On the Fine Art of Giving Yourself Advice

by McPoodle

Credits & Acknowledgements

The first credit and acknowledgement is to my editor, Hope, who spotted some truly egregious logic errors and instances of characters being wildly out of character. Thank you so much for your time and enthusiasm.

The fourth generation of My Little Pony, Friendship Is Magic was created by Lauren Faust. Since I’m largely pulling from the flashback versions of the characters depicted in the episode “The Cutie Mark Chronicles”, I’m giving equal credit to M.A. Larson, writer of that episode. My Little Pony: Equestria Girls was created by Meghan McCarthy. The comic book story that introduced the freshman versions of the human characters was written by Ted Anderson, so he gets half credit for that.

I think it’s pretty clear which characters belong to which franchise. The fact that an earth pony named Raven is Mayor Mare’s assistant while a mostly-identical unicorn named Raven is Princess Celestia’s assistant is never explained in either series or comic, but I’m not the first to imagine that Raven is more than she appears: “Raven” by SaintChoc made her immortal, while Raven as a composite being is from “Inkwells Across Equestria”, by Keyslam. The following characters are original: Kolbe (Kolbe!). The future Prince Blueblood’s father and mother. The explorer Baré. Gnosi Augur and Meridiem Tempest (taken from my earlier fan novel Equestrian Business). Professor Flattery. Muck Tarbell. Fast Clip. Gilda in the Equestria Girls setting. Everyone associated with Human Rarity’s adventure. Cat Lulamoon. Dr. Oath. General Farrago. Jeremiah and Thomas / Tom and Jerry. Ms. Pansy. “Somnia.” Mrs. Pizzaz. Archbishop August from Equestrian Business. Lunch Pail. The wolf characters. Chef Gallop. Drs. Teeter and Totter. Gus Guiseman from Equestrian Business. Jeff Bellamy. Gabe, George, Bonnie and Rex. Truth Delver from Equestrian Business. And Mustang Sally. Everybody else is the property of Hasbro.

Any differences between existing characters in canon and my interpretation should be due to this being an alternate universe, but if you think the characterization sucked despite that fact then yes, you can definitely blame me for that.

Moving on to the notes by chapter... These are all from the blog posts that went with each chapter so if you read those, you’re done.

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Prologue: A Change of Plans (P. Celestia, Sunset Shimmer)

The character headings, and why they’re in the chapter names

Unlike most uses of character headings I’ve seen on this site, they are not used to delineate multiple first-person perspectives, because I don’t really care much for first-person writing. Instead, I’m using a third-person limited perspective, where we look over the shoulder of the named character, and are privy to their thoughts and their thoughts alone.

Perhaps more for my own amusement than for any other reason, I color each section with the personality of the named character: the “P. Celestia” section should feel like something (Princess) Celestia the pony might write about herself if she used the third person, while the “Sunset Shimmer” section is colored with Sunset’s characteristic snark and her anger. The way I think about it is this: It’s decades into the future, and somebody is writing a book (this book) about the fateful events of these three days. He (me) interviews all of the characters to get their stories, and even gets to borrow some diaries. He then makes the character sections read like they had been written by each character in the third person.

Why are the character headings in the chapter titles? Because this is a complicated story. There are more than a dozen main characters, and the plot intercuts between all of them. I don’t know about you, but if I were reading this story instead of writing it, I would be guaranteed to start reading about a character who hadn’t done anything in the past five chapters, and find myself completely blanking on what this character was doing. If you’re like me, those character headings in the chapter titles will help you go back to catch up on characters you’ve forgotten about. Just be warned that some of these character sections are ludicrously short.

What’s with the “P.” in “P. Celestia”?

This is one of the notes I put in the story description: “P” stands for “Pony”. We’re dealing with pony and human versions of most characters, and you’ll need to keep track of which one is which. For characters that switch bodies, the initial is going to follow the mind around, not the body.

That’s another reason I’m using character headings, to keep track of which counterpart we’re dealing with at any particular moment.

Day Zero

The mirror portal will only be open for three days. This is the day before the portal opens.

Whinnyfield and Vinny

These are the two ponies in My Little Pony The Movie who were guarding Songbird Serenade—I’m imagining that they were royal guards before they became private bodyguards and that Whinnyfield in particular was the guard captain before Shining Armor. (Or maybe there was somepony between Whinnyfield and Shining Armor. I haven’t decided yet.) The two characters were inspired by the characters played by Samuel L. Jackson and John Travolta in Pulp Fiction, Jules Winnfield and Vincent Vega. Vinny is also a little bit Travolta’s character from Welcome Back, Kotter, Vinnie Barbarino, because I sort of see Vinnie Barbarino in all of Travolta’s characters.

Kolbe

Hermann Kolbe (1818–1884) is one of my primary arguments against immortality.

Before his thirtieth birthday, Kolbe was one of the principal founders of the science of organic chemistry, pulling it out of the Dark Ages and establishing the basic rules for how to build organic molecules from scratch.

After his thirtieth birthday and for the rest of his long life, Kolbe used the position of power he had been granted to fight tooth and nail against the advances of the younger generation, such as Kekulé’s theory on the structure of benzene or van’t Hoff’s theory about asymmetrical compounds. He was the editor of one of the leading journals, and not only refused to publish their work, he also put columns in the journal violently denouncing these ideas and personally insulting the authors. Kolbe had to die before these advances could be accepted by the academic community.

Kolbe sucks.

Prince Blueblood the Diplomat

Twilight’s contemporary Prince Blueblood was made into a diplomat in the comics.

My general rule on the canonicity of comic material: I’ll accept it if a) it’s not directly contradicted by broadcast or theatrical material and b) it doesn’t mess up the neat idea I just had for the story.

I’ve used the idea of Blueblood’s male ancestors all being named Blueblood in multiple places, including Equestrian Business.

Baré

Jeanne Baré (1740–1807) was the first woman to circumnavigate the globe. She did it by disguising herself as a man in order to accompany her lover and employer Philibert Commerçon, the naturalist for Louis Antoine de Bougainville’s 1766–69 voyage.

On the subject of teleportation, it seems to be a strong fan-held opinion that only the strongest of magic users can do it: Celestia, Luna, Twilight Sparkle and Sunset Shimmer. I’m dealing with that theory by having this character limited to line-of-sight teleports, with long rests in between.

Sunset Shimmer’s title

I’m not sure if Sunset had a canonical title with Princess Celestia corresponding to Twilight’s “most-faithful student” moniker. I decided to go with “most-remarkable student” here, but I’ve seen plenty of other candidates in fanfiction.

Raven as Celestia’s confidant

Hey, I needed sompony for Celestia to exposit to.

Raven is a background character in the series and even when she shows up in the comics, her personality is dictated by whatever the writer of that issue needs her to be.

The chronology

This story makes four assumptions: 1. Time passes differently in the pony and human realms when they aren’t connected by the mirror portal: 30 months between openings on Equus, and 6 months between openings on Earth. 2. The future Mane Six were ten years old when they got their cutie marks. 3. Their human counterparts were 15-year old freshmen in high school at the same moment, which is the moment they first met. 4. Sunset crossed over to Earth in the fall of her freshman year.

These assumptions are based on a chain of logic that has some very weak links. If I was going for the most-likely chronology, I likely would have ended up with different assumptions, but these four give me the story I wanted to tell, so I’ll go with them. I will now waste your time by listing these links:

• Sunset left Equestria for Earth on the same day that Twilight became the Princess’ student. This is based on the line in Equestria Girls when Twilight claims to have no knowledge of Sunset’s existence before the start of the movie. The “Fall of Sunset Shimmer” comic story showed a filly Twilight in the background of a scene, about the same age as when she got her mark. Anything more accurate than that is an exercise in artistic license. Logically, Sunset must have used the portal on the last possible moment of the third day in canon, so that there would be no way she could be pursued by the Princess or a guard volunteer. This is an alternate universe, based on having her go on the first day instead.
• Sunset arrived on Earth and immediately became a freshman at Canterlot High. The final panel of “The Fall of Sunset Shimmer” shows her arriving at the school looking about the same way as she did in Equestria Girls. So therefore she went straight to school at Canterlot High, as opposed to poking around for a few years first as an adult in a child’s body. I’m going to guess that Sunset isn’t ageless as a human, and teenagers age rapidly. Also, she’s in three separate Fall Formal Princess photographs, so I’m going to assume she won in her freshman, sophomore and junior years—there’s no way she would let herself repeat a grade. I figure she needs at least a month after arriving to become enough of an object of pity to earn the Fall Formal crown. So let’s say she arrived in September, and the Formal is in October.
• The Mane Six got their cutie marks when they were ten years old. This is a pure guess on my part.
• Fifteen years passed between Twilight Sparkle getting her mark and her first visit to Earth. This is not backed in canon so again, I’m just making an assertion that makes the math work out easily.
• The human counterparts of the Mane Six (minus Twilight) all met on the same day that the ponies got their cutie marks. This is documented in another comic story with the confusing title of “Equestria Girls”. This the Freshman Fair. That the two events happened on the same day is of course my assumption rather than anything explicitly stated in canon.
• 30 months pass between every opening of the mirror portal on Equus. The span is stated to be “thirty moons”, with the writers declaring that a “moon” is a deliberately undefined timespan. I’m deciding to make it a month anyway, like everybody else does. Combined with the “15 years” assumption above, this means that the mirror opened six times after the one covered in this story, and the sixth opening is when Equestria Girls takes place.
• A little over 6 months pass between every opening of the mirror portal on Earth. Many authors have had to deal with dating discrepancies when trying to match up events in the two worlds. This is what I’m stuck with in order to line up six mirror openings in fifteen years in Equestria with three years (and a month) on Earth. This is absolutely not supported anywhere in canon.

Now if you’ve read Equestrian Business, you will have an objection: if time is passing five times faster on Earth compared to Equestria, why did the marking meteorite land one thousand years ago instead of two hundred? I’m going to say that the relative flow of time between the two realms varies. It’s five times faster on Earth now, but at some time in the past time passed faster in Equestria to keep the two worlds from drifting too far apart, so overall 985/997 years have passed in the two worlds since Nightmare Moon was banished.

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Day 1, Chapter 1: Nervous Breakdown (P. Twilight Sparkle, H. Twilight Sparkle)

“H.”

Stands for “Human”.

The filly who ran out crying

Fire Flare, the unicorn who was easily talked into becoming a breedist by a disguised Chrysalis in “The Summer Sun Setback”.

Trixie’s backstory

Largely invented for this story. Some parts (like having no magic and being Twilight’s best friend) are a part of the alternate universe of this story, and are not meant to be true in the original timeline.

The four unicorn examiners

This will be on the test.

The other test

Getting rings out of embedded objects is a standard magician’s trick.

Twilight being shoved into another universe by the magic mirror during her entrance exam

I borrowed this idea from a few different fanfics, including Star Trek: Phoenix by Dewdrops on the Grass.

Human Twilight’s neighbor at the science fair

This is Puffed Pastry, the chef character from Spring Breakdown and Sunset’s Backstage Pass who keeps having run-ins with Pinkie.

The Coriolis force

Responsible for controlling the direction the water goes ‘round in your toilet. And absolutely nothing else, if you go by the number of internet references.

The clay put on Twilight’s horn to cut off her magic

This is “cork”, a magic-blocking substance that I nicked from the very old fanfic “In Her Majesty’s Royal Service”, by Sagebrush.

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Chapter 2: Breaking the Universe (P. Rainbow Dash, P. Fluttershy)

98 ponylengths-per-second

Just think of it as 98% of the speed of sound/magic.

The Sonic Magi-Boom

If the Sonic Rainboom is supposed to be legendary, and a pegasus’ contrail is the same color as their mane, then that would mean that only rainbow-maned pegasi are capable of breaking the barrier, which doesn’t sound very fair to me. So I decided that the feat is generically known as a “magi-boom”—Rainbow re-branded hers as a “rainboom”, and got everypony to buy into the term instead of the generic one.

As for the warnings? Something similar was a popular belief before Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier in 1947.

Pseudo-magic

Yeah, that’s depressing—the idea that with all of the wondrous magic in Equestria, there are still paranoid ponies that believe in types of magic that are in fact impossible...or impossibly dangerous.

The “weird blue creature” chasing the “brick on wheels”

This is your hint for how to put this and the following chapters set on Earth in chronological order.

Posey Shy and Cloud Cover

Fluttershy’s parents aren’t named in canon. I took the names from a pair of comments on their MLP FIM wiki page. Posey is the name of the G1 pony that Lauren Faust used as the inspiration for Fluttershy.

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Chapter 3A: Main Character, Part 1 (H. Rainbow Dash)

“That orange kid”

Hate to disappoint you, but this is the only appearance of H. Scootaloo in this fic. The human counterparts of the CMC are not yet in high school at this point, and so there’s no way that Scootaloo would be able to talk to her hero. At least, none that I would think of that wouldn’t derail the plot.

Human Fluttershy’s cynicism

I’m using the excuse of her harassment at Crystal Prep, with this being her coping mechanism. Don’t worry, she’ll drop it once she transfers to Canterlot High.

Human Spitfire

In the “Equestria Girls” comic origin story, Spitfire is the captain of the Canterlot High soccer team. I’m not using that because my idea is better.

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Chapter 3B: Main Character, Part 2 (H. Rainbow Dash, H. Fluttershy)

“Dear Rainbow Dash...”

This is the entire reason I wrote this story. Specifically, the idea for a scenario where the Equestria Girls counterpart to a pony is the more mature one for once.

“Griffon magic is wind magic, and pegasi magic is anti-gravity based.”

I have a bad habit of putting forward ideas I think are original, when in fact I read them somewhere a while ago and then forgot about them. So, if anybody knows of a story or blog entry that advanced this particular theory first, please let me know so I can put that credit right here.

I think this theory is pretty sound, especially the pegasus side of it. I’m just going to assume that cloud walking is an ability completely separate from flight, to explain how griffons can stand on them without blowing them to pieces. After all, a pegasus sleeping in a cloud home doesn’t fall through when she falls asleep, while a flying pegasus who was knocked out would not just float in place. That implies that cloud walking is involuntary while flight is instinctual/conscious. And therefore pegasi and griffons can both cloud-walk in the same way, while flying in two different ways.

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Chapter 4: Lucid Dreaming (P. Rarity)

“I’ll see you Friday at school!”

I don’t make a big deal about the dates in this story, but in fact it’s Wednesday, September 22, 2010 on Earth. It’s traditional when a Markist gets their mark to take the next full day off to celebrate, which would mean that Rarity would be expected to return to school on Friday.

Sweat-soaked Trixie

She’s so sweaty because she’s been running after a missed bus. I told you in Chapter 2’s notes that I was using her for internal chronology.

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Chapter 5: The Alien (P. Rarity, H. Rarity)

Pinkie Pie

I have a rule with writing Pinkie Pie: any time I write a story that is not in the same continuity of any of my previous stories, I’m required to come up with a new origin story for Pinkie.

Rarity apologizing to Pinkamena

This is something that I really wished that Friendship Is Magic had addressed: the fact that everypony treated Pinkie Pie with her cartoon powers as a one-dimensional happy stereotype, in order to keep from thinking about what she might do if she ever lost her temper. I imagined that an episode pairing her with Spike—a character that understood her well enough to start borrowing some of her tricks—would be a good way to do this. The other scenario I came up with to have this conversation was after the end of “The Last Roundup”, when Rarity and Pinkie Pie were alone together on that rail cart.

Well, now I got to do it myself.

H. Rarity

I got Human Rarity’s plotline straight from the 2011 animated movie Rango, with Rarity playing the part of the title character. The part of Beans is being played by “Applejack”, who is obviously a reformed changeling.

You probably have questions about “Applejack”, but I’m not going to answer them. In fact, let me point something out that you probably didn’t think of: She’s taking the form of an adult Applejack. Pony Applejack is a ten-year-old filly, so how did this changeling know what her adult form would look like?

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Chapter 6: A View Out the Window (H. Applejack, P. Applejack)

Trixie

This is her before her appearance in Chapter 2. She hasn’t chased after a bus yet, and she doesn’t have her mark yet. (The stuff with Rarity also makes this clear.)

In the “Equestria Girls” comic origin story, Trixie was running the Glee Club booth at the Freshman Fair. In this alternate reality she’s running the Magic Club booth.

Noctiferian

A term I threw together for Nightmare Moon worshipers in my other fic “The Masterpiece”. In my world at least, the cult is a joke, and are allowed to exist by Princess Celestia because of how obviously pathetic they are.

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Day 2: Ponies on Earth, Chapter 7: Stan Lee Cameo (P. Twilight Sparkle, P. Applejack, Sunset Shimmer)

The Phoenix/Dark Phoenix Saga

Everybody knows this one by now right? Well, just in case you don’t, it was a storyline in the X-Men comic books from 1980, adapted unsuccessfully into film and television at least four times, written by Chris Claremont with art by John Byrne. In it, the psychic character Jean Gray appears to sacrifice her life to save her teammates after a dangerous mission and ends up in a coma. She wakes up with vastly expanded mental powers, calling herself “Phoenix”, and shortly afterwards saves the universe—that’s the Phoenix Saga. The sequel Dark Phoenix Saga starts with Jean Gray being corrupted by a group of seductive villains, becoming “Dark Phoenix”. And then she goes off and blows up a star just for the fun of it, killing off an entire civilization, and she has to be put down. (Of course she doesn’t stay dead. This is Comic Book Land—nobody truly dies in Comic Book Land.)

Sci-Twi, of course, is going to become a character whose gem-bestowed power is telekinesis, the same basic power that Jean Gray started with.

The Tangled trailer

Tangled got its widespread American release on November 24, 2010. This story is set in September of 2010. The bit about the skin colors is because before the discovery of America, Markism was only practiced in England.

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Chapter 8: The Light of the Sun (P. Rarity, P. Rainbow Dash, P. Fluttershy, Abacus Cinch)

General Farrago

“Farrago” is one of those words you use to show off your vocabulary. It means “mess” or “hodgepodge”, as in “that story was a farrago of myth and fact.” The word derives from the Latin for “cattle feed”, which is a mix of grains.

A light grayish mulberry in color

Rarity is very exact with her colors.

Three diamond shapes, each one a different cut

Pony Rarity now has a slightly different cutie mark as a result of her fashion epiphany on Earth.

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Chapter 9: Wild Blue Yonder (The Human Mercenaries, P. Fluttershy, P. Rainbow Dash)

The Mercenaries

Yeah, I’m doing that thing again. If you don’t know what “that thing” is, I’ll spell it out in Chapter 12.

The quadcopter

This is only a little in advance of actual drone technology of 2010.

Outsider

The Markist term for someone lacking in Markist culture. So this would not only include most non-Markist Americans, for example, but even Markists who had been raised without the web of strange and unexplained traditions that permeate Markist-majority cities and towns.

“A youth clothing store named after gum, or candy, or something like that.”

Hmm...sometimes I write these things, and then I come back to write the notes, and I completely forget what I was thinking. Was it Icing? Whatever it was, it was big in 2010.

2023 Update: I remembered! It was Juicy Couture. This company vaulted into popularity in the 2000's for making custom velour tracksuits for various celebrities starting with Madonna, opening their own stores in malls around the world shortly afterwards. By around 2010 they had sales of over $200 million a year. But by 2015 the company had collapsed, and they are now only a minor brand sold by J.C. Penny's.

The Hanna Gang

Led by the brutal Will Hanna, and his equally brutal lieutenant Joe Barbera.

The Grimm Fairy Tale that ends with the evil stepmother being thrown into a barrel studded with pointy nails and rolled down a hill to her death

Well, Thomas is not quite remembering it correctly, because I wasn’t either. I always thought that was the ending of the Grimm “Cinderella”, when it fact it’s mostly the ending of “The Goose-Girl”.

“dollars to donuts”

One of those things that my Dad used to say, and nobody else that I knew. The phrase always makes me think of a bizarre local gameshow called Bowling for Dollars that aired on KBHK 44 San Francisco for six months back in 1978, when I was six years. Why I remember a six-month long television show from when I was six but have trouble remembering the bank card PIN I use every day of my life I’ll never know.

The movies Rainbow and Fluttershy watch in the mall

Stormy with a Side of Pudding is from the “Movie Magic” special, and is called one of Pinkie Pie’s favorite movies. Inception had its widespread U.S. release on July 16, 2010, and so would still be playing in theaters on the date when this story is set.

“This here is a Rocket 305...”

Oh, I love the internet. It lets you fake being an expert in anything.

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Chapter 10: Wine-Dark Sea (P. Applejack, P. Rarity, H. Trixie)

Chestnut Magnifico

The actress from “Movie Magic”. Rarity seemed to be a fan of her in that special.

Pixel Pizzaz

This character was a member of human Trixie’s band in Equestria Girls: Rainbow Rocks. From her fashionable appearance, I figured she might be a friend of Rarity as well. She doesn’t have a pony counterpart in canon.

Rarity’s classroom schedule

It is absolutely ridiculous for me to come up with a complete class schedule for Human Rarity, given that we only hear about two of her classes. I did it anyway:

1^st Period, 8–8:50 am: Algebra 1
2^nd Period, 9–9:50 am: Business 1 (a semester class, with Marketing 1 in the spring semester)
3^rd Period, 10—10:50 am: Literature and Composition 1 (so far they’ve covered The Epic of Gilgamesh and The Iliad)
4^th Period, 11—11:50 am: World History II (starting with the French Revolution)
Lunch, noon to 12:30 pm
5^th Period, 12:30—1:20 pm: Biology
6^th Period, 1:30—2:20 pm: French 1
7^th Period, 2:30—3:30 pm: Home Room (3 days a week), alternated with Physical Education (2 days a week)

“Sing in me, Muse...”

Start of the Robert Fitzgerald’s 1961 translation of Homer’s Odyssey, the gold standard.

The seven primary uprisings of the Revolutions of 1848: the Italian states, France, the German states, Hungary...

...And of course Denmark, the Netherlands and Poland. Come on people, this was on the test!

Lance Burton’s last show at the Monte Carlo

The famous stage magician’s last show at the Las Vegas casino was on September 4, 2010.

H. Trixie

This was the moment when I added Trixie to the character list. The human one, but in context that means both of them.

Queen of the Damned

For once, this book didn’t come out in 2010 like all of my other pop culture references, but instead way back in 1988. The movie adaptation came out in 2002.

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Chapter 11: Champagne Wishes and Caviar Dreams (P. Applejack, P. Rarity, H. Trixie, H. Pixel Pizzaz)

“I send you all champagne wishes and caviar dreams.”

This is supposed to be the sign-off line for every episode of Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous, but good luck actually finding it used in a YouTube video of the series.

Platinum Junior High

The only (comic) canonical junior high school in Canterlot City is Cloudsdale, which Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy attended before going to Canterlot High according to “Equestria Girls”. I invented Platinum Junior High for unicorn counterparts, and Mustangia Junior High for earth pony counterparts.

Wait, didn’t you say that Scootaloo was from Mustangia Junior High in Chapter 3?

Yes. Yes, I did.

“They’re taking the hobbits to Isengard!”

By some kind of miracle of restraint, I didn’t link that one earworm video. Not even in these notes.

Adventure Time

The series premiered on Cartoon Network on April 5, 2010, if you don’t count the pilot.

H. Pixel Pizzaz

Nope, I haven’t added her character tag to the fic.

“The Goddess sees into all of our thoughts”

No she doesn’t. Princess Celestia would have to be institutionalized if she had to deal with the thoughts of humans on a regular basis, even good-natured Markist humans.

The Fairly OddParents

Originally ran on Nickelodeon from 2001 to 2006, and then from 2007–2012.

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Chapter 12: Storytime (P. Rarity, P. Applejack, H. Celestia, Abacus Cinch)

This chapter mostly exists to link the events of Equestrian Business with this story.

World War III ending all life on earth

This is a very illogical belief. Nevertheless it was the one I grew up believing in during the 1980’s, and therefore the one that I declare to be true for this alternate version of Earth. Or at least, that’s what everyone believed to be true...

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Day 2 (Humans in Equestria): Chapter 13: Code Duello (H. Rarity)

Code Duello

These are the rules that govern a duel. For example: the challenged party gets to choose the weapons, date and time.

Nowhere

The town in Rango is named Dirt.

The drunk chameleon

Formerly the main character of Rango.

The Man with No Name

I’m just going to link to a little tribute video, for those unfamiliar with the character.

The bartender

I’m taking most of the Rango characters and replacing them with the inhabitants of Klugetown from My Little Pony The Movie. Rango’s bartender was a Sonoran desert toad named Buford. I replaced him with Louise, the frilled lizard bartender from The Movie.

White Raven

Raven is the trickster god of many Native American tribes. He started out white, and there’s a famous story about how he got his black feathers. I already have a character named “Raven”, so I decided to use “White Raven” for Rarity’s alias.

“Beyond the fields that you know...”

I’m curious to see if anyone recognizes this quote from The King of Elfland’s Daughter, a once-famous 1924 fantasy novel by Lord Dunsany. The quote is a glorification of the East as a compass direction, in direct contradiction to Rango’s deification of “The Spirit of the West”.

White Raven’s shrinking spell

In Rango, the title character told a story about how he killed seven outlaw brothers with a single bullet.

Passamaquoddy

Main setting for Pete’s Dragon.

Tom and Jerry

Aka “that thing” with the mercenaries from Chapter 8. These two take the place of both Bad Bill and the unnamed hawk antagonist in Rango.

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Chapter 14: The Bank of Nowhere (H. Rarity)

Tortoise John, Mr. Merrimack and Angelique

These three characters are taken from Rango without changes.

University of Panthera

In the comics, Panthera is the capital of Abyssinia, the kingdom of the talking cats. It’s where Capper comes from.

Mustangia

This is the town that Ms. Peachbottom comes from in the episode “Games Ponies Play”. Since my story is set before Appleoosa was founded, I picked Mustangia to be the closest Western pony town to Nowhere.

The strips beside the staircase

The machinery in the Mayor’s wheelchair is able to engage with some gears and tracks behind those strips, allowing the Mayor to be lifted up- or downstairs.

“The people need to believe in something.”

I believe I shall have another drink.

Pushkin the tailor

The tailor in Rango is unnamed in the film, but officially called Mr. Black. His goggles only have two lenses and he’s actually a black widow spider instead of a tarantula. Pushkin is the name of a snapping turtle vendor from My Little Pony The Movie.

“The wicked Princess Celestia”

And here I start nudging the plot of my Rango knockoff in a more Equestrian direction.

The umbra

This is a race of living shadows from the comics. They seduced Luna into becoming Nightmare Moon, they can be destroyed by the light of the Crystal Heart, and they created the half-pony, half-umbra Sombra for the purpose of destroying that Crystal Heart.

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Chapter 15A: A Voice from the Everfree, Part 1 (G. Gilda, P. Fluttershy, P. Rainbow Dash)

G. Gilda

This was the moment when Gilda was added to the character list. Also, “G.” stands for Griffon.

Hoofington

Hoofington is the town where Trixie had her made-up battle with the Ursa. In my fanfiction, I always put it in the opposite side of the Everfree from Ponyville, and use it as a dark mirror of that town. As you will see, I’m also making it the hometown of Flim and Flam.

Blaming a couple of foals for the embezzlement

I think you can guess which characters’ origin story I just invented here.

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Chapter 15B: A Voice from the Everfree, Part 2 (G. Gilda, P. Rainbow Dash, P. Fluttershy)

Wild magic of the Everfree

I think the show could have done a better job of showing why the Everfree was dangerous and still stay within the content limits. Having everypony’s magic go wild is my solution.

The deer

In the comics, the deer are an intelligent race with a secret kingdom in the heart of the Everfree. They are distrustful of ponies.

Fire Streak

This is the never-shown pony whose retirement from the Wonderbolts would open the spot taken by Rainbow Dash.

“Have you ever heard of a mad unicorn living in the Everfree?”

“No, but I can point you to a half-dozen stories on this site where that’s the plot.”

---

Chapter 16A: Rescue, Part 1 (H. Fluttershy, G. Gilda, H. Applejack, H. Rainbow Dash)

The timber wolves story

This is taken from “Timberwolves, Guardians of the Everfree”, by Keystone Gray.

Everygriff

I used to use “everyffony” as my “everybody” equivalent for griffons, for example in The Best of All Possible Worlds. But Friendship Is Magic series eventually settled for “everygriff” in the last few seasons.

Doctor Horse’s reflector

That’s what those things are actually for, you know: to see a patient better in low-light conditions.

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Chapter 17A: Seeing the Light, Part 1 (P. Trixie, P. Celestia)

“[Vinny’s] using the little colt’s room again.”

In Pulp Fiction, the Vinny character is always having to use the bathroom, which eventually becomes a plot point. That’s because Vinny’s a heroin addict, and that’s something that heroin does to you. The pony Vinny just has a small bladder.

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Chapter 17B: Seeing the Light, Part 2 (P. Celestia, H. Twilight Sparkle, P. Trixie)

“Thank you, Guiseman!”

A reference to the main character in Equestrian Business.

Mustangia.

Dun, dun, dun.

---

Day 3: Morning & Afternoon, Chapter 18B: Status Check (Raven, H. Rainbow Dash)

The non-existent name tag.

I alluded to something like this in Perfect Little Village of Ponyville:

“...what kind of freaky powers does this Pinkie friend of yours have, anyway?!”

As she looked around her, Pinkamena suddenly realized that she saw little labels floating in front of every book with their titles and possible uses. Next to each earth pony and unicorn was an information box with their birthdays, likes and dislikes. As far as she could tell, the only reason the pegasi in the room lacked these boxes was because they hadn’t been around Ponyville long enough for her to suck the information out of their skulls.

“No!” Pinkamena exclaimed, slamming her head sideways into a nearby pillar. When her vision cleared, she nodded at what she was no longer seeing. “Much better.”

“Four and twenty”: For those of you not raised on English nursery rhymes:

Sing a song of sixpence,
A pocket full of rye.
Four and twenty blackbirds,
Baked in a pie.

When the pie was opened
The birds began to sing.
Wasn’t that a dainty dish
To set before the king?

Now I could go on for quite a while about “sixpence”. It was a silver coin, and it took forty of them to equal one pound sterling in Great Britain’s old currency (so a sixpence was something like 3 American cents in value). In 1740, the approximate year when “Sing of Song of Sixpence” was written, sixpences were traditionally put in Christmas puddings—whoever found the coin would get good luck in the coming year. Since a sixpence had so much silver in it, you could bend the coin in your bare hands; since a sixpence would be enough money to get yourself wasted in the local tavern, the practice was known as “going on a bender”.

Oh, and they never taught me the other three verses of “Sing a Song of Sixpence”:

The king was in his counting house,
Counting out his money.
The queen was in the parlor,
Eating bread and honey.

The maid was in the garden,
Hanging out the clothes,
When down came a blackbird
And pecked off her nose.

And shortly after that,
There came a little wren,
As she sat upon a chair,
And put it on again.

Gilda’s Canterlot-spawned paranoia: Readers, I hope you weren’t too disappointed when I finally get around to explaining what Gilda’s afraid of.

Zero X: The pony equivalent of “Xerox”. Xerography was invented in 1938, roughly seventy-five years before the setting year of 2010.

XO: There were some weird things from the Fifties that somehow managed to survive until my childhood in the Eighties, like being taught handwriting like that would ever be a useful skill in the days of electric typewriters and “word processors (electronic device)”. Anyway back then “XO” stood for “hugs and kisses”, and was put at the end of mushy handwritten letters between people who had crushes on each other. I have no idea if the abbreviation has persisted to the present day.

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Chapter 19: Overload (P. Twilight Sparkle, P. Rarity, P. Rainbow Dash, Sunset Shimmer, H. Gnosi & Meridiem)

The first cornu bundle

“Cornu” is Latin for “horn”.

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Chapter 20: Consequences (basically everybody except H. Rarity, P. Applejack, Abacus Cinch and her minions)

P. Celestia’s tent

This is supposed to be a jousting tent.

“All of our trusted mages are in Yakyakistan”

Remember that it’s been less than three days since the expedition set out, and Sunset believed that it would take weeks for the stubborn Kolbe-led mages to figure out that they truly had been tricked by her. (Kolbe!)

The Omen

That movie is deliberately constructed so that the acts of Satan all appear to be believable accidents. It is the accumulation of so many incredible coincidences that convinces the viewer that something supernatural is happening, rather than the appearance of over-the-top special effects.

“...right before [my father] started using us as pawns.”

In my fan novel The Best of All Possible Worlds, Celestia and Luna’s father is established to be Clover the Clever, who deliberately transformed his daughters into the alicorns he needed to overthrow the emperor Discord.

“If I may dare to ask the Princess the same question,” Voltaire said with a crafty smile, “did you get the father you deserve?”

Princess Celestia gave Voltaire a long cold look before finally answering. “My father made me the Celestia you see today.” Without another word, she turned and walked out of the room, her horn’s magic opening and closing the door.

“That doesn’t sound so bad,” said Eveningstar.

Voltaire shook his head. “She didn’t say that her father made her what she is today. She said that her father made her what she is today.”

“Having dry lips is practically the basis of [pony] civilization.”

I don’t know how many fanfics I’ve read that obsess about ponies slobbering all over everything. It’s not true to Earth horses, and it’s not true to the series.

“I just happen to have a spare Twilight Sparkle.”

The chance to invent lines like this—and hopefully get a good laugh out of you readers—is why I write.

What Twilight saw out of the corner of her eye when she teleported.

I hope all of you readers waved at her when she flashed through our reality.

---

Chapter 21: Confrontations (H. Fluttershy, H. Sweetie Belle, P. Rarity)

Chef Ramsay

Gordon Ramsay, British chef and television personality. Since the British are no longer Markists in my setting, he gets to keep his name pun-free, unlike his pony counterpart.

Grizelda V of the Emerald Sky Clan

The Best of All Possible Worlds/“Secret Histories” reference.

Metaphorical Party

This would become the name of Pony Maud’s first comedy album.

---

Chapter 22: Griffon Day Afternoon (Jeff Bellamy)

The title

Dog Day Afternoon is the name of a 1975 movie about a simple bank robbery that spirals into an all-day hostage standoff with the police.

bmd.org

Stands for Baltimare Markist Diocese.

And she was off like a greyhound.

Because that’s what her counterpart looked like in Equestria. Gilda’s gang is made up of griffons (George, Gabe) and Diamond Dogs (Bonnie, Rex).

---

Chapter 23: Birth of the Stare (Abacus Cinch, P. Fluttershy)

Morrigan

The playable character Morrigan Aensland from Marvel vs. Capcom: Clash of Super Heroes (1998) comes from Capcom’s Darkstalkers series of games. The original character is a succubus with bat wings who had two-thirds of her power removed at birth to keep her from accidentally destroying the world, and who has a fondness for human ways. The name Morrigan comes from an Irish deity, goddess of war and protectress of the land and animals. I could see Morrigan as a dark alter ego for Fluttershy.

“What if it’s Rarity?”

Oh, it’s going to be Rarity.

---

Chapter 24: Small Talk (Sunset Shimmer, P. Celestia, Various, H. Apple Bloom)

The Day the Universe Changed

A BBC documentary series hosted by James Burke, about the long-term consequences of scientific advancements through history. The series was first aired on the American PBS network in 1986, and was released on DVD in 2009. The character of Truth Delver in Equestrian Business was inspired by Burke.

Pokémon Black & White

Pokémon Black and Pokémon White were paired games for the Nintendo DS handheld gaming system, released in Japan in 2010, and a more widespread release in 2011. (We’ll just say it was a simultaneous release in this continuity.) The title is a bit of self-puffery, as “Black and White” is also the name of the non-FIM fanfic I wrote that I’m most proud of, and that I also created in 2010.

Rumspringa

A practice among the Amish whereby a young adult travels to the city and participates in modern culture for a while to decide if they are happier in the city world, or back in the 18^th Century enclave of Pennsylvania Dutch country.

Apple Bloom turning into a pony

A small tribute to Bloom Filter, a fanfic by ferret.

The X-Men prequel

X-Men: First Class would have its American wide release on June 1, 2011.

---

Day 3: Evening & Night, Chapter 25: Thoughts of a Princess (H. Celestia, P. Trixie)

Raven’s origin

This ties her into the Pie cameo in The Best of All Possible Worlds (K). That story and this one are not in the same continuity, but that part at least was shared by both alternate universes.

The dead voice of Truth Delver

Oh look, I managed to get the other main character from Equestrian Business into this story!

---

Chapter 26: On the Road to Nowhere (H. Celestia, Raven)

Hey, I found a way to sneak a song title into the story without everyone noticing. Here’s a link to the Talking Heads music video.

37°0'37"N 117°27'1"W

On Earth, those are the coordinates for Ubehebe Crater, a volcanic crater located in Death Valley, California. It does not contain a glass lake. If I could have found a glass lake in Death Valley, I would have used that instead.

---

Chapter 27: The Past: Recent and Distant (H. Rarity, R. Mustang Sally)

The bank theft

I thought the bank robbery was the weakest part of Rango, making the main character seem far more incompetent than usual, in order to fill the plot hole of how that hole ended up in the middle of the street. The line of “maybe [the thieves] got lost, and came up [in the middle of the street] first to get their bearings” covers what actually happens in the movie. I countered with using it to lure Merrimack out of his impregnable bank.

The characters

Charlie is the name of a Diamond Dog in Klugetown. I turned him into a cat. He’s playing the part of Spoons, a mouse prospector in Rango.

Mori is the name of a fish vendor in Klugetown—yes, there was actually a walking fish in My Little Pony The Movie. He’s been turned into a buzzard, and the name just obviously makes him the mortician.

Ron the Roadrunner Wrangler is an invented character. Rango made a big deal of using roadrunners as mounts to the point of adding a couple of pointless scenes just so you could see them in action. I just dangle the possibility of Rarity riding a roadrunner before your noses, but never follow through on it.

Doc the Scorpion is a combination of two Rango characters: a rabbit named Doc and an unnamed scorpion.

The digging machine

The machine itself is in the movie. The extra clues are not. (We got the one appearance of red mud, and that was it.) “F&F” is obviously Flim & Flam.

Catching Tom & Jerry

I’m now going rather far astray from Rango’s plot, because the movie is more bloodthirsty than I am. In the movie, Merrimack is found dead from drowning, whereas I only left him mostly dead. And the movie has an extensive sequence with an outlaw mole family that I thought while entertaining was overcomplicating the story, so I cut them. Therefore it’s the moles that are thrown into jail in Rango rather than the outlaws who were killed off earlier in the movie.

By the way, Rarity’s dialog in this section is largely lifted from Johnny Depp’s performance as Rango.

Everfree Valance

I’ve already speculated that ponies view the subject of complete freedom with considerable distrust, hence the use of “Everfree” as a synonym for “Badass”. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance is an excellent 1962 Western about the contrast between the Wild West and its out-of-control liberty, and the forces of civilization. I believe this movie had some influence on Rango, although perhaps only indirectly.

Adamantine the dragon

In Rango, this is Rattlesnake Jake, the most-dangerous gunslinger in the territory, and like Adamantine, under the secret employment of Mayor John.

Tall Tale

This is a town that some Apples hailed from in “Apple Family Reunion”.

Ransom Stopper

In The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, “the man” is named Ransom Stoddard.

---

Chapter 28: Showdown(s) (H. Celestia, H. Rarity, P. Pinkie)

The two bypass valves

In Rango this is a huge psychedelic set piece. Sorry I couldn’t live up to it.

The ending (compared to Rango)

Rango ended with the dual between Rango (Rarity) and Rattlesnake Jake (Adamantine), with the water surge through the street hole, and him pulling Tortoise John down with him. So I added everything else. It’s a bit bloated, I know.

“Forget it Princess. This is Nowhere. The rules are different here.”

Anyone who’s seen both movies will know that Tortoise John was clearly based on the character of Noah Cross from the 1974 film Chinatown; I at least think the two characters sound very similar to each other as well. The earlier movie explains the madness of its ending with its final line of “Forget it Jake, it’s Chinatown.”

---

Epilogue Part 1: Getting Everyone Home (Sunset Shimmer)

Cecil

Cecil is from The Perfect Little Village of Ponyville. Cecil is an artifact, a rock imbued with a personality and the ability to cast spells. How many of you that read that story actually predicted that he would ever show up again?

---

Epilogue Part 3: Wrapping Up with the Ponies (P. Granny Smith, The Pony Mane Six)

Shining Armor’s accent origin

Hey, it had to come from somewhere, right?

Annie Smith

I’m pretty sure I’m not the first author to declare that Granny was known as Annie in her younger years. I wouldn’t be surprised if somebody else also made her a retired agent of S.M.I.L.E., but for now I am unaware of such a story (or again, I forgot it).

“Good idea.”

...Said King Arthur.

“Of course it’s a good idea!” retorted God/Princess Celestia.

Kekulé and benzene

August Kekulé worked out the theory of atomic bonds in 1857, stuff like “carbon has four bonds, oxygen has two, hydrogen has one,” and so on. I mentioned him when I was talking about Hermann Kolbe in the Prologue notes. The theory was doing quite well for him until he tried to figure out how benzene’s bonds worked, and nothing he could come up with followed the rules he had already deduced. In 1862 or perhaps even earlier, Kekulé had been dozing off one day when he imagined a snake swallowing its own tail, and suddenly realized that benzene’s molecular structure must also be circular.

Choleric with Kubla Khan

The poem Kubla Khan was written by an Englishman between 1365 and 1865 and so by the rules of my continuity, he must have an Equestrian name. The author’s actual name was Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and Kubla Khan was written in 1797 and published in 1816. Coleridge had been reading a description of the summer palace of the Yuan Dynasty of China, founded by Kublai Khan, while smoking opium, and had then fallen asleep. A full 300-line poem popped into his head while he was sleeping and when he awoke, he started furiously writing his vision down. Unfortunately, he was immediately interrupted by a very persistent visitor and when he had gotten rid of the pest, he found he had forgotten the last 250 or so lines.

---

Epilogue Part 5: Wrapping Up with the Humans (H. Trixie, H. Celestia, Seven Humans and Two Ponies)

The Hermann the Great poster

Here’s the one place on the Internet where I can find this poster, which was taken from the book Magic: A Pictorial History of Conjurers in the Theater, by David Price.

Trimline telephone

I doubt the current generation is very familiar with the various styles of landline phones anymore. Here’s a page showing what the trimline looked like. The picture is part of a gallery showing multiple views.

“It’s the tiny, in-front eyes”

You may be countering that ponies and Equestria Girls humans have eyes that are about the same size. I will counter that the character models don’t reflect reality—Rainbow Dash is supposed to be the shortest of the ponies in canon, yet she appears to be exactly the same height as most of the other adult ponies in the show.

Clover the Clever’s counterpart

I am describing John Dee, Elizabeth I’s court astronomer/astrologer. John Dee didn’t create stage magic, but he basically created the British Empire and he did actually believe to his dying breath that he had used magic to save humanity from eternal damnation on that dark day in Prague in 1585. Star Swirl by the way is Isaac Newton.

“I have done a great many things I’ve been told I should feel guilty over.”

I never found the place to put this scene:

“Everything you described so far has just seemed petty,” Principal Celestia told her counterpart in the dream. “Clearly she must have done something unforgivable.”

Princess Celestia grit her teeth. “I don’t like telling you about the darker aspects of Equestria, Celly.”

“You can’t expect us to take this as seriously as you do if we don’t know the full truth,” Vice-Principal Luna pressed.

Princess Celestia sighed deeply. “She enslaved all the adult ponies in a town. Sire’s Hollow, population 278. She kept insisting to me that it was an insignificant town. ‘Nopony would even miss it.’ You see, she had come across a prophesy that said that she might become a princess in her own right someday, like what happened to Cadance. And Sunset wanted to ‘practice’. That was her excuse...to ‘practice’.”

“But you reversed it, right?” the Principal insisted. “You undid the spell, right?”

“It was dark magic that Sunset used, Celly. It was a spell with no reversal. Those 200 ponies are still Sunset’s slaves. And will be until the day they die, exactly 199 years from now. They don’t even get the choice of when they are going to die.”

“Did she show any remorse?” Luna asked incredulously.

“She showed disappointment,” the Princess said bitterly. “Said that it wasn’t ‘as much fun as I was expecting.’ She didn’t know that there would be so many responsibilities to go along with the spell, like having to tell her unwilling subjects to eat, or sleep. In the end she threw up her hooves and abandoned the village to its fate, saying, ‘well, at least I learned something from it. Next time I’ll cast a smarter spell.’

“I had her order them to act like they weren’t enslaved. I also had to wipe their memories, because if any of them remembered being Sunset’s slave, they’d go back to losing their free will. In Sunset’s mind, that means that the problem’s been fixed, and she never has to worry about it again. And I suppose, other than accidental invulnerability and extended lifespans that she’s technically right. Maybe by human standards she did fix everything. But those are 200 ponies that have been permanently severed from their destiny. They might as well have had their cutie marks ripped from their hides, because they will never fulfil the destiny given to them by Harmony now. They are ponies without purpose now. ...Humans.”

Luna thought this over for a few seconds, after dismissing the obvious prejudice of her sister’s counterpart. “And Sunset didn’t care because...she doesn’t believe in Harmony?”

“Exactly,” said the Princess. “Sunset believes she is where she is because her genius has made her superior to all ponies other than alicorns. ‘I am an alicorn already in every way that matters,’ she told me in our final confrontation before she used the mirror.”

“Oooh,” Luna said in realization. “She’s a follower of Nietzsche! I had never equated an alicorn with the Übermensch before.”

Lensmare effect

The Lensman series is a set of science fiction stories written by E. E. Smith between 1934 and 1948, republished as a series of novels between 1948 and 1954. They don’t really have anything to do with the effect of using magic in a magic-poor environment, but it sounded like a good name for the effect, so I used it anyway. (The titular “lenses” in the Lensmen series enhanced telepathic abilities in their users, and their users formed a corps of lensmen who fought the forces of evil. The Green Lantern Corps had Lensmen as one of its inspirations.) I could say a whole lot more about the Lensmen series, both for good (planetary-scale battles that inspired Star Wars) and for ill (being way too enthusiastic about eugenics), but I’ll leave it at that.

Pinkie Pie and Rarity

(This doesn’t really belong here, but I wanted to get it off of my chest.)

It is my belief that Pinkie Pie and Rarity are more effective when they combine their efforts. Pinkie can make a sad individual happy, but that happiness is short-lived. And Rarity can help somebody to realize their own self-worth, but that person will not be open to what Rarity has to say if they are too down on themselves. So I believe it takes both Laughter and Generosity to truly turn somebody around from darkness to light.

Oh, and this section in the story is where I explain the relationship that I think exists between Pinkamena and Pinkie, if you believe that the two personalities are indeed distinct from one another.

They went through their lives unburdened by a terrible purpose.

“My name is Loki, and I am burdened by glorious purpose.”

Princess Celestia’s game

If you know my writing, you know I don’t like casting Princess Celestia as the villain. Hopefully you can see that after failing to reconcile with Sunset, she set up a convoluted plan to trick Sunset into making friends and getting her magic back.

Comments

[FanOfMostEverything]

Excellent work throughout. I do have to love the dramatic irony in Principal Celestia's last warning to the girls. After all, looking at the prequel's epilogue, something happens between now and then.

In any case, thank you for an outstanding tale of ridiculous circumstance, strength of character shining through, and Harmony working in mysterious ways. Especially when it has to improvise.

[Stet709]

Loved this! I think I can see now what Princess meant by throwing herself under the cart, by willing to bear any hatred or distrust against her from Sunset, if it means, through her manipulations, Sunset will see the error of her ways and reform in time.