i imagine after all the villains are defeated (chrysalis, cozy glow, tirek,) and everyone is living peacefully, twilight and co set out to try and reform them (seeing as imprisoning them in stone for all eternity kinddddda seems like fate worse than death). but this is a monumental task, so to make things simpler all the villains are put under the care of members of the mane 6! cozy glow is placed with apple jack, a powered down chrysalis is sent to fluttershy, and tierk is sent to twilight herself (i'll add more on their redemptions later lol).


with all the villains now assigned to someone, that only left sombra. the stallion was found years after his defeat wounded and weak wondering the frozen north. he was captured, striped of his power, and placed in tartarus until the princesses could figure out a way to deal with him. eventually its cadence (and shining armor) that tasks herself with reforming him, I mean, who better than the princess of love to help someone learn how not to….murder…people…. haha okay so maybe she's bitten off more than she can chew.


in the beginning its a nightmare, yes sombra is powerless but he's still, well. sombra. he ignores all of cadance's attempts at teaching, oderers around her subjects as if their his servants, and plans day in night to get his powers back. it takes little over a week before she considers telling celestia sombras a lost cause and sending him on a one way trip back to tartarus. that is, until he meets flurry heart.


They first meet completely on accident. cadence and shining had made sure flurry heart and sombra were kept on seperate sides of the castle to minimize the chance of them coming into contact before sombra was fully rehabilitated. but flurry is a sweet, curious, (sheltered, lonely…) kid! the minute she catches wind of sombra staying in their home she searches for her potential new friend immediately! she quickly finds the room he's hold himself up in and promptly invites (re: forces) him to have a tea party with her.

sombra is annoyed by this little pony at first, who does this foolish filly think she is? forcing king sombra into playing with dolls and feeding them fake biscuits! how dare she! she should fear him! the second his powers return to him he will curse her and her entire bloodline for the next century! but… perhaps until then the tea partys and dress up games beat rotting away in tartarus. and if he were to be sent back now who, would defend the young one from those cruel foals she tells him of? who would play with her while her mother and father are away? who would be there to tuck her in and read to her until she falls asleep? no. no, being sent back to tartarus now would simply not do. he would play nice with the new king and queen of the crystal empire, if that what it took took to make the little filly happy.

plus she…. reminded him of someone…


sombra begins paying closer attention to cadance and shining's teachings after him and flurry's little meeting, and slowly but surely he comes to realize the error of his ways and commit to making a change for the better. (and maybe possibly kinda falls a tad bit in love with the two doofuses) in my verse cadance and shining armor are both polyamorous and fall for sombra almost immediately after they see how sweet he is with flurry heart 🥺😭😭