Sometimes, watching those we care about suffer can hurt more than anything.

Iron Will doesn't sit down and take pain in stride, though. He's gotta fight back. Like an angry bull. So when the ignorant jerks up at the state capitol decide to be idiots, he has to figure out a way to make things right again.

Only sometimes, there's no perfect catchphrase for the job.

First place entry in the Quills and Sofas Transgender contest.

My entry for the Pride and Positivity event. Please consider donating to one of the following charitable causes:

• Transgender Law Center
• Palestine Children's Relief Fund
• Sewa International (Indian charity collecting funds for COVID relief)

Cover art was a gift from a friend, applejackofalltrades! Thank you so much!

Much gratitude for my fellow Q&S members for their support/suggestions/prereading: applejackofalltrades, themoontonite, Undome Tinwe, The Red Parade, Silvermint, Bicyclette, wishcometrue, The Hat Man, Vis-A-Viscera, and Atom Smash.

Additional editing/prereading provided by ninjadeadbeard, Jarvy Jared, and Arkane12

The ponies of Equestria know Harmony as not just an ideal, but as a force that actively shapes their existence. It guides them through their lives, brings them prosperity and ensures good will triumph over evil most of the time.

However, exposure to it can be unpredictable for those crossing over from other realms. Sufficiently long stays in Equestria can even lead to a change of form to one indigenous to the land.

And those unlucky enough to be slated to become a source of Harmony itself may find themselves unable to leave.

Translation: This fic contains the gradual transformation of a human (male) to a very young alicorn filly.

Set just before Season Five. Non-Earth human and an Equestria that's slightly different.

Cover Art by the talented Mix-up check out his work here: http://amalgamzaku.deviantart.com/

Arcane Word has an unusual profession among Equestrian ponies: a necromancer. After a lifetime of creating characters and telling stories, she's in the perfect position to provide relief to first-generation ponies with holes in their family. For every pony unwilling to ask for Celestia's help to fill in the gaps, she is the perfect pony—she even lives in the abandoned city of Wintercrest, surrounded by appropriately spooky decor. The authenticity of her results were always secondary to the satisfaction they produced.

At least until a particularly troublesome client arrived, flush with resources from Equestria Online's distant borders and megastructure expansion. What would it take for Equestria to bring a pony back from the dead? What about everypony who had ever lived?

Arcane Word could never turn down such a tempting job. The impossibility of the task was only ever a minor setback.

Updates Daily

This story was written for the print anthology of Friendship is Optimal stories I'm currently publishing. Every time I make a print book, I like to include something that has never been published before, this is it. If you'd like to get a copy of the book for yourself, you can order it here: https://igg.me/at/recursive-iterations

Thanks to Bitera and Sparktail for editing. Zutcha did the cover.

A distress call issues from a mansion in the snow-capped peaks of the Crystal Mountains. One of the six young residents is reporting evidence of a changeling among them. The Royal Guard rallies to their remote location with all haste, but they are days away—they have charged Detective Pesco and his apprentice Bluebird with investigating the scene in advance.

There's nowhere to run, and nowhere to hide. Identity is a delicate thing, and the changeling's isn't the only one on the brink of unraveling.

A novel-length mystery (social deduction, closed room, limited suspect pool) with an emphasis on character drama. Entirely original cast split among canonical and semicanonical MLP species: ponies, griffons, reindeer, zebra—and among them, the changeling.

Assumed to take place prior/alternative to the changeling reformation in season 6.

Cover art (one and two) by Rocket Lawnchair.

Many thanks for the catches and suggestions from my beta readers, including: wonderkid125, Miller Minus, mikemeiers, Secret Moon, Majora.

This story is a sequel to The Witch of Canterlot

Sunset Shimmer needs a vacation. She doesn't feel she can really match the accomplishments of the ponies around her, and even though she knows leaving Canterlot is just running away from her problems for a while, maybe it's what she needs to get her head back in the game.

Griffonstone needs someone to save it. The griffons won't ever admit that, but it isn't half the city it used to be. The birds still in town do everything they can to leave, and the whole place is ravaged by terrible gale-force winds.

The earth roars! The heaven howls! The crowds cry out for a hero! Can Sunset really end a curse that's lingered for generations?

There are three of them, all Alicorns living to the desert land south of the Everfree Kingdom, which is the land that will one day be Equestria. They are a family of three: an elder sister and the younger kin she raised long before Celestia and Luna had even been born.

Elinora of the White Flame rules wisely, alone until the others are of age and get their marks. Hasad is charismatic and an excellent mediator. Stellaura is nervous, paranoid, and wants nothing more to be like her brother and please everyone, including herself by overcoming her inferiority complex. All of them have their own wishes for the world.

Only one of them will have their wish fulfilled.

Major spoilers in the comments and groups! The cover art is by turnipberry but was edited by me. Contribute to the TVTropes page!

Lemon Zest is pretty lucky for a pony who just got fried to death, as she scores the one in ten thousand chance a pony has at becoming a ghost. Knowing nothing about how to survive the afterlife, Zest seeks out the guidance of a far older and more experienced specter named Sugarcoat. Fittingly finding herself haunting an abandoned schoolhouse, Lemon Zest will need to learn the basics if she ever wants to be a pro-ghost.
Of course, tuition isn't entirely free, and Sugarcoat will expect Lemon Zest to help her recruit more ghosts to the lonely Shadowbolt Academy.

More stories set in this AU can be found here.

This story is a sequel to Sparkle

Twilight Sparkle has been out to her friends as a mare for a while now, and things have been better than she could have imagined.

But the Grand Galloping is fast approaching, and Twilight plans to attend as herself. Which means coming out to all of Equestria, and by extension, her parents.

Surely there'll be enough time along the way for Twilight to figure out exactly what Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash are to her! Not to mention how to tell her other friends...

Set only a week after the banishment of Princess Luna to the moon, the realm of Equestria is in a state of upheaval. Celestia's royal guard attempt to regain control over the vast empire once ruled by dual monarchs, and the young alicorn's actions as a ruler have become a subject of scrutiny after her sister's attempted coup. Two factions have risen in the turmoil: The Knights of the Sun and The Bright Moon.

Far away from the political infighting and sword rattling exists a small mining town on the outskirts of Equestrian territory. Where once the royal guard would have no trouble fending off raids from bandits or other criminals, the panic of the capitol has caused a withdrawal of military forces to more essential cities and trading ports. Completely undefended and without a spell or sword amongst them, this town was soon overrun by a band of bi-pedal canines calling themselves the Diamond Dogs. As brutal as they are lazy, the Diamond Dogs have forced the local population to work until collapse to collect gems from the town mine.

Outraged by his inability to fend off these bandits and thieves, a young unicorn named Bone Marrow tries with all of his might to find his purpose in life - his cutie mark - and hopes that it will be enough to drive off the invaders of his home. He will soon discover that his special talent is far more than he bargained for.

((A Sequel will begin for this story as soon as I finish I Am a Pet Changeling. Stay tuned on Discord! https://discord.gg/nDXd3AB ))

There are 100 billion stars in the Milky Way, and humanity is determined to explore every one. We send probes, probes with the blueprints to reproduce human explorers upon arrival. Uninhabited worlds the galaxy over can be colonized and populated, until after many years they too can join the vast throng of interstellar civilization. But if a probe is very, very lucky, it will land on a populated world instead. Equestria is one such world.

Even so, it's far from perfect for colonization, not with an environment lethal to human life. But each probe is resourceful and armed with the greatest machine intelligence mankind has devised. If placing a human mind into a newly manufactured human body won't work, it will just have to get a little more creative.

This book has a Hardcover! If you want to pick it up, you can grab it here: https://starscribe.net/

This story was written at the behest of Canary In The Coal Mine, who is sponsoring it on my Patreon. As usual, cover by Zutcha. Editing by Two Bit and Sparktail.

Fantastic prereading help from: Chyre, Danger Noodle, Doctor Disco, and Doggyshakespeare (who also did the Esperanto translation). Thank you all for helping to make this story more readable and more consistent for everyone.