Essays Index
Remarked Timelines series: Part 1 - Overview | Part 2 - Sombra | Part 3 - Chrysalis | Part 4 - Nightmare | Part 5 - Tirek | Part 6 - Discord | Part 7 - Flim & Flam | Part 8 - Wasteland

The Sombra timeline:
Much like in the prime timeline, Dash initiates the race with Dumb-Bell and Hoops to defend the honour of Fluttershy. Fluttershy still falls to the ground and briefly meets the animals, and the race goes on uninterrupted for a while, but Starlight interferes by using telekinesis to hold Dash in place and force her to lose. Dash is confused and unaware of what is happening to her, and never even sees Starlight herself.

In the prime timeline, the bullies didn't even believe Dash's claim to have performed the Sonic Rainboom, which was a far more visible event than one unicorn's telekinesis; no matter how much Dash tries to explain to the other foals, everypony believes that she choked in the race. Her social standing and confidence in flight camp are affected by this, making her doubt even herself, and thus Dash also challenges Dumb-Bell and Hoops far less from then on. Those two, in turn, only get more sure of themselves as a result, and are inspired by their success to reach much higher than they otherwise would've.

From here, Dash goes on to lead a life not too dissimilar to the one she led in the prime timeline. Both her and Fluttershy get their cutie marks later, and end up in Ponyville as before. Dumb-Bell and Hoops, however, lead very different lives. In particular, Dumb-Bell puts his strength to use as a Royal Guard instead of pursuing an athletic career like Hoops, drawn to the service by pegasus culture's general admiration for the military.

Dumb-Bell is strong for a pegasus, and so distinguishes himself in the Royal Guard, becoming a great fighter. This gets him noticed by Shining Armor, who decides to recruit him for the team that he is assembling to face Nightmare Moon.

Dumb-Bell is one of several stallions who joins Celestia as she faces her sister for the first time in a thousand years, and he fights with admirable skill. However, Dumb-Bell is still an unintelligent brute. While Celestia specifically orders the Royal Guard team to pull their punches and help her take Nightmare Moon alive, Dumb-Bell disregards this when Nightmare Moon briefly appears to be winning. He goes all-out during the fight, and Nightmare Moon is accidentally killed.

With her sister dead, Princess Celestia becomes distraught and withdraws from public view, going into a long period of mourning. Dumb-Bell is court-martialed, and Princess Cadance steps up as temporary regent of Equestria. While this puts strain on her relationship with Shining Armor, the two of them still plan to get married, but decide to postpone the wedding for a while until such a time as Princess Celestia is feeling better.

However, the death of Luna had other consequences. Just like in the prime timeline when they transferred to new bearers, the Elements of Harmony are no longer connected to Luna after her death, and so they go through a similar kind of reset. The spells keeping both Discord and King Sombra contained are broken, and it is now only a matter of time before both return.

As in the prime timeline, Discord returns first after soaking up enough ambient chaos magic to escape, but this time he refrains from throwing Equestria into total chaos. Not being completely heartless, and having known both the sisters personally, Discord takes pity on Celestia and instead leaves Equestria alone for a while, claiming that initiating a new age of anarchy at this particular moment would be in bad taste. The fact that he owes his freedom to Luna's death also stirs conflicting feelings in Discord, which he goes to contemplate in private.

At this point, the Flim Flam Brothers enter the picture. Having been planning their move for a while now, they take their completed Super Speedy Cider Squeezy 6000 to Sweet Apple Acres during cider season. Just like in the prime timeline, they challenge the Apple Family's way of doing things, calling their methods outdated, and touting the superiority of their modern machine. The rest of the Apple Family are still prideful, and intend to defend the old ways in a direct contest, but in this timeline, Applejack spent somewhat longer in Manehattan before she returned, and picked up some slightly different values.

Applejack convinces her family to let go of their pride, and to enter a business arrangement with the brothers rather than risk the farm for no good reason. Granny Smith, Big Macintosh, and Apple Bloom are all uneasy about this, but trust Applejack enough to go along with it. This begins the long and gradual process of the industrialisation of Sweet Apple Acres, as Flim and Flam stick around to invent many more such machines, all intended to revolutionise agriculture. Over time, these efforts bear fruit, and Flim and Flam expand their business empire.

Elsewhere in the world, unnoticed by anyone, Tirek escapes from Tartarus when Cerberus briefly leaves his post.

Equestria at this point remains peaceful and unsuspecting, and so Queen Chrysalis still lurks in the shadows, waiting for a chance to strike. However, her moment is slow to come. With Princess Cadance now acting as regent and under heavier guard, Chrysalis has no opportunity to replace her, or to get close to Shining Armor to sabotage him. But despite her disadvantages, Chrysalis has still been infiltrating Equestria for years, having sleeper agents all over Canterlot and even within government agencies. She thus feels confident enough to attempt an attack regardless.

Chrysalis makes her move, first launching an invasion on Manehattan to draw Shining Armor away from Canterlot, and then attacking Canterlot itself to target Princess Cadance. Celestia is roused from her inactivity by the event, but has limited ability to fight off so many changelings at once, and both princesses are defeated. While Shining Armor's forces fight their way back towards Canterlot, the city is briefly conquered and occupied by the changelings, with only small pockets of resistance fighting back.

Rescue comes from an unexpected source, as Discord returns to Canterlot. With enough time having passed since Luna's death, he feels better about screwing with Celestia, and so enjoys making her beg for his help. She does so without hesitation, and with her blessing, Discord casts the changelings out of Canterlot with one mass teleport, scattering them across the planet and leaving only Queen Chrysalis remaining in the city. She is quickly taken into captivity.

Discord sticks around the palace afterwards, soaking in the admiration of the citizens, who now regard him only as a hero, knowing nothing of his history. He also lords over the princesses and Shining Armor, annoying them as much as he can get away with, but still holding back on starting a new age of chaos just yet. Celestia hopes to use the opportunity to reform Discord, as she has always wanted to do, and begins spending time with him. The two talk a lot, and Celestia gets some much needed emotional catharsis from the experience, finally beginning to make peace with Luna's death.

Shortly afterwards, the Crystal Empire returns, bringing King Sombra with it. He attacks the Empire and takes back both his throne and the Crystal Heart before the Equestrian government can respond, as Princess Cadance is still needed in Equestria, and cannot go herself like she did in the prime timeline. Celestia tries to convince Discord to go for her and stop Sombra, but Discord habitually rebels and leaves the ponies to their fate, having no desire to risk his own life or become Celestia's puppet.

King Sombra, once back in power, begins experimenting with his dark magic again, and puts his slaves to work on mining metal and forging weapons and armour. In short order, he is able to form his crystal pony slaves into a vast army, and supply them with all the equipment they need to conquer Equestria. Compelled by the mind-control spells weaved into their magical helmets, the dark army marches south for war. Her hoof forced, Celestia finally returns to the throne to lead her nation against the onslaught of the Crystal Empire.

Sombra's impressive army and early successes in capturing unsuspecting northern settlements quickly gain him the admiration of certain other parties. He soon finds himself gaining new allies in the war. Lord Tirek comes out of hiding to throw in his support for Sombra, becoming one of his most loyal and deadly soldiers in exchange for permission to drain the magic of the defeated Equestrians. Meanwhile, the Nightmare Forces also reappear, allying with Sombra out of their mutual admiration for fear and darkness. With so many new friends, Sombra begins making fast progress with his southern conquests.

The turmoil engulfing Equestria feeds Discord, but he is still displeased by the regimented and orderly military operations, to say nothing of Sombra's practice of slavery and mind control. Disgusted by the state of affairs, he begins to entertain the idea of actually dealing with Sombra himself, but he continues to act aloof around Celestia to save face until he can get her to beg him again. At first opportunity, he agrees to help, all while feigning reluctance, and then heads north to put an end to King Sombra.

Discord fights hard and ruthlessly against King Sombra and his allies, and is able to deal no small amount of damage to them, especially the Nightmare Forces. However, being a wielder of order magic, Sombra is actually able to harm Discord in battle. In a typical display of hubris, Discord does not consider King Sombra a real threat, and his arrogance ultimately leads him to a violent death. Discord's body is sent back to Celestia with a message, while Tirek consumes his magic.

In the aftermath of this event, Tirek begins to gradually descend into madness, acting more and more unstable. Having consumed Discord's very soul, including the Fundament of Chaos itself, Tirek begins to lose his mind, overcome by Discord's personality. As Tirek slips more and more into his Discord persona, King Sombra eventually decides that he is no longer worth the risk to keep around. Sombra murders Tirek in the night, losing one of his best fighters in the process, but sparing himself a potential disaster.

With Equestria in a state of crisis, Sunset Shimmer finally sees her opportunity. From across worlds, she returns through the Crystal Mirror and approaches Celestia. With the princess at the end of her rope, Sunset intends to extort Celestia for what she believes she is owed. She offers her help in the war effort, promising to devote her talents to saving Equestria from King Sombra, and in exchange, she demands that she finally be made an alicorn princess. Although angry, Celestia is no less desperate than when she begged for Discord's help, and so she agrees to grant Sunset her wish, but only if she wins the war.

Together, Celestia and Sunset gradually transform Equestria into a war machine. The Protective Pony Platoons run a large civilian recruitment campaign when their current forces prove to be inadequate. Equestria's industrial sector diverts its support to the war effort, the extremely successful Flim Flam Brothers and Sweet Apple Acres included. And along the northern border and east coast, the Equestrian military finally begin to slow Sombra's advance.

Not long after Sunset Shimmer's return, the plundervines sprout after a thousand years of being dormant. Just as in the prime timeline, they kidnap two alicorn princesses, this time Celestia and Cadance, and strangle the Tree of Harmony. Sunset makes an effort to stop the plundervines herself, but is too late to do anything about it. The Tree of Harmony is killed, the captive princesses are released, and the plundervines wither away and die in a matter of days. Discord's plan, one thousand years in the making, is finally executed, and Harmony in Equestria is officially dead. But at this point, it hardly makes any difference at all.