly in the beginning.
For whatever reason, the draconequus was quite happy to help her get around her need to shop by conjuring the items himself, so she remained happily isolated in her cottage with just her critters and her Chaotic neighbour for company.
It was a few months before Fluttershy realised she should go back to Cloudsdale and tell her parents she was alright.
Discord violently protested her going, but the pegasus could put her hoof down when it really mattered.
"I'm sorry, Discord, but it'll just be a week. I'll be back before you know it."
"What if I come with you?" he asked hopefully, transforming instantly into a dark grey pegasus.
Fluttershy suddenly found herself blushing at the thought of introducing Discord to her parents. "Actually, I was hoping you could keep an eye on the critters while I'm gone?"
"Critter-sitting?!" the draconequus (and a few critters) exclaimed, horrified.
"No, just check in every now and then to make sure they're alright," the filly explained, patting several of the animals' heads reassuringly. "I'll have Angel with me, so you don't need to worry about him." This was partly due to Angel being so young, partly because she wanted to introduce him to her parents, and partly because Angel had never forgiven Discord for rabbit-napping him, and Fluttershy wanted to avoid the disaster of leaving the two of them alone together.
The bunny now clambered onto his mistress' back, smirking at the draconequus. Discord scowled back at him.
"Please, Discord?"
The Chaos Lord wilted under her pleading expression. If he didn't know any better, he might have thought her Stare had finally started to work on him. "Very well. What are neighbours for?"
"Thank you!" She hugged him goodbye and trotted outside. Making sure Angel was secure, she took flight.
Discord stood at the door of the cottage, waving her off. When she'd disappeared from view, he turned back to the houseful of critters, who were all watching him uncertainly. "Hey, I'm not happy with this, either!" he told them. "Guess we'll just have to make the most of it for a week."
Fluttershy's parents ran outside to greet her when they saw her approaching, wrapping her in a huge hug the second she'd landed.
"Oh, we were so worried when Rainbow came to tell us what had happened!"
"How have you been? Are you alright?"
"And who is this?" her mother asked as Angel hopped onto the grass outside the little house.
"Mum, Dad, this is Angel Bunny; he's one of my new friends," Fluttershy said proudly.
The older ponies cooed over the baby bunny as they ushered their daughter inside. Once they were seated around their dining table, however, and all three ponies had a cup of tea – Angel had a glass of milk – the questions began again.
Fluttershy found herself telling them everything, beginning with the bullies picking on her all the way to finding and fixing up her new cottage. Then she hesitated. "Th-then, little Angel accidentally got onto my neighbour's property, so I had to go get him back, and met my neighbour. H-his name's...um...Discord."
At this, the rabbit put down the carrot he was now munching on and started squeaking angrily, which Fluttershy translated as Hey! Don't go changing the story as though it was my fault! That monster rabbit-napped me! Plus a few words his mistress would have normally scolded him for.
Fluttershy cringed, but thankfully her parents could not understand the bunny and took no notice.
"What an unusual name," was her mother's comment, while her father simply nodded in agreement.
"Yes, well, he is rather unusual," their daughter replied, smiling to herself. "But we've actually become good friends."
Angel crossed his arms huffily.
Her parents were gazing at her with strange expressions, and Fluttershy grew nervous, afraid they'd recognised the name and knew the identity of her unusual neighbour. "W-w-what?" she stammered.
"You just...sound so different," her father said gently. "So confident and brave. So..."
"...happy," finished her mother.
"Oh." Fluttershy blinked, surprised that the realisation had not occurred to her before now. "Yes. I am happy."
Fluttershy returned home a week later, landing a little way off from her house so Angel could hop down. All of a sudden, a grey blur streaked out of her cottage and collided with her, lifting her off the ground and shouting, "FLUTTERSHY!"
"Hello...Discord..." the pegasus wheezed. The draconequus' enthusiastic greeting was making it difficult for her to breathe.
Thankfully, he seemed to realise this and loosened his hold, holding her out at arm's length instead so they could see each other. "I'm so glad you're home!"
Fluttershy giggled. "Me too, Discord. Uh...why were you in my house?"
The draconequus' expression suddenly became deadly serious. "Something terrible has happened."
"What?!" Fluttershy gasped. "Is it one of the critters? Are they hurt? Sick? What happened?!"
"Somepony moved into the Everfree Forest!"
Fluttershy stopped panicking, instead tilting her head at Discord curiously. "Um...that doesn't sound like an emergency."
"It is!" Discord cried angrily, finally releasing hold of her. Fluttershy dropped a little way before catching herself. "I live in the Everfree Forest, because nopony's supposed to go in there! That way nopony can find me and report back to the princesses! I've had to give up my chaos magic in order to stay hidden!"
Fluttershy glanced towards the trees – she could see two of them chatting to each other on the outskirts, waving their limbs about – and then back at Discord, one eyebrow raised.
"All obvious forms of chaos magic," he amended.
"Couldn't you just scare them off like you usually do?" Fluttershy wondered.
"I tried! But this pony's got some weird sort of magic I've never seen before! I'm not even really sure it is magic. So none of my tricks worked! I had to take refuge in your cottage."
Her friend's distress was so plain, Fluttershy found herself saying, "Don't worry, Discord. We'll figure this out," and trying to comfort him like she would a frightened animal. She led the draconequus back into the cottage and put her things away, barely noticing the changes Discord had added while 'in hiding'. (Thankfully, he'd known well enough to leave the animals and their shelters alone.)
Discord had perked up again and started an argument with Angel, who was squeaking back at him angrily. Fluttershy took no notice of the pair of them, too busy working out a plan to keep Discord safe, and went back outside. The rabbit and draconequus paused in their insults, surprised, then followed. They found the young pegasus picking flowers.
Uh, what are you doing? Angel asked.
"Uh, what are you doing?" Discord asked.
"I'm collecting flowers to give to our new neighbour," Fluttershy told both of them.
The other two glanced at each other with equally confused looks, then back at the pegasus. "Why?" they chorused.
"Well, here's my plan," she said, turning to face them. "Obviously, Discord can't go up and introduce himself, and then ask them nicely not to turn him in. So...I'm going to go introduce myself, and see if they're trustworthy."
Both rabbit and draconequus put one paw to their mouth, gazing at her thoughtfully. Fluttershy stifled a smile at the sight of them.
"It might work..." Discord conceded.
I doubt it will work, Angel replied at the same time.
"Well, there's no harm in trying," Fluttershy said bravely, picking up her bouquet of flowers. "You stay here, Discord." She began to trot towards the Everfree Forest.
Discord and Angel looked at each other. Then the bunny shrugged and bounded after his mistress. She paused to let him climb on her back.
The draconequus huffed. "Well, I'm not about to be shown up by a rabbit!" he said. "I need to go and make sure that voodoo witch doctor doesn't hurt her!" He vanished with a pop.
Fluttershy's bravery quickly started to evaporate as she walked through the Everfree Forest. She still wasn't quite used to it (Discord's chaos did not stop the place being incredibly creepy), and she was headed towards a strange pony's house who had magic that Discord didn't know how to combat. Angel patted her reassuringly, and she smiled back at him, grateful for the bunny's comforting presence. She shrieked as a familiar draconequus popped into being right in front of her.
"Sorry, my dear," said Discord, "but I couldn't let you go alone. I did promise you'd never be harmed while in the Everfree Forest, after all. Besides, who else could show you the way?"
Fluttershy smiled weakly, still recovering from her fright. "Thank you, Discord. But stay out of sight, okay?"
"No problem." He transformed himself into a flowery hairpin, which floated over and slid into her mane. "I'll be right here if you need me," came a tiny voice, whispered directly in her ear.
His breath tickled and she giggled, resuming her journey with a lot more cheerfulness.
Discord directed her to a large tree, and her courage wavered again at the strange decorations hanging all around the place. Wooden masks seemed to glare down at her from all sides, and Fluttershy cowered, wanting to run away. But Angel slid off her back and scampered to the door set into the trunk to knock, and she had no choice but to follow.
The door was opened by the strangest pony Fluttershy had ever seen. Her mane stuck straight up in a mohawk, she had slanted blue eyes and she was covered in black and white stripes all over her body. Her flank was marked with a strange, swirly design. The pegasus nearly lost her nerve again.
"Uh...h-h-hi..." she stammered. "My n-name i-is F-f-fl-flutter-sh-shy and I'm..."
The stranger blinked at her as she trailed off.
"Flowers?" she whimpered, holding out the bouquet she had picked.
The stranger took the flowers. "My, what beautiful blooms! This deserves a proper thank you. Please, come in and have a brew, so I may get to know you." She held the door open wider and smiled warmly.
Fluttershy blinked at the zebra's accent and rhyming, but her words had gone a long way towards making the filly feel more at ease. She tiptoed into the hut.
Zecora, as she introduced herself, was from a distant land. She'd decided to travel and come to Equestria. "And here I found the most wild Everfree. It'd reminded me of home, you see? So I decided to stay, though I fear these trees would prefer I go away."
Fluttershy smiled. "Um...maybe...they're right? I mean," she hurried on, "there's a lovely little village not so far away where I'm sure you'd be welcome. And I know I'd certainly not like living here...but, um, it's your decision," she finished on a mumble.
Zecora blinked. "I know and have been to this town. But unfortunately I found all shops shut down."
"Really? That's odd."
All of a sudden, Discord appeared in the middle of the table, back to normal. "Alright, that's enough!" he shouted.
"Discord!" Fluttershy yelped.
"What is this? A draconequus?" Zecora cried.
"Yes," Discord hissed at the zebra. "A draconequus who has already laid claim to this forest, and doesn't welcome outsiders! Now that I know about your zebra magic, I know just how to get rid of you!" He raised his lion paw, ready to snap his fingers.
"Discord, no!" Fluttershy flew up to stop him, blocking his view of Zecora.
He stared at her, shocked and hurt.
"Zecora hasn't done anything!" the pegasus pleaded. "She just wants to live here peacefully, just like you! Why can't you share the forest?"
"You know why, Fluttershy!" he spat. "Sooner or later, she's going to tell somepony about me, and the princesses will come and turn me back to stone!"
Zecora was looking back and forth between them. At this, she smiled. "Ah, so this is why this place is so malevolent. Because you would prefer that I went?"
"Yes," huffed Discord.
"If I promised to ensure that you are left alone, would you then allow me to share your home?"
The Chaos Lord hesitated, glancing from Zecora's serene expression to Fluttershy's begging, slightly panicked eyes. He knew the pegasus would never tell about him, but not many were as understanding as the sweet filly. He didn't know this zebra. Though there was something telling him to trust her. Perhaps it was the fact that she was also an outsider, or just the influence of the pegasus urging him to take a leap of faith. Slowly, he lowered his paw.
"Fine," he muttered. "But you don't tell anypony about me. Ever. Or else." His hands crackled with power in warning.
Zecora nodded once in agreement. "While I continue to live here, your presence will stay a secret, I swear."
Fluttershy sighed with relief.
As Fluttershy, Discord and Angel made their way back to Fluttershy's cottage, Discord broke the silence with a question. "Did you mean that?"
"Mean what?"
"When you said you'd hate living in the Everfree Forest," he replied.
"Oh." Fluttershy blushed. "Um...if you were still trying to get rid of me, like you were with Zecora, then yes, of course. I wouldn't like living in such a scary place."
The draconequus stopped, and the pegasus, confused, stopped too. "But I don't want to get rid of you," he said. "And you've said there are parts of the forest you like."
"We-ell, I guess now it wouldn't be so bad..."
"I promised you would never come to harm in this forest," he went on. "Besides, I really..." Discord suddenly stopped, blushed and muttered something under his breath.
"What?" Fluttershy asked.
"N nngg mhmm mhmngng."
"What?"
Discord sighed and finally mumbled, "I like your company."
"Oh." It was Fluttershy's turn to blush. "W-well, I-I like your c-company t-too, Discord."
"Do you think, um, would you consider...moving your cottage into the forest?"
Fluttershy blinked, startled at the suggestion, her face burning scarlet. "W-w-well, um..." Her teal eyes locked with Discord's red and yellow ones, which were scared and hopeful all at once. She could feel her heart beating rapidly, but not quite with fear. "M-maybe?"
The draconequus' eyes widened with shock. "Really?"
Really?! Angel asked, for entirely different reasons.
Fluttershy ignored her bunny's outrage and nodded with a small smile. "I'll...I'll think about it, Discord."
Discord stared at her for several seconds, then – apparently with great effort – contained his excitement to a simple smile. "Wonderful! Now, you should get home, Fluttershy." He raised his eagle claw and snapped.
She was instantly transported to the door of her cottage. Looking back at the forest, she heard a faint 'Woohoo!' and saw fireworks explode over the treetops. Fluttershy giggled.
She headed inside, her mind still on the Chaos Lord and his offer. Move into the forest? With him? She was already starting to warm to the idea.
Then Angel was in front of her, squeaking madly. Are you crazy? Do you remember the first time you went to Ponyville and came back to find the cottage floating in the air?!
"Oh, you're right, Angel," Fluttershy said, glancing around the room at all her friends' nests and hutches. Then she thought of Discord again and giggled. "I guess I'm going to have to nail all these animal shelters down."
Hehe, I love writing Angel vs. Discord scenes.
And that brings this prequel story to an end. Thanks so much for reading! Please leave a review to let me know what you thought. Also, I had a real issue with the length of the chapters with this story when it turned out so long, so for future reference, it would be super helpful if you guys could let me know if they should be shorter/longer or what. (First two chapters of this story were 2500-3000w, this chapter was closer to 3500.)
And now that I've finished this one, there should be another Fluttercord Chronicle chapter up soon. Keep an eye out!
Love OnlyHere4Puckabrina xoxo