Fanfic / Yin-Yang

Yin-Yang is a Fusion Fic written by Dr.Indigo between She-Ra and the Princesses of Power and Masters of the Universe, specifically a Broad Strokes variant of the 2002 version.

Adora awakens and finds herself in a world surrounded by stars and soon comes across a lone man named Prince Adam of the House of Randor. Together, they team up to try and get her back to Etheria, and in the process, discover the truth about her origins.

For the general use of the yin-yang symbol in media, see Dragons Up the Yin Yang.

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Yin-Yang provides examples of:

• Acceptable Breaks from Canon: Given that the story began and was being written before Season 3's release, many things differ from what went down in later seasons.
  • In Season 3, Shadow Weaver gets taken into custody by the Rebellion after her escape. Here, she hides within Adora's shadow to recover.
  • The Crimson Waste is a Crapsack World that neither the Horde nor the Rebellion control and is filled with the hoodlums and lowlifes of Etheria. In this story, it's part of territory owned by Scorpia's kingdom, much like how it was in the 80s cartoon.
  • The Heart of Etheria doesn't exist here seeing as the story was written before Season 4.
• Adaptational Badass: While Moss Man and Evilseed were already powerful in the 2002 series, in this fic they're the living manifestations of the light and dark halves of Eternia respectively.
• Adaptational Heroism: Canonically, it's revealed that the First Ones were actually an evil empire. Here, they aren't and even allied themselves with ancient Eternia to keep the peace.
• Adaptational Jerkass: In canon, Hordak was loyal to Horde Prime well before he was left stranded on Etheria. Here, he was far more disobedient and insulting towards his brother when he wasn't around.
• Adaptational Nice Guy: Horde Prime still tried to get rid of his brother, but only after an insurmountable failure on Hordak's part. He even took pity on him due to his defects and allowed him to maintain some level of power. In the show, he pretty much tried to get rid of him the instant he learned about his defects.
• Adaptational Sexuality: Perfuma and Scorpia end up together in canon, but here the former explicitly states she prefers boys and the latter has Ship Tease with Mekanek.
• Adaptational Villainy:
  • In Season 4 of Princesses of Power, it was revealed that Mara sent Etheria into Despondos because the First Ones were actually an evil empire. Here, since Eternia suffered many repercussions from this, combined with the First Ones not being an empire, and her severing Etheria from Eternia in a fit of despair after her lover was killed, it causes her actions to be far less heroic than they were canonically.
  • Nikolas was not a villain in the 2002 series. Here, he is the reason Mara sent Etheria into Despondos and turned Keldor into Skeletor.
  • As the Crimson Wastes are part of Scorpia's territory in this fic, Huntara works for the Horde.
• Adaptation Name Change: Skeletor's forces are named the Outcasts instead of the Evil Warriors. This is because the author felt the name was too generic and that Outcasts fit their Ragtag Bunch of Misfits nature better.
• Adaptation Origin Connection: In canon, Adora was summoned to Despondos by Light Hope. Here, she was thrown in by Skeletor as a ploy to emotionally hurt Randor.
• Adaptation Species Change:
  • As revealed with both Mara and Adora, the First Ones in the show were humanoid to the point where it's almost impossible to tell the difference between them and normal humans at a glance. In this fic, the First Ones, aka the Hok, are an almost angelic species, being winged humanoids.
  • While Veena's species in the 2002 show was unknown, she was implied to be native to Eternia. Here, she's a member of the Hok.
  • In the show, Adora was purely a First One. In this fic, she's an Eternian who descends from the First Ones. Same for Mara as well.
• Alien Sky: An inverted perspective take on this trope, but Adora's surprised to see stars in the sky once she gets to Eternia.
• Ancestral Weapon: Both the Sword of Power and the Sword of Protection are the legendary weapons of the bloodline of Grayskull, having been passed down for generations and are now wielded by Adam and Adora, the current He-Man and She-Ra.
• Anthropomorphic Personification: Moss Man and Evilseed are the physical embodiment of the light hemisphere and dark hemisphere respectively. They used to be a singular being who embodied Eternia as a whole before the Great Separation.
• Anti-Hero: King Ro, the last He-Man before Adam, was this of the nominal variety. He did do protecting, but he'd only do so if he could gain something out of it and was, all-in-all, a complete asshole most of the time.
• Asshole Victim: While King Ro was innocent of killing Jade, he was also kind of a homophobic jackass.
• Bad Boss: Hordeth was a pretty callous leader. He orders the weakest of his men to attack King D'Vann first, knowing all of them will die, then he and his elites personally attack after their opponent has been drained fighting the fodder.
• Bait-and-Switch: The seventh chapter starts with Catra as the apparent overlord of the Horde, only for it to be revealed to be a dream.
• Big Brother Instinct: Moss Man deeply cares for his sister, Razzuma (aka Madam Razz). Even his evil half still cares for her and is outright furious at what her exile to Despondos has done to her.
• Big "WHAT?!": Catra has this reaction when she sees a newspaper showing Adora reuniting with her family.
• Black-and-Grey Morality: Eternia has this compared to Etheria's Black-and-White Morality. While the likes of Skeletor and other forces on Eternia are pure evil, heroic characters like Randor, while much more sympathetic and well-intentioned in their pursuits, have committed their fair share of bad actions as well to try and maintain peace on Eternia. This is something that causes arguments with Bow and Adam in Chapter 19, since Bow doesn't understand the full context behind Randor's past actions and just labels him as a villain.
• The Blank: Nikolas' new form after being mutated by the dark energies that split the planet looks humanoid, but completely lacks a face.
• Brother–Sister Team: Adam and Adora form one as they fight across Eternia together. Though they don't learn that they are siblings until they get to Castle Grayskull.
• Cain and Abel:
  • Evilseed and Moss Man respectively, though Evilseed doesn't want to kill his brother, it's just in their nature to fight as the embodiments of the two halves of Eternia.
  • A non-biological case with Randor and Skeletor since they were raised as brothers. Skeletor wants to kill and torture not just Randor, but his entire family while Randor originally wanted to reason with him before he sent Adora to Despondos, at which point whatever love he had for his adoptive brother died.
• Clingy Jealous Girl: In Chapter 24, Netossa is furious when she finds out about the hologram of Spinnerella in a belly dancer's outfit Adora made for her Holo-Suite (she had no idea the two were married) and vows to "throw down" with Adora after the dimension problem has been sorted out.
• Cloudcuckoolander's Minder: When Moss Man and Evilseed were one being that embodied Eternia, he was this to Razzuma, as he kept her from going too far in her Mental Time Travel and helped her stay anchored to the present. After Mara sent Etheria out of Eternia's system, she had no one to keep her on track and is a lot more senile in present day as a result.
• Composite Character: The Faceless One is merged with 2002 Hordak as the one who saved Keldor and turned him into Skeletor.
• Cooldown Hug: After seeing Adora breakdown upon watching the visions of the past and their family, Adam immediately hugs her to try and calm her down.
• Darker and Edgier: Adora and co. are forced into a much darker world than Etheria where bloodshed, violence, and gruesome killings are more common than they're used to. Get's lampshaded by her and Swiftwind as well.
  She-Ra (After seeing Battle Cat maul Taran Chula to death): That... that got dark. That got dark so fast.
  
  Swift Wind (After killing members of the Spider Guild): That got so dark. That got so dark so fast.
• Death by Adaptation: Callix is revealed to have died of his injuries during Hordak's initial invasion of Eternia while Mantenna was killed during an ambush much later.
• Death Glare:
  • After he sent Adora into the Well of Darkness and gloated about it, Randor gave Skeletor a glare so frightful and withering that he saw fit to get the Hell out of there.
  • Randor gives one to Shadow Weaver to make her back down from seeing Castaspella and Angella.
• Declaration of Protection: After Catra expresses her concerns that Hordak intends to execute her for Shadow Weaver's escape, Scorpia makes it clear to Catra that she'll do everything in her power to make sure she's safe, even get her family to go to war with the Horde itself if it means helping her friend.
• Deliberate Values Dissonance: As noted by Shadow Weaver, homosexuality wasn't considered acceptable back when Mara was She-Ra.
  Shadow Weaver: I'm afraid on Eternia, in this age, certain ideas, certain passions, were just not tolerated.
• Demoted to Extra: As Adam's identity as He-Man isn't a secret in this fic, Man-at-Arms and Teela don't have as much of a presence in the story as they do in most canon continuities.
• Dies Differently in Adaptation: In the 2002 series, King Grayskull performed a Heroic Sacrifice in banishing Hordak to Despondos. Here, he lives to old age and dies of natural causes.
• Dirty Cop: Catra interacts with some when she winds up on Eternia. Besides harassing her for no reason outside of being poor, they're also shown to be on the Spider Guild's payroll.
• Emotionally Tongue-Tied: Frosta is so attracted to Adam when they first meet, she can't even form a real word around him and passes out.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: The Faceless One/King Nikolas is a Manipulative Bastard who caused the death of his era's He-Man, but he was shown in flashbacks to be a loving father to his daughter, Evelyn/Evil-Lyn.
• Even Evil Has Standards:
  • Catra and Leech may be Horde soldiers, but the corruption of the Spider Guild and their treatment of the poor is so repulsive that even they balk at it. Catra considers them worse than the Horde in that regard.
  • King Ro is certainly one of the more crude of the Grayskull line and an outright homophobe, but he'd never go so far as to kill his cousin's lover out of spite. He was outright horrified when King Nikolas did so.
• Face of an Angel, Mind of a Demon: King Nikolas is described as handsome and having the conventional good looks of a king, but he's a Manipulative Bastard who pulls a Frame-Up on Ro and makes it look like he killed his cousin's lover.
• Foil: Swift Wind and Battle Cat in how they differ as loyal animal companions. Swift Wind is a flying animal who openly communicates with everyone around him and detests bloodshed, as he was horrified with having to kill members of the Spider Guild when attacking their base. Battle Cat, meanwhile, can only communicate with those connected to the power of Grayskull, can't fly, and openly relishes in the bloodshed he partakes in to the point of being bored by anything that doesn't involve fighting and killing.
• Foregone Conclusion: In the flashback chapters chronicalling the past of the bloodline of Grayskull up to the present, the readers already know that they end with Adora being sent to Despondos and assumed dead by her family. The chapters just show how that happened.
• Frame-Up: King Nikolas murders Jade, Mara's lover, and makes it seem like her cousin, Ro, committed the crime.
• Fusion Fic: The story combines the lore of He-Man after She-Ra and the Princesses of Power exiled Eternia from continuity.
• General Failure: Hordak was this in the past, as all his plans to conquer Eternia backfire and blow up in his face. He suffers one humiliating defeat after another in his efforts to usurp King Miro, all of which culminates in him retreating with enough losses that Horde Prime finally decides that he's as good as dead.
• Greater-Scope Villain: King Nikolas only appears in two chapters; he's still responsible for pretty much everything that went wrong for both Eternia AND Etheria over the previous 1000 years (and since what happens on Eternia effects the entire universe, that means he's also responsible for Horde Prime's rise to power). He's also the guy who saved Skeletor's life when he was mortally wounded and is implied to have taught him the ways of being evil.
• Half-Identical Twins: With exception to gender, Adam and Adora are practically mirror images of each other. When Catra read the newspapers detailing the royal family reuniting, she noted that Adam was "almost [Adora's] exact double." Bow also makes note of this resemblance after meeting Adam.
• Heroic Lineage: Both Adam and Adora are the children of King Randor, who is recognized as the hero of the Great Unrest and a legendary warrior. They also get this from their mother's side, descending from several ancient heroes of Greek mythology, such as Perseus and Odysseus. They also descend from the original bloodline of King D'Vann Grayskull and Captain Veena of the Hok, aka the First Ones.
• Hero with Bad Publicity: She-Ra doesn't really have a good standing on Eternia with those ancient enough to remember the name thanks to the actions of Mara that led to the planet being split into light and dark halves as well as sending its sister planet, Etheria, into a starless void.
• Humiliation Conga:
  • Catra went through one when she was transported to Eternia. She was constantly belittled, spat on, thrown into dirt, and turned into an urchin. She was also abused by corrupt cops.
  • Leech and the Horde force commanders went through one when they tried to invade Eternia. Miro humiliated them using beehives, water balloons, and stealing their clothes and weapons when they bathed.
• Incompatible Orientation: Adam flirts with Adora when they first meet. Besides the fact that they are siblings (though they don't learn that until later), Adora is only interested in girls.
• Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy: Catra lampshades this when she states corrupt cops are better shots than Horde soldiers.
• Know When to Fold 'Em:
  • One of the Spider Guild members, who was a veteran of the Great Unrest, ran away the minute Adam started transforming into He-Man. Unlike the rest of the Guild members, he's the only one who survived the ensuing fight.
  • When Adora destroyed the tower that kept out Evil-Seed and Moss-Man, Webstor fled despite having a mech-suit.
• Legacy Character: Adam and Adora aren't the first He-Man and She-Ra, but they are the first in 1,000 years since their ancestors, Ro and Mara. This stems all the way back to Atticus and Angela, the first He-Man and She-Ra.
• Like Father, Like Son: Adam and his father, Randor, tend to be brash and headstrong, though Randor is better at maintaining himself until his emotions cloud his judgement.
• Meaningful Name: Adora's true name is Galatea, which means "milky white" or "white as milk", which likely references her kindhearted nature.
• Mooks: The Horde army. When Entrapta asks Emily which of the 12,082 soldiers stationed at the Amethyst Tower are considered expendable, Emily simply states that all of them are.
• Multiple Head Case: King Hiss.
• Mythology Gag:
  • After Adora hears Adam yell "I Have The Power!" after he transforms into He-Man, she considers saying something similar after she transforms into She-Ra, which is a reference to the old Cartoons when she said "I Am She-Ra!" after transforming. She later says it, albeit awkwardly.
  • Queen Marlena jokes about Bow proposing to Adora, knowing full well Adora's actually a lesbian and there's nothing going on between them. 80s Bow, on the other hand, had a huge crush on She-Ra.
• Named by the Adaptation: The First Ones in canon were only ever referred to as "The First Ones". Here, their species name is the Hok.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Mara sending Etheria into Despondos not only caused Eternia to be split into its light and dark halves, which caused the planet's inhabitants to have to deal with the mutations and monsters of the dark hemisphere, but also threw the universe out of balance and led to the existence of Horde Prime's empire.
• Noodle Incident:
  • It's implied something happened between the Sorceress and Shadow Weaver before Adam and Adora showed up. Something the Sorceress rather not talk about.
  • In the thirteenth week of Adora's time with her family, she and Adam were somehow turned into birds (an owl and raven respectively). Absolutely no explanation is given for how this happened and it's undone in the next scene transition.
• Normal Fish in a Tiny Pond: When Hordak first invaded Eternia, he got his ass handed pretty easily and was kind of a loser thanks to King Miro frequently making a fool of him. When he first arrived on Etheria and started his conquest, however, he quickly became The Dreaded due to being against a planet of pacifists who didn't know the first thing about warfare.
• Origins Episode: After Shadow Weaver tells Adora who she truly is, the next few chapters focus on explaining to her and Adam the origins of the power of Grayskull and their lineage.
• Patchwork Fic: The story combines the lore and characters of the 2018 She-Ra reboot with the lore and characters of the He-Man side of the franchise. In addition, while the He-Man lore is mostly rooted in the 2002 incarnation, it also combines elements of the original Filmation cartoon and the comics as well.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: King Ro, the cousin of Adora's predecessor, was homophobic and lashed out at Mara for being a lesbian.
• Pragmatic Villainy: Horde Prime refuses to target Eternia less out of having standards or fear and more because anything done to Eternia affects his empire across the rest of the universe due to the planet being at it's center.
• Precocious Crush: Just like her 80s counterpart, Frosta is smitten with Adam despite being much younger than said counterpart.
• Put on a Bus: Glimmer and Bow were mentioned to be on Eternia as well, but they haven't been seen since Chapter 2.
  • The Bus Came Back: Bow finally is referenced again in Chapter 17 and makes a full return to the story in Chapter 18.
• Related in the Adaptation:
  • In canon, both Mara and Adora are First Ones, but with no relation to each other (as far as we know). Here, Mara is her ancestor.
• Sadistic Choice: Skeletor forced Randor to chose which of his children he will kill. When Randor just begs him to stop, he decides to kill them both.
• Secret Identity: Averted. Much like Adora, Adam doesn't use this, so Eternia knows that he is He-Man.
• Sibling Yin-Yang: Adam and Adora, with the title being a reference to this. Adam is cocky, smug, and brash, which contrasts Adora's modest, humble, and cautious temperament.
• Sins of the Father: More like "Sins of the Predecessor". Evilseed has a raging hatred for Adora because of what the previous She-Ra, Mara, did to Eternia that split the world into the light and dark hemispheres (and him and his brother by extension).
• Speaks Fluent Animal: Battle Cat can't be understood by anyone except for Adam and Adora due to all of them deriving their powers from Grayskull.
• The Stars Are Going Out: Inverted. Something that signals to Adora that something is very wrong is when the stars come back. She later learns that she's trapped on another planet outside Despondos.
• Stupid Evil: Ninjor is so much this trope that he was actually kicked off the Outcasts because of it. He assumed Adam and Adora were in Anwat Gar to ruin his plans to force the shogun's daughter to marry him and secure himself a line to the throne, so he responds...by immediately announcing his presence and explaining his evil plan in full detail to the twins who were just there to have fun. Adora even calls him out on how much of an utter moron he is.
• Summon to Hand: Adam can call the Sword of Power to his hand with a thought, though it does need to be within range to do so. Adora learns how to do this with the Sword of Protection. Funnily enough, it works better if you think "Please" to the sword.
• Surprise Incest: One-sided example. Adam flirts with Adora when they first meet, but she isn't interested in him at all. After they learn that they are siblings, Adam is really glad Adora rejected him.
  Adam: I...I'm not sure how I feel about this. Other than that I've never been so happy to be rejected by a girl in all my life.
  Adora: Yeah...lucky us.
• Switching P.O.V.: The chapters often switch between who the central character is and focuses on their perspective of events. For example, the end of the first chapter focuses on Scorpia and the seventh chapter primarily focuses on Catra's POV.
• Teens Are Monsters: Evil-Lyn kidnapped Adora and Adam when she was a teenager; Webstor also worked for Skeletor as a teenager.
• Trauma Conga Line: Swift Wind went through this when he first arrived on Eternia. He was attacked by dragons, nearly used as a Piñata by giants (which resulted in giants becoming a Trauma Button for him), captured by the Spider Guild, and almost sold to Skeletor and his army. He also ends up traumatized after killing many Spider Guild members.
• True Companions: With exception to Skeletor's Bad Boss nature, the rest of the Outcasts all get along swimmingly and are shown to be close with each other.
• Truer to the Text: Adora being Adam's twin and the lost daughter of Randor makes this more accurate to the original cartoon than the show, which had the He-Man side of the lore Adapted Out.
• Underestimating Badassery:
  • Adam let himself and Adora get captured so the Spider Guild they could use this trope to get their swords and Battle Cat back.
  • Hordak greatly underestimated King Miro's strategic ability and the brutality of Eternia, which led to his forces being humiliated and slaughtered, as well as led to his disgrace.
• Unrelated in the Adaptation: In the 2002 series that this story uses for the He-Man side of the lore, Keldor was Randor's half-brother. Here, he was specifically adopted into Randor's family and has no blood relation to them.
• Villainous Lineage: Hordeth was Horde Prime's (and by extension Hordak's) ancestor, and we see in flashbacks that desires for conquest and enslavement are practically genetic traits.
• Wham Episode:
  • Chapter 20 reveals that Glimmer did end up on Eternia…and the horrors of the Dark Hemisphere broke her mind to the point where she regressed to an infantile state. To make matters worse, she's now a member of the Eternian Horde.
  • Chapter 21 follows the above up by revealing that the Dark Hemisphere did something to Glimmer that split her into two halves, the evil of which now serves under Skeletor. The chapter also reveals that Skeletor has unearthed ancient Hok tech that he plans to use to gain access to Etheria so he can conquer it.
  • Chapter 22 ends with Orko accidentally getting into contact with Perfuma back on Etheria.
• Whole Episode Flashback:
  • Chapters 11-15 are all flashback chapters that show the beginnings of the Power of Grayskull, how and why Etheria was sent to Despondos, and how Adora wound up on Etheria in the first place.
  • Chapter 22 is largely a flashback detailing the tragic events that led to Orko's banishment and how he first met Adam.
• World of Snark: Pick a character and watch them engage in Snark-to-Snark Combat. Everyone from Adora, to Adam, to the Sorceress of Castle Grayskull has made many snide remarks in one way or another.
• You Have GOT to Be Kidding Me!: Catra has this as her second reaction to seeing Adora as Eternia's princess reunited with her family after her Big "WHAT?!".

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