Friendship Is Betrayal/Characters
Twilight and her 'Friends'
Twilight Sparkle
Princess Celestia's faithful student, who is secretly plotting her downfall and is willing to go to any lengths necessary to ensure it. The tragic loss of her parents left her being stuck in her care, giving her considerable insight into their ruler's facade.
- Anti-Hero
- Broken Bird
- The Chosen One: Appears to fit a ancient prophecy about somepony destined to bring about harmony between day and night.
- Conspiracy Theorist
- Even Hyper-Paranoid Protagonists Have Standards: She's horrified that her choices in "The Mare in the Moon" resulted in Luna's gruesome execution, though she reassures herself that she did what had to be done.
- Hanlon's Razor: Relies heavily on this when trying to determine which of her friends might betray her, causing her to leap to conclusions quite often.
- I Did What I Had to Do
- Passive-Aggressive Kombat: As she can't openly defy Celestia, she uses this when addressing her in her letters.
- Properly Paranoid
- Self-Made Orphan: Not intentionally, but reinforced by Celestia's gleeful refusal to restore her parents after their Baleful Polymorph into plants.
- Start of Darkness: Celestia took advantage of her accidentally turning her parents into plants to forcibly take Twilight on as her apprentice.
Spike
Twilight's personal servant, a baby dragon. Always tells Twilight to lighten up and stop seeing conspiracies in everything, with little success.
- Geas: Due to a magical enchantment, Spike cannot leave Twilight's service and must do as she commands.
- Love At First Sight: Towards Rarity, who exploits this.
Pinkie Pie
A perky, playful pink pony who finds joy in just about everything. Everything including carnage, death and destruction. Though her parents rejected her and her gifts, she's learned to always look on the bright side of life and your knife~!
- A Day in the Limelight: "Griffon the Brush-Off'".
- Abusive Parents: They called her love of laughter a sin against God and cast her out of their house, forcing her to work as a slave to survive.
- Ax Crazy
- Breaking the Fourth Wall
- Dissonant Serenity: Usually smiling and incessantly cheerful.
- Gratuitous French: Calls Fluttershy 'mon petit fleur'.
- Knife Nut: Her Weapon of Choice.
- In Love with Your Carnage
- Made a Slave: By her own parents, no less.
- Painting the Fourth Wall: Her Thought Bubbles are bloody red and dripping, with white lettering. During her Flash Back, they're the same colors, but shaped regularly until she has her knife party.
- Self-Made Orphan
- Start of Darkness: The horrible treatment she recieved at the hooves of her parents nearly drove her to suicide; however, witnessing the Sonic Rainboom helped her see a bright side to everything... including murder.
- Yandere
Rarity
An elegant seamstress who considers herself a truly rare jewel, and believes her dresses reflect that perfectly. Beautiful, manipulative and vain, she'll seize any opportunity to gain the respect, attention and love she knows she deserves!
- A Day in the Limelight: "A Dog and Pony Show".
- Black Magic: Started practicing this as a filly in order to make others desire her dresses.
- Charm Pony: How she primarily applies her knowledge of Black Magic. Victims of this develop Black Eyes of Crazy.
- The Chosen One: Princess Luna sensed she would become the Element of Generosity, and dragged her away from her home in order to appear before her and reveal this, converting the filly to her cause.
- Fairest of Them All: Out of envy, she tried to enchant the costumes she created for the school play so that everyone would pay more attention to her hoofiwork than to the ponies wearing them.
- It's All About Me
- Painting the Fourth Wall: Her Thought Bubbles are purple with black text; in her Flash Back, they're used to imply she's not recalling exactly what was said so much as what she wanted to hear.
- Narcissist
- Skewed Priorities: When her magic forcibly dragged her to her destiny, she was more concerned about how filthy her hooves were getting than things like starving or losing her way back.
- Small Name, Big Ego
- So Beautiful It's a Curse: How she sees herself.
- Taking Advantage of Generosity: When Spike helps her collect jewels.
- Vain Sorceress: Very proud of her appearance, and uses magic to make herself even more desirable.
Rainbow Dash
A cocksure pegasus who commands attention, Dash is the only pony who's ever successfully pulled off a Sonic Rainboom, a feat that's left her with a swelled head and an ego to match.
- Don't Explain the Joke: Prone to this when nervous.
- Pride
- Small Name, Big Ego
Applejack
After losing her parents to a tragic accident, Applejack was left in charge of the family business. Hard work and huge sacrifices must be made to survive in that cutthroat world -- she learned that much very quickly, and has dedicated herself to ensuring it prospers, no matter what.
- Deceased Parents Are the Best: Her parents were lost five years ago to an exploding rainbow.
- Greed
Fluttershy
A seemingly sweet Shrinking Violet easily dismissed as too timid to do much of anything on her own. Underneath that innocent exterior, however, lurks some very dark thoughts -- thoughts which have been building under the pressure of years of unpopularity and isolation. Only her tight bonds with her animal friends have kept her sense of empathy strong -- for them, anyway.
- The Beastmistress: Her unique talent lets her communicate with animals, giving her considerable empathy for them.
- Mule In Sheep's Clothing: While generally seen as sweet, shy and innocent, her thoughts are much darker than others realize.
- Not Good With Ponies
- Shrinking Violet: Which made her unpopular at school, only feeding into her shyness.
Celestia and her Servants
Princess Celestia
The eternal ruler of Equestria, a beautiful alicorn loved and feared by all. Though hailed as a benevolent and wise ruler, she hides a sadistic side beneath her constant smile. Her sister Luna saw through this facade, leading to her failed rebellion. Now her faithful student is following the same path... but just how much does she know...?
Gilda
A griffon who attended the same flightschool as Rainbow Dash. Serves as a member of Celestia's Royal Guard.
- Just Between You and Me: Tells Pinkie that "Dash has chosen her side! There's nothing you can do about it!" before trying to kill her.
- Killed Off for Real
Sapphire Shores
An envoy of Princess Celestia who was sent to check on Rarity's progress after the unicorn was charged with creating their ruler's dress for the Grand Galloping Gala.
- No Sympathy: Dismisses Rarity's work as 'mere glitter'; when Rarity reveals she used all her diamonds on that dress, smirks cruelly while commenting she'll have to find more.
Other Threats
Nightmare Moon
Formerly Celestia's little sister Princess Luna, she came to realize the depths of Celestia's depravity and tried in vain to warn everypony. For her troubles, she was painted as a jealous, powerhungry brat and was ignored and scorned. Desperate, she turned to the dark arts and became Nightmare Moon in order to overthrow her, only to get sealed away in the moon for a thousand years. This didn't quell her desire for revolution at all, and upon her return, she immediately tried again.
- Black Magic: When nopony was willing to support her, she turned to the dark arts to find the strength she needed to stand against her sister.
- Cassandra Truth: Everypony thought she was Driven by Envy rather than fear and insight into Celestia's true nature.
- Hoist By Her Own Petard: Intended to inflict this upon Celestia by recruiting all of the Element bearers and sealing her away. Instead, she was hit by this herself.
- Killed Off for Real: After the Elements stripped her of her powers, Celestia immediately executed her.
- Mind Rape: Inflicts this upon Twilight.
- Not Helping Your Case: Becoming Nightmare Moon only made it even easier for Celestia to paint her as a would-be conquerer and tyrant.
- The Revolution Will Not Be Civilized
- Well-Intentioned Extremist