Poor Twilight Sparkle: pride and joy of the University of Eohippus, she is in charge of a team of the most brilliant unicorn minds (plus Fluttershy) of her generation. So it's a shame they're also at least six kinds of deranged and ten kinds of embarrassing.
There's Twinkleshine, whose girly-girl demeanour masks an ambitious monster. There's Moondancer, who's about as social as an oyster, and Lemon Hearts, who's about as charming too. There's Lyra Heartstrings, whose research barely qualifies as sense, never mind as science. And then there's Sweetie Belle, who should totally be in school but who'd much rather hone her skills as the world's worst personal assistant secretary fangirl... thingy.
However, this is merely the start of Twilight's problems. In the midst of mad science and a city overstocked with adventure, she'll confront MIA mages, enigmatic infernos, freaky furniture, political plots, hush-hush histories, and worst of all... the fact that she is destined to solve everything.
Oh, and Trixie's in there somewhere.
It's totally gonna go wrong.
A very... odd start. We're diving right in and I've got on inkling of what's going on. A lot of Spike here despite a lack of character tag. Suppose we'll see where this is all going.
Hmm, not sure what to make of this Twilight. I think I get the gist of her; straight laced and wanting to project a sense of not being better than anypony else. A hard time relating to others, just like the show, but I suppose willing to try. I get the image in my head she's a machine just learning what's it's like to be alive.
Not sure if Trixie's comments and attitude are helping. Leaning towards sarcastic neutral.
Moving on!
Getting more of the picture, here. Kinda curious where this is heading.
Heh, I wonder if these Pacifiers got the name because they're dumb like babies.
Curious dynamic between Twilight and Trixie. It's like if Trixie took Spike's place but Trixie sure ain't no Spike. Too much personality to let any slights against her slide.
Will await more!
Another Shitty Racist Equestria. Normally I keep clear of such settings, but you do Quality Pone, so I shall forge onward to chapter 2.
What a strange and fascinating universe you've created. I look forward to seeing more of it, and any adjacent ones.
Twinkleshine and Minuette sure are a pair, aren't they? One wants to push boundaries while the other likes staying within those boundaries. But nothing can stop SCIENCE!
Moondancer is adorable. 'Nuff said.
Ah, so Garble (I'm assuming that's him) is part of the interdimentional travel it seems. Or at least skews it. More SCIENCE! needed.
I’m confused, but it’s like Austereoh, you got me hooked.
It doesn’t hurt that I’m running out of stories to read either.
Thank you all for the lovely comments! It's been a delight reading them.
9344111
I'm flattered, though slightly nervous.
I do intend to tie the dragons and the other plot points together, so hopefully it'll at least be an interesting world-building note. Only time will tell.
9345299
Wow, really? I've seen lots of people say the opposite: too many stories, not enough time. In any case, I'm at least pleased you're enjoying this one! As for the confusion... I hope later chapters clarify things a little. I was going for a "pick things up as we go along" kind of tale.
9344415
I'm glad you're liking it so far. More on the way soon: I plan to get a good chunk of the story out before Christmas.
9344533
Haha, I love reading comments like these, especially the parts about Trixie. I hadn't consciously positioned her as this universe's Spike, but now you mention it, it's an intriguing idea I could adapt later into the plot. You mind if I steal it?
Thanks again for the comments! In the meantime, here's the next two chapters a-coming up.
Lemon Heart’s a jerk
Yikes. And here I thought Trixie would be the one with a mouth. Lemon Hearts (the Queen of Bitter Hearts) eats Trixie's sarcasm for a snack before getting to the main course.
This chapter really put things into a bigger perspective. Fluttershy's interview helps flesh out more of this world and the motivations of the characters. Not sure what Sweetie Belle is doing there, but I suppose we'll find out.
Also, I liked how Fluttershy, for being so passive, can quickly flip and go on a (tepid) tirade when animal shenanigans are brought into question.
Now, if only she can survive a campus full of crazy unicorns...
Whoops! Somehow skipped this chapter and read the one after it first. That clears up why Sweetie Belle's there.
There's snarky Twilight! She's just too focused on being a good leader that she keeps it internal. Ah, and some insecurities too. Twilight's got quite the hooffull of characters to deal with.
Lemon Hearts was the culprit all along! What other secrets does she keep within her trash bag?
Good on Minuette and Twinkleshine for a success, even if they'll be picking flees out of their coats for a while. And I get the sense that Twinkleshine is one of those "bloodsuckers" Lemon Hearts' isn't fond of.
Does Trixie do actual work here or just use her room for practicing her shows? At least she's got the space for it.
Welcome to Hell, Fluttershy. The meals are free, the rent is cheep, the pay is good, and the occupants as crazy as all get out. You'll learn to love it!
Till next time!
Mysterious!
Rather bad and sad situation Moondance is in. Bad due to being kidnapped and forced to build something against her will, and sad that she doesn't even think the ponies in her life will even notice.
So, it looks like there are multiple creatures that can use portals to cross worlds. Considering the tone of this chapter, that can't be good.
Looking forward to more!
I love that the thagomizer is the actual scientific term for this... and it's from a Far Side cartoon.
On the topic of great comics, this entire chapter, all I could think was, "Scientific Progress Goes *Boink*"
What a wonderfully off-kilter world. The madness of academia is... really not as different from the real thing at that level as it should be, and the quirks of the various characters are just delightful.
Twilight might have a problem if the things providing the lasers ever come for her through the portals directly. I do feel like whatever is going on is 100% her fault though.
Loving this so far. Such a fun spin to the story.
Poor Flutters
That reveal for Lemon was perfect. And... yeah. They really do rule the world.
These unicorn nerds are going to collectively explode or maybe implode the planet if someone doesn't stop them, so this kidnapping by Garble may be for the overall best.
The monkey scene about killed me.
Weird and intriguing.
I'm making the guess that Twilight is following the Friend's Journey. Look's like she's in the "Refuse the Call" stage. Break through it, Twilight!
Also, Sweetie is adorable. If her enthusiasm could be curbed, I think Twilight might warm up to her being around.
Oooh, more big dragons. Looks like they are strategically positioning themselves. What for, I wonder...
Heh, silly ponies.
This puts
TwinkletoesTwinkleshine higher on the list of ponies that seem to be more into the glory than the science. Rubbing withers with the higher class, eating expensive food, sticking your nose up in the air at those groveling at your hooves. Yeah, she's looking up and not looking back.Wonder if this means we finally see Rarity. Suppose we'll find out!
Ha! Twilight's going to need to have a "conversation" with her parents later. That'll be an interesting visit.
Some nature VS nurture arguments here, some of which I don't follow. Meh, it lead to some nice interactions with Ember regardless.
Emotions by smell? Is Ember secretly a changeling?
Looks like Sweetie Belle will be sticking around for a while. Twilight's nerves will be bounced on with gleeful sincerity.
Till next time!
Well, this is about as far as I got. Now I'd like to thank everyone who commented, and I'm gratified to know people have enjoyed what I've written. It's not nothing, and I do appreciate it. Thank you so much.
These three are a riot. There's a lot of snipping back and forth but it's all good natured. They'll laugh about it tomorrow.
Or at least they would. Seems like Moondancer's kidnapping wasn't as snatch and grab as it first appeared. This will definitely get the campus fired up (no pun intended).
Huh, Lyra's reasons for quitting seem legit, but after seeing the fire, I'm thinking she's going to be putting in a lot of extra work. Her and everypony else.
If this is where it ends, that's a shame. I'm curious to see how the dragons, the mysterious figure, Twilight's collection of odd ponies, and everything else comes together.
I was going to make a guess as to who the mysterious voice is but every choice didn't make sense. I'm torn!
Poor Spike. He's in the role of G1 movie Spike, doing all of Tirek's dirty work.
Drunk Flutters is adorbs, but Fluttershy is adorbs no matter what she's doing.
Till next time!
I hope there will be more eventually and it looks like the abductions are about to be discovered.
Because this chapter can use more comments I will simply say that Sweetie Belle was adorable.
9377561
Well, never say never. It might take a while, it might not happen at all, but I would like to finish what I started. Not at the moment, though. I need a little while to get some affairs in order first.
Sweetie Belle is the best. Also, interesting family history for Twilight.
Dang, so much for the happy banter night out. I wonder if this fire was set to hide Moondancer's kidnapping or if it was just a wierd coincidence (seems unlikely, but worth speculation), and in the case of the former if the kidnappers did anything to deal with the fact that there won't be a burned corpse for the investigation to find.
Looking forward to more when you get around to it.
A universe where ponies hold dragons as slaves..... Prevent them from growing up and also seem to prevent new dragons from hatching, desiring to make the entire dragon race go extinct.
Very dark, something I did not expect from the description and the tags. And the description is a real mystery, same as this first chapter. But I already notice your distinct, refined style here, so I'm already liking what I read.
I wonder who our big dragon friend is, to what kind of establishment he sold himself to and why he wanted to get in there so much..... And also what role Twilight is going to play in all this. And then this crystal mare, a pony, yet she seems to be getting enslaved anyway.....
You built up a lot of mystery already, I can't wait to read further chapters to see how this goes on.
Now I've fallen for this story. I already liked it before, but now I'm in love with it. The Twilight of this universe is even more a workaholic than the Twilight we know. Or, maybe, the Twilight we know used to be like this, too? Indicators for that are there, but we haven't seen much of the time before Twilight moved to Ponyville. Either way, Twilight's in overdrive here and I love it!
And also the setting and how you changed everything up. An even more work-obsessed Twilight, who is close friends with Trixie instead of being in a rival relationship with her, and still struggling with friendship, in an environment where her fame isn't working in her favor for everypony, a fertile ground for intrigues against her. Then Trixie's personality, still boasting and full of herself, but just like Twilight, cranked up to eleven.
Everything so new, but still in-character. Everything so fresh and still somewhat familiar. And that is only the start of the story.
This story is a prime example for it how we can create countless of alternate universes and never run out of G4 pony stories that way. I can't wait to see where you'll lead to with this story!
Well. That's quite the contradiction in character narratives to start off. For Spike it's obviously a crapsack world, where he's essentially trained from birth to be a servant for ponies (and potentially other races), and isn't allowed to question or really even think, or grow for that matter. And since dragons can live a long time, he has a long life ahead of them like this if he doesn't break free. Contrast Twilight, who has too much freedom if that's possible, and hence almost no direction in her life as she gets absorbed into book after book after pastime after study.
Given this is an AU and the synopsis, I'm guessing Twilight is neither Celestia's student nor an alicorn in this continuity.
Oh Twilight. Even in an alternate universe you're still a social misfit and neurotic mess. It's a good thing the Great and Powerful Trixie graces Twilight with her noble presence to always give useful life advice in the form of backhanded compliments
. Heck, she may be the only to tolerate Twilight, if Minuette et al's reaction is anything to go by
You may want to reword that, since it sounds like Trixie's pants are running by Twilight. Also, I'm just fundamentally immature so I keep giggling seeing Twilight stutter at the cockatrice and repeat 'cock' over and over again like a broken record.
Twi really does need an intervention. Too bad for her Trixie's really the only pony even slightly close to her to try, and all she can do really is snark.
Fool mare. When first you think you've figured out quantum mechanics, all it turns out is that you've just opened up a new can of worms that turns everything into an even greater headache!
Also, poor Moondancer, getting kidnapped by a dragon twenty seconds after making a revolutionary breakthrough in science. That rather reminds me of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, actually.
“And then, one Thursday, nearly two thousand years after one man had been nailed to a tree for saying how great it would be to be nice to people for a change, a girl sitting on her own in a small café in Rickmansworth suddenly realized what it was that had been going wrong all this time, and she finally knew how the world could be made a good and happy place. This time it was right, it would work, and no one would have to get nailed to anything.”
Followed by the Earth getting destroyed before she can get to a phone booth
Oh look. It's Sweetie Dumb in her full glory
It's rare for me to see a characterisation of Lyra that I dislike. This doesn't break that trend. Lyra is such a goofball and lil shid that we all know and love and the way she and Amethyst Star play off one another is hilarious.
I'm probably one of the few people who actually thrives on seeing Twilight be a full-gallop social misfit. And oh boy, she's got 'social misfit' in spades here, even if she's not quite as bad as Moondancer is. It's entirely worth it having the scene be from Fluttershy's perspective, because when her internal monologue dares to snark, she delivers it hard. Lemon Hearts...will likely nearly scare Fluttershy away, but I guess we'll have another incident to keep Fluttershy from running off and never coming back.
Sweetie Belle actually may have helped that interview along with her more innocent probing questions as opposed to Twilight's probably disaster of an interview style.
Oh dear. There's a lot of inferiority complexes on Team Quantum. Like Twinkleshine's, of course. It makes me wonder what Trixie must do if she's somehow compared an add-on even to the likes of Twinkleshine and the ever-sarcastic Lemon Hearts. Fluttershy's got her work cut out for her...she's probably going to hide in the cubicle inside the cafeteria, isn't she?
Threatening Moondancer's friends would work...if she had any friends
. Well, she does have friends, just not anypony who's going to realise she's gone missing for a few days yet. They'll probably have better luck figuring out that her home is on fire and burned to ashes. Still, now there's a conspiracy
afootahoof!I kind of feel like this would be a more amusing take on Sweetie Belle and Twilight's walk through the evolution exhibits
derpicdn.net/img/view/2012/6/20/11709.png
Yeah, Lemon Hearts sounded like she was singling Twinkleshine at least last chapter. Though I suppose I can't blame Twinkleshine, either. Science simply isn't really glamorous or sexy most of the time, so to have somepony recognise the work you're putting in is motivating. Kind of like when somebody comments on every chapter of a story as he goes, ain't that right
? Poor Twinkleshine. She got her hopes up so much with the guard asking for her autograph, only for her hopes to be dashed 
Minuette and Lyra might not be the most competent ponies on the crew, but they're certainly the friendliest and likely the best for morale. Really though, that's pretty much their canon personalities to a T.
I feel like Ember is the smartest one in the entire room there. Or at least, maybe not books-smart like Twilight Sparkle is, but she recognises all of Twilight's personality flaws and calls out her meekness. Then they get into a weird argument about nature and nurture, because this story hasn't really had a weird tack for direction already, and I sort of feel like there was an odd subtext about epigenetics that wasn't really meant to be written in? Pyre is certainly too weird even for Twilight. Maybe Ember has to tell Twilight to go visit her parents and ask questions because Ember knows if she doesn't say anything, Twilight won't. Because if Twilight did ask questions and her parents indeed were super-special-awesome ponies, that means Twilight really does have a special inheritance that helps her get where she was, even if it wasn't the be-all-end-all.
Also, Sweetie Belle is just dumb.
Those three really are best buds. Even as each one of them gets into a funk or a rut, the other two are around to drag the mare in question back above the water. Well, the end of the chapter might be a funk too big for any of them to handle. On the other hand, maybe Moondancer's disappearance will motivate the three of them to start taking things just a little more seriously and develop as characters.
That...kind of seems a little too coincidental, that Fluttershy just happens to live next to Amber, who was kidnapped by whoever our mystery mastermind is. And that Fluttershy's former boss is some sort of cryptic pony who has a mind like a trap, met Twilight's parents 2 decades ago, and is instantly able to figure out who her parents are just from looking at her fringe. I mean, I can tolerate weird contrivances and stuff so long as they make sense and come together, but it feels like everything is still very loose and hasn't quite meshed together yet.
will this ever see an update?
11863578
Honestly unlikely. It's rare-to-the-point-of-never for me to return to an old public project that's incomplete. That's why I implemented a rule after 2018 that I'd publish a fic only once I'd finished a first draft at minimum.
Trust me, it's better I be blunt with you now than stay silent and accidentally raise your hopes later.
11863594
well, at least you're honest
been going through my tracking catalogue, so honesty is appreciated
nothing quite as depressing as looking over a graveyard of potential