As if dying of embarrassment in the middle of a Crystal Empire celebratory dinner wasn’t bad enough, now Shining Armor has to entertain the worst guest imaginable. No, not Lemon Hearts. The one with the inexplicable agricultural tool. No, not Crazy Lace Agate. The one with the ominous powers and the unstoppable determination to – No, not Cadence. Look, Death, all right? It’s Death. Death’s the worst guest imaginable.

And when the spectre at the feast wants you dead and can’t die in turn, not even love and friendship are strong enough to stand in the way of grim destiny.

Not that this will stop them. Love and friendship are funny like that.

An entry in Imposing Sovereigns IV, using the prompt "Princess Cadence and Shining Armor/Harmony".

Diamond Tiara is a true Rich. Will be, to the end.

Despite all her past setbacks, she’s grown up to become the hyper-successful CEO of Barnyard Bargains Incorporated, a business empire which has spread across the globe. Now she’s built the high-tech Equestrian Dream Shopping Mall right in the heart of Ponyville, a town suited to the ultra-modern vogue not at all.

But when they said corporate would eat her alive, this is NOT what she had in mind…

An entry in Imposing Sovereigns IV, using the prompt "Diamond Tiara and Apple Bloom/Persistence".

Werewolves. Vampires. Earth people, a.k.a. humans. In a world where they've learned to cooperate, it's a bad idea to let your inner wolf off the leash. People tend to look up to you as a role model (when they're not looking at other role models who are way more awesome because they don't even need supernatural stuff).

Sour Sweet doesn't care about that. She just wants to snark at her girlfriend and pet monstrous abominations. But when the balance of power rests inside her own head, it's no longer resting on stable ground...

An entry in Imposing Sovereigns IV, using the prompt "Sour Sweet/Strength".

Once everypony has gone to enjoy the rest of the night, the great mystery of Nightmare Night remains: what really happens to all that delicious candy when nopony else is around? Does Nightmare Moon gobble it up, or is there something even more sinister (and entertaining) at work?

Bloo knows. Bloo's mother knows too. And the problem is that once everypony else has had their fun, the other side of Nightmare Night has barely any leftovers of fun worth talking about.

Perhaps this year will be different. There's a special guest at this year's Nightmare Night: THE special guest. And in the gathering darkness, maybe Bloo will see the light more clearly than ever before...

#TheEarlyYearsOfVignetteValencia
Thru the eyes of her cousin, who her very much.

If the soul is a private garden, then Wallflower's is full of choking weeds and abandoned trash. Thankfully, she's clearing it out now, with help from her friend Derpy in the gardening club.

Yet something lurks below the soil, waiting for its chance.

Wallflower wants to bury it, but she's scared. What if it can't be killed at all? There must be another way. A better way to keep a garden pure...

From the outside, she seems to be a very lucky girl. She has a loving family, lots of friends at school, a comfortable home to call her own.

In her head, things are different. Trapped in her own mind, surrounded by the ruins of her life, the only survivor of the death of her soul. She has no family, no friends, no home, nothing.

And one enemy.

Ruby Pinch is not alone. Ruby Pinch is never alone.

Lemon Hearts is an Equestrian matchmaker. That's sort of like a doctor for ponies with a very specific and persistent disease. And like most doctors, she hasn't picked the soft option.

In the magical land of Equestria, even love isn't a fairy tale. Not all the time. Certainly not forever after.

Of course, she's got the backstage pass to love: the black, unsavoury-looking one that lets her access all floors, including its classy penthouse apartment. And its rotten underbelly.

Mad couples, unhealthy habits, lots of cider, and a princess who's a little too perfect... You gotta laugh, because you're not allowed to cry...

Ever since Dean Cadence became Principal Cadence, she's learned the hard way that running a school as prestigious as Crystal Prep Academy is a bureaucratic knife-edge. Among other things, she has to deal with spiky students, a terrifying janitor, and constant comparisons between her and Cinch – which are somehow always in Cinch's favour.

Hardest of all might be getting one of her students – Sour Sweet – to apologize for years and years of bullying. Not least because she must convince the girl it's for her own good too…

An entry in Imposing Sovereigns III, using the prompt "Dean Cadence/Justice".

In the world of ponydom, Equestria is but a young and vulnerable nation. It needs heroes to defend it. It needs authority. It needs pillars.

Yet Star Swirl and his legendary Pillars have mysteriously vanished. After guiding ponydom for so long, their absence is sorely felt, their stability lost, their legacy in peril.

Young Celestia knows this. But what can she do? She's just a disobedient student.

Young Cinch knows this too. And in her mind, it's not a question of what she can do. It's a question of what she will do. For she is always working – she prides herself on it – and now she is working on a solution to everything...

An entry in Imposing Sovereigns III, using the prompt "Cinch/Integrity".