Part Three
Doctor Ulric Chia smirked down at the S.M.I.L.E. agent kneeling on the floor in chains in front of the raised platform that held the central control to his machine. “Ah, finally. The elusive spy that has been hindering my operations this whole time. It’s good to finally meet you, Agent…”
The spy straightened up, meeting his eyes with an unflappable expression. “Bonds. War Bonds.”
Doctor Chia paused. “...truly? That seems a little on the nose, doesn’t it?”
“I won’t deny there were certain expectations growing up.”
“Ah yes, speaking of expectations…” The villain tilted his head expectantly.
“You won’t get away with this!”
“There we go. You will find, Agent Bonds, that I will very much get away with this. You will find it quite easily, considering that you are going to have a front-row seat.” Doctor Chia paused again. “Now would be the time to ask me to explain my nefarious plan, you know. I’d be happy to, really. The machine needs a bit more time to power up and I’d hate for you to spend your last moments of freedom in awkward silence.” He paused again, looking over the good twenty pounds of chains. “Well, relative freedom.”
The agent tilted his chin up defiantly. “I’ve already uncovered your scheme. You plan to bounce a gigantic hypno-ray off the surface of the moon to enslave everyone on the continent to your will.”
“Awww, no! Who blabbed? Come on, I thought we had this whole thing going on!” Doctor Chia gesticulated wildly, whining a little. “Really, who else am I supposed to gloat to about this? My minions? They built this thing! We have weekly meetings about the status of the evil world domination plot! I can’t just hold a speech to a bunch of mindless hypnotized slaves, it’s just not the same.”
“There will be no mindless slaves!” Agent Bonds glared at him, squirming a bit in his chains.
“Oh?” Doctor Chia leaned in. “And who is going to stop me? You?”
“What? Of course not, don’t be daft. I’m quite chained up down here.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Oh yes, completely immobile. Quite expertly, I might add, just tight enough to be uncomfortable but not so much to be mean. I have to commend whoever did this.” Agent Bonds wiggled a bit to demonstrate.
“Oh yes, that was probably Jim, he says he used to be a magician’s assistant… no, wait, no! If you’re not going to stop me, then who else is?!”
“That would be me.” The buxom blonde overseeing the console straightened up and turned around, gloved hands taking off her wig and sunglasses.
“An infiltrator! Impossible!” Doctor Chia paused. “Another infiltrator, I mean. Not to disparage the skills of Agent Bonds earlier. Apologies, I tend to get distracted.” He gasped dramatically. “Impossible! You’re–! ...I’m sorry, who are you?”
“Chrystine Fey, although you might know me as Agent Queen.” Chrystine tossed her dark green hair and posed with a hand on her hip.
“...doesn’t ring a bell, sorry. I mean, you’re a secret agency, you can’t expect every villain to just coincidentally have a list of your most relevant agents.”
Chrystine tapped her foot, glancing over at Agent Bonds. “And this guy was a threat enough to send out two teams?”
“Eh…” Bonds tilted his head back and forth lightly. “He’s very good at HR and delegating.”
“My apologies, the tangents.” Doctor Chia shook his head. “What did you do with Miss Moneypincher, fiend!” He paused again. “And what did you do with her dehydrationator, for that matter? Really, that thing was quite expensive to make and ah there it is.”
Agent Bonds rubbed the blood back into his wrists, looking between Agent Bishop towering over him with the gun in question and the small silver cube that used to be the steel chains. “You realize that dehydration doesn’t work like that, right?”
Tyrek raised an eyebrow. “Do you want them back?”
“Magic, not physics. I’m good.” Bonds held up his hands, standing up and stepping back.
“Well now, this isn’t going to plan at all.” Doctor Chia pouted, pulling out his phone. “Test test, ahem… GUARDS! TO THE MAIN CHAMBER!” He paused, tapping his foot a little impatiently before looking at the three agents again. “Give them a minute. It’s a big facility, they should be here any moment.”
There was another few seconds of silence before one of the doors opened with a soft whoosh, a single sharply uniformed guard marching out a few steps before coming to a stop with a salute, futuristic rifle at the ready.
“Excellent, excellent! Well, 2.3 percent of excellent. Where’s the rest?”
The guard paused, blinking and looking around in confusion… and then froze, twitching lightly before he fell over like a tree, thin cords at his back still connected to the taser held by the small figure of Agent Rook.
“Sorry about that, must’ve missed that one. I swear one always slips by.”
Chrystine tapped her foot. “Was that all of them, then? Can we finally wrap this up?”
Doctor Chia sputtered a little before straightening up and pulling out a key. “Fools! Even if you have defeated all my henchmen, you can’t stop my Infinite Moon Spiral Reflector Cannon without the emergency key!” He blinked, looking down at his empty hand. “Oh right, Miss Moneypincher had the Larceny Gloves on her, didn’t she? Well, you still don’t have the secret password necessary to oh no wait, I told you that one twenty minutes ago, didn’t I? Well, there’s still… no, that was a different secret lair. Hmm…” He paused again, thinking for a moment before looking up sheepishly. “I’ll profess, this is a little embarrassing. I swear this doesn’t usually happen.”
Agent Bond patted him on the shoulder, putting him in a pair of handcuffs before leading him off. “If it helps, you were really quite sporting. Definitely one of the most accommodating evil mad scientists I have worked against.”
“Why yes, naturally. It wouldn’t do to be impolite just because you’re nefarious. You know, my mother always said…”
The three remaining agents watched them disappear into the lair until Suzy piped up. “So… we’re done here, then?”
Tyrek cracked his neck. “I’d say so. Someone else can take this whole mess apart. I think that guy has a partner with a whole crew at base for that stuff, Municipal or something.”
“Don’t know, don’t care. Let’s go, I’m starving.” Chrystine shrugged and headed down towards the nearest door, leaving the other two to catch up.
Suzy grinned. “Well, it’s my turn to pick! I think I saw an Ukrainian restaurant in the town we passed through on the way.”
Tyrek snorted. “You know, some people will get concerned over your weird obsession with horse-meat-based dishes.”
“So? What are they going to say? We’re humans now, it’s cultural or something.” Suzy waved off. “Besides, you don’t hear me complain when Chrys drags us along every time she sees someone sell fried crickets, or all the money you spend ordering yak steaks and lizard-on-a-stick.”
Chrystine smirked, showing a hint of fangs. “What can I say. It’s a taste of home.”
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One day of story outlining.
Six weeks of procrastination.
Twelve hours of writing crunch.
49 seconds submitted before the contest deadline.
#thisishowiwriteeverystory
#onthewikipediapagefor"horsemeat"at11pmwhilewritingmlpfiction
Reveal, Analysis, and then Future!
I didn't expect this result.
I wonder what the humans thought about this.
Okay first, that was a lot of fun. The Agents of SMILE are such a bunch of characters. My only disappointment is not having much time for them to bounce off each other in a group.
Second, Doctor Chia reminds me of SRMD in A Miracle of Science. Mad Science is a memetic infection with a particular script, and if you manage to use it to talk them down properly they’re usually quite relieved to be stopped before they start babbling on about their next big idea.
Yes!
YES!!!!
10488532
Honestly, I don't think the average human will notice anything off... or at least not more than with half of the other, 'regular' members of S.M.I.L.E.
They're
basically Team Rocketall kinda weird.10488661
I did my best to have the three human counterparts play off each other a bit in the first chapter, but I think having all six of them in a single scene would've gotten a bit confusing before long. That, and the contest was about alternate counterparts meeting so I focused on that part.
Doctor Chia is pretty much just a dork. Well, that and a stupid anime reference/pun.
10488688
Yesssss
10488714
An excellent dork!
I think Agent Chrysalis was my favorite for her attitude, but I LOVED Agent Tirek’s interrogation of his counterpart.
And Agent Glow... I think her plan of abducting an alien spaceship with a magic wormhole is great! I wonder if there were diplomatic ramifications, or will be...
Hmm, the genie engine, what a fun and terrifying idea. Even if you can’t reach outside of the device itself, I’m thinking you could make one with a (small) omnipotence chamber for your ten seconds of being Discord. Like ten feet or so. Which is still alarmingly useful actually.
Aww, that's it? I need more! This is too good to end this quickly!
I don't even have to read this to know that it's awesome.
I still will though.
I really enjoyed the original “Smile” fic, and as such I was overjoyed to see a sequel to it. The EqG version of the trio are a delight to read. I particularly enjoy the way they absolutely destroy the Mean Three by pointing out how half-baked their plans were.
I would have like to have seen the Smile agents interact more with the ponies, but what we did get was golden. Agent Chrysalis is still hilarious; I liked that we see her interact with her counterpart, while showing how different they actually are.
Hope to see more!
Aw man, this was delightful! I loved the banter between the Equestrian and Human versions throughout the fic. 10/10 would read again and hope for more content!
Also, this might be me reading into things a little too much, but since Tirek mentioned he dabbled in carpentry, did he make Cozy's desk, which is why she wanted to protect it so badly? It'd be adorable if that were the case!
Nice. :D
Thanks for writing!
10489547
That was exactly the intention there and I'm really happy someone picked up on it. Not just the desk though but also that bench in the gym. I'm glad that it did come across as adorable as intended and not just contrived.
10489147
I do still have plans for some prequel episodes someday. At latest when FOME does his next contest, I suppose.
10489149
You know it's awesome but only if you read it will you know how awesome exactly.
10489452
I'm really glad the sequel lived up to the original. That was honestly my biggest concern.
10489576
Thanks for reading. And commenting.
10489588
:)
10489583
Oh, nice! Thanks. :)
Well, I liked it. As much as I liked the prequel. But I cannot help but feel there is A LOT of missing content berween ch 2 and ch 3.
10489620
Being fair, it's a big ask of River to write the interim content in the 49 seconds he had to spare. :P
What a courteous and thoughtful mad scientist! A good sport and a great manager. The world would be in far greater peril if there were more folks like Dr. Chia around.
Brilliant expansion of the prequel, especially what you did with human Cozy. Always nice to see a positive outcome for these three. (I hesitate to use the term "good.") Thank you for this, congratulations on beating the deadline by the skin of your teeth, and best of luck in the judging.
10489620 10489643
Well, part of it was the deadline but mostly it's the fact that there really is A LOT of content between those two chapters; at least several months but more likely a few years.
10489723
From the inevitable spin-off:
Dr. Chia: "A S.M.I.L.E. agent?"
Agent Bonds: *puts on fedora*
Dr. Chia: *gasp* "Bonds the S.M.I.L.E. agent! My apologies Agent Bonds, I'm not terribly good with faces. Is the hat new? Very snazzy."
Add that one to the list of best lines ever.
10489903
That was one of the first lines I wrote when I was still outlining this story and it's still one of my favorite lines.
This was pretty amusing! ANd why does Human Cozy Glow kinda remind me of Washu from Tenchi Muyo
10490125
Never seen that one, but I can't deny every character in this story is full of tropes.
Glad you liked the story.
10490106
It's been a while since I read the prequel.
10490139
your welcome! And as to Washu shes a literal Goddess (pending on which tenchi universe it is) and is thousands of years old, and her lab is in a sub space pocket (acceable from a closet door), and she can pretty much science anything XD
I couldn’t believe it when I first saw this, a sequel to my favorite EQ story!!! 👀
They continued their friendship to the human world and loving it, ohmygosh yeeesss.
They’re agents now, omg!
I love the characterizations of every one. Everyone is so spot on, I love them. I don’t know how else to express it, I just really like it. 🖤
Hahaha! Well, that was not the Chapter 3 I was expecting, but it was hilarious in its own way. I also would have liked to see more of the characters interacting, but I do understand the time crunch factor, and this was still a heck of a lot of fun. Thank you!
10490269
Thanks for the enthusiastic comment, I'm happy you liked this sequel as much as the original story.
10490277
We might someday see more of the two groups interacting, but honestly it wasn't just the time-crunch involved here. The time-skip was more or less planned in that way from back when the contest was first announced; if I'd gone past that first day and initial, establishing interaction chapter, I would've had to either rush through the rest of it in a montage or pick one or two other specific days/events/interactions before skipping the rest and go into the final chapter anyway.
Hey, thanks for writing this. I was one of the judges on the original contest, and that story was my top pick of all the entries. I feel that, on the basis of that, I kind of owe you an honest review, but have been deliberating for the last half hour over whether or not to say anything.
You left that comment about procrastinating for six weeks and getting this done at the last minute, though, so I'm hoping this will be useful for you rather than negative and sad.
So, uh, I think this one needed more time. Time in planning, time in execution, and time in evaluation. I think the most obvious aspect of that, for me, was that this felt rather disjointed, and the ending rather rushed. Like the key character moments, of them actually evaluating their lives and deciding to try a new path, happened unseen, and so we were left more with the before and after without the crucial process in between. Just in terms of characters used, the first chapter is much more about Sunset and Twilight than the others, yet those two then don't turn up for the rest of the story. And the last chapter spends more time on the OC villain and hero than it does the Equestrian trio, or indeed the EG trio. Which, yeah, left it feeling disjointed for me.
I think, though, there's something of a flaw in the premise, and I think a bit more time at the planning stage might have helped iron that out. The main joy of the predecessor story was watching Tirek and Chrysalis reinvented for this new context, and how familiar bits of themselves shone through. And the secondary appeal was just how brilliantly the two characters worked together and played off each other. I don't think there were any scenes they weren't both present for?
And the issue for me with this story is that both of those selling points are kind of shot down by the premise itself? For starters, we've already seen Tirek and Chrysalis in the first one, so their twist on the canon characters isn't anything new anymore. Indeed, by far the most interesting character here was the human Cozy Glow. Furthermore, rather than the EG characters showing us little hints of how they're different versions of their canon counterparts, here they're directly contrasted with them, which makes them feel more distant. Less like reinventions of the Chrysalis or Tirek we know, and more like OCs unrelated to those canon characters, because said canon characters are right in front of us doing all they can to show how different they are from the SMILE team.
I mentioned that the other thing I really liked in the first story was Chrysalis and Tirek together, and, again, I think the premise here rather shoots you in the foot in that respect? I think the only scene they were both in was the opening one, along with Cozy, Sunset and Twilight, so they really didn't have many moments together. I think perhaps with more time to plan, you could have found ways around that. I wonder if perhaps it might have worked better had Tirek been the one to talk with Chrystine, and Chrysalis with Tyrek? Insight from people who are straining to see a glimpse of the person they're friends with under all the bluster and villainy, interplay between two sets of the main characters, and perhaps more of a focus on the show's theme of friendship (if a little less of what the contest aimed at, but then maybe the contest is wrong
).
In writing, too, I think more time might have left you able to tighten it here and there? While I did laugh a lot at the Adagio line, I'm afraid that was about the only part I really laughed, when I remember the previous story being full of little witticisms. Which are here, definitely, but they feel a little subdued in comparison? So I wonder if some more time for finetuning might have served it a bit better?
I say all this in the hope that it might help you fight off some procrastination next time. We all do it, and you've written about 8,000 more words in the twelve hours leading up to this than I have in the twelve weeks before, all because of procrastination. So I hope next time this might poke you into starting it with two days to spare rather than one, because I think that's all it would have needed.
I should also say that most of my criticisms here come from comparing this story to its predecessor, which is probably unfair. I'm afraid the previous one is why I read this one, and I can't get the comparison out of my head.
I will end with some positives, because there were some bits I really liked. Sunset's embarrassment in the first chapter was great, as was Chryssi's line right before the title appeared. The carpentry, and how the other two valued Tirek's creations, was a lovely touch. I will admit I only got the significance of the wooden furniture items from the story comments. And I googled some things trying to work out that pun and got nowhere, looking forwards to hearing what it is, though, when someone gets it, because it sounds great and I like that you've put that much into setting it up (just saw you posted the answer in another comment - niiice). Cozy Glow is a tough one to translate to being human, but I liked your take on her, and her approach to being good or evil was pragmatic and refreshing. You can buy horsemeat at markets in France, if it helps, but I don't know of any traditional French dishes that use it. I really did like the shipping line, that was definitely the highlight for me. And I agree with your assessment, that's something Chrysalis would say when sincerely trying, and I'm not convinced it'd have the desired effect.
I hope this isn't too dispiriting to hear. I haven't read any of the other contest entries, but I'd guess this is still one of the best ones.
10491100
Thank you for the comment. I'm... honestly probably not really great at implementing constructive criticism, because I have a somewhat uncommon writing style and tend to be stubborn about it, but I do appreciate it nonetheless. The bit about procrastinating less is definitely fair, but the whole disjointed style was how it was already planned six weeks ago so I'm not sure how much it would have changed in the end.
I think there's three main reasons for most of the problems you brought up. The first one is, like you said, the whole contest premise of alternate versions of a character meeting; so focusing more on the interaction of the Agents like in the original story would've meant moving further away from the goal of the contest.
The second one is entirely on me, namely the fact that I haven't written more in this series yet. If I'd already had a few more stories or chapters with those two/three agents as the main focus, seeing one story without the main focus on them probably would've felt a lot less jarring. It's still high on my list of things to write next, but considering I haven't published anything for about a year before this I probably shouldn't make any promises as to when I'll put out more of these.
The third reason is that there was a lot more dialogue and exposition in this story than in the previous one. The original story had the huge advantage of playing on the sidelines of the canon movies and specials, meaning that there was a whole lot of action and content without me actually having to write most of it out; so I could had a lot more room for jokes and character development that had to go into setup instead in this story.
Of course there's also the possible fourth reason that my writing style involves a lot of leaving details between the lines and implied, so that always plays into it as well. It's what I think I write best though, so I can't say if going more into detail actually would've turned out for the better. I'm really bad at writing flavor text a lot of the time.
Still thank you very much for the review. It's absolutely appreciated and I'm happy that you still liked the story despite some of its flaws. I absolutely understand and it's fair to say that it doesn't live up to its predecessor because, quite frankly, I'm not sure any of my other stories do. That one was probably my magnum opus and this is just one of several medium opuses.
(P.S.: I'm German and horse meat was always something I associated with East Europe, so I just picked Bulgaria at random. It's probably part of French cuisine, too, but then again they eat way weirder animals than horses so I don't think the association would've been quite as obvious there.
)
My internal reference-o-meter says "dig here".
I knew by the time I made it through the intro that this would be a fun read, and it didn't disappoint. Well, almost didn't disappoint. The last chapter, while amusing in its own way, almost seems better suited to be part of another story, rather than the end to this one. I think you could have gotten away with working on reforming (well, to the extent that they would ever be reformed) the three villains and leaving it there to slightly better effect.
I haven't read the prior story to this, though it was happily entirely accessible and no less amusing, I think. I'll have to toss the other story onto my RIL stack.
And a couple of specific gripes from earlier in the story:
Perhaps I am crazy, but we don't have images attached to our birth certificates, at least in the US. I certainly wouldn't expect those images, if they did exist, to be up-to-date. Perhaps you had in mind some other form of identification?
This makes me sad.
10493703
I'm not from the US and don't travel much in general so I was just going for a random official-ish prop without thinking about it much. I'll admit though that a birth certificate probably wouldn't have the picture of an eight year old on it. I still have no idea what would fit better instead though.
Also, your sadness is warranted. I am very ashamed of myself.
Ah, a sequel!
I like how the SMILE counterparts dealt with their Equestrian selves. Also, that ducking DuckTales reference! Loved it!
I don't want to diminish the awfulness of pony Cozy's magic drainage scheme, but having her be put in her place by her human counterpart was so much fun. You can really tell the difference between the two after that.
Great job!
10500795
Glad you liked the story and thank you for the comment.
Now to find a way to bring back the Rescue Rangers cameo in the next sequel.
Hi there again! I finally got around to reading, and I am happy to see another entry in the Mr and Mrs SMILE -verse of things.
Expanding on the premise of the old story for the new contest was fun. It's an interesting way of having characters who would normally be too tied up into themselves or in their own head or too stubborn to change undergo reflection by meeting their very reflections.
The joy of AU! One gets to see 'what if' and in this case the AU is canon and in-universe.
I particularly did like the one on ones and I giggled at some of the interactions. I particularly liked Cozy leaving the gun in the open just to see if Suzy would pick it up and try to shoot her with it. The key part of the trio is that they are not redeemed, lovey dovey per se but just different paths of our villains.
Though I have to admit that the story is like getting a feast of possibilities and only getting a chance at a couple of bites at it! Ironically I read the first two chapters and though. "Oh that's neat I wonder if they will make a sequel." because I at first thought it ended on chapter 2. Then when I saw the comments I went back and read chapter 3 and it felt like reading a different story. I might have actually preferred a more ambiguous end at chapter 2. Not that Chia wasn't a delight, but I want more in-the-moment stuff
It's not so much a complaint, its just that I think you could write 50k words with these six. Yes yes, my pouty comment is of course "Hey write more" which is probably not helpful on an entry to a contest you only managed to squeak under the wire (I know the feeling though.)
Though if you couldn't write more, then perhaps 10491100 's suggestion might be something to consider for next time or another story with a cast like this. To mix up who was meeting who between chapters. Or having the Equestrian trio meet at the end and talk it over as a Coda to what they learned. Or an EqG Tirek and Chrysalis sharing drinks (with Cozy and juicebox) having their own convo with themselves about themselves. Just some ideas to spitball out a few.
But I am happy that you sound like you are interested in writing more stories in this verse. If you can get over the procrastination devil that beleaguers all of us. I'd adore a non-contest story where you can put out a big meaty fic in this setting from start to finish
10504678
Thank you for commenting and I'm glad you liked the sequel as another fun take on the characters. I do have to give credit to FOME for these prompts spawning these stories in the first place.
Cozy was fun to write, especially since this was her first appearance (for both versions of her, as far as my writing goes). There's definitely a lot of stuff here that I had to leave out but honestly I still feel like I've put in the most interesting parts... at least as far as I had ideas for. I haven't yet figured out ways to possible continue between chapter two and three without slowing the whole story down considerably. Also possibly that it'd be best to have some more of the background of S.M.I.L.E. established before bringing it into that.
There's definitely a lot more to write, both before and after this story. You're definitely free to complain about that and I hope it'll get me to finally write that prequel sooner rather than later. Not sure if it'll be big and meaty or more of another anthology like the first story, but we'll see.
I liked it.
I'm dense - can someone explain the vacuum pun to me?
10533415
It's The Cold Vacuum Of Zpeis.
Can I get a reference to me in the sequel?
No, Spirit.
what the hell XD
11163793
Glad to hear you like it.
The three/six were a lot of fun to write.