29 – Burned Bridges
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Burned Bridges
⠀
⠀
To say that shit hit the fan after Sunset stole the crown would be a massive understatement. Everything had been looking up just the day before, but all at once, everything had gone straight to hell.
To start with, she’d been in Equestria all night. It had been somewhere around midnight when she first went through the portal, then between walking around the Crystal Empire and reading about Twilight Sparkle’s perfect little life, the entire night just slipped away from her. By the time she came back through to the human world, the sun was just starting to rise.
Which shouldn’t have been a problem. Missing a night’s sleep was hardly a concern in the face of everything going on, and she still had three days to figure out what to do with the Element of Magic. But when she came out from the portal, it was nowhere to be seen. Since there had only been seconds in between the crown going through and Sunset going through, her best guess was that inanimate objects travelled through the portal faster since they didn’t require any transformation.
Which was a fascinating idea in and of itself, but it didn’t really console Sunset much in the wake of her crown going missing. As it turned out, Fluttershy had found it and gave it to Principal Celestia, who didn’t even seem to realize that it wasn’t the Fall Formal crown. But since she was only incompetent at her job it wasn’t convenient for Sunset, she decided to not put the recently stolen crown back on display.
Without any way of knowing where it was, the only option left was to win it back. Which should have been easy, considering she was running unopposed. But then Twilight Sparkle just had to follow through the mirror as well, and lo and behold the Princess of Everything Sunset Ever Wanted just couldn’t be kept down.
Sunset had tried, of course. When Twilight announced her plan to run against Sunset, Snips and Snails had filmed her making a fool of herself. Sunset put together a video, which spread through the student body and showed everyone what an idiot her opponent really was. Sunset was positive no one would vote for her, but Twilight Sparkle found a way.
Because no victory of Twilight’s would be complete without tearing apart everything Sunset worked for, she’d managed to reunite the school. Worse, she’d reunited Applejack and her friends, as well as became friends with them herself. It wasn’t enough to have the pony Applejack, Twilight Sparkle needed both.
And since Twilight was just as useless as Cadance, Applejack and her friends were basically pulling her weight. Twilight clearly didn’t know anything about life as a human. Even the dragon that she’d brought along for some reason proved more competent than her; he played the role of a dog perfectly, while Twilight stumbled around on two legs and couldn’t seem to grasp how to use her hands.
The first two days had gone so well. Victory had been practically guaranteed for Sunset on Thursday afternoon, but then Friday at lunch Applejack and her friends somehow turned it around with, of all things, a song. Sunset had watched the scene with glee as it started, thrilled that Twilight clearly couldn’t manage a real plan
But it seemed she underestimated how idiotic the student body was. After only a few minutes of singing and dancing around the room, everyone seemed to change their tone in an instant. Suddenly Twilight Sparkle was not only back in the running for Princess of the Fall Formal, she was looking like the more popular candidate.
Not one to give up so easily, Sunset formed a new plan. If the school cared so much about this stupid dance, then what if their precious little princess was caught messing it up. Sunset told Snips and Snails to cause some damage to the decorations and edited some pictures that incriminated Twilight. That should have settled things, but the universe seemed to have no problems bending over backwards for its favorite pony princess.
The problem was two-fold. One, Flash somehow proved that the pictures were fake – because, of course, Flash Sentry was absolutely fucking smitten with the bitch as well. Why wouldn’t he be? By this point, It was a miracle that Snips and Snails hadn’t switched sides yet.
But that might not be such a good thing. Even worse than Flash’s involvement, when Sunset told Snips and Snails to cause some damage, they apparently thought that meant to absolutely trash everything in sight. Sunset looked at the scene of the dance in horror, wondering how they could possibly think that she wanted the dance canceled after she had put in so much work to win it.
But, of course, the god damn wonder horse came to the rescue again. And this time it wasn’t just Applejack and company helping her out; dozens of people from every clique showed up to get the decorations finished in time. It was sickening, but even Sunset had to admit this was for the best.
“You’re lucky she was able to pull this off,” Sunset told Snips and Snails as they watched in secret from a supply closet. “Next time I ask you to make a mess of things, try to show a little restraint! I need this Formal to go on tonight just as much as she does.”
Students were casting their votes as they left the gym, and Sunset had no doubts as to whom they were voting for. She closed the door as they left so that no one would see them.
“So... what are we gonna do now, Sunset?” Snails asked.
“There’s only one thing left to do. I will get that crown, no matter what.”
“Do you think they’ll still vote for you after that?” Snips asked.
“It doesn’t matter. If they won’t make me their princess, then I’ll just get the crown from the princess herself.”
“Uh, do you really think she’ll give it to you?” Snails asked. “She went through a lot of effort to win it.”
Sunset clenched her fists. “She got carried by those other girls. Twilight Sparkle is useless on her own.”
“I don’t know, Sunset. I think she’s doing –” Snails was cut off by a harsh glare from Sunset. He held his hands in front of him as he corrected himself. “I meant, uh, yeah! She’s the worst!”
Sunset scowled for a moment more before opening the door to check if the coast was clear. Everyone seemed to have left, so she left the door open as she turned to Snips and Snails. “Twilight will give me the crown, because I’m not going to give her a choice. The dance is in a few hours, so go get dressed up or something so you two can blend in, then meet me in the courtyard.”
“What do you want us to do at the dance?” Snips asked.
There wasn’t a whole lot for Twilight to care about in this world. After all, she’d only spent a few days in it. But she’d stupidly brought the dragon, and that could give Sunset some leverage. “When Twilight’s getting crowned, you two are going to steal her dog. Make sure she sees you and bring him to the courtyard.”
Snips and Snails exchanged uncertain looks. “Don’t you think that’s going a little too far?” Snips asked.
“Oh, we won’t hurt him. Twilight is going to hand over the crown, so there won’t be any need for that.”
“If so say so, Sunset…” Snips said.
“Trust me, I know her type. She doesn’t have it in her to make hard decision. Now go get yourselves ready.”
The two of them usually ran off in a hurry to follow her orders, but this time, they left with some reluctance. Still, they left, and Sunset knew she had to make the most of this time. Truthfully, she didn’t trust something so important to the two of them, so she knew she’d have to find something better to threaten Twilight with.
There was no telling what would possibly be helpful, but unless Twilight cared deeply about sports equipment, Sunset wasn’t likely to find anything in the gym’s supply closet. She took a look around anyway, mostly because she didn’t know what else to do.
When nothing of interest popped out, Sunset left the closet. The gym was decorated and ready for the Formal, but it was empty. There was nothing to do in the gym either, so Sunset left that as well. She had no idea where to go, but she knew that there was no point in staying where she was.
Her thoughts on what to do next were derailed as soon as she walked out of the double doors. Someone was waiting for her out in the hallway, and aside from Twilight Sparkle herself, it was probably the last person Sunset wanted to talk with.
“Sunset Shimmer,” Applejack said. “Can we talk for a second?”
Sunset pursed her lips and didn’t look at her. “I don’t think we have anything to talk about.”
Applejack sighed. “Look, I get that you’re still mad about me not talkin’ with ya a few weeks ago, but we do have something we need to talk about.”
Sunset started walking down the hall with no particular destination in mind, and Applejack followed. She debated just refusing to answer, but she never could manage to keep her mouth shut when Applejack was around. “No, we really don’t. I’m not stupid, I know it’s over. Twilight won and I lost.”
“Yeah, you’re right about that part.” Even now, Applejack didn’t sound like she was gloating. She had every right to, but she didn’t. There was something else in her voice, though, and Sunset couldn’t place exactly what it was. “Which is why I’m not here to talk about the dance. I’m here to talk about you.”
“There’s nothing to talk about there either.” Sunset knew she should just ditch Applejack as soon as possible, but it seemed that even now, she couldn’t bring herself to get rid of her when she wanted to talk. “How’d you find me anyway?”
“Had a hunch you’d stick around to see what happened. Then I saw Snips and Snails slinking around, and I knew you wouldn’t be far.”
Why did she even bother with them? Those two couldn’t even leave the gym without drawing attention. “Yeah, well, congratulations on figuring it out. But I’m not gonna trash the gym again or anything, so you can run along to your precious little friends. I’m sure they’re waiting for you.”
“Nah, I told them I’d catch up with them. They’re all off gettin’ gussied up for the dance. Don’t reckon they’ll miss me none, at least not for a while.”
Sunset sighed and turned to face Applejack for the first time. That same thing that Sunset had noticed in Applejack’s voice showed on her face, and Sunset realized it was resolve. It seemed that Applejack had come to talk about something serious, and she wasn’t liable to leave until she’d said whatever was on her mind. “What do you want?”
Applejack inhaled and looked off to the side. She may be resolved to talk about whatever it was, but she clearly didn’t know how to talk about it. “I, uh, talked to Twilight about somethin’ mighty interestin’ earlier.”
“Oh yeah? What, you catch on that she’s not even a student here? The fact that she’s even allowed to run is a joke.”
“Well, that was part of it, kinda…” Applejack nervously adjusted her hat. “The thing is, well, she told us about where she’s from.”
That stupid little bitch. It wasn’t bad enough that she was insufferable, she had to go and keep proving that she got everything Sunset had ever wanted without so much as the smallest trace of worth. What had she seen in the past couple days that so much as hinted that this was anything but a god awful idea? All Sunset could do was feign ignorance and hope she wasn’t already incriminated. “And I care because…?”
“You already know, don’t you? About the pony world?”
Sunset forced a laugh as she looked around to make sure they were alone. “I gotta tell you, that’s literally the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard you say.”
“Sunset…” Applejack placed a hand on Sunset’s shoulder, and she knew it was over.
Sunset looked down at the floor and resigned herself to whatever was coming. “So what’d she tell you?”
“About you? Nothing. She didn’t have to.” Applejack let go of Sunset and placed her hands on her hips. “I got to wonderin’ if you’d put up such a fight if ya knew how important this crown was to her, and that got me to wonderin’ why you wanted it so much in the first place.”
“So? I’ve been collecting crowns for the past year.”
Applejack nodded. “Right, that’s what I thought at first too. But I couldn’t help but think there was somethin’ more. It took a little while, but then it hit me. When we were little, you came to my farm to see a pony.”
No one had brought up that day in years, and Sunset would’ve been happier if no one ever brought it up again. True, it would settle into her thoughts regularly, but that didn’t mean she had to talk about it too.
“That was a long time ago, but I think I remember you insisting that ponies and horses were different. And I definitely know ya don’t have any family in this world. In fact, I remember you sayin’ ya didn’t know if your parents were alive or not, which would make a lot of sense if they aren’t in this world. Now, I may just be one of those country folk that aren’t very bright, but it wasn’t too hard to figure out that the two of you might come from the same place.”
Sunset hadn’t even noticed balling her hands into fists, or clenching her teeth, or tensing her muscles. At some point, every part of Sunset’s body had gone rigid, and it was only when Applejack stopped talking that she noticed it.
Sunset closed her eyes and forced a deep breath. When she opened them again, she looked directly into Applejack’s. “Equestria,” she said as calmly as she could manage. “The place Twilight and I come from is called Equestria.”
“Equestria.” Applejack nodded, and Sunset knew that she believed her. For the first time in her life, someone believed her about Equestria, and it was Applejack. “Now, here’s the part that really worries me, Sunset. Back in middle school ya told me that you’re afraid of horses, as well as some other stuff that makes me wonder about you.”
Sunset grinned, if only to hide whatever other emotions might work their way into her face. “I did say you didn’t really understand me.”
“Yeah, yeah ya did.” Applejack scratched the back of her head. She looked away for a moment, then looked back with concern in her eyes. “Sunset… have you been stuck here this whole time?”
Sunset already couldn’t manage to keep up her uncaring grin, so she folded her arms and looked away. “Why do you even care?”
Applejack placed a hand on her forehead. “Jesus, I can’t even imagine what that must’ve been like. And you’ve been here since way back when we were five?”
“Seventeen.” Sunset wasn’t sure why she was telling Applejack anything. She didn’t like talking about herself or about Equestria, but she couldn’t stop now that they were on the subject. “I was seventeen when I went through the portal. It made me a kid again, I don’t really understand it.”
“Really? So then wait, how old are you?”
Sunset hung her head and laughed. She hated thinking of that question because the answer was so complicated. “Seventeen? Twenty-nine? To tell you the truth, I just don’t fucking know anymore. It all kinda blurs together, especially since it fucked with my brain chemistry too. It’s pretty hard to feel like an adult when you have the body and mind of a child, no matter how many years you’ve been alive.”
“And ya haven’t told anyone about any of this, have you?” Applejack asked. It was phrased as a question, although she clearly already knew the answer.
“I tried once. Didn’t work out for me.”
Applejack reached her hand out towards Sunset. “Sunset, I –”
“Stop.” Sunset stepped away before Applejack could touch her. “This is just like when you found out I lived at an orphanage. You want to pretend like now that you understand me, you can just come into my life and make things better. Well, you don’t understand me, Applejack. And you have no idea what you’re dealing with.”
“You’re right, I don’t understand.” Applejack shook her head. “But you’re wrong about me thinkin’ I can make things better. I know I can’t, and I know that what ya been through ain’t an excuse for what ya done. Because you’ve been horrible to everyone at this school, especially me and my friends. And to tell the truth? I’m still pretty damn pissed off about all that.”
“So then why are you here? What do you want from me?”
“I don’t know. I guess I want you to realize that what happened is in the past. Yeah, it was awful and ya probably didn’t deserve it, but there’s nothing ya can do about that now. What you can do is stop taking it out on people that had nothing to do with it! You could at least stop messin’ with Twilight since you know that crown is really hers.”
Sunset felt her muscles tensing up again. “Oh, I’m sure she spun quite the story about that! She probably told you all about the great things she’s done, and how she’s Princess Celestia’s favorite, and that everypony just loves her so much!”
Applejack took a moment to answer. “No, uh, she didn’t mention any of that. Although I gotta say, you’re not really making your case sound any better here.”
Sunset scoffed. “Whatever. It doesn’t matter, anyway. Twilight won, so this whole thing is over.”
“Don’t be like that. Look, I meant what I said about being angry at all the stuff ya done, but I am tryin’ to understand. So talk to me. Tell me your side of the story.”
“No. This conversation is over.” Sunset turned away, but cast one last look over her shoulder. “And you were too late, anyway.”
Applejack didn’t try to follow Sunset as she walked away. She still had no idea where she was going, but she didn’t care anymore. She just needed to get away.
So Applejack knew about Equestria. So what. In only a few more hours, Sunset was going to have the crown, then none of this would matter anymore. Not this world, not this school, and definitely not Applejack.
Just a few more hours. Everything would be over soon. Even if Snips and Snails failed, Sunset would find a way. Twilight had to return through the portal eventually, Sunset could stake it out. She’d figure out a way to get the crown, she had to. The crown was the only thing that could fix things. There was no other way.
“And what will you do when you’re back in Equestria?” Sunset’s voice asked her.
Sunset looked around, but she was alone. With no mirror to appear in, the demon could only follow her as a voice. “I… I’ll figure it out.”
Her voice spoke from within and around her, both a part of her and apart from her. “Do you think Celestia is just going to welcome you back, just like that? Face it, she likes Twilight better than she ever liked you. Why else would she share the secret to becoming an alicorn with her when you were the one who deserved it?”
“I know, but… She’ll understand, she has to. Somehow, I’ll…”
“You’ll never be her faithful student.” The voice was right behind Sunset, although she didn’t dare turn around to see. “But it’s okay. We don’t need her anymore anyway. Just get the crown, and we won’t need her anymore.”
“No.” Sunset bowed her head. “I’m not going to do anything to hurt Celestia.”
“Fine. Have it your way for now. But, Princess? Look behind you.”
Sunset was terrified of what she’d see, but she turned around. She couldn’t help it, she had to know what would be there. But there was no demon, or anything else to scare her. Just one red flower, poking up through the floor.
There was no need to examine it, but she did anyway. Just as she thought, it was a lycoris. Sunset looked around until she saw another. She knew how this worked by now; the flowers formed a trail for her to follow.
And Sunset did follow them. She never liked what she found at the end, but she followed every time.
The trail was hard to follow at first. There would be one flower, and then Sunset would have to look for the next once she reached it. But as she kept going, the flowers grew in number. A dotted path began to form, then a steady stream of red. They grew in the floor and on the walls, leading her through the school.
She knew she was nearing her destination when she heard the sound. It also started small, but grew louder the closer she got. It was a pulsating metallic sound. Like something was inside one of the lockers. Like something was trying to break through.
Before Sunset even had her locker in her sight she knew what it was. A box was locked away inside, one that Sunset had always done her best to ignore. It was trying to break through.
Sunset reached her hand down as she walked, feeling the soft flowers brush against her palm as she approached her locker. The vibration was strong enough that she could see the door rattling. She calmly dialed the combination on the padlock and pulled it off.
She brushed the blood-red flower petals off the box and opened it. There was only one thing inside: a heavy brown book with a red and yellow sun on the cover. Leaving it at school had been supposed to make it easier to ignore, for all the good that had done her.
Once Sunset pulled it out, It vibrated one more time in her hands, and then stopped. Everything was deathly still as Sunset stared at the book, trying to decide if she should trust it. It had vibrated so many times before, but there hadn’t ever been a new message in over eleven years. Still, she opened it every time.
Sunset placed her hand on the cover, but stopped short of opening it. “No.” She tossed the book back into the locker, causing a loud thud in the otherwise quiet hallway. “You had your chance. For years, you had your chance. But now? Now you’re too late.”
Sunset closed the locker and walked away. She heard the sound of her own laughter, from both within and around her. And Sunset smiled along with it. Her only regret was that Princess Celestia couldn’t see her now.
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I want to see an AU of this where sunset has her magic.
8605569
Ah, sorry for the super late reply. I’ve been so caught up in racing the clock to get this story finished on time that I haven’t really had the chance to sit down and give any kind of decent length reply.
Ayway, I can see where you’re coming from. I don’t agree with you on her being a boring character in the movies, but to each their own there. I do agree with the fandom side, although I haven’t had as hard a time finding stories where she’s a flawed character (I’ve certainly seen the fics where she’s perfect, but I’ve also seen plenty where she isn’t). Rather, when authors do give her flaws, I see people justifying them in the comments as if she was completely right no matter what she did, which is what bothers me.
I’ve written Rainbow and Sunset having problems in other fics, and it often comes down to interpretation of what loyalty is, I think. Without getting into spoilers, there was some drama that went on between Sunset and one of the mane six, and Rainbow sided against Sunset. She was being loyal, just to a different person. Aside from that example, loyalty isn’t blindly following, and if Dash interprets something Sunset does as disloyal, I think it works well for her and Sunset to have issues. Plus it just fits her personality, if not her element
I guess this is the only thing that gets me, and I don’t even actually disagree with it really. Sunset is awful, but it sounds more like you’d rather see her suffer for being bad than see her actually try to improve herself. I definitely think she needs to earn that, but the bad things that are happening are a large part of what has her on an a downwards spiral.
8616885
That could be interesting. Athough it could just tip the balance a little too much in Sunset’s favor
8616924
I was thinking more , ah, earlier parts.
8616937
Ah okay. You’re not the first one to bring that up, actually. I think it sounds like it could be very interesting, especially with Sunset’s earlier doubt of all things Equestria.
8616967
Especially when she first came out, perhaps a surge would be fitting?
Missing a period at the end
I feel like the beginning of this chapter has too much tell and not enough show, but I guess since we've all seen it in the movie it's just a summary to connect the scenes. I hope we get to see more of Sunset's thought processes and inner turmoil in the reformation scene.
The extra scene between Applejack and Sunset was nice.
8616983
Yeah, that’d be cool. lol now I want to see someone write an AU prequel where Sunset has magic, there’s a lot of places that could go.
8617041
I agree, I’m not thrilled with it either. I decided to go with that because I figured it would be boring for readers to see the same scenes over again. Even if I could manage to make Sunset’s inner thoughts amusing by poking fun at the silly plot, it would ultimately be a lot of stuff we already know. Adapting the scenes that I have adapted has also made me realize how unfitting my dialogue is with the movie’s (and not just all the swearing lol), since I’m fairly wordy and the movie is constantly rushing past plot points. Basically I only do it as a last resort because I never actually like those parts of the story
But after this, everything should be smooth sailing. This chapter is easily the most rushed part of the story, since it covers like 80% of the film in its first thousand words. And I have something interesting planned for the reformation scene, no worries there
Thanks for the correction, and I’m glad you liked the AJ scene 
8617168 Weird how we're kinda okay with Kim Possible being good at everything, but not Twilight. But my last comment still stands.
I think the series has been stuck keeping Snips and Snails around for a long time.
8617181
Hmm, I can't say much on that one. I did watch Kim Possible a bit, but I haven't in a long time and I didn't watch it that much even back in the day.
8617205
I'm okay with them whenever they pop up, but I can only think of one time I've ever seen someone do something particularly good with the characters (that being Glitter Shell). They're pretty much out of this story by now, which I'm quite alright with
What is the sequel to this? I want to continue reading, and if I'm correct, this is a prequel.
8617422 Eh.
8617429 The sequel is the first Equestria Girls movie.
8617429
I made a bad call early on and wound up writing stories out of order (I had a plan that justified why, but it was very dumb and basically I just made a novice mistake that I’m still trying to correct), so sorry for this mess of an answer.
That question is unfortunately a little complicated
This story is the earliest story in my Who We Become series. but a major part of the problem is that this story’s direct sequel isn’t actually written yet. It’ll be the next thing I write for the series, but that doesn’t do a hell of a lot of good right now. There are a decent amount of other stories in this series already, and several of them involve Sunset after Looking Glass, but the next step for her hasn’t actually been written yet.
Ignoring the gap in the timeline, there are still a few answers as to what story is next, depending on what exactly you’re interested in. The next story chronologically is By Blood or Choice (which actually happened some time between act 1 and 2 of Looking Glass), but that doesn’t involve Sunset in any way; it’s about pony Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash as teenagers in Cloudsdale and explains why they moved to Ponyville. That’s a oneshot side story, so even if you decide to read the series, that one could be skipped without missing anything important. The next major story is Inner Strength, which takes place after Looking Glass. It also doesn’t heavily feature Sunset, being about pony Twilight and Fluttershy, although she is a minor character in it via conversations with Twilight through the journal. So neither of those stories are really sequels to Looking Glass despite being in the same universe because different characters different world.
Warmth in the Snow is the story after Inner Strength, and that one is about Sunset. Just a heads up; It’ll involve spoilers for Looking Glass’s proper sequel, if you care about spoilers for a story that hasn’t been written yet. Warmth in the Snow is another optional side story, written as a Christmas special a few years ago (so hey, right time of year). And finally, Finding Home is the next major story to feature Sunset, and it absolutely spoils the hell out of Looking Glass’s sequel (tells how the story will end, basically). But it’s another novel-length story about Sunset and what she does after LG, so it’s probably the closest to what you were looking for.
In summary, read:
By Blood or Choice if you want the full story of everything and everyone.
Inner Strength if you want the main story and are interested in all characters.
Warmth in the Snow if you want a short story about Sunset a few years after LG (and don’t mind spoilers for the unwritten sequel).
Finding Home if you want the next major story with Sunset (and don’t care about spoilers for the unwritten sequel).
Sorry this is such a mess, but hopefully I was clear enough to not leave you confused
Soooo... I still can't read the next main stories of WWB because spoilers for a sequel to LG. Ok, I'm not reading much pony atm, I'll wait.
Thanks for the chapter.
Its demon shimmer's time to shine!
8617864
Ah yeah, that’s a very good point. lol I’d certainly take this idea over more high school dance shenanigans.
And nice
I knew you’d read a good amount of WWB stuff, but I didn’t realize you’ve read everything 
8618229
More Applejack can never hurt
And you could read the next main story, Inner Strength, without worrying about spoilers if you want to. The next story with Sunset would involve spoilers though (still kicking myself over that, but only one more fic and the whole issue will finally be fixed).
8618437
Demon Shimmer’s gonna shine, while everyone else gets burnt to ash
8619101
Kingdom Hearts was actually exactly what I had in mind when I mentioned having reasons for telling the story out of order. KH is my favorite game series, and I wanted to play with releasing stories out of order in the same way that KH does it. But while I feel that the only proper way to experience KH is by playing the games in the order released, I don’t feel that way about WWB, personally. I kinda get the feeling that I was trying to do something that was above my experience level when I intentionally left the gap, and I think that any benefit I could’ve gotten from it is mostly lost by telling readers the ending of the time-gap story in Finding Home.
With Kingdom Hearts, for example, we know what happens to Roxas when we first get into 358. So the main point of 358’s story is exploring his relationship with Axel, which was only touched on i KHII, and telling us Xion’s story, which we knew nothing of. With my time-gap story, everyone pretty much knows everything already
There’s enough to explore that I still want to do it, but I would do it differently now.
But I’m not trying to convince people not to read ahead, I just want people to know what’s up if they do decide to do that.
8619169
It can come down to a matter of opinion, and of course people can decide to read in any order they want. I like to consider authorial intent when stories are told out of order, and if it wasn’t for the gap, my preferred way for people to read the stories would be chronological, starting with Looking Glass. C. S. Lewis had the same view on The Chronicles of Narnia, in that he later expressed the opinion that the stories were better if read chronologically, starting with “The Magician’s Nephew”, rather than in the order they were written and published, which would be starting with “The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe”. Reader opinion differs on which order is better, but both are viable. With something like Kingdom Hearts or Star Wars, the intent was never to read/play/watch them in chronological order, so there’s no reason to question which to start with.
I think another factor here is skill level. Tetsuya Nomura told Kingdom Hearts out of order, but he was already an accomplished storyteller when he did that, and he did it to great effect. I told WWB out of order, but the more practiced I become at storytelling, the more I feel like I just made a mistake. To me, filling in the gaps and recommending people read in my preferred order is just fixing an error I made due to lack of experience.
But not everyone will see it that way, and that’s totally fine. If people prefer to read in the order I wrote them, then I won’t try to sway them. If I felt really strongly about it, I could’ve taken the later stories down temporarily or something, but I really don’t.
From this chapter (fourth paragraph in):
I know the first few paragraphs are basically running through the film's plot in order to get to the meatier Sunset/Applejack conversation, so they're necessarily a but rushed, but I'm having a hard time parsing the second sentence here.
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I'll definitely see about clarifying that bit. I've been planning on going through the whole story once it's finished and I can look it over as a whole to look for things like and improve them. If I haven't addressed this by then, I'll definitely keep this section in mind while I do that.
Yeah, I see how that's worded poorly now, thanks for bringing it to my attention
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Having read a bit further along, I'm very glad it was resolved quickly. Rather then drawing it out for a very long time. It's more "oh, well he's a dick". And while yes it does affect her and her future actions, it doesn't become a defining point, like it could have easily been. Only on chapter 14 so far but I love it and can't wait to read everything.
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So, essentially the sequel that has anything to do with this is not out yet?
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Well, the direct sequel to Looking Glass hasn’t been written, but other Sunset stories (so thus stories connected to this one) has been. Basically, Sunset’s storyline would go Looking Glass→unwritten sequel→Finding Home. Finding Home is complete if you feel like reading that, but it’ll involve spoilers for the unwritten sequel (although you won’t need to know the story of the unwritten sequel to understand it by any means).
8621384
As in this Finding home?
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Nope, this one
Well, all caught up now.
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And lol I did thoroughly enjoy that cliff hanger a couple chapters back, not gonna lie 
Lol well you were
So Applejack was smart enough to piece together what Twilight told her about Equestria and link it together with Sunset. Good for her
Too bad it won't do any good besides at least explaining some of Sunset's attitude, since it's pretty clear Sunset is suffering one hell of a sanity slippage right now. Not too long before the denouement of this piece.
I do have to wonder what Applejack was thinking when Sunset revealed she was _29_. Certainly, the brain chemistry probably messed up her mental development, but as far as actual time lived, she's still 29.
I could almost feel her frustration and anger in the first few paragraphs.
Good on Applejack for being so perceptive, their conversation was great. Even after all that Shimmer has put her and her friends through, she hcan still put her anger aside and not give up on her. The Sunset/Applejack interactions have been the highlight of this story.
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Sounds fun, but quite confusing. The story is probably better off without it, ultimately.
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I'm less happy with those first few paragraphs. Summarizing the majority of the movie rapid fire like that never really sat well with me, but I couldn't think of a better way to do it at the time. Oh well, good to know that her frustration and anger came through well, in any case.
Sunset-Applejack interactions give me life, glad you're enjoying them
Haha yeah, that's probably true
Okay, this may be my favorite chapter yet. I absolutely love the scene between Applejack and Sunset, and then the scene at the end is just... damn. It's fantastic. I love this story.
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That's interesting, it's possibly my least favorite of the fic. I do like the Applejack scene a lot, and Sunset hallucinating is always a lot of fun, but summing up the majority of the movie into a few paragraphs rubs me the wrong way. Anyway though, glad you liked it
Need a little something here, perhaps 'when' would fit.
Need an a! Or could be plural, to make hard decisions! I'm helping, really!
It's hard to admit to faults of your own. It's harder still to see a path onward when you're shrouded in darkness. Also I was right about that comment of mine about burning bridges earlier. Dang I'm good. And hopefully Sunny will see the chance to be too.
The parallels between the convo her and AJ have near the end and the convo they had like.. i don't even remember, a few chapters ago? Immaculate. Sunset really said “let me spin your own words on you.”
And I have always loved the little motif type thing you have going with the lycoris
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The lycoris go away for most of this story, having been in the beginning and coming back around this point. And while I think it works nicely as an effect, it's literally because I forgot I wanted to use that motif when writing the middle portion of this fic lmao. I probably would've used them in her middle school years, but yeah, just forgot to rip
Sunset L
sucks not being hte protagonist huh?
damn those orphans are really incompetent!
hoowee this looks a lot worse in the context of this more realistic depiction of human children
it’s joever…
given the math, like thirty or something
hey that’s the number of this chapter!
oh good so it wouldn’t be weird for her to kiss Applejack right now, whew!
oof well that is not how she ends up!
yay the licorice is back
aww i wonder what would’ve happened had she opened it!