Back in the nether, Discord’s eyebrows rose and his hands subconsciously went to his crotch. “Smart girl: she figured out my little trick,” he mumbled before a shoulder-launched rocket slammed against his face, sending him flying through the nether. Of course, with nothing to hit, he had plenty of time to climb atop it and grip its directional fins, steering it right back around towards a cluster of soldiers and leaping off just as it blew them straight to hell. “YEEE-HAWW!” He shrieked, a cowboy hat materializing in his hand as the dust from the explosion settled. “Y’all sure do know how t’throw a rodeo!”

The soldiers responded with another volley of rifle and machine gun fire, which he blocked with a magical shield while stifling a yawn. “Oh, come now my little dearies,” he sighed, rocketing down towards them and scattering them with a sonic boom. “Surely you can do better than that.”

Leaping back to their feet, the soldiers rushed him with whatever weapon they could find: some with their fists, even. He replied with a massive sweep of his tail that threw every man off his feet, where they landed in a mass of sticky pink cotton candy. “All I am saying…” he whirled around and slashed with his claws at a man coming up behind him, sending him twirling away, “…Is that it shouldn’t be too much…” whirling in the air like a ballerina, he landed deftly on a commander’s head, using the man as a shield for the gunfire meant for him as he pirouetted around, a tutu appearing around his waist, “…To ask for a bit of creativity!”

Two helicopters circled overhead, bearing down on him with heavy machine guns and rocket launchers blazing. Rolling his eyes, Discord snapped his fingers and watched as the choppers were transformed into large masses of bubbles, which drifted apart and sailed off into the nether, leaving their former pilots behind to land at the Lord of Chaos’s feet. He scooped one of them up by the front of his uniform and screamed in his face: “I mean, come on! Show a little bit of variety to spice things up, that’s all I’m asking for! Is that really so hard?”

“So you want something different, hmm?” A deep and horrendously cold voice asked from somewhere high above them. It took all of Discord’s strength to hide the shivers it sent racing down his spine.

“I was wondering when you’d show up,” he said coldly, barely even noticing as the few remaining men gathered in a tight circle around him, allowing just enough room for the man in the grey trench coat to descend amongst them. He snickered. “Well, well, so the big, bad, leader finally decides to…”

With blinding speed, Mars’s fists lashed out in a pair of jabs aimed at Discord’s throat. The Lord of Chaos narrowly dodged the blows, swatting them away with his claws and replying with a punch from his bear paw, which simply rolled off the top of Mars’ head. Immediately, the two were locked in an up-close and personal duel of hand-to-hand combat, both moving so quickly some of the soldiers gathered around had to look away or risk vomiting.

“Oh, so that’s it then?” Discord asked, sweeping at his opponent’s feet with his tail. “No witty repartee? No back-and-forth in an attempt to add tension to the scene?”

“No,” Mars said coldly, dodging Discord’s sweep and replying with a roundhouse kick aimed at the Draconequus’s throat. “I find that to be cliché.”

“A shame,” Discord said, ducking under the kick and sending a punch towards the man’s exposed crotch. “Your father (well, the American one, at least) was more than willing to oblige me on that front. Enthusiastic, in fact.”

“My father…” Mars sneered, leaping from Discord’s grasp and rolling to his feet a few yards away, a dark look crossing his face. “My father is a weakling, too ‘afraid’ of his impact on the lesser beings of the metaverse to ascend to his true calling and bring unity to those deserving of life! My father sought to bend me to his will, molding me into just another copy of himself for him to control. He wished to turn me into a perfect mirror from which he could admire how good and wonderful he is in the ultimate act of vanity!”

“Oh, lovely,” Discord sighed, rolling his eyes and crossing his arms. “Let me guess: this is the part where you regale us all with a tale from your childhood under the cruel and oppressive Swarm, thus ensuring that we see you as a mere victim of circumstance and that you become a more relatable character?”

“No,” the man said flatly, extending his hands. A pair of shimmering, chrome spikes extended from his wrists, tapering off to a pair of horrendously sharp points. Discord’s eyes widened as the man slowly advanced, spikes still extended. “This is the part where you die!”

The man leapt at Discord, a look of pure fury in his eyes. The Draconequus raised his hands to defend himself, only to be driven back by the sheer force of his enemy’s blows. His feet slid a good twenty feet over the barely-existent floor before he managed to stop himself, a shockwave booming off into the distance from the hit. Cringing, he barely had time to block as the man lashed out at him with the spikes, striking again and again with a strength and speed that could only be described as feral. Then, just as Discord thought he might have discovered some sort of pattern in his enemy’s attacks, he noticed movement in the corner of his eyes. He knew what it was: the soldiers advancing on his flanks, hoping to add enough confusion to the melee to give their master the upper hand.

‘This is it,’ he realized. ‘It’s die here, or die there. But then, I guess there are worse places to kick the bucket than in one’s own backyard.’ A grin crossed his face and he delivered a shove to Mars’s shoulders. His enemy stepped back, stunned, as the Draconequus rose into the air. “You believe you’ve won!? Give me a break; you have yet to deal with my ultimate attack!”

The man sneered, raising his spiked wrists.

Summoning a bit of a light show, Discord raised a glowing paw and closed his eyes, wishing for a cigarette and a blindfold as he mumbled some nonsense charms. Nothing much: just a few little spells that threw some sparks and made his body glow, filled the air with a few sound effects, all for the benefit of his audience below. His ploy worked like a charm: a hand clamped over his mouth and squeezed with enough force to shatter a lesser being’s jaw. He opened his eyes to watch as Mars raised him over his head, throwing him down with the kind of force that could knock planets off course. Discord hit the ground hard enough to shatter every bone in his body. As it was, a small spell he’d cast over himself managed to protect him from death, though just barely. He turned on his side and coughed, spitting a bit of blood up on a couple soldiers’ boots. “Is...is that all ya got, daddy’s boy?” He grinned, revealing two rows of fangs that were now broken on top of being mismatched.

With a cry of fury, Mars rocketed towards him, the sheer force he pushed off with causing a sonic boom to echo into the distance. And still, Discord waited, biding his time, waiting until the absolute last second, when Mars’s fist made first contact with the tuft of fur on his chest. Then, the Draconequus sent a tiny, nearly subliminal pulse through the ground. In an instant, a green circle appeared around every being in the void, sending them crashing right through into an entirely different world, Mars following through with his final blow, still screaming in rage.

Somewhere in the distance, a massive boom rumbled. Luna turned away from Swarm’s unconscious body and watched, her eyes widening in terror, as a massive plume of smoke blasted into existence somewhere far away. “Sister, what do you suppose that is!? Some new sort of attack from the enemy?”

Celestia looked away, tears streaming down her cheeks. Luna kept gaping at the explosion, which by now had taken on a strange green hue. “Say,” she wondered out loud. “You don’t think that green color could be…”

Suddenly, the man lying on the ground between them bolted upright. “That traitorous bastard!” He bellowed, scanning his surroundings. Eventually, his eyes fell on the princesses. “Oh great,” he added, pushing himself to his feet and stretching. “He got you as well, hmm?”

“Actually, Swarm, we’re not entirely sure Discord betrayed us,” Luna added.

“Whatever do you mean, Princess? Why else would he attack us?”

“Well, uh…” the Princess of Night looked uneasily at her sister, who by now had buried her muzzle in the ground. “Celestia believes he was actually…saving you. Taking your place as the bait in our trap.”

Swarm cocked an eyebrow. “Why in the metaverse would he do that?”

“Perhaps we have misjudged him. Perhaps we have been too quick to declare him a villain.”

“Free us.” Celestia mumbled.

“Too quick to…” he trailed off as Celestia’s voice built up to a harsh whisper behind him. “He’s the Lord of Chaos, Luna! He has earned that title through years of spreading disharmony and mayhem throughout reality!”

“But perhaps that is just his way: a harmless prank here and there…”

“Free us.”

“A harmless…” he slapped the palm of his hand against his forehead. “Do you even remember his reign? Or the terrors he spread when your sister freed him to test the Elements of Harmony? He almost corrupted them! He was perhaps a few days away from permanently warping them into beings of hate and despair, completely lacking the memory of the friendship they once shared!”

“But he DID accomplish what Celestia asked of him! I mean,” she shrugged sheepishly. “We discovered each Element’s weakness: Discord found and exposed what each was vulnerable too.”

“Free us.”

“No Princess, I just can’t buy it,” Swarm shook his head and crossed his arms stubbornly. “He went much too far with his little ‘test’ for us to still call it as such. That incident was a deliberate attack meant to test his strength against ours, perhaps for a future breakout!”

“Well, if that was truly meant to…”

“Will you quit debating and get around to LIBERATING US ALREADY!?” Celestia screeched, her voice booming over the valleys. The other beings with her stared at her in shock as she continued: “In case you’ve both forgotten, there is a war going on!”

“Oh, I’m sorry sister; there was just so much to get Swarm caught up on!” Luna gasped.

“I beg your pardon, Princess,” Swarm bowed apologetically before setting to work on her bonds. “I allowed myself to get distracted by current developments. I wish…”

“Shut up and get me out of this,” she said coldly.

Swarm paused in absolute shock, but continued work on her bindings. “Again, I’m so sorry, sister!” Luna added. “I didn’t even get around to pointing out the explosion!”

“The what!?” Swarm wheeled around and faced the mushroom cloud dissipating in the distance, eyes widening at the sight of the green glow at its heart. “Dearest God, he actually…”

“SWARM I SWEAR TO JESUS FUCKING CHRIST IF YOU DON’T GET ME OUT OF THIS SHIT RIGHT FUCKING NOW I’LL RAM MY HORN SO FAR UP YOUR ASS IT’LL CHANGE YOUR SNOT TO PIXIE DUST!” Celestia screeched.

This time, Swarm obeyed without another word. Luna didn’t bother apologizing this time. She took one look at the fury in her sister’s eyes and realized that now was the time to keep her mouth shut. The three remained silent as Swarm worked with the tangle of VCR cables and Christmas lights around the Princess of Day’s body when he realized something. “Huh,” he mumbled.

“What?” Celestia asked flatly.

“Well, I’m just not sure why you two had any trouble escaping these bonds,” he replied. “They just seem to be an ordinary, if highly entangled, collection of assorted household products. There is some magical hue to them, but it appears to be fading.”

“Discord’s hold on them must be failing!” Luna realized out loud. “Celestia, I think we can…”

Before her sister could even finish her sentence, Celestia burst free and blasted into the air with a flap of her wings. The Princess rocketed off into the sky, a white blur shooting in the direction of the green hue now fading away somewhere in the distance.

“Goddammit, wait!” Swarm screamed, leaping into the sky with Luna at his heels. “Where is she going!?”

“To help Discord: he might need us!” Luna yelled as they raced to catch up with the white blur.

“Well, that must be a sentence I’m sure you thought you would never say!” He grinned at her.

“Today is just full of surprises, isn’t it!?”