Of course, it is likely enough, my friends, likely enough that we are going to our doom: the last march of the Ents. But if we stayed home and did nothing, doom would find us anyway, sooner or later. That thought has long been growing in our hearts; and that is why we are marching now. It was not a hasty resolve. Now at least the last march of the Ents may be worth a song.
Treebeard, The Lord Of the Rings: The Two Towers.

When Discord appeared in the throne room with his usual ostentatious flash of light, his eyes were immediately drawn to Galatea. She was standing a little behind Celestia and Luna, as though not wishing to draw attention to herself.

“Oh, hello,” he said, eyes widening as he looked at her. “I was wondering what I could smell. There was something a little different about the castle today.”

Galatea merely narrowed her eyes at Discord, an expression of cold disinterest on her face.

“Greetings, Discord,” Celestia said. “We require your help with a delicate matter.”

“‘We’?” Discord asked, looking between Celestia, Luna and Galatea with a slow smile. “Whatever for?”

“Breaching the barriers of this world and reaching another,” Galatea said curtly. “You will provide the raw energy. I will grant direction.”

“Ooh, how fun,” Discord said. “I’ve toyed with visiting the rest of the multiverse again – did it once on a dare, a long time ago.” He turned on the spot. “I just have just three small questions.” He held up his lion’s paw. “Where?” A digit went up. “Why?” A second digit went up. “And who are you?”

He pointed at Galatea, who’s eyes narrowed still further.

“Will you help us or not?” she asked.

“When I know who I’m doing it for, sure,” Discord retorted. “But I don’t know you, which is pretty surprising since you’re an Alicorn and I’m usually good at knowing when things like you are floating about.”

Galatea gave a cold smile. “Then I am grateful to stymie you, Chaotic Remnant.”

Discord raised an eyebrow. “Chaotic Remnant, indeed? Ooh, you know the old words.”

“Will you help us?” Galatea asked again.

Discord grinned, before disappearing and reappearing right in front of her, floating at eye level whilst lying prone, as though on a bed. He lay his chin on his hands and smiled at her.

“Why should I?” he asked. “What do I get?”

Galatea raised an eyebrow. “It was mine impression that you were bound to aid Celestia in times of need.”

“Help Celestia,” Discord said. “You’re not Celestia.”

“She isn’t,” Celestia put in. “But I am asking you, Discord. Please.”

“I want an answer to my question,” Discord said, not looking at Celestia. “Why? I’m not one of your golden-armoured shinies running around, Celestia, I don’t jump when you ask how high. I want to know what it is you’re selling.”

“Do you think you’re in a place to demand anything from us?” Luna asked, snorting indignantly.

“I’m the one you need help from,” Discord retorted. “So, yes.”

There was a pause, and then Galatea started chuckling. Luna looked at Celestia, who held up a wing to forestall any further comment.

“Do you want to know a secret, Chaos thing?” Galatea asked, still chuckling. “When I saw your age of discontent, all that occurred to me was that, somewhere deep within your subconscious, you wanted to be defeated, didn’t you?”

“Excuse me?” Discord asked.

“You have so much power, and yet are cursed with such a hatred for stagnation,” Galatea continued. “Such is the curse of all Chimerae.”

Discord’s eye twitched. “How do you know that name?”

“You said yourself that I knew the old words,” Galatea said, still smiling. “I know all of them. Even the Old Knowledge, that you yourself have all-but-forgotten.” She let out a soft sigh. “But I also know this of you, Discord. You desperately, desperately seek to be challenged. To test your power against other power. To find greater and greater ways to entertain yourself.”

“So what if I do?” Discord asked.

Galatea leant forward. “Does it rankle you, never truly meeting Celestia one-on-one, head on? Never challenging yourself properly against her for fear of breaking the balance too greatly and ending the challenge? Never being quite so immoral within your chaoticness, so brave and convinced of your rightness, as to do anything that you could not undo with a snap of your claw?”

Discord flashed to behind Celestia.

“I need an adult,” he whimpered, perhaps only half-jokingly.

“I offer you nothing more or less than Celestia,” Galatea said.

Discord’s ears perked up. “What?”

“You did not mishear me,” Galatea said, still smiling. “I offer a Celestia that you can go all out against, Chaos thing. An enemy we must fight, one that you need have no qualms about hurting if that is what it takes to lay her low.”

Discord sniffed, narrowing his eyes as though wondering whether this was a trick, but then he grinned. In a flash, he was in front of Celestia again, his arms folded.

“Tell me more, Ms Mystery Mare,” he said, sounding dangerously excited.

“There is another world that we must reach, one with a corrupted Celestia,” Galatea said, still smiling. “And we must confront her, lend our aid to those fighting her. It will be… dangerous.” She paused. “Will you lend us the power we need to reach that world?”

Discord chuckled. “And in return, I get a go at the ‘evil’ Celestia?”

“Exactly,” Galatea said.

Discord let out a long, evil-sounding cackle.

“You have a deal,” he said.

“We will meet you tomorrow morning, Discord,” Celestia said quietly. “We shall begin then.”

“Whatever you say, Celly,” Discord said, and then he disappeared in another flash of light.

Galatea sighed, her smile disappearing. “That was… tense.”

“You could have been more diplomatic with him,” Luna chastised her. “We did need his help, much as it rankles me to say it.”

“And we have procured it,” Galatea rejoined.

“We nearly did not,” Luna countered. She sighed. “Did you have to be so… unpleasant with him? I do not like him any more than you seem to, but antagonising him was not wise.”

“It worked, did it not?” Galatea said, sounding almost irritable. “Perhaps antagonising him was not the wisest course, but it does not matter, because we have still procured his help.”

Celestia stepped between the two of them, a gentle smile on her face, her wings raised to forestall further conflict.

“Both of you, please,” she said. “Remember we are sisters.”

There was a momentary pause, and then Galatea let out another sigh, looking at Luna. “Mine apologies, sis – Luna. Discord’s reign was a troubling time for me, as well.”

Luna nodded stiffly. “Accepted. Though I still don’t entirely think-”

“Luna,” Celestia said.

Luna scowled and looked away, muttering something under her breath. Celestia didn’t pull her up on it.

“Tomorrow, we will begin our moves against this new enemy,” she said quietly, looking at both of them, “and it is likely that it will be the most dangerous thing we have done in all our years.”

“That much,” Galatea said quietly, her expression resigned, “is true. If you will excuse me.”

She turned and trotted gently out of the throne room, leaving Luna and Celestia alone.

“Seriously,” Luna said after a moment. “I do not like her, Celestia.”

Celestia raised an eyebrow. “I’m so surprised at this shocking revelation. You have caught me completely for a loop. I am totally floored.”

Luna rolled her eyes. “Sarcasm is not helpful.”

“We cannot choose blood, Luna,” Celestia reminded her gently.

“We can choose how we react to it,” Luna retorted. “And I choose to react to this Galatea with distrust: there are a million things she could be doing, a million lies she could be telling. If this Alexander Reiner is from a world where you are somehow corrupted, how do you know she is not the reason?”

Celestia sighed. “I cannot explain with words. I can only tell you that I do believe her. It seems too…” She shook her head. “It seems too great a lie to be a lie.”

“You mean it’s so audacious that it must be true,” Luna said flatly. “This is not a game, Celestia. We could be endangering ourselves.”

“It could be a trap, you mean,” Celestia said.

“Precisely,” Luna hissed. “She could open a portal to who knows where. We could be sending the bulk of our forces to their horrific demise!”

Celestia smiled. “I have no intention of blindly sending an army to their death, sister.” She rapped her hoof lightly on the ground. “Discord?”

In a flash of light, Discord appeared, a smirk on his face.

“A third sister?” he asked. “Sounds like the sort of thing a bad writer would come up with for a soap opera. Heck, I think somepony did that once.”

Celestia rolled her eyes. “You’ve been listening.”

“Yup,” Discord said. “Gotta say, Lulu, your lack of trust in your brand new sister dearest is… well,” he chuckled, “I don’t know if it’s heartening or sad. Maybe both?”

“My point,” Celestia said, before Luna could reply. “My point is that we are not blindly trusting. But we are also not blindly distrusting.”

Luna shook her head. “So we’re trusting him? That feels like burning a forest to cure a spreading rot.”

“Please, Lulu, you know full well I’d never do anything to upset our… arrangement,” Discord said, too innocently.

Luna rolled her eyes, but her expression softened as she looked at Celestia. “I will trust you on this, sister. If you think all of this is… is a good idea…”

Celestia nodded, before smiling. “Cheer up, Luna. Tonight, we drink with our sister, and celebrate the joyous occasion of our reunion.”

“Would the prefix ‘re’ really work?” Discord wondered aloud. “If you’ve never actually met before…”

Celestia levelled a withering glance at him, and he shrugged, before disappearing.

The cells were dark and dreary, and the guards po-faced and armed with spears. Somehow, it both was and was not what he had been expecting from it, but all the same, here he was.

Redheart didn’t look up when he arrived. She was busy throwing a ball against the wall, catching it in her hoof, and throwing it again. It was almost comical.

“I was wondering if you would come to visit,” she said, not looking up.

Alex paused, thinking his words over. He folded his arms. “I didn’t want to… I wanted to see what you were. Now that I know.”

“What I am is what I was,” Redheart retorted, throwing the ball against the wall again.

“I just…” Alex gathered his thoughts. “I don’t get why.”

“Why what?” She did not stop throwing the ball.

He pursed his lips. “You know what.”

“Ah, that.” She sniffed, throwing the ball again. “Do you want to know a secret?” She caught the ball, holding it for a moment, before looking up at him. “Neither do I.”

Alex nodded slowly. “But… you still did it.”

“Before this war I was an Aunt and a sister,” Redheart said, throwing her ball again. “Now? I am neither. But I am still a nurse.” She caught her ball, pausing, and closing her eyes, something that might have been a tear leaking from one eye. She threw her ball again. “My Hippocratic oath still applies.”

There was a pause. The hard impact sound of the ball rebounding from the cell wall seemed to echo between the two of them.

“I don’t get you,” Alex finally said. “Your people spend all their time trying to kill us all, and yet you saved me instead of just letting me slip off. You didn’t have to do anything.”

“You’re right.” Inexplicably, she chuckled. “Strange, isn’t it? So many of our people can’t comprehend human honour, human mercy. But at the same time, you – despite working alongside traitors of our kind – can’t comprehend my mercy.”

“I’ve seen too much of Equestria’s ‘mercy’,” Alex retorted. “Or whatever you call it.”

“Oh, you’ve never seen the glory of Equestria,” Redheart snorted. “They say after we destroy your kind, convert or kill the last of you, we’ll have a magical renaissance.” She paused, a flicker of something unrecognisable in her face. “I hope that’s true. Seeing this place… it’s reminded me of what we were, what we might be again.”

“You won’t win,” Alex hissed, leaning forward, a sudden burst of anger surging through his veins. “We’ll do everything we can to deny you your victory.”

“I know,” Redheart said, smiling almost sadly. “You still hate me, don’t you. Despite what I did.”

“Of course I do,” he replied.

“But,” she continued, “you haven’t done anything to me. Even tried to.”

He scowled. “I’m not in the habit of murdering prisoners or defenceless people. Despite what people think.”

Redheart chuckled. “That isn’t what I’ve heard about you, Colonel Alexander Reiner. Second in command of the Defiance raid, under the… infamous Colonel Robert Gardner. Executed Fergus Farnowitz with a single shot – without trial, wasn’t it? That got you a commendation if I recall.”

“You’ve got the advantage of me, Redheart,” Alex said curtly. “I don’t know anything about you. Your record, your achievements, any of it.” He sniffed. “I guess you’re not all that.”

“But you do know that I saved your life,” Redheart countered, ignoring the obvious bait. “In direct contradiction of the Empire’s established protocol.”

“Yeah,” Alex agreed, “I just don’t know why.”

“It bothers you, doesn’t it,” she said with a chuckle. “If I were just the friendly nurse, or just your ‘evil’ enemy, it would be so simple. But I am the friendly nurse who is your enemy, who saved your life.” She chuckled again, louder this time. “You just don’t know what to think, now, do you?”

“You couldn’t have broken the Geas,” Alex said. “That’s so rare it’s not even funny. I know of one mare who did it, and she’s the exception who proves the rule.”

“I know,” she said. “And yet.”

She rubbed her forehead in obvious discomfort, and there was a moment of silence.

“Strange, you know,” she said quietly, not looking at him. “I should have killed you. That was what was expected of me. It would have been easy. To just… do nothing, let your internal injuries end you slowly and quietly. That would have been merciful, too. I would have spared you the fate you are terrified of, spared you more of the horror, and allowed you to die in a land more peaceful than any your kind or mine has ever known. An even more perfect Equestria.”

“Well, you’ll have a lot of time to think about why you did what you did,” Alex said, scowling at her.

“Maybe,” she retorted. “Or maybe I’ll have less time than you think. You never know.”

He didn’t reply to that. Instead, he turned and walked away. Redheart could only chuckle again.

Neither of them had gotten what they wanted.

Three Alicorn mares sat in a room, a single bottle of wine sitting half-empty in front of them, each of them nursing a beautifully crafted glass. Celestia’s glass was already half-empty (though she would doubtless have said ‘half full’), where Galatea and Luna had barely touched theirs.

“So,” Luna began. “Just what is it that thou ‘watches’?”

Galatea tilted her head. “In what sense?”

“Thou claims to have been passively observing us for millennia,” Luna said, taking a sip of her wine. “What exactly is it that thou observes?”

“Ah,” Galatea said, nodding in comprehension. “Well, let us see. I observed the events leading up to the two of you becoming the diarchs. That was fascinating.” She paused. “I watched other events, shall we say.”

Luna snorted. “My fall. My… corruption. Thou need not be delicate with me, my skin is no so thin.”

“Very well,” Galatea said, nodding again. “Your fall, your corruption, your transformation into the false further-ascended, whatever you’d like to call it. The events surrounding those events. The battle between you two. It was concerning – there was a moment I feared you might overcome Celestia, and then I might have had to intercede.”

“How fortunate for you that you did not,” Luna said coldly.

“Indeed,” Galatea said, apparently without a trace of irony. “It would have ruined millennia of work, and poisoned the neutrality of the observation, if Celestia had known about me.”

“I can see why,” Celestia put in, speaking up for the first time since the dinner had started. She took a sip of her own wine. “After all: if you know you’re being watched, you do all sorts of things differently.”

“Quite,” Galatea said. She paused for a moment, a slight twinkle entering her eyes. “You would not have your century old collection of ‘Playcolt’ for a start, no doubt.”

Celestia snorted some of her wine, her eyes widening in surprise. “What?!”

“You used to send a runner to the printing press,” Galatea said evenly. “Now you have a subscription sent to your personal PO box that nopony’s supposed to know exists.”

“That,” Luna put in, her eyes round as saucers, “is horribly intrusive!”

“It is mine role,” Galatea said evenly, perhaps a bit too quickly. She blushed. “I have to be aware of even your thoughts. Failing the ability to read minds, and since it would be… discourteous to seek out your private journals, your reading material suggests much of your mindset.”

“Indeed,” Celestia said, smiling softly, her momentary shock forgotten. “And how much of our reading material have you seen?”

Galatea took another sip of her wine. “Issue seven hundred and fifty four is a favourite.”

“Ah, seven hundred and fifty four,” Celestia chuckled. “The one with the three page spread and the large -”

“If you both don’t mind,” Luna interjected, “I’m not favourably inclined towards feeling quite this nauseous before drinking at least eight bottles of wine.”

“Then perhaps we should drink eight bottles of wine, if that removes the limits of our discussion,” Galatea put in.

Celestia blinked. “You’re joking.”

“I do not ‘joke’,” Galatea said evenly, though there was an odd twinkle in her eye as she said it. “But if this is to be our first, and possibly last, dinner as sisters, I would say we should enjoy it. My understanding is that drinking facilitates that.”

“Would you look at that,” Luna said scathingly. “She isn’t a complete automaton after all.”

“Would that I were,” Galatea rejoined with a snort, finishing her glass with one smooth motion. “Believe me when I say, it might have made mine millennia of passive observance more tolerable.”

There was a pause.

“How?” Luna asked after a long moment, her eyes boring into Galatea.

“How what?” Galatea asked, not meeting Luna’s gaze.

Luna rolled her eyes. “Don’t play stupid. How did you do it? How did you stand nine millennia of solitude? How did you not go mad?”

Galatea turned her gaze on Luna. “You were alone on the moon for a single millennium. How did you survive that?”

Luna looked away, suddenly blushing. “I… do not wish to discuss it.”

Galatea nodded slowly. “You had it harder than I. I had mine purpose, you had nothing but the corrupting rage.” She took a deep breath. “And mine purpose was sometimes, it must be said, the anchor that kept me from drifting away into lonely insanity.”

To hear her speak so frankly made Luna feel a sudden wave of what might have been shame.

“I’m sorry,” she said quietly. “I did not think about how hard it would be for you.”

“No, you did not,” Galatea agreed, “but I forgive you that. Mine role is unique in all the history of our world.” She smiled. “And now it is over.”

“‘Over’ sounds so final,” Celestia said quietly, sipping her drink.

The morning brought no comfort, even as Alex pulled his shirt over his head, his nose flaring at the smell of some sort of fragrance. His entire wardrobe seemed fresh as the day it had been made.

“I, uh, think they cleaned your clothes overnight,” came Lyra’s voice from the door to his chamber. He looked at her, a smile on his face as she hastily put away her notebook. “Uh, sorry.”

“Making notes about how I wear this stuff?” he asked. At her widening eyes, he chuckled again. “You did that the first few days of our working together on my world too.” His smile faded. “She did.”

“It’s hard for you, isn’t it?” Lyra asked quietly, her expression softening into a sympathetic smile. “Being here, among ponies you know, and don’t.”

“You don’t even know the half of it,” Alex told her, shaking his head. He met Lyra’s eyes. “It’s going to be strange for everyone, seeing you again. Everyone and everypony.”

“I can’t begin to imagine,” Lyra said quietly. She sighed. “But I don’t…”

She trailed off awkwardly. Alex looked at her, a frown on his face.

“Don’t what?”

She swallowed. “I have to admit, I don’t know what I can do. I’m no Guard. I’ve never fought anyone before, except Redheart. And, well…” She chuckled awkwardly, but that died in her throat at Alex’s expression. “I just don’t know what good I can do.”

“Maybe it isn’t your job to do anything,” Alex suggested. “I mean, you’ve been a great help while I’ve been here. That’s more than enough in my book. Maybe you should just let Celestia and Luna – and Galatea, whoever she is – handle things.”

She shook her head. “No. No, that doesn’t feel right to me. It wouldn’t feel right if I do nothing while your world is under attack.”

“Then what are you going to do?” Alex asked, folding his arms.

“I… don’t know,” Lyra said after a moment, but she smiled. “But I think starting where I left off might help.”

It took Alex a moment to understand what she meant, and when he did, he nodded approvingly.

“If this all works out, I can have your – have her journals sent to you,” he said. “How long will it take you to go through them?”

“Depends on what she had to say,” Lyra said quietly.

Seeing Discord was a bit of a surprise for Alex, when he walked into th

“So,” Discord said, cracking his knuckles and throwing Galatea a sideways glance. “Figure this should work. It’s got enough energy in it to make an entire ocean of chocolate milk – for which, incidentally, you’re welcome,” he added with a pointed glance at Celestia. “And should, if Little Miss Secret Sister here’s any good at whatever she was doing, lead not far from where Colonel Reindeer -”

“Does he always come up with nicknames?” Reiner asked, raising an eyebrow.

Discord clicked his tongue. “Only for people I think need a stick or two taking out from unpleasant places, Colonel Rainman.” He sniffed, looking at Galatea. “So: whenever you’re ready, eh?”

Galatea sighed. “Firstly; Celestia, have you decided who is to go?”

Celestia nodded. “Colonel Reiner, I will be sending my sisters and Discord to represent us to your people. Luna is a skilled diplomat, and Galatea and Discord will be needed to open the way back.”

“That… makes sense,” Alex said, nodding slowly. “Princess Luna is well-regarded. Though there’s the question of whether my people will believe it’s really her.”

“Is there some password I might have to ease their fears?” Luna asked.

Alex looked thoughtful for a moment, and then beckoned her close. He whispered in her ear, too quietly for anyone else present to hear (although Discord cackled loudly). She scrunched her face in distaste, and then stepped back.

“I… can’t say I like the idea of saying that,” she said after a moment. “But if it’s the best password -”

“They will know your trustworthiness by it,” Alex said, giving her a small smile.

Luna sighed. “Very well, then.”

“Personally,” Discord said, snorting, “I am loving the dies of hearing you say that in a diplomatic meeting. So incongruous! So unlike you! So… chaotic!”

“Shut up, Discord,” Celestia said with a twinkle in her eye. “The time has come.”

“Ooh, so portentous,” Discord said, snapping his fingers.

There was a soft glow that seemed to emanate from nowhere at all, and then Galatea’s horn glowed. She closed her eyes, concentrating, and the glow solidified, becoming a silvery circle in the air. The circle seemed to grow, until finally it became large enough to encompass an Alicorn. It didn’t quite look like the one Alex had seen in his memories.

“Why does it look different?” he asked.

“To the one that sent you here?” Galatea asked, her horn’s glow fading away. She looked tired. “Different means of creation. The raw energy then was supplied by me. Now it comes from Discord.”

Discord gave an idle salute. “Happy to help.”

Alex nodded. “When you get there… just…” He sighed. “Tell them I’m okay. Cheerilee, Stephan, hell, even Durant.” He paused. “And good luck, Princess.”

“Thank you,” Luna said, sighing. She looked at Discord and Galatea. “Are we doing this, then?”

“Absolutely,” Discord said, winking.

And with that, he walked through with a jaunty swagger. Galatea rolled her eyes, before following. Luna gave Celestia a look, and the two of them exchanged a final smile. And then Luna, too, walked through the portal.

Alex let out a whistle. “Well. Now we wait.”

Luna blinked, the light from the portal having been so bright that she almost felt blinded. The light faded from her eyes, leaving a faint purple afterglow, and she blinked a few more times, trying to dispel the effect. After a moment, her vision cleared…

… and she found herself facing a giant, bipedal metallic figure.

“Alright,” it said, bringing one of its arms up and aiming it at her - was that a weapon? “How about you tell me who the fuck you are and why the fuck you’re here, madame?”

As with The Story of Sharon, this was me tapping away as a way of getting some mental exercise. It was nearly finished (sort of) anyway, so it might as well be one-hundred percent finished.

Again, this doesn’t herald a return proper to FimFic. But I hope you enjoy it in the meantime.

Cheers,
Jed.