The End, and the Beginning
“There’s cake, if anypony wants some.”
Everypony else seated around the table—a small gray pegasus mare, the Changeling, Lady Chrysalis, and the speaker’s twin brother—all shook their heads. It was the first cake any of them had seen in years, brought to the Justices Flim and Flam’s courtroom by some admirers, and none of them were hungry for it.
“I thought not,” said Justice Flim.
“But we thought we’d ask,” added his brother.
The light of a glorious summer full moon slanted through four stained glass windows, replicas of the small ones in the former King Sombra’s private chambers, casting multi-colored shadows on the floor. The Justices sometimes quipped that they liked the stained glass window of themselves (“Pictures of us!” “Weakness of ours!”), but the presence of the other three windows with their friends in them put the lie to this. The windows belonged together, a visible sign of their friendship with each other, and with another friend, who was now out of the picture and out of their lives.
From outside, the four at the table could hear ponies celebrating. Fillies and colts squealed in delight, grown ponies danced, complete strangers grabbed each other and kissed, and impromptu parades and carnivals sprung up on every street corner. “Heartless,” said Justice Flam, shaking his head and refilling the glass in front of him.
The Grey Scholar slid her glasses down her nose. “They’re not celebrating his downfall,” she said. “They’re celebrating because the land is beautiful again. Their children aren’t starving. You can hardly blame them.”
“I wouldn’t be too sure,” Justice Flim said. “At the courthouse, I’ve been hearing that King Sombra put a curse on the land. He put a curse on the land!—and the princesses lifted it! Stupidity. It’s enough to make you tear your mane out.” He levitated the bottle of apple brandy in front of his brother and refilled his glass, too.
“And question what the hay we’ve been doing all these years,” his brother added. “Justice, my left hind hoof.”
A sky blue alicorn burst through the door, blowing hard.
“I’ve been trying to break through to him all day!” she gasped. “All day! I’ve tried everything, everything he taught me. Nothing works.”
“Defensive shields were his specialty,” said the Lady Chrysalis. “I suppose they still are.”
The Gray Scholar looked at Princess Trixie sharply. “Is he protecting himself from us, or us from him?”
“I . . . I think it’s both,” she said, still breathing heavily. Justice Flam courteously pulled a chair out for her, and she dropped into it. “He’s sent all the guards away, all the servants away—and he’s pulling up the walls. He’s all by himself in there. There’s . . . there’s ice growing up the shield, too. Do you think he’s trying to—to die? He said he hoped that no one would shed tears for his death if he ever became like that other Sombra.”
The older mare shook her head. “That’s easy for him to say, isn’t it? But you do make an interesting point, Trixie.” She pulled over a small pile of books. The rest of them stared.
“How did you get those?” said Trixie. “Those were in his private library! I can’t get anywhere near that!”
“Perhaps not now, which is why I borrowed them shortly before that confrontation with the princesses. I’ll be certain to put them back when it’s possible to do so. Hmmm.” She flipped through her notes. “As you know, there is another world, another Equestria—and we’ve been speaking of it as though it were a mirror of ours, but that’s not strictly true. There are some important differences. They have the Elements of Harmony. We do not. We have science that they do not. Our Sombra cannot simply have turned into theirs. For one thing, their Sombra was a usurper who took over the Crystal Empire.”
All the others at the table looked blank.
“What’s the Crystal Empire?” said Flim.
“I’ve never heard of it,” his brother said, levitating the bottle back and refilling his glass.
“Exactly,” said the Scholar. “As far as I can tell, we don’t have one. And his Majesty has ruled Equestria ever since the Three Tribes asked him to, well over a thousand years ago. The other Sombra enslaved and tortured his ponies. Does that sound like our Sombra?”
The Justices looked at each other. “No, of course not,” said Flam.
“He was always fair,” said Flim. “It’s . . . well, it’s one reason why we loved him. Flam,” he added, coughing, “pour me another glass while you’re at it, will you?”
“The other Sombra was greedy. Was ours?” she said, looking over her glasses.
“No.” Trixie shook her head. “The castle always had the poorest food. He saw to that.”
“The Sombra in these books cursed an Empire and had a ‘heart as black as night.’ Our Sombra sacrificed himself and saved the mare he loved, another mare who had done him and his ponies nothing but harm, and two universes,” said the Gray Scholar.
“And his heart was clean,” said Lady Chrysalis softly. “I am sure of that. I know.”
The Scholar snapped her book shut. “He may have turned himself into the villain,” she said, “but our friend could no more turn himself evil than red could turn itself into blue.”
“But he took in all that dark magic,” said the alicorn princess. “He cursed himself. He taught me that dark magic corrupts. It’s why he made me that protective amulet. It’s why he wanted nothing to do with dark magic—he knew what it would do to him. And I’ve tried and tried to get through!”
“Yes,” said Lady Chrysalis. “Dark magic does corrupt. It will eat through the heart in time.”
“The question is, then, what can we do?” said the Scholar. “What does he need?”
They all gazed down at the table, as though it would provide an answer.
“A reformer?” said Trixie, hesitantly.
Flam snorted. “Reform. You can’t reform a pony who doesn’t want to be reformed,” he said.
“We know,” his brother said. “We’ve tried.”
“Dozens of times,” added Flam. “Community service, thirty days, programs. . .” He hiccupped.
“‘Thanks for the second chance,’ she says, ‘only it’s the, the fifty-sixth . . .” said Flim, “only it’s sort of nice to see her in court again. ‘S’comin’ up again Monday. Petty larceny. Almost like she cares.” He rubbed his eyes. “Sorry. What was this about?”
“Yes, well,” the Scholar said acerbically, “whether it works or not, he can’t be reformed, because in point of fact, he hasn’t done anything. And he certainly doesn’t need a new love when what’s left of his shattered heart is full of her. He doesn’t need to be reformed; he needs to be healed. If he were to do what the other Sombra did, we would have to follow his wishes. He would rather die than harm anypony: so be it. But he hasn’t. I won’t let him banish himself into the ice. I am his friend and I will not give up on him.”
“I can’t bear to think of him living for thousands of years with only his own dark thoughts for company,” said Trixie. “It seems so unfair.”
“Fairness,” Flim said bitterly. “Fairness is for suckers. Look where it gets you. If he’d done as we asked, he might be with his Princess and happy today, but oh, no, he just had to save everypony and her worthless sister.”
“He should have looked out for himself,” agreed Flam. “Bugger justice, it can look after itself, ‘cos that’s what I’m gonna do. ‘Cept for you, of course,” he said to Flim.
The small gray mare rose, trotted to their side of the table, and slapped each on the face. She did not slap them hard, but water stood in their eyes.
“Listen to me,” she said firmly. “You are going to go upstairs and go to bed, and tomorrow you will get up bright and early and get down to the courtroom. And you will play that organ and sing and dance, because. . . ?”
“The show must go on,” Flim said dully.
“What was that?”
“The show must go on,” they repeated.
“There’s my good colts,” she said. “Give me a hug.”
They rose and hugged her, one on each side. They towered over her, but she held them down tightly to her. “There’s my good colts,” she said softly. “Now off to bed. Tomorrow will look much brighter. You’ll see.”
They left the room, leaning heavily on each other. The remaining three could hear crashes and thumps upstairs as the Justices made their way to bed. “Poor boys,” said Lady Chrysalis. “They must feel their Element is worthless.”
“It hit them hard,” agreed the gray pegasus. “Fairness requires a certain level of optimism, and they’re all tapped out. They’ll bounce back by tomorrow, you’ll see. They always do—you can’t keep them down. And they know that justice doesn’t happen all by itself.”
Trixie sniffed. “Trixie is far better than that,” she said. “Trixie would not lose faith in her Element so quickly.”
“Trixie just did,” the Scholar pointed out, and Trixie slapped her hoof to her mouth in horror. “And we can’t allow that to happen. It would make his sacrifice pointless.” She sighed. “I’m just a bookworm, and I really don’t know anything about magic. It will have to be up to you two.”
Trixie shook her head. “I’m not powerful enough to expel all that darkness,” she said, “and we don’t know where it would go. I think that’s why he took it all into himself.” She sighed. “And you know he would be happy with all this,” she added, waving her hoof at the celebrations outside. “His ponies well-fed and healthy again, flowers growing. I’ve always wanted that, too. Containing and imprisoning dark magic is the first thing I’d think of, and that’s what he’s done. If there’s a force overwhelming enough to obliterate it in our world, I’m sure he would have used it before.”
“Darkness does not have to be imprisoned or obliterated,” said the Lady Chrysalis. “It can be Changed.”
She saw the looks of confusion on her friends’ faces, and continued. “That is what I and my people do. We feed and transmute. We Change. Few beings are dark or evil in themselves, and Sombra certainly is not. The darkness in him can be broken down and turned into what is good. I have done this for him for years.”
“Can you do that now?” said Trixie eagerly.
“No,” Chrysalis replied. “I took only small amounts from him at a time. There never was very much,” she said, shaking her head. “But our friend has swallowed thousands of years of dark magic built up in two powerful beings. I and all my people could not remove it without risking poisoning ourselves. The process often leaves the patient weak. Sucking away so much at a time might kill him. And then he was willing. Now he will fight us all off, believing that he must remain evil in order to protect everypony, and Sombra’s defenses are powerful, even when he is not angry. And he must be very angry. He certainly will be angry at us for trying to help him.”
“And time is not on our side,” she continued. “The dark magic within him has already begun to eat him away. We would have to move quickly.”
“But we must try,” said the Gray Scholar.
“Yes,” Chrysalis said, nodding. “We must. Although you must make the decision, Princess.”
Trixie shook her head. “No longer a princess if he is not King,” she said. She rose from the table, and an expression of intense pain flitted across her features.
“Are you trying to un-princess yourself? Well, good luck with that,” said the gray pegasus, snorting. “I think you’ll find you’re stuck that way. You’ll be needed. You were Sombra’s student, and Celestia has no experience ruling a country in a benevolent way, only in trying to destroy it. You must offer to help, even if that offer is rejected.”
Trixie looked up sadly. “Do you think my help would even be acceptable?”
“It will,” said a new voice, and they all looked up to see Princess Luna framed in the doorway. All of the others sank into a deep bow. “None of that,” she said. “Come here, child.” Trixie ran towards Luna, who folded a wing over her. “I mourn for him, too.”
The gray pegasus stood straight, head up. “We intend no threat to the lawful rulers of Equestria. We want only to help our friend.”
“As do I,” said the moon princess. “He was like a brother to me. I know him far better than I know my own sister. He saved my life several times over. Of course I will help.”
She dropped the wing encircling Trixie, and moved to the center of the table, placing her right hoof on it. “The last favor his Celestia asked of me was to look after Equestria and to look after him. I shall do both. I shall not permit his memory to suffer,” she added, looking towards the gray pegasus.
“That will please Flim and Flam,” she said. “The injustice of that hurts them deeply.”
“Thank you, Princess Luna,” said Lady Chrysalis, a smile lighting up her odd face. “He thinks he is alone, but he is not. That in itself is powerful magic.”
“He will never see his Princess again,” said Luna, withdrawing her hoof and bowing her head, “and for that, I am partly at fault.”
Chrysalis hesitated. “I do not like to say ‘impossible’ where love is concerned, and they both may have thousands of years to live yet. They must both know that they will probably never meet again, but that doesn’t mean love dies. Like anything else, it merely Changes. But he can be healed, and he has the love of his friends, and friendship . . .
. . . Friendship is worth something.”
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That's an important point. The two world can't be completely identical save for mirrored moralities. And the moralities are now even less mirrored, with both Sombras evil (unless one of them is dead) and both pairs of Royal Pony Sisters good.
AJ?
Flim and Flam are deeply demoralized and starting to doubt their purpose in life. It's touching, though, that even in that mood, they're still loyal to one another. Then again, Flim and Flam Prime are loyal to one another -- it's their redeeming moral virtue even as con artists.
D'oh!
I get the impression that in this world Luna raised Trixie as her student / surrogate daughter just as in Equestria Prime Celestia raised Twilight. That would also make it similar to the Lunaverse, except that there are no Elements of Harmony -- or at least not in a form they are recognizing.
This also mirrors Luna Prime's comforting of Twilight in the comic book.
Indeed it is -- whether or not it's literal magic.
In the mirror world, Trixie's character arc might have looked like this:
(1) Mentored by Princess Luna as her star pupil until Luna fell into darkness at the same time as Luna Prime was saved from the Nightmare,
(2) Learned to become a true heroine without the benefit of Luna's leadership, probably hoping all along that Luna might be saved from darkness,
(3) At some point during this process became an Alicorn, and finally
(4) Reunited with her former mentor Luna, but at the price of losing Sombra (whom she might have been secretly feeling love for, given his overall charisma and fine qualities, but aware that this love was hopeless).
I'm guessing both from your portrayal and from the inherent logic of the mirrors that in many ways the Trixies have similar personalities.
4600138 I am, too. I would
to see a fic about them from someone.
Heck, even though I know that it will never happen, I'd love to see the regular comic book do a story arc on them..But that, I doubt, will likely never happen.
On another note, I wish Andy Price (the artist for this story arc) did commissions. I'd love to get a pic of the Mirrorverse "Bad Girl" Applejack from him, in his style, just her by herself.
I don't think he does them, though, and even if he did, they'd more than likely be ridiculously expensive!
If you're talking about the little 2-page comic at the end of Issue 19, I noticed that, too.
Little stinkers.
And they were just kids in that!
Or were you by any chance talking about a different 2-pager that's in Issue 20? I don't have that one yet. It's comin' from TFAW, but it hasn't hit my mailbox as yet.
4612642 From what I understand, a lot of this story arc was heavily influenced by Fringe. I wasn't going to watch a whole series only to toss what I didn't want anyway, but part of the thing in that is that everything isn't opposite. Some of it is subtly different--like John F. Kennedy still being alive, sheep being extinct, and Manhattan being spelled "Manhatan." So it seemed reasonable to me that instead of everything being precisely upside-down or reversed, some stuff might be very similar or just slightly askew. Heck, maybe there's a Ruby or Sapphire Kingdom of Hippogriffs they don't know about, but the point is that it isn't the same.
I want to preface the next bit by saying that a lot of my ideas about the Justices came about by bouncing them off Yildun.
The Justices are a wreck.They really DO need to get over AJ. It's going nowhere, and heaven knows they have plenty of groupies. Oh, my, their infatuation for what amounts to the head of the Cavendish Gang is a mess. Of course, they're badly tempted to cut her some slack, but they can't be less than impartial, so they bend over backwards not to, and then they have to try not to overcorrect and be too hard on her, and at the end of the day they go home with a headache and AJ laughs her way to the next bank.
Actually, Trixie's teacher and mentor is Sombra, not Luna. Sombra is his world's Celestia. He made the Alicorn Amulet for her (as it turns out--sometimes you find these things out when you write them). It makes use of his gift for defensive shields, and as it happens, it turns off the kind of sustained magical attack the other makes possible. Trixie stands in the same relationship to Sombra as Twilight does to Celestia. Mirrorverse Luna has also had to go without her sister, but for the opposite reason--Celestia's the one who fell. Maybe Sombra should have banished her to the sun or something, but instead he welcomed the younger sister to his court as a princess in exile, where she became friends with Celestia Prime. You can see how that set of friendships stitched up a lot of wounds. I'm sure he had to prevent his world's Celestia from attacking her sister multiple times.
Luna was in Sombra's court up until only a few years ago, and knows Trixie from that time--as Sombra's star pupil (essentially, at that point, Trixie was at the same point that Twilight was at Season 1, Episode 1.)
The more I think about the possibilities this opens up, the more interesting I think it is, and of course, it's a thematic and tonal departure from my usual CheesePie.
4613253 Oh, you never know. I doubt they'll do a whole arc, but you never know when they'll toss a couple of pages in.
They were KIDS at the end of Issue #19?
I never noticed that!
4614799 This is some really deep stuff. And I haven't even read those comics yet...
I loved the epilogue. It's good to see Flim and Flam being so equine and temporarily giving up, while getting drunk, and not just because of what they let slip. Only natural for them to feel like their element failed. I also really love the ladies and their desire to help too. Sombra has good, true friends and I hope that some day Chrysalis and her hive can bring him back to them.
Sorry, it just took me awhile to mull this over a bit before responding. I thought I'd have more to say, but I don't have much. The Mirror verse has a lot of potential though. This is why I love AUs... especially canon ones.
4614799
I am best sound board!
I feel bad for the Justices though; the AJ thing was all my fault. I dragged them into that one.
I have the sense that they will get over her eventually, but they'll never truly give up on her. It's the difference between never burying the flame and still loving someone after moving on. If they genuinely care about her, only AJ being the worst pony in the history of ponies could possibly sour them completely and destroy all hope. As bad as the Mirror Six might be, I'm betting they're not in that position yet. Even the Mane Six falter, so I think the Mirror Six have their good moments as well. The bad just outweighs the good, usually.
I wish they'd done this in the comic itself, that's all I can say. You did a great job characterizing the Mirror-Equestria's "Element Bearers" (even if they don't technically have the Elements), and I like the hints about Black Hat Applejack of the Mean Six. If we ever see more of this from you, I''ll be sure to read it.
After Season 4 ended, and we had this whole background of the Mirrorverse in the IDW comics, on how the mirror Celestia was evil, and mirror Discord was a hero... one cannot help but wonder: What was the mirror Tirek like?
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Did you "snitch" that from me?
If so, I heartily approve.
If not, that's okay, too.
4614799 This is true, but it sure would be cool if they ever decided to. (Can't help but think that the Mirrorverse thing is over and they probably never will do one of just the (formerly) Good Sombra/Evil Celestia world, just to expand on it more. But, a gal can dream, can't she?
)
And hey, I'd happily take a couple of Mirrorverse pages here and there during the comic's run! Especially if was about the "Erroneous Equines" (or, as I've come to affectionately call them, "The Mean Six"!
)! I think that that would be Rainbow-Awesomely cool!
Yep, they are. You can find them in the 3rd and last panel on Page 2 of the l'il "How Star Swirl Got his Hat" mini-comic thing that Katie Cook has been doing for the back of the books lately.
And Filly Twilight looks adorable (positively pinchable!) in her glasses and her mane in a pony-tail in that last panel! Check it out! They're all adorable, really.
(Filly AJ is my fave, as usual. Bad girl, or not.
)
4621370 He's probably a good guy, like Mirror (Sir) Discord/"Captain Goodguy" (Lord, could the writers get any more corny than that?!). Dunno what his brother Scropan would be like, since it was shown that he became a good guy in the show.
I was halfway expecting you to pull a good ol if cliched time travel paradox twist...something about the whole alternate universe being actually the long forgotten past of the main-line universe, shrouded in myth and legend, and of course it history being morphed and altered when retold across generations.
-Flim and Flam renouncing justice and their descendants being more and more amoral with each passing generation.
-Trixie and Derpie similarly starting a line of descendants each with less humility and wisdom respectively with each passing generation.
-Chrysalis trying to help Sombra (out of love, maybe) but in the process corrupting herself and making her the ancestor of (if not being the very same) the current changeling queen.
-Sombra shield forming ice creating the artic north we know where the Crystal Empire is settled.
-The story of Equestria creation, Sombra imprisonment and the nature of the princess being the rulers of the land being an amalgamation of the true story, and the ignorance of the populace.
-SOmbra sacrifice itself dispersing magic everywhere in Equestria, creating then the tree of Harmony and the elements themselves.
I know, sometimes I have too much imagination.
Still, I love to see that somepony is giving some attention to the Mirror Universe, I hope more follow suit 
So why are the ponies looking to Celestia and Luna to lead them, especially Celestia? I get that she's reformed, but Celestia and Luna PRIME took the throne by right of deed when they defeated Discord, presumably after the three tribes governments was destroyed/turned into jello. When Luna was purged of Nightmare Moon, she got her throne back.
If King Sombra was elected King by the Three Tribes that predated the Royal Sisters, then at no time were Celestia and Luna ALT granted authority by defeating some great threat, unless Sombra was somehow incapacited and Luna somehow temporarily took the throne.
Maybe she earned it defeating Starswirl the Tyrant, enslaver of the bearded ponies? Or helped the noble Tirek defeat his evil brother Scorpan? Either way, Celestia ALT seems to never have been a good pony before she was brainwashed JUST NOW, so are they just giving her the throne as a sort of "Most Improved" award?
Oh, and somebody should really keep an eye on Sir Discord/Captain Goodguy, I suspect he's in for a face/heel turn any day now...
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4596962 Hey, guys--if you didn't know about it, there's a Mirrorverse group, (which I did not start), and I've started a thread on Mirrorverse Headcanon, if anyone is interested.
More direct responses later!
Cool! Thanks for the tip! I'll be sure to check it out!
4627244 Already a member of the Mirrorverse group, thanks. That's how I found this story!
4624204 They should watch out more for Scorpan.
Have you ever considered submitting this story to Equestria Daily? You can find out how to do so here.
4628600 I'm pretty sure they came up with that name in the 80s after Transformers rejected it as the name for a Decepticon.
4628540 Yildun, actually.
4628601 I'll think about it. Swear on Camembert and Sidewalks of Noo Yoke were featured on EQD, but I'm not sure they'd like this one. I thought about submitting Flim Flam Justice, but it's under the word limit and I don't want to tack on extra words just to make it fit.
Damn straight.
An excellent exploration of this universe and those who dwell within it. The Glass Councilponies were all well realized, and the changes to the changelings are especially intriguing.
In all probability, the two worlds are now thoroughly disentangled, and it would take another portal between them to put them at risk. Sombra's burden almost certainly isn't a cosmic keystone on which two universes' integrity rests.
Almost certainly.
I look forward to any other Mirroverse stories you may write.
An excellent story.
It is nice to see a story that deviates from the norm.
No overused pairings and senseless, gratuitous clop .
Nice, meaty, heavy story, expanding on the consequences of Good Sombra's sacrifice.
Still, I would have thought that the populace at large would turn to the Glass Council for leadership, rather than just throwing the mantle of leadership onto two sisters, (albeit alicorns) that had been, up till that point, openly tyrannical.
Otherwise, an excellent story, well worth reading.
4650883 Yeah--I'm stuck with the comic book, alas. You would think they'd turn to Alicorn Princess Trixie, wouldn't you? And while Celestia and Luna are just magically supposed to be "good," if I were living in Sombra's Equestria, I'd have a problem with trusting Celestia, at least. Luna's only been evil for a few years, so perhaps less so with Luna, but Celestia's been evil for over a thousand years. Eh, ponies have short memories and they're easily distracted by musical numbers, so maybe not.
The comic book is awesome, but it leaves a lot of holes, and I think it will be fun exploring this new world. And thank you for the compliments! I very much enjoyed your story.
4629052 I agree. The problem seems to have come from the portal, or even maybe the ways in which it was used. In any case, I don't think Sombra needs to remain "evil" forever, though he might think he does.
I'm already planning another Mirrorverse fic, with the title "Princess Trixie and her Magic Dragon."
If there's anything I have to say about this so far is that it's good. I enjoy this immensely, but no offense; I don't feel like they have any character traits. Derpy is wise, so she shows it and has to be wise all the time. Chrysalis is the Element of Love, so everything she says needs a love reference or speaking directly about it. The same goes for Flim and Flam and Trixie. There dialogue is heavily influenced by that which makes them different from the other world. The only time it strays from that idea is when mentioning Sombra, also occasionally when they stray from their Elements. Maybe I'm being too tough on it, I'm not really too good at making my own fanfics yet. I just think the characters should be fleshed out a bit, perhaps that's done in another story?
4831779 I'm thinking about it. It's ok--it's just not as good as my other fics. Part of that is that there was almost nothing to work with. You think it's hard pulling a character out of a brand-new background pony--these guys are all based on ONE FRAME. I'm much prouder of Flim Flam Justice.
I've been picking away at another fic based in the same 'verse, but meh--few people seem to really like this one and it's much harder to write and I have other stuff I'm working on, so I'm not sure.
4831828
People seem to gravitate more to the comedy aspects of fanfiction. I understand it would certainly be hard to create an entire personality based off the only one character trait that was given. I always thought giving a backstory helps, such as details about why certain characters are doing something different in the other world. I hope you continue with this idea, I haven't seen anybody else focusing on the world in the comics, and would love to see it continued. Good luck on all your other fics.
4831907 Well, these chapters were both written within a week: immediately before and immediately after the release of Issue #20. There wasn't a lot of backstory because there wasn't supposed to be: it was a before and after snapshot.
I don't know if I have the energy to pour into doing this from scratch. It's in a genre that isn't my forte with practically nothing to base it on. I might get back to it, but right now I'm focusing on my EG-based fic--and that requires quite a lot of world-building, too!
4831924
Good luck with that
Not a lot of action, but the characters really show through. You paid a lot of detail to the nuances of their personalities, which was very fun to read. Have a like and a ribbon:
i.imgur.com/6MrWqNZ.png
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I understand being stuck with the comic, though I don't see why that would restrict you to having the populace embrace Celestia with no reservations, since we never got to know the population in the comic. Yes, being able to somehow reverse the famine would be a big step in the right direction, but I can't imagine that there wouldn't be arguments over whether Celestia can be trusted after everything that happened.
I'd be interested in seeing a story about Celestia's reaction to turning good again, and how the Glass Council would treat her. I'm hoping for lingering resentment and guilt; I can never get enough stories like that.
4923289 Hmm. Well, I think in the immediate aftermath of the famine being reversed, there would be the typical noisy celebrations. Whether the populace as a whole would still feel that way after six months--not so sure.
And I'd say that even after they sober up, Flim and Flam are going to feel bitter, and the Gray Scholar very wary.
The fall of the good King Sombra is sad.
Wait a minute... "Amulet"? What KIND of... "Amulet"?
4650930
Sounds interesting, what's it about? Let me guess: Garble's analogue is the "Dragon"?
4948852 Good, I think. It's supposed to be.
5018701 The Alicorn Amulet, which here, in this Mirrorverse world, is a protective amulet designed to shield the wearer from dark magic, and infused with Good King Sombra's special talent for defensive and shield spells.
Further, I get the feeling Alt-Applejack's family's fortunes may start drying up as more folks start getting fed up with what I can only assume are dishonest business tactics (similar to what Flim and Flam Prime use, only THEY do it "RIGHT").
Ok, I think I get it, but just to be clear: this isn't a whole story; it's a prologue and epilogue to one of the comic arcs?
5098597 Yep: that's it.
Tell that to Fluttershy who reformed Discord.
4624204
Considering the circumstances of the reverse in the Equestria we know, only if he meets Fluttershy.
may i also post this story? on the somblestia blog i mean
5488703 Of course.
4650930 So... when are we seeing that "Trixie and her Magic Dragon" thing? (And I assume the Dragon is Garble, by the way).
5642262 Might be a while, but I already have the cover art, so I pretty much have to write it.
It's Crackle.
Just kidding. It's not.
5642401 Can we have a little preview?
So... what's Mirrorverse Garble like?
This was simply wonderful! I felt somewhat cheated by the end of the Reflections arc, and this story really helps to rehabilitate it for me. The characters were all fascinating, and the precise way in which they differed (and resembled) their Mane Universe counterparts was great. Good King Sombra is one of favourite comic characters, and I love his characterisation here most of all.
6343235 Thank you!
Well, I wasn't intending that, no . . . but I guess it could be seen that way. I do have a sequel planned (gosh knows when I'll get to it), but it's not a shipfic.
6897042 Thank you!
I wonder if some of Mirrorverse!Celestia and Mirrorverse!Luna's former supporters are being rounded up and brought to justice... not to mention if the Apples (who may be a mafia or something) are working to provide shelters and safehouses to their fellow allies from under Mirrorverse!Celestia and Mirrorverse!Luna.
7213622 They might be! I have to get back to this. I've had a sequel sort of lined up, but no time to do it in. Soon, I hope, because I've even got cover art for it.
I would so love to see more of this!!!