For tropes relating to other ponies in this fanfic, see the Triptych Continuum page.
Fleur dis Lee
- A Day in the Limelight: Is the viewpoint character/protagonist for Anchor Foal: A Romantic Cringe Comedy.
- Blackmail: She favors a form of Sexual Extortion — the ability to know exactly what a pony likes, even for those things which would normally be kept concealed, can give her a lot to work with. However, Celestia points out that she's not very good at it: while Fleur was able to collect funds, Celestia's investigations found enough ponies who were willing to talk to give the Princess enough evidence to convict. It turns out in chapter 44 that this probably had to do with the fact that her "unearthings" were largely embarrassing, not illegal, which would naturally make her victims more willing to talk.
- Boomerang Bigot: Due to her Protoceran background, she is frankly often contemptuous of ponies, despite biologically being a unicorn herself.
- Boxed Crook: As part of her informal sentencing, she's outfitted with an enchanted titanium bracelet that contains a powerful tracking spell. It can pass for jewelry, but it also doesn't come off. (There's also some minor workings present to prevent fur damage and fungal infections.)
- Broken Bird: Where do we start? As a filly, she was the only child of a terminally-ill mother and spent every day trying to keep her parent alive. After her birth mother died, she was adopted by a griffon ranching family and found a sister — who suffered brain damage after monsters broke through an enchanted door when the charge had run too low, and that wound happened because Grace was trying to protect Fleur. The family sold off most of the ranch to try and find a cure for an injury which had effectively wiped out all sapience, there was none, and Fleur decided the only way to find out if Grace was still in there was through the use of Thought Pain: any remaining degree of conscious mind would make itself known through the resulting agony. Instead, it killed Grace, as it would any mindless animal. Fleur ran, was found by her tutor in unicorn magic — who was the pony responsible for keeping the door charged and a pedophile who'd been scouting her for moons. He got her into his house, and the resulting assault attempt led to Fleur's mark.
- Complexity Addiction: Downplayed. It might look that way at first when Fleur would rather try to learn who the other Bearers are on her own rather than simply asking Fluttershy, but she doesn't want to give off the appearance of prying and shut the pegasus down. This doesn't get any better when she learns that at least part of Ponyville will actively protect the Bearers from such inquiries, trying to let them lead normal lives.
- Crazy-Prepared: She had a mentor who trained her how to do a lot of different things. Like setting those really nasty compound fractures where the bone breaks through the skin. Or defeating an ostrich with her bare hooves. It turns out that largely comes from growing up on a Protoceran ranch. Which is like a cross between a livestock ranch and a big game preserve.
- Cross-Cultural Kerfluffle: Alongside speculation about what her apparent origins in Protocera, the griffon nation, have caused for her interactions with Equestrian ponies, in chapter 20, she makes the mistake of offering some of her Protoceran Pony Cuisine to a pegasus customer whilst trying to be friendly. She's morbidly impressed at the result: she didn't know it was possible for a pegasus to simultaneously fly and projectile vomit. In chapter 43, she admits that she is a Protoceran native.
- Dark and Troubled Past: There are hints throughout the earliest chapters that something very, very nasty happened to her when she was a little filly. The story is largely made clear at last in chapter 44.
- Fleur was born to an impoverished unicorn single mother in Protocera. Her mother got sick when she was very young, and ultimately died. This led to Fleur being taken in by Protocera's social services — which are extremely well-organized, as griffons have a major cultural hangup about protecting children — and adopted by a family of griffon ranchers. She was Happily Adopted, and adored her new elder sister. As she was growing up, she naturally began thinking about what kind of role she would take; she loved the ranch, but being a unicorn, she wasn't physically suited for a lot of the work there. She studied under the local vets, which is where she learned how to brew the poison Putaverunt Dolore ("Thought Pain"). The ranch relied heavily on magitek to keep its monstrous livestock contained, but the local "thaum seller" was actually a lot weaker than he claimed to be. This led to a disaster when he didn't charge up the containing ward on the pen of a particularly dangerous monster called a zanustrach, but instead merely applied an illusion that he'd filled it up. Which led to the zanustrach breaking free when Fleur was checking the pens. Her griffon sister attempted to rescue her, but in the fight the zanustrach speared the griffon through the eye with one of its horns. Though their parents saved them both, it was too late for the grifflet; she'd not only lost an eye, she'd been heavily brain-damaged, to the point she was a mere vegetable. Their parents refused to accept this, plunging the ranch into bankruptcy over moons as they tried and failed to find any doctor anywhere in Protocera who could cure her. Alone, guilt-stricken and desperate, Fleur tried to shock her griffon sister back to consciousness by feeding her Putaverunt Dolore, but in her brain-damaged state, the poison simply killed the grifflet. Half-mad with guilt, Fleur took a few tokens from her dead sister, put them in her mourning box, and left the ranch, only to blindly wander onto the property of the local thaum seller. He coaxed her inside, and then the unicorn stallion revealed his true colors: the pedophile attempted to rape her. Desperately trying to understand what was happening and why, Fleur's Talent triggered and with it her Cutie Mark. This startled the pedophile enough that Fleur was able to fight him off, stabbing him in the eye with her horn before fleeing. She could have gone to the local sheriff, but she was so guiltstricken over her sister's death that instead she returned to the pedophile's house — fortunately, he'd survived her attack and chosen to flee the inevitable griffon retaliation — where she sheltered for the night and ultimately ran away, fleeing all the way to Equestria.
- Did You Just Flip Off Cthulhu?: In chapter 7, despite being absolutely terrified of Discord, she still manages to snark at him quite extensively — mostly because she refuses to let him see just how afraid she is. This is then partially deconstructed at the moment he leaves: Fleur immediately collapses into the grass and lies there trembling for as long as she can get away with, and gets to suffer multiple nightmares as soon as she goes to sleep.
- In chapter 46, Discord lets a whole herd of Eldritch Horror would-be suitors out of Tartarus. Colossal monstrosities, emitting waves of decay and reek and terror, and Fleur proceeds to verbally rip them a new one in glorious fashion.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Is absolutely outraged to hear that Celestia isn't paying the obviously poverty-stricken Fluttershy anything for being a Bearer of Harmony. Likewise, she had every intention of playing her role as matchmaker to Fluttershy dead straight, considering the idea of deliberately setting her up with somepony she won't get on with to be reprehensible.Sun and Moon, what kind of monster kicks somepony into a fight with Nightmare and doesn't even pay...
- Fluffy Tamer: Well, it's not so much "taming" as "terrifying Angel Bunny into avoiding her and never daring to try his usual bully routine" in chapter four, where she achieves this feat by sweetly informing she cares about his life to the exact same extent he cares about hers, and then giving him a toothy grin.
- It's been noted that she seems to know an unusual amount about animals. Fleur isn't on Fluttershy's level, but she's capable of recognizing several examples of species behavior and has indicated she's served as a veterinarian's assistant at least once. It turns out in chapter 44 that she got this experience by working on her adoptive family's ranch.
- Friend to All Children: Sees innocence as something which has to be protected at all costs, and so has a soft spot for the young. She's also extremely careful around any child whom she knows to be developing a crush on her, trying not to encourage or hurt them.
- Given Name Reveal: In chapter 50, Fleur tells Fluttershy that her birth mother named her Peculium ("my treasure" in the griffons' language). Her adoptive family often called her "Culi" for short.
- Hidden Depths: After actually setting up in Ponyville, Fleur starts showing there's a lot more to her than just a blackmailing escort. (Which doesn't mean she isn't keeping an eye out for future blackmail material.)
- Heart Is an Awesome Power: Fleur managed to turn her talent, which boils down to the rapid deduction of a pony's exact sexual interests, into a formidable tool for finding blackmail. She's also capable of using it as an extra sense in its own right, and could rewrite any number of books on sexual psychology.
- Taken further in chapter 43, where Fleur proves the potency of her talent by instantly sussing out Miranda Rights' most secret fantasy — making love in the dark, where her colors make her effectively invisible — and revealing she can tell almost to the day how long it's been since somebody had sex.
- Her personal "Trick" is the ability to create a vibrating field, which she normally uses as a massage tool or for more... carnal satisfactions. She also mentions using it to make milkshakes. She can also, if she wants, intensify the field to the point of being able to vibrate living creatures apart.
- It's All About Me: Genuinely can't see why all of her blackmailing was wrong and why she deserves to be punished.
- Lethal Harmless Powers: One of the most dangerous things about Fleur is her willingness to use her powers in creative ways.Miranda Rights: You took a trick which exists for comfort and healing. And you found a way to kill with it.
- Mortality Phobia: One of Fleur's defining traits. Her inner monologue shows her to be obsessed with time: when she's thinking over what Celestia did to her, it's the effective loss of the time she spent in Canterlot that she fixes on, and she instantly and categorically rejects Time Turner upon seeing that his mark is an hourglass — a rejection only enforced by finding out his name.
- Invoked in chapter 19, when she considers her mission, and then logically wonders what Discord would do if, say, Fluttershy died on a mission.
- Ultimately, subverted; as chapter 45 reveals, Fleur isn't afraid of death at all. Instead, she's obsessed with time because she's intimately aware that an Escort can only really make a living at that role whilst she's young and attractive enough to draw in customers, so she's determined to get financially secure before she ages out of that bracket, as she doesn't think she has any other employable skills. There's also an element of counting down the time until the pedophile who assaulted her is eligible for release from his prison in Prance.
- #1 Dime: Fleur retrieves a small box from a hiding place in a run-down Canterlot apartment and, after making sure the contents are intact, goes to great lengths to conceal it in Ponyville. Its contents aren't revealed until chapter 44 — hoof shavings and mane clippings from her birth mother, who died when she was young; and fur/claw clippings and a feather from her adoptive sister, whom she euthanized to spare her a lifetime in a brain-damaged vegetative state. It is known as a mourning box and keeping one is strongly implied to be a Protoceran custom.
- Pet the Dog: Despite the Cutie Mark Crusaders running into her, she's very patient and understanding with them, warns them that they don't want to experience what she went through to get her mark, and promises to keep quiet about their whole "accidentally chased a deer into town" misadventure.
- Also, she's extremely patient with Fluttershy, and outraged on her behalf both at the idea that Celestia is giving her no financial support and when she believes Celestia is forcing Fluttershy to have foals.
- The Pornomancer: Fleur's Talent is an extremely narrow and specialized form of empathy that lets her quickly and completely identify and understand a pony's sexual desires. It really adds something to an escort's career when they can do exactly what a client most desires before that individual ever asks — and knowing a pony's darkest desires can provide a wealth of blackmail material.
- Raised by Orcs: Fleur's acceptance of the cycle of predator and prey, and her own attitudes about the importance of not being prey, has resulted in speculation that she was actually raised by griffons, hence her far more aggressive and cynically pragmatic mentality, compared to the softer ponies around her. Pretty much confirmed in chapter 20, where it reveals that she genuinely likes Protoceran Pony Cuisine... aka, "vegetables cooked with meat, so they absorb the flavor". She even considers it comfort food. Chapter 43 confirms that she is a native of Protocera, and Chapter 44 reveals that she was adopted by a griffon family after her mother died.
- The Rival: Downplayed, but it's implied she's one of many ponies who feels this way about Photo Finish: Fleur hates the fashion agent for tricking innocent models out of all the money they earn for their modelling. In this case, Photo Finish hates Fleur right back for having evaded this fate by actually reading the fine print before signing, and used her own contacts to cause a little early damage to Fleur's escort career. (Fleur states that the photographer is a leading cause of models transitioning to escorts because a lot of ponies decide that if they're going to spend their lives getting screwed, they might as well get paid for it.)
- Silly Rabbit, Idealism Is for Kids!: Mocks the concept of Honesty being important enough to deserve a position as one of the Six Elements, to the point that finding out this was true actually gave her a genuine laugh.
- Statuesque Stunner: Fleur's considerably taller than the average mare, to the point where she could potentially just about look Princess Cadance in the eyes.
- Younger Than They Look: As it turns out in chapter 45, Fleur is actually a lot younger than everypony around her thought she was. Her unusual height makes her appear older to ponies, and she uses that to her advantage. She only entered Equestria shortly after Luna's return. All evidence in the story points to her being somewhere between 16 to 22 years old, with
Word of God confirming she's the equivalent of a 21 year old. In chapter 48, Fluttershy realizes to her shock that Fleur is younger than she is.
Harem Fantasy
A romance novel incarnated by Discord to help him understand dating.- And Your Reward Is Infancy: In chapter 48, Discord realizes that he doesn't need Harem anymore and de-animates her book, but transfers her spirit into a mare giving birth at the Ponyville hospital. Said mare is very surprised to find out that she's about to deliver two foals instead of one.
- Animate Inanimate Object: After his first meeting with Fleur, Discord sneaks into the Canterlot Archives to learn about dating, doing so through bringing the books in the relevant section to life and having them lecture him on the subject. This quickly turns frustrating: while the books agree on what dating is, none of them can reach a consensus on how to do it, and he soon restores them to normal — with the exception of a harem fantasy novel which wasn't even supposed to be in that section. (One of the junior Archivists had been reading it on the sly.) He winds up taking that book with him as a declared "research assistant." She's capable of speech and getting headaches without the benefit of having an actual head.
- Bait-and-Switch: Throughout the story, the reader is led to believe that the titular "anchor foal" will be a child eventually born to Fluttershy and whatever mate Fleur finds for her. The last chapter reveals it to actually be the reincarnation of Harem Fantasy.
- Genre Savvy: At least when it comes to romance tropes. Unfortunately, reality bares only a passing resemblance to her expectations.
- Morality Pet: She quickly grows on Discord and he expends quite a bit of energy making sure she's safe during their misadventures.
- Morphic Resonance: Her pony form has fur the same reddish-brown as her book-form's cover, with a paper-white mane and tail shot through with threads the same shade of gold as her cover text.
- Thinks Like a Romance Novel: And a very meta one at that.
- What Measure Is a Non-Human?: In her viewpoint chapter, she is shown to be very confused and unsettled about the details of her own existence.
- Wrong Genre Savvy: She spent several "chapters" believing Discord was Fleur's rival, much to her chagrin.
- You Are Better Than You Think You Are: She gives a rather impassioned speach to Discord in chapter 40, when she tries to talk him out of setting Fluttershy up on a date with a creature from Tartarus. She points out that the creatures down there are monsters because they lack the fundamental ability to care, and that's why Discord isn't a monster, because he does care. Discord's jaw literally drops when Harem Fantasy says this, so it evidently took him quite by surprise.
Dr. Tria Lorem
A griffon psychiatrist in Canterlot who does therapy sessions with Fleur, one of the conditions attached to the latter's pardon.- Freudian Couch: The one in her office is actually a nest since she deals with a lot of griffon patients.
Caramel
An earth pony stallion famous throughout Ponyville for his constant pursuit of a pegasus girlfriend. Inadvertently becomes Fleur's first friend in Ponyville, though she largely views it as her responsibility to bully him into a better lifestyle.- Abhorrent Admirer: Caramel's long, long list of failed relationships has resulted in him becoming rather infamous amongst Ponyville's pegasi mares, and many of them reject him on principle, as the stories often paint him in a much worse light than he deserves.
- Bondage Is Bad: Thanks to a little nudging from Fleur, he finally hooks up with an interested pegasus mare (revealed in the sequel to be called "Aviatrix" at the end of Anchor Foal. He promptly breaks up with her by the start of Anchor Foal II, because she's a sexual dominant with a BDSM fetish and he is very much not into that. Fleur isn't sure what happened, precisely, but she suspects a saddle was involved.
- Dogged Nice Guy: Caramel is a nice stallion at heart, but his luck in the field of love is distinctly lacking. He tends to vacillate between Low-Key Yearning, particularly in the direction of the very-not-interested Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash, and Spectacular Spending when he finally gets a mare interested. However, his relationships never last, partially because he tends to drive himself almost bankrupt in a desperate effort to keep the current mare's interest.
- Has a Type: Pegasi. Caramel is exclusively attracted to pegasus mares, and only pursues them.
- Inverted in that it's noted he finds unicorns a turn off, due to an incident as a teenager where he was poked in the eye by Miranda Rights' horn when they were making out in a closet.
- Anchor Foal II eventually reveals that Caramel might be more accurately said to have a feather fetish. To Fleur's horror, when Caramel sees Gilda the griffon in flight, it awakens a whole new facet of his "puzzle".
- Love Hungry: Invoked. In Anchor Foal II, Fleur notes that part of Caramel's issue is that he can't stand to be alone, so he rushes off to find a replacement marefriend as soon as possible.
- Love Martyr: Downplayed. Caramel's desperation to be in a relationship is noted as causing him to overlook a certain amount of character flaws from the current object of his affections, but he's also noted to have limits.
- Perpetual Poverty: Caramel's constant cycle of hooking up, splurging hugely to impress his current marefriend, then breaking up, has left him perpetually on the edge of debt, and he's become very good at stretching his bits to jungle his myriad debts. One of the things Fleur is stubbornly working on is teaching him better budgeting skills, and especially not to make expensive romantic gestures on a candy shop sales assistant's salary.
Zephyr Breeze
Fluttershy's younger brother.- Big Brother Bully: Zephyr is characterized as an emotional bully to his sister Fluttershy. There was an incident shortly after Fluttershy moved to Ponyville where Zephyr showed up then tried to steal her property to sell it for cash. His arrival in Anchor Foal II causes Fluttershy to start losing all of the confidence in herself she has spent years building up.
- Born Winner: A significant part of his Continuum characterization. When he and Fluttershy were younger, adults tended to treat him as the one in charge (even though he is younger than Fluttershy and a Lazy Bum) almost entirely because of his height and his high magical strength - two traits which are entirely a function of his genetics and which he didn't have to do anything to get or maintain.
- Gold Digger: A rare male example, Zephyr is very attractive and excels at finessing his looks into getting attracted mares to give him a place to crash, free food, and sometimes even financial support, though his laziness invariably causes the relationship to sour when his partner realizes he's just sponging off of her and they promptly kick him out of their lives.
- Lazy Bum: His defining trait is his sheer laziness and selfishness. He continually gets fired because he can't put in any effort to his work. Fleur's Talent even lets her deduce he's an absolutely terrible sexual partner because he literally just lays there and lets his current lover do all the work of gratifying herself.
- Unskilled, but Strong: Zephyr has a lot of raw pegasus magic, but is too lazy and/or untrained to use it with any real finesse, typically treating his wind control as a blunt object.
