History Recap / TriptychContinuumTriptych

** During their stint in the woods, Rarity mentions she's been practicing the extremely difficult parlor trick of changing the color of her magical aura. In chapter 46, she uses this to make it look like Twilight is manifesting a double corona through her PowerLimiter, tricking a guard into removing that limiter and thus letting Twilight use her magic for real, which is instrumental to freeing them.

* InnocentInnuendo:

--> "So when a friend reads to you," Rarity quietly continued, "your natural listening position is to lie down so that your head is resting on his forelegs?"
--> Twilight hesitated, searched for a response, then wondered how visible that hunt had been.
--> "I don't know," she replied, and also wondered if the words sounded just as defensive to Rarity's rotated ears. "None of you ever read to me. So I guess any position I use during my first time would be my natural one."

** A more amusing example; before TheReveal of [[TheMasquerade The Secret]], Twilight dismissed ''her'' potential powers in earth pony state by mockingly suggesting that ''she'' would just "grow plants at us". Chapter 50 shows Doctor Gentle trying to scare ''her'' while she's in earth pony form, believing they're about to be capturing, ''knowing'' nothing will happen -- and cue instant vegetation wall.
--> "...oh," Twilight said, and barely heard her own words from the twin depths of storm and stun. "She grew plants at us..."

* TownWithADarkSecret: Trotter's Falls is beginning to display elements of this, as an increasing number of ponies appear to have some awareness of the attempt to find a way of changing a normal pony into an alicorn, a process known as The Great Work.

* ProtagonistTitle: Triptych is [[spoiler:the name that Gentle Arrival's daughter picks herself]], as said in Chapter 55.

--->'''Gentle Arrival:''' "Then why don't you '''act''' like it? Talk to them! Make them ''believe'''! You owe me your '''life''', Fluttershy! ''She'' owes me her life, she owes me a debt for Primatura's '''death''' and she has spent her lifetime trying to pay it! Why can't you give me five minutes, just ''five minutes of reason --''"

** Invoked in chapter 50, when Twilight wishes desperately to herself that Quiet's rationale for helping the Great Work sound like it made ''sense'' to him.

* TransformationHorror: In chapter 53, an enraged Discord drops the MixAndMatchCritters body he normally wears amongst ponies and reverts to what might be his "true form", an ElementalEmbodiment of chaos itself, terrifying everyone in

* WifeHusbandry: After reading some of ''her'' memories in chapter 51, Twilight theorizes that Gentle Arrival may have been hoping to use ''her'' Ascension to somehow bring ''her'' mother's soul back from the Shadowlands, displacing ''her'' soul in the process. The implications of that are enough that Rarity wishes she could vomit.

** Princess Celestia used an experimental ''working'' of Star Swirl's creation to try and ''force'' him into reincarnating. She also believes that Twilight is Star Swirl's reincarnation, or at least his latest one.

** Chapter 40 makes this argument for Gentle Arrival. Loudly.

* AdaptationalVillainy: It's eventually revealed that in this continuity, Star Swirl the Bearded became so jealous of Celestia and Luna's powers after they transformed into alicorns that he turned to {{necromancy}} to try and upgrade himself. He harvested ''essence'' from the dead and dying and shaped it into a magical amulet -- the Alicorn Amulet -- to try and boost his powers, something that forced the sisters to fight him and either kill him or imprison him somewhere until he died of old age: Trixie was unable to research events far enough to determine his ''exact'' fate, but knows he (or rather, the Amulet) took no notes concerning the final battle -- which pretty much identifies the loser.[[note]]In chapter 29, Gentle Arrival reveals that Starswirl was defeated and taken alive, whereupon the sisters imprisoned him on some forgotten island off of Equestria's west coast, where he ultimately died of old age. (The finally-inert Amulet was eventually removed from his corpse.)[[/note]]

** Discord granted Fluttershy the ability to remove ''any'' one thing of her choosing (potentially including a ''pony'') as part of their mission -- or rather, he'll know when she wants it done and make that thing ''go away'' accordingly. (This was the only thing the Bearers received for the mission at all.) It has yet to be fired, and that lack of firing is Lampshaded in chapter 46, where Fluttershy patiently explains to Rainbow Dash that A: they have to be certain they're using it for the ''right'' thing to vanish, and B: they need to be certain they understand just ''what'' they're making vanish.

* FridgeHorror: InUniverse: during Chapter 40, Doctor Gentle explains ''why'' all pegasi try to give birth on the ground: it's from the terror that the foal will be an earth pony or unicorn -- for whom a single second of resting upon a cloud's surface might kill. Rainbow, upon overhearing this within the spy perch, is immediately shaken, openly admitting that she had never before considered the possibility: it's also enough to disturb some of the unicorns in the floor-level audience.

* PainfulTransformation: Experienced by ''her'', '''''[[UpToEleven constantly]]'''''. Whatever went wrong in the ascension attempt resulted in perpetual cyclical shifting between the three main pony races, moving from pegasus to unicorn to earth pony to pegasus again, and so on through the cycle. Rarity believes the wing bones are ''breaking'' rather than simply being reabsorbed. Whether this is true is unknown -- but ''she'' is in endless, unrelenting agony.

* PetTheDog: Zigzagged in chapter 29; the opening of the chapter shows Gentle Arrival has been doing everything he can to solve ''her'' pain, but it's still not enough to make him renounce his plans to repeat the experiment.

** Starswirl the Bearded created the Alicorn Amulet as a failed attempt at ascending, using {{necromancy}} to do so.

* SmugSnake: Clear Coordinator, overlapping with SmallNameBigEgo, as made amply clear in his viewpoint swamp dive during Chapter 30.

** In chapter 50, Quiet Presence tells Twilight Sparkle that his little sister was born an earth pony -- which led his parents to "send her on": either leaving her as a foundling in another settled zone or OffingTheOffspring. (He's never been able to learn her actual fate. When looked at in view of his earlier flashback, this explains why he developed a mark talent for his version of {{Invisibility}}: he was hiding from his parents in fear of having the same thing happen to him -- to the point where the need to be overlooked defined part of his core.

** In chapter 50, Quiet Presence tells Twilight Sparkle that he had an earth pony little sister, but his parents "sent her on", and despite all of years of searching once he came into his majority, he never found her, so the odds are very good, as he tells her, that they ''killed her'' for being an earth pony. In passing, he also confirms that they tormented him so much for his physical fragility so much that he developed a Talent for the Continuum's equivalent of {{Invisibility}}.

** As part of her lecture on pegasus magic, Rainbow Dash explains that pegasi can see temperature differences. In chapter 49, she is able to detect a secret passageway because, due to the passageway having to descend into the ground, which is cold and damp due to it being Autumn, night, and with a heavy storm outside, the doorway is markedly cooler than the rest of the wall it's imitating.

* DirtyBusiness: Chapter 50 reveals that this is how Quiet Presence feels about the Great Work all along. Unlike Gentle Arrival, he's not a bigot; he doesn't personally care what tribe his foals belong to. But, the fact his parents discarded (or ''murdered'') his little sister for being an earth pony, and the fact his arranged wife is made of the same stuff, has him convinced that the Great Work has merit. As he puts it, it means no birth would ever be dreaded, no foal ever hated for what it is; it would mean an end to ''both'' forms of "sending on".

** Chapter 50 reveals that the fate of his earth pony sister, discarded or murdered by their own parents, is why Quiet Presence is allied to Gentle Arrival.

*** Come chapter 36, it all blows up explosively in Coordinator's face as Twilight shrugs off his threats, feeling that the resultant fallout couldn't be any worse than what she already lives with -- and when he threatens the ''other'' Bearers, she comes within a hair's length of crushing him to death in her ''field''.

* HoistByTheirOwnPetard: In chapter 48, a panic-stricken and desperate Coordinator drinks a ''[[FantasticDrug booster]]''. Unfortunately, this particular variety works by [[CastFromHitPoints converting the drinker's life energy into mana]], and Coordinator wasn't very strong to begin with. The result is that he ''burns himself up'', completely consuming his LifeForce for an ultimately useless surge of magical power.

** For a darker twist, it's revealed in chapter 50 that Quiet Presence's fraility isn't the reason why he's never had kids: he's refused to have foals because his wife is of the ''exact'' same mentality as his parents. The same ponies whom he believes ''murdered'' his little sister for being an earth pony. Quiet Presence himself doesn't care what his children are, but he refuses to have foals so long as he has to be scared of the chance they might turn out to be earth ponies.
** A more amusing example; before TheReveal of "The Secret", Twilight dismissed ''her'' powers in earth pony state by mockingly suggesting that ''she'' would just "grow plants at them". In chapter 50, ''she'' does just that, using her powers to make an instant barrier out of super-accelerated-growth vegetation.

** There have been an increasing number of hints that this represents an aspect of his ''talent''. In particular, Chapter 38 has the party about two body lengths away from where he's speaking to Doctor Gentle, with ''nopony'' noticing the conversation. Doctor Gentle immediately asks him just how much he's exerting himself and as soon as they reach an enclosed room, conducts basic medical monitoring. Chapter 44 has Twilight and Rarity figure out that it is indeed a talent. Twilight describes it as Quiet projecting dismissal so that others will not notice him and even forget he's in the room with them.

** In Chapter 42, Twilight swears by ''Discord's antler'' that the Elements will not help ''her''. Gentle actually pauses to note that he's ''never'' heard of someone swearing by Discord before.

* OvenLogic: Invoked in passing; thanks to her general impatience, Rainbow Dash just doesn't understand why "turn up the heat" does ''not'' equate to "it gets cooked faster", which is mentioned in chapter 46.

* SmugSnake: Clear Coordinator, overlapping with SmallNameBigEgo, as made amply clear in his viewpoint during chapter 30.

** Invoked in chapter 50, when Twilight wishes desperately to herself that Quiet Presence's rationale for helping the Great Work didn't make so much ''sense''.

** Celestia and Luna are confirmed in this story to have originally been ordinary ponies[[note]]for what may be added irony, a blog post has revealed they were actually ''earth ponies''[[/note]] who were turned into what may have been the very first alicorns by the Elements of Harmony. Cadance also appears to have been initially normal [[note]]and as in canon, she started as a pegasus[[/note]], but all anypony knows about her route to ascension is that it ''didn't'' use the Elements. Twilight eventually winds up sending Cadance a scroll, directly asking what happened, just in case it has any relation to what went wrong with ''her'': Discord's rules forbid the Bearers from contacting Canterlot, but not the North. It isn't until chapter 50 that Spike gets her reply, but the details are a case of TheUnreveal.

* AbusiveParents: Chapter 8 strongly suggests this for Pinkie. Chapter 17 confirms it as both mental and physical: her parents hated her and treated her with scorn because she has absolutely no affinity for natural earth pony magic, which was especially enraging since they are, as a family, very skilled at earth manipulation -- in fact, her father in particular was a hardcore earth pony supremacist. Chapter 26 features Applejack revealing this truth to Twilight Sparkle.

* FreudianExcuse: Chapter 40 reveals that the whole mess began after Doctor Gentle's wife died giving birth to their daughter -- who turned out to be an earth pony. Maddened by grief, Gentle couldn't bear the idea that their daughter would never know the magic her mother had, and so began to seek out ''any'' way of restoring what he saw as her stolen heritage.

** Also a problem for ''her'': she's studied various theories of magic, but has never gotten to put them into practice. Add in fear-triggered PowerIncontinence and her lack of control can become a deadly issue.

* VillainWithGoodPublicity: Doctor Gentle Arrival is the much-beloved father of modern obstetrics in Equestria, a unicorn whose unique magical talent has allowed him to save hundreds of ponies who might have otherwise died in childbirth. Who would ever believe a stallion like that is involved in a conspiracy to forcibly transform other ponies into alicorns? Or that he might well be ''experimenting'' on the foals he helps deliver?
** And now 'might' is out the window: he's been doing it for a generation.

** Celestia and Luna are confirmed in this story to have originally been ordinary ponies[[note]]for what may be added irony, a blog post has revealed they were actually ''earth ponies''[[/note]] who were turned into what may have been the very first alicorns by the Elements of Harmony. Cadance also appears to have been initially normal [[note]]and as in canon, she started as a pegasus[[/note]], but all anypony knows about her route to ascension is that it ''didn't'' use the Elements. Twilight eventually winds up sending Cadance a scroll, directly asking what happened, just in case it has any relation to what went wrong with ''her'': Discord's rules forbid the Bearers from contacting Canterlot, but not the North. At the current point in the story, no reply has come.

** Snowflake: a capless, critical pegasus birth who was infused with earth pony essence to help him survive: this grants him the raw strength to fly despite having had so much of his wings amputated. He's also completely impervious to the claustrophobia that bedevils pegasi as a whole, and there's a hint that he's capable of sending reverberations through the earth.
** An unnamed earth pony mare infused with pegasus feels a craving for heights, which has led to her becoming a master balloon pilot, aided by the fact she subconsciously controls the winds around her vessel. (The Comments section suspects this may indicate Cherry Berry.)

** Fluttershy: a pegasus infused with earth pony essence, producing her affinity for animals and a subconscious, short-range version of the Cornucopia Effect: the cottage is actually just outside Ponyville's true radius. The Stare occurs when the shard of chaos within her is unknowingly recognized by those she focuses upon, forcing them to submit just to make the experience ''stop''.

%%** Officially subverted, disrupted, and just about blown to Tartarus in Chapter 40. (How? This needs to be explained in more detail.)

* HonoraryUncle: Both Pinkie and Fluttershy seem to regard Doctor Gentle with degrees of this, with many of the others whom the obstetrician has delivered feeling the same way.

** Officially subverted, disrupted, and just about blown to Tartarus in Chapter 40.
* MineralMacGuffin: Deathstone, which Rarity renames to the more appealing "shiftstone" and which is given the alternative name of "chaos pearl" in chapter 24. Its precise use remains a mystery, but it is somehow very important to the Great Work and to Gentle Arrival's assisted deliveries.
** Ultimately, they turn out to be the containers of chaos energy and pony essence, essential for the attempt to artificially reproduce the alicorn creation process. And without them, there would be no hybrids.

* OvenLogic: Invoked in passing; thanks to her general impatience, Rainbow Dash just doesn't understand why "turn up the heat" does ''not'' equate to "it gets cooked faster", which is mentioned in chapter 46..

** Celestia and Luna are former Bearers who ascended to alicorndom, just like Twilight Sparkle.

** Discord granted Fluttershy the ability to remove ''any'' one thing of her choosing (potentially including a ''pony'') as part of their mission -- or rather, he'll know when she wants it done and make that thing ''go away'' accordingly. (This was the only thing the Bearers received for the mission at all.) It has yet to be fired.

* TheNondescript: Quiet Presence. There are times when even the narrator struggles to make adjectives stick to him, and a large number of ponies seem to have trouble noticing when he's around or remembering what he looked like after he leaves the room. In reality, he's a small young adult unicorn stallion (somewhat shorter and thinner than Twilight, who's described as being slightly built for a mare), whose coat, mane, and eyes are slightly-differing shades of grey. According to the text, ponies can tell that his mark exists in the proper location, but it's just as grey as the rest of him and so far, nopony has been able to determine exactly what that mark ''is''. Chapter 44 has Twilight and Rarity realize that it goes beyond this. Being easily ignored and forgotten is his ''talent''. Twilight describes it as Quiet projecting dismissal.
** There have been an increasing number of hints that this represents an aspect of his ''talent''. In particular, Chapter 38 has the party about two body lengths away from where he's speaking to Doctor Gentle, with ''nopony'' noticing the conversation. Doctor Gentle immediately asks him just how much he's exerting himself and as soon as they reach an enclosed room, conducts basic medical monitoring.

* TheNondescript: Quiet Presence. There are times when even the narrator struggles to make adjectives stick to him, and a large number of ponies seem to have trouble noticing when he's around or remembering what he looked like after he leaves the room. In reality, he's a small young adult unicorn stallion (somewhat shorter and thinner than Twilight, who's described as being slightly built for a mare), whose coat, mane, and eyes are slightly-differing shades of grey. According to the text, ponies can tell that his mark exists in the proper location, but it's just as grey as the rest of him and so far, nopony has been able to determine exactly what that mark ''is''.

* VillainHasAPoint: [[spoiler:Our villain, Gentle Arrival]], would be possibly saving lives by ensuring pegasi purity, because birthing on a cloud is possibly deadly for their children, "Because some of their foals will ''not'' be pegasi.", and so would fall to their deaths, as said in [[https://www.fimfiction.net/story/101769/40/triptych/presentation Chapter 40 - Presentation]].

** Snowflake: a capless, critical pegasus birth who infused with earth pony essence to help him survive: this grants him the raw strength to fly despite having had so much of his wings amputated. He's also completely impervious to the claustrophobia that bedevils pegasi as a whole, and there's a hint that he's capable of sending reverberations through the earth.