One of my livereaders has been working on his own story for a hella long time. It's an adventure fic and you can find it here:

Broken Wings, Scattered Dust

It's nice and long, but not done yet.

It's at 30,000 words.

I'm in the middle of a TwiLuna chapter.

I have at minimum two more Celestia chapters and two more TwiLuna chapters, and probably one chapter beyond that.

The plot's mostly working fine, theme is not as tight as I would have liked.  But, oh well.

I still need a better title than Main Sequence!

And from now on I am totally imagining dragons having scales like Atheris instead of their silly monocolor ones.

They went down, through abandoned passages and through open caverns, though narrow galleys outlined by spatterings of green.  Finally she was led into a great central chamber, and here at last were other changelings, muttering and rustling around the periphery of the room.  And in the middle Chrysalis lounged on a black throne, watching through slit-pupiled eyes.  “Why, Celestia,” she said in a voice dripping with acid insincerity.  “What a pleasant surprise.”

Apparently, there is such a thing as a Golden Zebra.

I just think that could be the basis for a fantastic MLP character, especially given the herd issues with non-black-striped zebras.  Obviously done poorly it could veer into terrible mary sue territory because the point would be the differentness, but they're also pretty gorgeous.

(This photo is almost certainly retouched)

After much deliberation (which is to say, prodding from my livereaders), I think I'm going to move Apotheosis (and thus the events of its sequel, so I'm going to have to do some editing there) to after the S3 opener.  Obviously I can't put it after the S3 finale, but I think the Luna we see, the few glimpses that we get, does not clash with the Luna I describe.  So I can do that without any real need to edit (I can essentially just replace one line.  'I haven't seen you since ___").

I think overall this has much to recommend it.  One, it spins the hints from S3 opener in a different light.  Two, it give me a far more interesting Chrysalis to play with.  Three, it gives me a more robust Shining Armor / Cadence dynamic, and since I'm addressing gods and things  I can discuss that in relation to the Crystal Kingdom.  If it comes up.

And if I finish this prior to S4...welp.  That'd be nice.

I love her design, I love her style, and I love all the tragedy implicit in her existence.

Apparently I'm not the only one.  I see a lot of Chrysalis stories.  But very rarely do I come across one that rings quite true. I'm not sure why that is - maybe because I have so much headcanon that it ruins my ability to read stories?  But I don't see her imbued with the gravitas, the wit, the panache, the sharp edge that she should have in most stories.  She's deception itself, the ruler of a frankly alien species.  She should be scary, but it should also be obvious why she is the queen (not just by power, but by attitude).

So what are the best Chrysalis' you've seen?

Writing progresses slowly of late, however.  I half-wonder if I'm trying to do too much in Main Sequence, even if the two storylines are essentially non-intersecting.  It's at nearly 20,000 words already and I feel very little has happened.  Ah well.

You know, writing Zecora is difficult?  Writing the Zebra gods, moreso.

So, Princess-Alicorn Twilight.

Did seem a tad rushed.  That was a pretty common issue with Season Three though, but that may be mostly due to it being a half-season.

Lots and lots of stuff here.

Explicit connection of cutie marks and destinies.  That wasn't unexpected (given that it's been alluded to), but interesting.

Straight-hair Pinkie!  I still think she looks better that way.  Also, apparently earth ponies really influence the land they're on.

Finally Celestia sings!  I still want a Luna/Tia duet but I'll take what I can get.  Lots and LOTS of singing in fact, wow.  In some ways I would have liked something super epic, but hey, it's all good!

So Twilight became a princess through revelation.  Friendship = magic; by really understanding friendship she became magic incarnate.  Sure, I'll buy it.  It does make me wonder how Cadence ended up an Alicorn though.

So, is Celestia canonically a goddess now? I mean, that star-plane thing was kind of insane, and the in-universe clip show magic thing was...sort of weird.  Lots of implications beyond what was shown.  Similarly, this is the first time we see them all in full regalia.   Luna has a moon crown, Cadence has a heart crown, Twilight of course has her EoH magic crown.  Celestia has...a generic crown.  That'll generate a lot of fanwank!

This actually addresses something that's brought up a lot in the Celestia/Twilight relationship - the student thing.  You cannot have a single teacher forever, and they covered that very succinctly and directly.  I very much appreciate that.  Though I hope they don't cut Tia (and Dear Princess Celestia letters) out entirely.

...

You know...depending on what exactly that astral plane bit was, you could make the case that Twilight did, in fact, die and was resurrected as a goddess.  And then I can pretend my ideas fit! <.<

So overall - yeah, it was pretty good.  I'm still undecided on how much I actually like Alicorn!Twi - we'll have to wait until S4 for that I think.  After all, it's more about actually working through the consequences and implications well that worries me, rather than the actual fact.  Lots of cameos here (Vinyl Scratch!  Derpy!), lots of backgroundness.

I'm not too worried about its implications for my fanon in the Apotheosis sequel.  I mean, that's explicitly AU at this point anyhow, and it's not too dissimilar thematically from canon. I am somewhat amused by the similarities between my interpretation and the canonical one, but I suppose the theme of transcendence lends itself to certain bits of iconography.

Also, the throwaway line - "it doesn't even rhyme."  That rather lends itself to GhostOfHeraclitus' idea about why Zebras speak in rhymes. Hmmmm.

Inhairitance.  Rainbows run in the family!

And Twilight is still OP magically, if she's casually dragging the others around like that.

In general the episode was decent.  I always cringe at this sort of plot but objectively it wasn't badly executed.

(Although I laughed really hard when RD smacked into the window above Rarity and Cadence.  That was a great gag.)

Arbitrary luck though...I dunno.  I feel that they could have made the resolution stronger if they'd paid more attention to the real inspector (storywise) throughout the ep.  Actually given that she calls the welcomes "phoney-baloney" I think it would have been amusing if she would have just seized the opportunity ("nobody's here to welcome me?  ...welp, day off woo!") instead.  And random-touristed it up in the background instead.

Ah well. It wasn't bad and the justification at the end actually made sense and was professional instead of personal.  I like that!

I felt the connection with Just For Sidekicks was actually very interesting, and even in isolation it works.   I also liked the continuity of, for example, the crystal heart fireworks.

Edit: Oh, and I liked how they portrayed Cadence.  There's not much, I know, but what we saw actually...works for a ruler of an empire that runs on emotion.

http://www.equestriadaily.com/2013/01/ia-ia-twilight-fhtagn.html

So.

I don't so much mind Alicorn!Twilight (though I prefer my interpretation, obviously!), but I am wondering about the status quo issues.  Princess Twilight means...what, exactly, for the show?  Again, if they revert somehow it weakens the whole thing.  This would be better suited for a series finale...which this is not likely to be.

(Unless it is.  Which would be sad.  But also interesting in a certain respect.  Or they could timeskip or whatever, but ANYhow).

Just like Keep Calm and Flutter On, I'm more worried about the possibility of doing this badly.  Keep Calm and Flutter On was...passable.  As I said in that entry, it was just too rushed even if they had it right thematically.   If this one is rushed it could be...quite bad.