A flash of purple light illuminates the greenery covered roof of Fluttershy's cottage, the faint pop of displaced air further heralding Twilight's arrival. Surveying her surroundings, Twilight frowns, disappearing a moment later in another teleportation attempt – this time reappearing atop the final fence post of the path leading up to Fluttershy's home. Groaning, she hops to the ground, crossing the final few feet to Fluttershy's front door and knocking three times, "Fluttershy! Are you there?"

A few seconds later, the door opens to reveal Discord attired in a formal black jacket over a white collared shirt, a matching pair of pants, and a brown tie speckled with pink polka dots, "What business might you have here, hm?"

"Not now, Discord. I'm here to see Fluttershy," Twilight replies tersely, pushing her way past him into the inky blackness of the cottage.

Discord grabs her tail with his own, his expression remaining unchanged as he unceremoniously yanks her backwards, "Unfortunately, my lady is currently asleep. I strongly suggest you come back at a later time."

"Discord-!" Twilight shouts, though her anger is distracted by four dim, white balls of light appearing near the cottage's floor.

"Discord, let her in, please," Fluttershy's voice requests from within.

Discord spares Twilight a sour glance, then looks back into the house, "Please forgive me, my lady, but are you sure you wish to grant this one an audience? She would appear to my eyes to be quite an impudent scoundrel of an alicorn. It might be best for you not to associate with such a disreputable character, especially at this late hour."

Twilight glares at him, "Hey, I'm right here."

"Discord," Fluttershy replies, her words laden with disappointment, "you know that isn't very nice."

Discord's butler outfit vanishes and he leans backwards, turning on the room's lights with a snap of his claws as he slithers through the air away from the door, "Very well, my lady, if you insist… "

A golden-eyed changeling with a similarly colored mane meets Twilight's eyes, a pair of golden bands stretching across her barrel to connect either side of her gold-topped shell. A pure white glow-in-the-dark bunny slipper adorns each of her hooves, providing a stark contrast to the black chitin of her legs while a teddy bear rests draped across her back on top of her wings, "Sorry about that, Twilight, come on in."

Twilight steps inside, Discord immediately appearing beside her, "And welcome, to the royal residence of her royal highness, Princess Fluttershy!"

Fluttershy blushes and yawns, covering her mouth with a hoof, though a couple flat molars in the back of her mouth remain visible through one of the holes dotting her leg.

Twilight sighs, rolling her eyes, "I know who Fluttershy is, Discord."

"I know you do," Discord replies, grinning, "but it does have a nice ring to it, doesn't it? Princess Fluttershy."

Twilight gives him a flat look, "And let me guess, you knew she was a changeling all along."

Discord chuckles, "Oh no, I didn't have the slightest idea; even if I had suspected something was amiss, I would never have guessed that my friend Fluttershy was a princess of an undiscovered race of shape shifting bugponies. I definitely would've tried to use that against her while you were all busy 'reforming' me. Why, I don't think I've been so surprised about something since Celly and Luna decided to intentionally free me from my stony prison. Or at least since the vamponies were discovered." He sighs, "So many surprises, so little time, am I right?"

Twilight wrinkles her nose, a weak yet malodorous scent wafting over from the draconequus next to her, "Right, sure… what's that smell?"

"I was wondering if you'd notice!" Discord exclaims, coiling around Twilight's barrel, "Do you find it… alluring?"

Twilight teleports out of his grip, reappearing beside Fluttershy, "No, I find it confusing. Why do you smell like stale orange juice?"

Giving his lion paw a wave, Discord summons an inflatable pool filled to the brim with orange juice, falling into it while neither creating a splash nor displacing any of the juice, "Well, you see, I was getting bored one day, and decided that a little bit of chaos was just what the doctor ordered. So, I transformed all the water in the North Luna Ocean around Vanhoover into orange juice, and-"

"You what?!" Twilight demands.

Discord groans, "Now now, before you go getting your tail in a twist, I'll have you know that I did get Celly's approval prior to doing this. Anyway, as I was saying," he pulls a fish-shaped orange from the pool, the fruit struggling weakly in his claws, "I then decided to host a fishing contest – whoever caught the biggest orangefish would be the winner, and would get three wishes granted by yours truly!"

Discord pulls an oil lamp from the pool's depths, a stream of orange juice shooting from its elongated nozzle as he rubs its side, "And I must say, I was quite impressed by the winners. They somehow caught a whalorange! I hadn't even realized I'd created any of those, and I'm still not quite sure how they managed to catch it with that dinky boat of theirs either."

"You transformed Vanhoover's port into an orange juice sea for a couple days," Twilight states monotonously, staring off into space.

Discord shrugs, "That is what I said, yes, though calling it a 'sea' may be a bit overly dramatic. But I did also freeze it off from the rest of the ocean first, and I even changed everything back afterwards too, so really there's nothing for you to worry about."

Twilight slowly blinks a few times, raising her hooves to rub her temples, "So… you got Princess Celestia's-"

"Celly's," Discord corrects.

Twilight's entire body freezes, her hooves resuming their massaging motions several seconds later, "You got Princess Celestia's permission first, isolated the port so you wouldn't acidify the rest of the ocean, and then you turned everything back to normal when you were done?"

Discord raises an eyebrow, the tuft of hair continuing to rise above his head until it phases through the ceiling, "You sound surprised."

"First," Twilight states, her eyes narrowing, "that sounds suspiciously like you coming up with an actual plan. And second-"

"Now hold on there just a moment," Discord interrupts. "I've come up with plans before. Remember when I separated you and your friends in that maze, and forced you all to act the opposite of your true selves so you wouldn't be able to use the Elements? Or when I planted those plunderseeds in order to capture Celly and Luna? I am the God of Chaos you know, not the God of Anarchy."

Twilight frowns, her eyes narrowing further.

Discord brings a tea cup into existence resting on the side of the pool with a snap of his claws, filling it to the brim with apple juice from his oil lamp and taking a sip before speaking, "Oh, my apologies, did you not like those examples?"

"Anyways," Twilight says after another long pause, "secondly, why in Equestria would Princess Celestia approve of you doing something like that?"

Discord removes his errant eyebrow from his cup, returning it to its rightful place on his face, "Because the world has become frustratingly boring during all those years my body was turned to stone, and somebody needs to help true harmony flourish, because goodness knows nopony in Equestria is going to do a decent job of it."

"Nopony in Equestria-" Twilight sputters, "My friends and I are bearers for the Elements of Harmony; we've done nothing but promote harmony, unlike you."

Discord chuckles, "My dear Twilight, I thought you were so much smarter than this. Petrifying me indefinitely for what ended up being millenia and imprisoning Luna in her own moon for a thousand years – do those sound like particularly 'harmonious' actions to you? Because they sure don't to me."

"My friends and I also used them to save Princess Luna," Twilight counters.

"Yes, the second time around," Discord replies, waving a claw dismissively. "And from what I hear, you did it by forcibly purging her of nearly all her magic. A few more fractions of a percent, and she would have been left a magic-less, cutie mark-less pegacorn for the rest of her very-few-by-comparison days."

Twilight stares at him, her mouth hanging open, "W-What? That's not-"

Discord sighs, "Must I really spell it out for you? Your Elements don't promote harmony, they enforce order, which is a very different thing despite everypony's propensity for confusing the two. You alicorns are lesser manifestations of that same concept. Your power, authority, and very magic bring order to the world around you as naturally as plants grow in the sunlight." He takes another sip of apple juice, "Temporary bouts of insanity or neuroticism aside, of course."

Twilight continues staring at him, gears turning in her head until eventually her eyes narrow, "I don't believe you."

Discord shrugs, "Then ask Sunbutt or Moonbutt about what happened the last time they tried to push too much order onto the world. Heartbutt might know as well, I suppose."

Twilight glares at him.

Discord smiles innocently, "Problem, Sparklebutt?"

Fluttershy clears her throat, "Discord, please give Twilight and I some time alone."

Discord glances between them, then bows without moving from his pool, "As you wish, my lady. But when you should wish for my return, you need only say my name backwards three times in front of an upside-down mirror."

Twilight continues to stare at the empty space previously occupied by Discord and his pool, a slight crease forming between her eyebrows.

Fluttershy raises a hoof, hesitating for a moment before tapping her friend on the shoulder, "Twilight? Are you okay?"

Twilight closes her eyes, taking a slow, deep breath before reopening them and turning to the changeling next to her, "Yes. Yes, I'm fine. Sorry about getting distracted by Discord; I meant to come here to see if you were alright, not to argue with a living, breathing incarnation of chaos."

She sighs, skimming her eyes over Fluttershy's body, "You are alright, right? Cheerilee and Big Mac said there were some Royal Guards who came to their house and harassed them, and might've even attacked them, although I'm really hoping that it turns out there was some sort of miscommunication about the attacking part. Not that harassing is fine either! Just, you know, outright attacking would be a lot more problematic."

"A couple of guards did show up, actually," Fluttershy says, "but Discord teleported them to his realm, so I was fine."

Twilight's jaw drops, "He did WHAT?!"

"He didn't keep them there very long," Fluttershy adds quickly. "Just for a few minutes, and then they ran away as soon as he brought them back."

"Oh," Twilight replies, taking several more calming breaths. "Okay. That's good. Well, better, at least. Having anypony stuck in Discord's dimensional pocket would just make everything so soooo much worse. The mailpony at least seems to be finally, sort of, getting the hang of it, but I can't tell you how often Princess Celestia, or Luna, or I have had to go rescue him after he's been missing for a couple days. The guards would never have been able to find their way out on their own."

Fluttershy giggles, "As long as Discord is around, I think I'm more worried for anypony who tries to do something than about anything bad happening to me."

"Yeah, I think I am too," Twilight agrees, smiling weakly. "Still, I don't understand why any of this is happening. Lieutenant Double Time is a good pony – he was even one of the ponies Shining Armor was considering as his replacement." She lets out another sigh, "But anyways, I'm guessing you've been staying here in your cottage since the announcement then?"

Fluttershy nods, "Mhm. Not because of any of the guards though. I just wanted to… you know… not be constantly stared at by everypony around me."

Twilight sits, glancing around at the rest of the room as various small animals begin poking their heads out from their hiding places, "And, I guess, are you hungry at all? Since you've stayed away from other ponies for close to 48 hours now, I mean. Unless you can feed on your animals' emotions?" She shivers, "Or Discord's?"

Fluttershy shakes her head, "After standing in front of all of Ponyville like that, I should be fine for a few more days, even if the emotions didn't taste very good. Eating any of the Discord's ambient emotions makes my head feel a little fuzzy though, so I've never dared to try feeding on him directly. He would probably have detected me doing that too. As for the animals I take care of, I can, but it takes more effort and doesn't really provide much energy."

Twilight's head tilts ever so slightly to the right, her gaze flitting from point to point over Fluttershy's horn while her mind's eye paints an entirely different picture, "Hm… "

Fluttershy smiles, the familiar tingle of Twilight's curiosity washing over her, "My mother explained it to me a couple times, and based on what she said, it's because even though squirrels and bears and all my animal friends can be fairly intelligent, they just don't have the same level of sapience that we do. Other truly sapient races, like griffons and minotaurs, are okay, but other ponies are a lot better and easier to feed from by a long shot. It has a lot to do with Theory of Mind, mental magic, and those sorts of things, which I'm not sure how I would explain since you can't sense the same things we can. You could always ask her when we go to Canterlot, I suppose, though I don't know how much she'd be willing to tell you."

Twilight's smile fades, the curve of her mouth flattening to form a straight line, "I see."

Fluttershy's ears droop, her friend's curiosity dampened by a wave of chalky, bland apprehension, "She really is a nice pony, and you don't have to worry about her doing anything bad."

Twilight blinks, "Fluttershy, I don't mean – I mean, I didn't say-" She pauses, inhaling deeply, "I'm sure she is, Fluttershy, and I don't mean for it to feel like I don't trust you, but I still can't help worrying. Whether about this, or just in general about how she's going to respond to whatever proposal we come up with to try to officially establish peace and integrate changelings with the rest of Equestria."

"Well, if it helps, I don't think she'll be too keen on integration," Fluttershy offers. "She'll definitely want peace though, and we are already kind of at peace, aren't we?"

Twilight chuckles, "If only it were that simple, but yes, I suppose that's true. Why wouldn't she want to integrate her hive with Equestria though? It has to happen at least to some extent, given the situation."

Fluttershy yawns, "I'm just pretty sure she won't agree to something that says all changelings outside the hive have to reveal themselves, or anything like that."

Twilight taps her chin, "Hmm, I guess I can understand that. But, that's a problem for another day. Or night. Either way, before we head off to Canterlot in a couple days to get started on all that, would it be alright if I asked the rest of the girls about coming over? It's been a while since we spent some time just having fun together, since, well… "

"Vamponies, changelings, and thestrals, oh my?" Fluttershy suggests.

Twilight exhales sharply, grinning, "Something like that. I'm sure Rarity is dying to get some good measurements of your changeling form for the dress you said she could make for you, and Pinkie probably has at least five different potential parties planned out by now."

Fluttershy giggles, "That sounds wonderful."

Twilight bobs her head, "Great. In that case, I'll-"

Fluttershy stifles another yawn.

"-I'll let you get back to sleep," Twilight finishes, glancing at a cuckoo clock hanging on the wall to her left. "I've gotten used to staying up the whole night, since that's what I've ended up doing ever since Luna and the vamponies showed up, but you were actually asleep when I got here."

Fluttershy nods, giving Twilight a tired smile, "Good night, Twilight."

Twilight stands, turning towards the cottage's front door, "Good night, Fluttershy."