Solitary Locust is the long-awaited comedy sequel to Hard Reset: Ultimate Edition, and is the final story in The Three Sisters universe, written as a Christmas collab between Leo Tolstoy and the guy behind Game of Thrones (Mark Wahlberg?)

Now, before I say anything else, why don’t I just let the story introduce itself and set the tone?

Spike snorted a little, probably frustrated that Twilight wasn’t adhering to the typical hero/villain interaction. “Why’re you taking a bath anyway? And why are you doing it here? Aren’t you supposed to be back at your changeling cave thingy? And why were you saying that thing Twilight used to say a lot? And why do you have on that magic limiter thing Twilight keeps with her dildos? And wh—”

PROTIP: The payoff after over 100k words, ladies and gentlemen...

The story goes like this: Twilight “Takbir” Sparkle announces that changeling Spies are sappin’ all dem sentries in Ponyville, so it’s time to weed them out. Nopony decides to switch to Pyro because they aren’t scrubs, so she makes some magic and accidentally goes Allahu Akbar on herself, which reveals she’s a changeling. The ponies form a lynch mob and try to hunt her down, and the fic kinda turns into The Fugitive for a while, except without the cool dam jump scene or Tommy Lee Jones just being himself.

Hmm… I wonder what his thoughts are on this...

After that, things get a little more complicated. I don’t want to spoil too much, but I do have to point out that the title is a little misleading. Never once does the story talk about locusts or solitary, like that one time I got two weeks in the can. Maybe it’s a metaphor or something. I mean, there’s a lot of other bugs in the story, but none of them are locusts, and they just do all kinds of yucky kinky things. I know this because the narrator doesn’t believe in wimpy things like “too much information”.

She flew over numerous spots of it that had turned into small ponds literally filled to the brim with insects, all of them breeding madly. Some had already hatched in the short time since the storm—the air was thick with mosquitoes that bounced off Twilight’s armored body as she flew through their swarms. They couldn’t bite her, of course, but even at the speed she was going, Twilight could hear their high-pitched buzzing with her oversensitive hearing. She was certain she’d go mad if she had to walk through them and listen to that noise for hours without end.

PROTIP: You don’t actually have to read the fic to know what it’s about. Just turn on the Discovery Channel at any random moment, and you get the same experience.

As usual with any fic involving changelings, the most prominent trope is that thing where “X and Y were actually changelings all along”. Not that a story shouldn’t have twists in it. After all, this is what changelings are all about, so it makes sense to try and fool audience. On top of that, it’s always ambiguous whether Twilight really is the purple horse we know and love. These two elements should make sure the story is incredibly gripping, since you never know who you can trust, including our main character herself.

This is exactly why over 90% of the story is Tyrone Sparkler having an existential crisis and moaning about all the booboos she got from the meanies that beat her up. I'm also led to believe the author's country doesn't have healthcare, because there's a huge emphasis on how the ponypuff girl treats her wounds. Is this like, some kind of subliminal training?

Every single action and event is drawn out really long so all the kids with ADD can run off and burn their schools down. I especially like that one chapter where Twilight just blows her nose, and that somehow turns into a lecture about philosophy and flower arranging. Also, Trixie shows up at one point for no reason, but no one cares about her because she’s an aimbot hacker bitch.

And once you take all these fun things away, the actual plot of the fic boils down to less than 10k words. I don’t know about you, but I think it’s loads of fun to read stories that are way longer than they need to be. It makes the intense bits have much more impact once you finally get to them. In fact, some of these bits are so exciting that I was afraid I might overdose on them and bite my own head off. It’s a good thing teh parasite gives me plenty of time to calm down and fall into a coma by showing off how well they can do the main cast’s personalities.

Therefore I have conclusively proven, she thought to herself, almost hysterically, that there are numerous reasons why casting the love-eating spell right now would be beneficial to ponykind. I am not doing this for myself, but for the advancement of knowledge!

PROTIP: The tension in this story is broken more often than Twilight’s nose. Keep in mind that the fic doesn’t have a “comedy” tag.

A big risk that stories keep making these days is stop rambling and actually have something happen. This is really dangerous, because the people reading them aren’t guaranteed to understand what’s going on. You can have things like a door opening, or someone walking down the street, and instantly half the audience is hopelessly confused. Thankfully, the narration in this story makes sure to repeat every single detail at least three times in a row, because everyone knows that the people who read pony fanfics never passed kindergarten and need help wiping their own asses.

Despite being an undisputed masterpiece, the fic did have its share of hard times. Like with everything else that bronies decided to ruin, Solitaire Mucus didn’t even get to to reach the conclusion before some idiot scrubs decided to complain about one of the chapters. I don’t know why former fans suddenly acted like they realized the story was “a waste of time” or whatever. Babies can whine about anything, right?

Anyway, it got so out of hand that the author actually decided to pull the chapter and get drunk over the event. That may sound extreme to you, but I can sympathize. I wanted to get drunk too while I was reading this. In fact, I wanted to play the “Take A Shot Every Time You See A Forced Meme” drinking game, but the last person who tried that ended up in the hospital. I don't wanna go there because there are no ponies in the hospital, just doctors that stick their fingers up your butt...

Overall, Solitary Locust is an excellent insect documentary and first aid training manual in a “2 in 1” package for dumb nerds. If you never read it before, you probably don’t have good internet reading skills and don’t know how to fanfiction.

…

…

...

Why did nobody think it was weird that a changeling would cast a changeling revealing spell on themselves?