Sunset Shimmer's is happy for the first time in a long time. She's accepted, has wonderful friends, and a life many would envy. Sure the person she loves may not return that love, and yes not everyone forgave the former demon, but that will change.
Unfortunately for young Sunset, that change will destroy her entire way of life.
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Chapters (55)
Calling it now, Tempo is the one whos sending the monsters to 'rewrite' the brainwashing to his own agenda and force Foxtrot's hand. SO he's has justification to 'save' Sunset and mold her into his anti Celestia campaign.
only problem is, Tia is going to retire. lol
This is a dark take on the Elements. Gonna watch this one.
Holy shit this combo
Calling it now: this is a long-con. This Perfect Tempo fellow, by his own words, controls the staff of this facility, and likely is the person who sent the tar monsters to begin with. He told those guys to put Sunset into solitary, and now he's taking advantage of the result.
The other theory, so far, is that we're seeing things from Sunset's position, which has been compromised. The dragon imparted a vision already, what if Sunset never actually was able to "kill" it? So, Sunset is trapped inside the hell the person controlling these creatures has created for her... That at least makes the underground facility make more sense; there's no reason to invest in it unless it's all actually fake.... A counter point to there being no reason is that this Perfect Tempo character wanted them to gather powerful things, under the guise of protecting people, but for his own usage. Dunno, lots of directions. We'll have to see!
Not a single tax dollar? Now, I know that's a lie.
Hmm, Perfect's been there and shaped history. Let's see how hard this goes sideways for the girls once they start looking into him.
Perfect Tempo gives them a little "reason you suck" speech there at the end about trusting Sunset. Good for him.
Sunny, bringing them along is going to turn out to be a mistake, if only because they're going to probably tell Princess Sparkle Butt about this whole thing.
Well I see the Spectacular 7 falling apart faster than a lead balloon.
I'm confused... How can a serious story be related to a silly story?
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did not understand your question can elaborate?
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They are both patreon supported stories that update monthly.
So the limiters, and the blinders, are off. Well, lets see what happens now.
That little bit with Sunset's memory of Celestia berating her maid was heart-wrenching, and yet, made perfect sense considering what we've been learning about Harmony in this world. I'm not surprised that it enforces heteronormativity. In that light, I have a feeling I know what Twi was going to say once the Element's conditioning got scrubbed out of her brain. But, I'll just wait to see if I'm right.
It not they don't trust her. They wonder if she being misled into something that doesn't seem bad at first but is actually bad . People who end up with abusive spouses are that position. And they don't want anything bad to happen to her.
If they want trust they have to give it. Being concerned that sunset maybe getting tricked in to a bad path is one thing but she demon really. Talk about hurtful. After being told to be on their best behavior. They can't keep their mouths shut
Girls...WHY?
Sunset... DITCH THOSE GIRLS. NOW
well yeah, "cutting the bad out" is the goal of most brainwashing. but there is no bad, there's just different facets of a person. cut out one, and you haven't helped someone, you've just damaged them.
that was quite the slaughter. i can't fault them for it, of course. if a man is determined to throw himself on your sword, you're quite justified in letting him.
not much worse than Equestria's. you should be far more disconcerted by the treatment of them by creatures that are on speaking terms with them.
as opposed to her old furniture, which was made by IKEA and was therefore only an illusion.
are they? or were you simply sheltered enough to not experience it? hell, most humans will never encounter that sort of thing in their whole lives, or know anyone who did. it's only because of the free and raid flow of information that we are so aware of it. in a place like Equestria, where information is anything but free or fast, well... it could easily be just as common. more, even.
The guy in the picture is Sunset's older brother, right?
Looks like all the girls got a boost from Sunny's brain being unlocked.
Why do I get the feeling that there's more to Twi's little outburst than just Dash not wanting to go to uni?
So the magic unclogged Twiggle's brain enough to realize she might like Sunset like that.
And, Celly continues to be a silent antagonist. Not sure I like whatever she's planning.
In broad daylight, right by the school? Wow, Foxtrot's getting brazen.
Also, Sunny, your envy is showing.
And so the battle is won. Good to see the girls got out of it without too much damage.
I am very confused. How is there any good will left for Perfect Tempo from the Mane 7? They are suspicious of him but in a ""hes kinda shady" way, when he very blatantly admits to being at leat A, if not THE bad guy.
Also he openly confesses to spying on them. His Organization isnt operating half as well as he says it would, if there is an active information leak on the VIPs hes protecting, well there shouldnt be one in the first place. It is becoming very obvious that Foxtrot is a puppet of Perfect. He seves as the bad guy to bring them all under his protection.
My problem with the story is that is isnt well executed. Perfect Tempo very clearly supposed to be the surprise Villain, but he is playing that role with the subtlety of a a Tank rolling through a mall. I feel the Mane 7 have been hit with the stupid hammer in favor of plot because they have no reason to even trust him a little bit. At least with Sunset it can be played off as her being so desperate for Magic as to not question anything in order to get it. Bt that isnt true for the Entire Rst of the Mane 7.
The only way i can integrate this into my suspension of disbelief is if there is some kind of jedi hand trick stuff at play but its not been hinted at as far as I can tell.
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Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.
Things are rarely quite so simple.
Well now, the girls have resolved to a course of action. Hopefully it doesn't bite them in the butts.
dead? i don't know about that. if she's walking around, talking, thinking... can you really call her dead? that's why they call them undead, after all.
ah yes, the ol' brainwashing elements headcanon. hardly a surprise, though, since I'm not sure how else i could describe what they seem to do that isn't just a fanciful rephrasing of the same thing. any reasonable person should be able to come to the same conclusion if they examine it with a clear and keen eye for but a moment.
yeah, they are right not to trust her. maybe if she gave them the slightest reason to trust her, they'd reciprocate. as it stands, all they can see is her going off to some spooky mansion to be dipped into a pit of god knows what in a machine she even admits she has no idea how it works, and then getting on their case and insulting them anytime they raise the perfectly salient concerns any sane person would have. I'm starting to doubt her judgement myself, and I've been right there with her this whole time.
ah. i see. so she is being brainwashed after all. i hoped for better from Platinum and Tempo, but i can't say i'm surprised. so this was their plan, after all. in retrospect, it makes a lot of sense.
yes... yes! many peculiar things are falling into place now. not everything, but enough that the gaps shouldn't be hard to fill in. i looks forward to seeing what the endgame of this quite well put together scheme will be. and of course how it will go awry, no plan is perfect after all.
yes, yes! tis even better than i imagined! i thought they were going to turn her against her friends, but that was foolish of me. these schemers are smarter than that by far. why turn them against each other when they can make them subservient to her, making it trivial to turn them all to their side in one fell swoop! all it took was implanting some fake memories, a simple matter for ones as skilled in mind magic as they likely are, and they were reduced to simpering sycophants, hanging on her every word. and grateful for it! and with her even more grateful for them "curing" her friends, their loyalties are more solid than even the most ironclad of brute-force enchantments.
my god, they're cunning bastards.
next, i imagine they'll have the one she has a crush on dump her boyfriend and hook up with her, just layer it on as thick as they can. that could be a mistake though. it could be a bit too wish-fulfillment for her to believe, and cause her to begin to doubt her reality. that might even be the thread that causes the plan to begin to unravel, sort of like the first generation matrix failing because it was too nice to be believed.
but perhaps not. i'm no mind mage, so it's hard to say. i'm sure whatever you do have planned will be as satisfying as the rest of this story has been.
I'm starting a series of videos on youtube reading the chapters of this fanfic, the first chapter is already on air.
Interesting that Perfect Tempo glossed over Twilight’s question on injury reflection...
Trouble in paradise for SciSpruce, and a bit of misinformation from Twilight, since if I remember right, she kissed Sunset, not the other way around. Well, regardless, hopefully they get a lead on Foxtrot from this little mindmeld.
Why am i picturing Perfect Tempo as Silko from Arcane?
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white-skinned, black-haired men who wear suits and have a huge underworld business empire... the only difference is that the perfect trades scars for golden streaks in their hair
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No idea if it's true, but it's as logical as any other theory at this time.
ah yes, here we go. like i suspected, they're attempting to ensure her loyalty even further by giving her some wish fulfillment in the form of her crush suddenly being of the same orientation and in love with her, and, judging by the whole "strong and protective" comments, submissive and dependent to her. but why did Twilight run away? is this another part of the scheme, or has their magic faltered somehow?
well of course they've all chosen to stay. how could they ensure that they remain under their thumb if they scatter to the four winds and aren't constantly reinforcing each other's loyalty? they might actually start thinking for themselves if they aren't consistently shamed any time they begin to.
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well, they did just recently go through some significant changes to their minds. sure, they claim that all that happened was removing the brainwashing they had been put through, but... i don't think i need to explain how suspect that is. it would have been so easy to make some small adjustments while they were at their mercy.
you know... that's a good idea, Timber. they can't run forever, of course, but they could lure them into a more favorable arena, maybe do some divide and conquer tactics along the way, and most importantly mitigate the risk of civilian casualties. running really would have been a smart move in that situation.
well now i know she's been brainwashed.
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Agreed.
What I'm really getting out of these is that Harmony = Order = Safety = Conformity = Tyranny.
I want to hope that the plague doctor is exactly what he says he is, but given the flashback we had previous chapter, I have a feeling there's a lot more too it than meets the eye.