Mirror's Image
is a My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic fanfiction written by EvilPresident. It is a Alternate Universe fic that starts with Twilight telling her friends about her miracle birth while they are on their way to Canterlot for Shining Armor's and Princess Cadence's wedding. However, things go awry when she is revealed to be a Changeling. Will Twilight embrace her Changeling nature, or reject it?
Mirror's Image contains examples of these tropes:
- Abusive Parents: The Riches weren't the best choice of parents for a Changeling.
- Arranged Marriage: Blueblood and Cadence's parents tried to organise one between Blueblood and Twilight Sparkle. Her parents refused, angrily.
- As Long as There Is Evil: As long as there is so much as a speck of chaos, Discord will exist.
- Berserk Button: Don't talk about war near Princess Luna.
- Big Brother Instinct: Shining Armor doesn't exactly like Blueblood, or the idea of his having a crush on his little sister.
- Big Damn Heroes: As Twilight is being petrified by a Brainwashed and Crazy Celestia, the changelings in the dungeon spring themselves to save her. One even bites the bullet and gets petrified in Twilight's place.
- Brain Bleach: After Twilight learns about changeling reproduction. Something about it is so squicky that she uses a mind wipe spell on herself. Twice.
- Brainwashed and Crazy: Princess Celestia, whenever something triggers the "surprises" left in her mind by Amethyst. She'll instantly start trying to petrify whoever happens to be standing near her.
- Chekhov's Gun: Early on, it's mentioned that Filthy Rich gave Twilight's parents money for no apparent reason. This becomes important later in the story.
- Daddy Had a Good Reason for Abandoning You: Young Queens need a lot more love than the average changeling, which is why they are exchanged for stillborn infants and placed in loving families.
- Deal with the Devil: The Flutterpony Queen made a deal with Discord to save her subjects. Three guesses how that turned out.
- Death of a Child: In the opening chapter. And then again with Chrysalis' previous children.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Luna swears to banish anypony who dares play a prank on her.
- Do Not Call Me "Paul": It's Chrysallis now, Celestia.
- Emotion Eater: Changelings can eat more than just love. They can eat pretty much any emotion, although love is the most powerful. Hate, however, hurts them.
- Young Queens need a lot more love than the average changeling.
- Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: Well, neither evil per se, nor exactly good, but Chrysalis doesn't understand why Princess Celestia is so calm and reasonable toward her, even after she invades Canterlot.
- Everyone Can See It: Blueblood's crush on Twilight Sparkle isn't exactly difficult to spot. Unless you're Twilight Sparkle.
- Fallen Hero: Chrysalis was once the bearer of an Element of Harmony, and Princess Celestia's student. That was a thousand years ago.
- False Reassurance: Rainbow Dash states she's an expert with weather control, while handling an ominously big raincloud. Applejack quickly decides to move out from under it.
- Fantastic Racism:
- Prince Blueblood towards Changelings. He sees nothing wrong with the thought of declaring war on them for kidnapping two ponies (though that would potentially be considered an Act of War in the real world).
- Applied to Celestia a thousand years ago. She banished her former student just for being a changeling, and even outright threatened her. Amethyst even points out that even when Celestia feels bad for what she did, she still hates changelings.
- Foreshadowing: Twilight Velvet claims she'd die before anyone "dared to lay a hoof on (her) daughter".
- From Bad to Worse: An insane Blueblood with access to the mirror pool.
- Generation Xerox: Chrysalis was Celestia's former student and former Element of Magic, which both apply to Twilight.
- God Save Us from the Queen!: Averted, in Chrysalis's case. She's just trying to make sure her ponies survive. Played much more straight with Amethyst, from what the flashbacks show.
- Happily Adopted: Twilight, once she learns that her parents love her for who she is, not what she is.
- Heavy Sleeper: Luna. The only thing that can wake her up are moon pies.
- Hive Mind: The Changelings are working on this. There are still some teething problems, though, such as when Chrysalis starts thinking on her past, and the entire hive (Twilight Sparkle included) feels her distress.
- Hope Spot: After a nice party in Canterlot, it seems Twilight as a Changeling will be accepted by everpony. Then Blueblood, empowered and corrupted by the Alicorn Amulet, attacks the group and ends up killing Twilight's mother.
- How Do I Shot Web?: Twilight naturally takes time get adjusted to her new form. Her first attempt at flying doesn't work.
- Improvised Weapon:
- Luna uses Pinkie Pie's non-stop talking as a way to threaten the Changelings during her trip to the Wastelands.
- Big Mac wields a broken flagpole to fight off the changelings during the invasion.
- In Spite of a Nail: Despite Twilight Sparkle actually being a Changeling, she still acts and thinks exactly like the canon Twilight, in every respect.
- I Regret Nothing: Said once by Twilight, having just consumed a bar of her brother's (medically prescribed) chocolate, and again later by Sweetie Belle, in the process of eating enough cotton candy to make herself sick. Both are Played for Laughs.
- It Runs in the Family: Apparently mares in the Twilight line have always had difficulty with pregnancy.
- Jaw Drop: Rainbow Dash has one when she discovers Chrysallis is the author of the Daring Do series.
- Knight Templar Parent: Queen Amethyst. When Celestia rejected Chrysallis, Amethsyt sealed Celestia's memories of Chrysallis' true nature, as a way of getting back at Celestia. This caused Celestia to be unable to find Chrysallis.
- Large Ham: Even as a Changeling, some of Trixie's essential Trixie-ness shines through, resulting in the Great and Powerful Changeling.
- Laser-Guided Amnesia: Inflicted on Celestia long ago by Amethyst, to prevent her going after Chrysallis.
- Anypony who becomes a Changeling loses all the memories of their prior life, though it's implied they could probably remember.
- Love Makes You Evil: Blueblood had a crush on Twilight and feared what happened to her. Unfortunately, his idea of what Twilight should be blinded him to the fact that Twilight had become a changeling. He put on the Alicorn Amulet to attack Changeling Twilight, and was corrupted to the point of releasing a deadly spell that killed Twilight Velvet.
- Luke, I Am Your Father: Chrysalis is Twilight's real mother. The real Twilight was stillborn, so Chrysallis used that to switch her with our Twilight.
- Mama Bear: Chrysalis. When the Riches broke up, causing the death of her second daughter in the process, she engineered things so that both of them would remain in prison for life.
- Meaningful Name: Dusty Tomes likes to live up to his name, as Prince Blueblood finds out.
- Medium Awareness: In the first chapter, Pinkie notices the section of the flashback that was in italics (which wasn't a part of Twilight's narration), and comments upon it, much to everypony's confusion.
- My Greatest Failure: Aside from the situation with Nightmare Moon, Celestia's other regret is what went down with Starlight Twinkle.
- For Luna, it's not being able to help the Flutterponies when Discord messed with them.
- Mythology Gag:
- A flashback shows one of Celestia's servants a thousand years ago was Surprise.
- Mention is made of the previous element bearers fighting Tirek and the Smooze.
- Not Helping Your Case: In a flashback, Princess Celestia wonders why some ponies think of her as a tyrant, and then when seconds later she ruminates about Luna, she mentions the guards won't tell anyone what they heard "if they knew what was good for them."
- The Not-So-Harmless Punishment: Twilight names one of her Changelings Sucker Punch in order to get him to stop being so zealous about his job. The rank and file of the Changeling Horde do not like being named, and Sucker Punch takes it pretty hard.
- Odd Friendship: Luna and Amethyst, the last Queen of the changelings, used to be friends a thousand years ago. Amethyst takes a moment during her "talk" with Celestia to call her on how she treated her sister.
- Paper-Thin Disguise: Played With. Flim and Flam disguise themselves using only fake goatees and call themselfves Flum and Flom. The Cutie Mark Crusaders and Twilight see right through it but don't call them out on it.
- Parental Substitute: Princess Celestia, for Starlight Twinkle. She rescued the filly from a fire that took the lives of her parents and raised her. Then Princess Luna turned into Nightmare Moon, and things turned sour between them. These days, Starlight holds the mother of all grudges against her.
- Pet the Dog: Unlike most fics, Blueblood isn't portrayed as a total slime, and is shown to care for Luna, and has a crush on Twilight. It is deconstructed when he desires to start a war with the Changelings over Twilight, and not believing that Twilight was a Changeling ends up donning the Alicorn Amulet. Corrupted and empowered, he unleashes a curse that kills Twlight's mom.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: Princess Celestia, natch. She's hurt when Twilight Sparkle's parents say they thought she'd banish or imprison Twilight for being a Changeling.
- Sequel Hook: The fic ends with an insane Blueblood not only still having an army of Mirror Pool clones at his arsenal, but also contacted by Discord, who wants revenge on Twilight for turning him to stone.
- Shout-Out:
- As they prepare to enter the changeling hive, Pinkie Pie claims she was "Born naked and screaming".
- At one point Prince Blueblood shouts at Luna to "Construct additional pylons or something!"
- Shoot the Dog: Chrysalis was forced to let her first child die of starvation.
- Stalker with a Crush: Blueblood has a serious crush on Twilight Sparkle, one she never noticed. Needless to say, he refuses to believe she's a Changeling.
- Stunned Silence: See Rainbow Dash's Jaw Drop above.
- Sweet Tooth: Twilight has a thing for chocolate, as do all changelings.
- Switched at Birth: Twilight was switched at birth when the real Twilight was declared stillborn. The real Twilight lies in a graveyard of the other stillborn children switched this way.
Chrysalis can't vouch that all of them, including the one she (Chrysalis) was swapped for, were really stillborn. - There Is No Kill Like Overkill: Luna will go to any lengths to prevent Pinkie playing the Pony Polka. Including using fire. Examining the evidence is what leads Pinkie to suspect someone may not like that record.
- This Is Gonna Suck: Twilight's reaction when she accidentally shapeshifts into Sweetie Belle, when Rarity bursts into the library thinking she's a burglar.
- Took a Level in Jerkass: Princess Celestia, after Nightmare Moon was sealed away. She began blaming her pupil Starlight for what happened to her sister, and when she returned as Chrysalis Celestia forced her to leave, even though she recognised her. She did at least acknowledge that she'd make a mistake, but then Amethyst showed up...
- The Unreveal: It's pretty obvious before you even begin reading the story to learn that Twilight is a Changeling.
- Her parents however already knew Twilight was a Changeling, due to noticing things that fillies just don't do, such as changing mane color or her fangs. Chrysalis also slipped them a book with an entry of her kind in it.
- Villain Decay: Luna mentions that the Discord she and Celestia faced was much, much worse than when the Mane Six encountered him.
- Villainous Legacy: Discord made the Changelings what they are, and Amethyst forced Chrysalis to be what she is.
- Villain Override: Chrysalis can speak through any of her subjects whenever she chooses. She usually uses this to upbraid Princess Celestia.
- Was Once a Man: Or pony, more accurately. The original Changelings used to be the Flutterponies. Then Discord came along...
- Any pony the Changelings "recruit", like for example Trixie.
- Wham Episode: In Chapter 18, Blueblood, under the influence of the Alicorn Amulet, fatally wounds Twilight's mother, Velvet. Velvet doesn't make it.
- Wham Line:"This Great and Powerful Changeling will take you to the hive."
- Wrong Genre Savvy: Blueblood.Almost like we're in a novel, where the evil overlord is nearly defeated and grasps at the last straws to keep himself alive, while the hero prepares to strike him down.
