TVTropes Now available in the app store!
Open

Follow TV Tropes

Break Down And Blossom

Go To

Break Down and Blossom is a My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic fanfic by GravityDefyingCoffeeMug. It depicts Stygian after the Season 7 finale still possessing some lingering darkness of The Pony of Shadows as a Split Personality that's about as morbid and cynical as him. Also, he eats the flesh of other ponies.

However, Stygian did not eat on Sundays. It was on one of such days, while resting on a shadowy overgrown enclosure, that a young filly came to him in some selfish need for companionship, or so he thought. He comes to find himself being content with her company and letting her ramble as it provided the usually reclusive and emotionally detached pony with an odd sense of normalcy.

The fic can be read on fimfiction.net here.


  • Abusive Parents: It's quite noticeable how malnourished, unbathed, and blemished the filly is, and it's not just because her family is poor. She casually mentions how her mother hits her, claims "she only has fun when she hits me," and even shows the scars to prove it. She's hesitant to talk about her dad, and it's revealed later that his abuse was particularly sexual. Furthermore, her death was likely caused by their mistreatment, and the mother is too apathetic or deranged to do more than try to throw her body at a river.
  • Accidental Truth: The filly makes up tall tales of fantastic creatures as if she's recounting actual memories, and it amuses Stygian that she's unaware that there are probably beings in the Everfree Forest that match her descriptions.
  • Adaptational Abomination: Downplayed. Although the Pony of Shadows is no longer a threat in this story note , his appetite is more monstrous. The show only depicted him drawing his power from shadows, but as Stygian's alternate personality in this fanfic, he eats the flesh of other ponies. However, he personally sees this as a natural way of things.
  • Call-Back: "Stygian did not eat on Sundays." is mentioned in the first and final excerpts. The first instance foreshadows that he eats pony flesh by following it with "This, he decided, was the only reason the small filly who came out to play in the backyard every Sunday, was still alive." The second instance occurs in a more tragic light. The filly dies, so he buries her. "Stygian did not eat on Sundays. But that didn’t mean he’d let her go to waste."
  • Death of a Child: The filly is dead by the story's end, likely killed by her parents' abuse. The exact cause isn't clear, only that her deranged mother tried to dispose of her body by a river.
  • Dissonant Serenity: The Pony of Shadows smiles serenely at the decomposing corpse that he eats the flesh of as he contemplates the cycle of life.
  • Growing Up Sucks: When the filly mentions wanting to be a teacher when she grows up, Stygian puts the ambition down with "the pay is lousy", and later on, when she says that "Grown-ups don't look like they have fun." the Pony of Shadows affirms that "Fun is for children." Stygian is amused when she says she doesn't want to grow up, to which she continues, "I don't wanna if it's not fun."
  • Hates Wasting Food: Stygian can tolerate many misdeeds, but wasting food is not one of them. Food in this case means the flesh of other ponies. He treats his meals with reverence, so when he sees a bloodied mare in an alleyway, he takes care to not ruin her body any further as he cuts off meat to devour. As he puts it: "Consuming her is a part of nature. But looking at her naked flesh would be a violation of the highest degree." Even when the filly who was nice to him ends up dead, Stygian doesn't want her to go to waste either, but he buries her instead of eating her.
  • No Name Given: Stygian acquaints a young filly, but he never cares to ask for her name, and she doesn't mention it either. Her mother, father, and younger brother also go unnamed.
  • Non Sequitur: Played for drama. Stygian's detached amusement while listening to the filly tell her imagined tall tales hits a wall when she suddenly resignedly states, "My mama says I'm gonna die."
  • Parental Incest: It's revealed that the filly's father has done unspeakable things to her. When Stygian says that he won't see her again, her "solution" is to tearfully raise her rump before him. He smells an overpowering mixture of ammonia and baby powder, and a sad realisation hits him: she saw engaging in these "grown-up games" as normal, or as a means to avoid being alone.
    "If I let papa… He doesn’t go. He doesn’t leave. You can… If you want. Don’t leave."
  • Predation Is Natural: Stygian/The Pony of Shadows' disturbing serenity in eating his victims comes from a sense of poetic justice that he is part of the natural order that decomposes those that came from and steal from the soil and makes them become part of it again.
  • Reformed, but Not Tamed: Stygian has reconciled with those he once turned on after Starswirl cast him out, judging by his merry anticipation to meet Starswirl again in Canterlot, and that he wears a cloak he got from him as an apology gift. However, some of The Pony of Shadows' darkness stayed with him, and some of Stygian's cynicism seems to be his own instead of the darkness' influence.
  • Scavengers Are Scum: Inverted. Stygian refuses to let the body of a murdered mare go uneaten because he Hates Wasting Food. As the story puts it: "Stygian may be a scavenger. But he's still a gentlecolt."
  • Superheroes Wear Capes: The filly asks if Stygian is dressed as a superhero because he's wearing a cape, though it's actually a cloak like Starswirl's.
  • Talking to Themself: Stygian is content with having only himself to talk to, and is fairly good at consoling himself. In this case, his other self is the Pony of Shadows, who he's confided many secrets and guilty confessions to.
    “I killed a stallion today,” he whispered.
    “He attacked you first.”
    “I was distracted from my mission.”
    “Nopony’s perfect.”
    “I doubted myself. I am ashamed.”
    “I still love you.”
  • Title Drop: "Break down and blossom" is what Stygian thinks to himself as he reflects on those who pass (including those he eats) - their decomposing provides back to the earth that they came from to provide nutrients for new life to flourish.

Top