STAND NAME: CHAOS LIVES IN EVERYTHING

STAND USER: THE PATIENT

Stand for Equestria: Origin of Harmony

Ze1a7in's Comment

"When faced with overwhelming odds, the last thing you want to do is jump into the jaws of Tartarus and hope everything goes perfectly." Your father was quite a zen man, even if his advice rarely applied to some stallion in the weather team such as yourself. But here and now, it well and truly matters more than anything else. You are, after all, faced with a Stand and it's user that pries and prods at every dark corner of your mind like a brain surgeon if he took a class in psychology. And no, you aren't sure that analogy works here, but you had to think of something.

In any case, your father was right: you need to start off slow and take this man down. And from what you recall from the bruises you had taken whenever New Divide had been hit (at one point by yourself), these abilities are tied to your physical form, if not your very life-force. So, that's an avenue to take. But what if you can't just incapacitate him?

...You're not sure you have the time to fully make peace with the alternative. But if he dies, he dies. Better than you or Canny falling. Speaking of which,

BrownDog's Comment, First Half

Playing it cautiously, you wait for him to make the first move. After finishing his manic pose, he suddenly lunges forth with a cackle, his teeth bared and, to your dismay, stained with red as he smiles wildly. The very second he closes the gap, you can hear the voices once again.

"Pitiful. Keep crying to daddy for all your advice."

"What's even the point? You're a Celestia-damned realist, reality is, Chaos Reigns. Lay down and die, you pathetic whelp!"

While your distracted, he suddenly lights you up with a Stand barrage, as you've taken to call it. The forehooves of Chaos Lives in Everything fly faster than you can blink, and you are overwhelmed with both pain and kinetic energy as he takes full advantage of your predicament. He has no battle cry, only what sounds like broken laughing chuckling through damaged vocal cords. With one final punch and a scream of "DIE!" you are sent flying, your body so fast and so full of momentum that you crash through a tree. Luckily, you don't sustain too serious injuries, but you are covered in bruises and welts, you can feel blood emerging from cuts, and judging by how you landed basically kidney first, you might pass blood a different way in an hour or two.

Undeterred, you fly upward, watching as Canny begins to back away from the madness. You take the time to lunge down, moving towards her and folding the space behind her. You push her back with a command of "Keep back! He's dangerous!" before unfolding the space, leaving her at least far enough to run should this Stallion get too close. You then proceed to fold the space above one of the cotton candy clouds, pushing it down and around him, covering him in chocolate milk and leaving him surrounded.

You fly down on shaky knees and suck a breath in, only to stare in horror as the clouds suddenly turn green and appear to dissipate. You can physically see his Stand suck in and inhale the clouds through the stitches, absorbing the now sickly looking mark of Discord before the Patient stumbles out to keep fighting you. You get some bottle rockets out of your saddle bag and light them up, sending them towards him and his Stand. Chaos Lives in Everything seems slower to react to projectiles, moving towards each one steadily, but it more than makes up for it in knocking the offending explosives out of the sky with powerful punches.

Moving swiftly, you buck a door right at him, which suddenly begins yodeling as it flies towards the Patient. He punches it and splinters the singing door, distracting him long enough for you to get behind him. Thinking quickly, you notice what appears a stampede of buffalo. Ballet dancing buffalo.

You're not even sure you should be surprised.

Instead, you use New Divide to fold them close, pushing them forward with a quick un-creasing of the terrain just as the Patient turns back around. He is quickly overwhelmed by the large creatures dancing around him, and you dart close before unleashing a barrage of your own punches. Finally, you hear your own battle cry, chopped up from a word you feel fits best as New Divide screams "VENDAVENDAVENDAVENDAVENDAVENDAVENDAVENDA!" With one final, hard punch, you yourself scream out the full word of "VENDETTA!" before uppercutting The Patient out of the stampede and onto the ground with a thud.

Perspective Shift: Canny Clockwork

Mere feet away from this carnage, you stand there gobsmacked. This new friend of yours must be something else to be so flagrant in whatever's going on. Said friend, Shooting Star, and this enemy of yours are just standing there, barely moving, yet cuts and bruises are showing up all over each. It's just like the furniture back in Canterlot. With widened eyes, you step back and ask aloud "W-Wha? What's goin' on?" You watch carefully for any sign of an explanation, but find none. "T-They're hittin' eachother without hittin' eachother! This whole day's been weird, but this takes the cake and blows out the candle!"

Perspective Shift: Shooting Star

Finally, you cannot resist and push back the feelings anymore. His Stand even being this close, let alone striking you, is beginning to amplify the already loud and painful voices shouting and screaming at you.

"VENDETTA? YOU ANGRY SOUL! WHAT'S GONNA HAPPEN IF CANNY, OR PINKIE PIE, OR ANYONE ELSE MAKES YOU ANGRY, HUH?!"

"You already lost it with Luna. You really don't deserve this, you flat, uninspired shell of a Pegasus."

It's too much, and you quickly push The Patient back just so you can breathe. He seems to know this well, and laughs at your misfortune before bragging "Don't you see?! This is the only way to make you realize how weak and gutless you really are! This is Chaos Lives in Everything's power! HAHAHA!"

wizard0209's Comment

His monologue and your inner conflict, however, spurs you on. It lights a fire that builds up until it burns in your veins, and as you stand up and stop him dead in the tracks of what must obviously be quite the inspired speech on his behalf, you hear the voices suddenly begin to sound encouraging, if only compared to what once was.

"GET ANGRY!"

"PUMMEL HIM!"

"KILL HIM!"

It's as if his Stand began amplifying the trait of yours you had the most qualms about: your anger. You roar before charging forward, and unleashing yet another powerful barrage of punches. "VENDAVENDAVENDAVENDA!" New Divide screams as you begin to hear things snapping and breaking inside of his body. With a cry of "VENDETTA!", you punch him straight through the air, where he lands hard against the wall of Lyra Heartstrings' home, cracking it. He falls towards the ground and lands on it.

You walk forward near-stoically, just watching he spits up blood from his internal injuries and tries to stand up on ever more shaky legs.

BrownDog's Comment, Second Half

You get near him with a cocky swagger in your step even as your gaze shows nothing more than burning hatred. Like a Dark Will forcing you forward, you uncaringly draw New Divide out to continue the beatdown, only for Chaos Lives in Everything to suddenly grab you with the straps of it's straightjacket! It pulls you in close as The Patient walks forward, caressing your cheek with his right forehoof as the voices grow and he begins speaking. "There is beauty in the Chaos," he recants, and somehow, you hear yourself saying the words along with him. "There is fairness. There is peace."

You are only vaguely aware of a feminine, accented voice yelling out "SHOOTING STAR!" in concern. But you pay it no mind. If you suffer and someone else doesn't, that's the day you want to remember. Assuming you survive this, in any case.

The Patient cackles right in your face, you can smell iron in his breath just before he continues his sermon. "Just let go...let Chaos reign. LET-!" And then all of a sudden he lets out a yell of pain as he steps back and blood splashes against the straps holding you close. New Divide cuts the strap and lets you step back to see what happened: there's a gear buried inside his left foreleg. "Ah-AHHHHH!" he yells out in pain.

"YEAH! How'd you like the taste of that, you tosser?!" you hear from behind you, and you turn back to see Canny, her hat opened up and the lid flipped open as it floats by her in a green-glowing telekinetic grasp. It's actually held much like a cannon, which she confirms when she continues firing gear after gear at The Patient. "Come on, psycho! Don't be scared, it just hurts a lot!" she continues to trash talk, even as The Patient dodges or blocks each gear.

You step backwards near her, and ask, utterly flabbergasted "You made a hat that launches gears?" She nods, not taking her determined facial expression off for a second. "...Why?" you continue.

"For protection, duh," she states in return, like it's the most obvious thing in the world. As far as you know, it might be.

eskimobill1919 and Arcticstorm's Comments

Still, you can waste this chance. While he's good and distracted, you push forward, New Divide right by your side as you approach. He realizes where you are a femtosecond before you act, using New Divide to suddenly fold up Chaos Lives in Everything. Trapping his Stand in folded space, your mind finally feels at ease. He growls and begins shaking, possibly trying to pull it out, but you use New Divide to crush the space. You immediately see the effects crushing a Stand has on it's user, as you can physically see ribs breaking as blood begins flowing from the top of his skull.

You decide to use another opportunity, grabbing your new knife from the saddlebag. You lunge with it in your mouth, and in his vulnerable state, you strike true. You stab the knife right into his body as he turns to weakly dodge the blow, stabbing and slashing across his side. He yells and kicks you in the face before Chaos Lives in Everything suddenly tears itself out of folded space. The knife is still impaled inside of The Patient.

BrownDog, Ze1a7in, Cloverleaf, and Sunny Milk: The Arrow

Suddenly, the three of you hear clapping, and you look up to see where it's coming from. To your dismay, and to both Canny's shock (judging by a gasp she lets out) and The Patient's joy (judging by a squee of fondness), it's Discord himself, clapping with a foam finger over his lion's paw. He's dressed in a jersey with a painted face and a red afro wig. "Bravo, bravo!" he says. "What a performance. Shooting, I'm definitely going to have to add you to my Fantasy Hoofball team! And you, I don't quite recall your name, but Patient 219, you did swimmingly!"

"Thank you!" said Patient says, you rolling your eyes at the banter and antics.

Canny is less amused than even you are. Narrowing her eyes, she bluntly asks "Alright, whoopee, you're watchin'. Cool. Piss off, Discord!"

Discord quickly reverts back to his base appearance and looks right at Canny. He smirks and smiles in an odd way, and you get a very bad feeling in your gut and in your heart. "And you. Boring horse. You did alright. But you're not on the level. If you'll allow me to fix that-" he says, reaching behind himself. And he pulls out, to your horror, The Arrow. This being Discord, he then proceeds to brag about it. "What's that, Shooting Star? You're wondering how I got this? I'm me! I stole the Elements of Harmony! A simple little arrow less well-guarded than the artifacts representing Truth, Justice, and the Equestrian Way is no big deal to me! This time, I'm going to keep it. Or, I would...but..,"

He pulls out a bow and you know exactly what he's about to do. You shout "CANNY, RUN!" but you can hear the string of the bow snap. Still, she does turn in your direction and start to trot, but it's too late. You watch, helplessly, as the arrow impales her in the side, her eyes widening as she gasps out on pain. She collapses to the ground, still sucking in weak breaths.

Down With Chrysalis' Comment

You hear the Patient laughing psychotically at Canny's pain, and even though you don't know if she'll make it or not, the rage builds up as you stand up from the earlier push and scowl at him. "SEE?! That's what happens when you underestimate and fail to understand Discord's true brilliance! His chaos shall bring about a new world of utopia for us all! Why can't you just see that and submit to CHAOS!"

It doesn't help your mood at all that he's the kind of villain who monologues. A lot. He lunges forward, but you manage to dodge a heavy punch from Chaos Lives in Everything. A quick glance reveals that Discord has vanished and the arrow has been pulled out of Canny, who is still breathing, albeit shakily, on the ground. You turn back and finally yell "Okay, just why are you so crazy about Discord anyway?!"

He finally pauses of his own volition, the pain from all his external and internal wounds not phasing him at all, though your own wounds don't seem to be keeping him down. With an angry scowl, he growls out "Why...why, you ask?! You dare and deign to question my faith in Lord Discord? He has given me purpose, true purpose. I was just like the rest of Celestia's hidden failures, and I had lost hope under her regime of restoring my dreams!"

Celestia's Hidden Failures? Wha...?

"But then, he was freed from the Stone Prison! He gave me the power to make my dreams a reality. I'll show her, I'll show all of Equestria, new and ancient, that Chaos is the true superior magic once and for all!" He poses again, this time not at all in victory, but lurching and hunching over as though punched in the gut as he just keeps laughing.

You, confused, still seem to be getting through to him somewhat. So, you let your curiosity take you, and you ask "So...your dream is to spread Chaos just like Discord?"

"NO, YOU FOOL!" he suddenly screams out, wrapping you up in Chaos Lives in Everything's straightjacket straps and pulling you close once more. "My dream is far more pure then simply spreading chaos! My dream is to prove that Harmony is nothing but a mindless, predictable and pathetic magic that has stunted our civilization for far to long! Chaos is the true beauty of magic, and with it the world shall enter a new era of UTTER BEAUTY!"

Wait...than this guy isn't under Discord's influence! He's just nuts!

"QUIET! No wonder Canny's going to die, you spend so much time just thinking that you never act."

Despite the emotional pain from the ability of the Stand, and the physical pain of being squeezed and crushed by the Stand itself, you still manage to gasp out "Y-You're...insane!"

He doesn't seem to appreciate this. The Patient rolls his eyes and finally stops smiling, the sight of a frown of him being quite jarring. "Of course you wouldn't understand, you're blind to the beauty of chaos. But you'll soon change your tune, OHOHO, you all will change your tunes soon enough!" The world around you suddenly begins fading black as all you can hear is your own voice screaming either at you or in pain, and the Patient's voice screaming "CHAOS LIVES IN EVERYTHING!" He then suddenly whispers, sounding as though it were close to your ear "...Trapped Inside a Dream..."

Perspective Shift: Canny Clockwork

By the time the pain subsides within you, tears are still streaming from the previous agony. Even through blurry eyes, though, you can see Shooting Star stood up on his hind legs, gripped by nothing as he's pulled against the madman, the Patient. But...no, wait, it's not nothing. It's straps from a white straightjacket. You see two floating equinoids, one actively attacking Shooting Star and the other standing stock-still, not doing much at all.

Suddenly, you are overcome by a purple light and some kind of immeasurable sensation in your blood-stream. Emerging from you is a floating spirit, just like theirs. The ones you now have figured out is how Shooting Star's been doing this. The figure appears to be wearing a zoot-suit and a top hat, black and white striped everywhere, with only the right eye visible. Same as the one your monocle is on. The rest of it's facial features are blank. You stand there in awe as it uses it's hoof to tip it's hat, which then falls, intagible, through it. It regains it's form before it hits the ground, which the spirit then picks up to place back on it's head.

"...N-Nice," you comment, before thinking aloud. "What to call you?" you say, but then you think of something. Black and white like a robber, dressed fancy like a cool cat. You look to Shooting Star and The Patient in their predicament, and simply say "Alright, Smooth Criminal. Let's go save Shooting Star and kick this psycho's flank once and for all!"

What will Canny Clockwork (and Shooting Star) do?
<---- To Be Continued

Author's Notes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPCLFtxpadE

Musical References: Canny's Stand comes from Chapter 1 of this very fic, and is named after the Michael Jackson song of the same name. Meanwhile, Chaos Lives in Everything's secondary ability here, Trapped Inside a Dream, is taken from the lyrics to the original song, specifically the chorus.

Woo! We're actually early on the schedule this time. Cool! Fun fact: this is the first long-form fic of mine to reach double-digit chapters.

So, yes, that's my resolution to the situation. Take BrownDog's idea, Ze1a7in's critique of it, and the other comments referring to it, and turn it into a moment of in-character dickery from both of our antagonists at the moment. I think it works as a good compromise. :D

Now, for the question of the chapter:

Do you think Notorious B.I.G looks like a smol baby when it first appears in Golden Wind?

...Er, I mean,

What do you think of doing perspective shifts?

I personally love it because it allows me to look at certain characters from a personal angle without breaking Second-Person View, and it also allows for some variance in chapters. Don't worry, I'm not going to make you Perspective Shift into, like, ten other characters. Gotta keep it small.

Anywho, I hope you enjoyed this chapter! Fight's still ongoing, so keep posting Spots for next time, where we (possibly) conclude Chaos Lives in Everything's battle.