A herd of giraffe-legged rabbits ran by, followed by bison dancing in their tutus through a house of cards. A house used its roof as a foundation as it floated by on its small inverted mountain. The checkerboard that was the ground held a game with itself just out of view while holding up a dark throne made from the finest mahogany.
Sat upon this throne was the lord of this realm, the maestro of a symphony of meaningful meaninglessness. The lord of chaos Himself, known to those of this realm as Discord, and known to others in times long past by more names than any single creature would care to catalog, was watching over his glorious chaos. A rain of peach pies went by for naught but a few seconds, prompting Him to laugh at the utter imperfection of it all.
A pink cloud flew by his throne, stopping to release its load of chocolate milk for its creator. A claw reached over to it, drying itself in the rain momentarily before a flash of light created a tall glass to fill with the cloud's outpouring contents. Quickly it filled from top to bottom and was drawn away. Discord closed His eyes to revel in his creations as He reaffirmed himself in saying, “Chaos is a wonderful, wonderful thing.”
The last tile slid into place, ancient stone clicking into place as the enormous doors before the pair opened in agonizing slowness, they and the room were lit from behind for a moment by a number of explosions outside the cave they were within. The battle raging outside simply so they could go through those doors.
With clanking armor one stepped forward, hand resting on his sword's pommel. He looked down to the other one there, telling them “Alright. Get out there and help them fight off the smaller beasts.”
The smaller one looked up, sadly saying “I'm all out of power. You'd be more useful to them, and they'll still need you afterwards. I've got this, you go.”
Metal shifted against metal as the armored figure ignored the other and started walking toward the doors while replying, “No. This is for me to do, now stop-” and was cut off with a scream as electricity arced across his armor. He fell down, numbly clutching for his sword and out of breath as he tried to ask “Why?!”
A small black rod was pressed back into his armored side, electricity filling him once again and forcing him into unconsciousness. The rod was drawn away, and tossed into the surrounding darkness as a quiet voice whispered “Because I wasn't asking.”
A small gold ring was pulled from a small finger, resizing itself as it was placed over an armored gauntlet. A word of power, meaningless except to activate the object, was spoken and the armored figure vanished from sight.
The tiny figure beside the now-invisible paladin stood there for only a moment longer before darting away through the grand doors, accompanied by another flash of explosive light.
The glass had just reached His lips as He was interrupted by a voice He expected even less than his masterful chaos. A feminine voice stating proudly, “Not as wonderful as friendship!”
The half-lidded glare from the lord of chaos would have made most sane creatures quail in fear before slinking away, or at least that was the intent with which it was leveled at those six colorful ponies. The glare was much less effective than intended however, so instead of watching these creatures run away in justified panic Discord wearily stated, “Oh, this again?” before drinking up his glass and throwing away the milk to explosive effect.
“That's right! Ya couldn't break apart our friendship fer long!” Came the southern-accented reply.
“Oh Applejack, don't lie to me. I'm the one who made you a liar!” Discord countered, while using his magic to draw her closer into the air. His face distorted in malice and concentration as He pulled the other four Element necklaces to hang in the air in front of Him. As soon as they all were floating there, He asked simply, “Do you ever learn?”
Beyond the doors was a massive chamber, empty except for what appeared to be a gravestone near the far wall, marked with nothing but a few words of power. The walls of the chamber were marked by thousands of enormous claw marks, a dozen meters long each. Each mark was only inches deep, evidence of just how powerful this place was.
A large gemstone was drawn from the tiny figure's side. It clattered and clanged as it bounced along the floor to the back of the chamber. The figure drew back their arm from throwing it away, and sat down in front of the stone, studying it and waiting, the distant sounds of combat their only company.
It was not long before the roar was felt as much as heard. The figure flinched with each echoing step of the beast as it approached. Eyes squeezed closed as the earth quaked, until the sound stopped only a few meters behind the tiny figure.
Eyes snapped open and mouth pronounced the few words there. The grand doors behind slammed closed, sending rushing wind through the chamber. Those eyes closed for a moment as a deep breath was drawn in. The tiny figure turned around, eyes calm and mouth open in a toothy grin.
There before them was a mountain of scales, muscle and claws. Behind the greater dragon, the door was sealed, no longer distinguished from the wall around it. Fury filled every part of the beast, a roar growing in its maw as both it and the figure accepted that they were trapped together for all eternity.
The figure's grin grew wild as they gleefully said “Hello beasty.” before rushing forward.
As He was watching them, He didn't notice their sixth member casting her spell to appear in their midst. A bubble of pink magic enveloped the entire group only a moment after, the lord of chaos flinching back in surprise for but a second. He watched the pink sphere float away back to where the six were standing just a few seconds before.
The bubble touched the ground, turning the glorious checkerboard it touched back into the boring grass these ponies thought it should be before the pink dissipated with a pop. The six ponies stood there, proudly defiant as their leader said “I'll tell you what we've learned, Discord.” as they all advanced towards the throne, “We've learned that friendship isn't always easy. But there's no doubt it's worth fighting for.”
Discord's long serpentine neck extended close to the group as He said “Ngh, gag!” He drew back before continuing, “Fine, go ahead, try and use your little elements, frienemies! Just make it quick.” And with a bright flash back to His throne moodily stated “I'm missing some excellent chaos here!” as a herd of pigs flew by.
The ponies clustered together, entering threatening poses as the purple one said “Alright ladies! Let's show him what friendship can do!” Even as their pink member was off to the side, panickedly yelling “wait, wait, wait!” as she guzzled chocolate milk from a low-flying cloud to the unimpressed stares of her friends. She shortly hopped back over to them before entering her own combative pose.
A glow surrounded the ponies as Discord closed His eyes and yawned deeply, ignoring the shimmering sound coming from them as unimportant. The glow grew in strength as each individual's colors joined it. Shapes representing each member of the magic six flew from them, passing by Discord on His throne. He had to duck below a pink star to avoid it hitting his face. Discord surprisedly asked “Oh, what's this?” as the shapes grew in strength and frequency.
The glow grew ever stronger, to which Discord could only reply with a disbelieving “No!” as the group floated within their magical field, their eyes glowing with strength that radiated off of them, quickly forming into a solid rainbow. The rainbow arced up high above Discord's throne, so fast it could not be avoided. Discord let out an extended denial, a long “Nooooo!” as His body rapidly changed, becoming frozen and gray stone.
Unnoticed to the ponies, before His entire body could be petrified, His eyebrow changed shape to almost be a clawed hand, poised with its pointer finger to the sky as the middle finger and thumb snapped together quicker than almost any eye could follow.
The figure flitted amongst the spikes on the dragon's back, as the beast spun around to kill the annoying gnat that had trapped it. Agility was all the figure had to keep them alive now, and they were privately amazed it had lasted this long.
A paw swept over the figure once more, missing them by inches as they leapt between the claws. This had been going on for a few minutes now, and the greater dragon's fury had only grown more incandescent. All skill it may have had was long gone, replaced with a desire to see this minuscule creature dead.
But even as the dragon grew angrier, the figure grew weaker. Their dodges became more and more desperate as they tried to extend their life as much as possible. But only a single mistake was necessary to end them. That mistake came in the form of the tip of the beast's tail being just a little longer than they thought as it whipped towards them.
Thrown across the chamber, the figure slammed into the wall, feeling their bones shatter as blood flew from their mouth. They slumped to the floor, unable to move as the beast regained its mind seeing its foe beaten.
Thudding footsteps crossed the floor, echoing through the chamber. They stopped above the tiny, broken figure. One foreleg reached down, and with surprising delicateness, picked up the figure. A whimper was released as they were lifted up in front of the dragon's eyes.
Some reserve of strength was found deep within them, as they coughed up blood before saying “Coulda beat you in my good days.” with a small grin.
The fury came back in full force as the dragon tossed the figure into their open maw, snapping it closed over them.
The rainbow continued out from Discord's frozen shape, forming a sphere around the area in which the battle had just been fought. The glow continued to grow, becoming blindingly bright before suddenly dissipating. Where before there had been a pastel nightmare, now a simple and idyllic valley spread out over the restored land.
The ponies gently floated down from their levitated positions just in time to watch the statue that had minutes before been Discord fall crashing to the ground. A relieved breath escaped most of them as the pink one leapt up and began cheering, “Yay! We're the bestest friendshippers ever!”
The purple one chuckled, saying “I don't think that friendshippers is a word Pinky.” in an exasperatedly fond tone of voice. She thought she heard something far above her as she turned to her friends. “We did it, girls! Now we need to get Discord back to the princesses and...is that screaming?”
The others started hearing it too, sounding like it was coming from above them and getting closer. They all looked around at each other before looking straight up into the sky, at the small speck growing larger. The white one began saying “what is tha-” before it quickly resolved itself into the form of a pony, flailing limbs all around. None of them had time to think of a response as, with a wet splatting sound, the figure landed right in the middle of their group, all of them leaping back with various startled cries.
There between them was a small pegasus filly, limbs out to the side and face down in the ground. They all slowly approached, still startled out of their thoughts. Looking down on the small form before them, the blue one summarized all their thoughts by asking, “What the fuck?”