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Illusion of Choice · FiM Minific ·
Organised by RogerDodger
Word limit 400–750
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Compulsive
You can stop at any time. Really you can.

You’re Twilight Sparkle and you’re in control here.

That’s right! You can stop reading whenever you like! You can put this book down at any time! There’s nothing stopping you from ceasing to read right now.

You’re just choosing not to. Not yet at least. This would be an inconvenient place to stop reading. After all, nopony stops reading in the middle of a sentence, right? And sentences form paragraphs. You want to top reading at the end of a paragraph, obviously.

But sometimes a paragraph crosses over between the pages of a book. So of course you have to continue on to the next page. But you don’t want to put a bookmark into place when you’re only a few sentences into a new page. When you pick the book up again later, you might not remember where you left off! Best to just read on until you find a convenient stopping point.

A chapter break would be a much better place to stop, right?

Of course, once you get to the end of a chapter it’s hard to resist the urge to just peek at the next chapter. Just to get a feel for what it’s about. There’s nothing weird about that!

Yes, you can put this down any time you like. It’s not as if you were ordered to read this by the Princess or anything! Or are reading it to help you solve a problem for the Princess. Or are reading it so you’ll be prepared in case the Princess asks you to solve a problem. It’s just a book of silly short stories. Most of them aren’t even that good!

So of course you can put it down whenever you like. It’s your choice to read each story through to the end. There’s absolutely nothing preventing you from putting the book down

You’re Twilight Sparkle! Faithful student of Princess Celestia! Bearer of an Element of Harmony! Archmage class unicorn! You’ve faced down mad moon goddesses, avatars of chaos, and crystal obsessed despots! With the magic of friendship there’s no challenge you can’t face, no obstacle you can’t overcome!

So putting down this book, ceasing to read this story, and doing so right now is no challenge at all. And you’ve decided to do exactly that.

As soon as you reach a convenient place to stop.




This story is over.

Your hoof hovers over the book, ready to flip it over to the start of the next story.

You hesitate for a moment before turning the page. Before choosing to turn the page. You can fit in one more story tonight. Just one more.

It’s your choice.




You click on “Next.”



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