All That Shimmers

Chapters

Chapter 1: Bad Night
Chapter 2: Busy Saturday
Chapter 3: Misfortune
Chapter 5: Double Sunday
Chapter 6: The Dregs
Chapter 7: Taking a Stand
Chapter 8: Bathroom Revelations
Chapter 9: Good Intentions
Chapter 10: There When You Need Them
Chapter 11: Second Chances
Chapter 12: Running the Other Direction
Chapter 13: Running the Same Direction
Chapter 14: The Best Laid Plans of Unicorns and Teenagers
Chapter 15: A Savior or a Killer?
Chapter 16: Inner Journeys
Chapter 17: Intervention
Chapter 18: Bad Habits
Chapter 19: An Existential Us Crisis
Chapter 4: Woke Up On the Wrong Side of the Hellish Landscape

Chapter 1: Bad Night

All That ShimmersChapter 1: Bad Night-ooooooo-

Bad night.

We all have one from time to time. You know… when things don’t work out quite the way we’d hope… or anything close to the way we hoped. Guess that’s a rather vague way to put it, but I guess you can at least relate to those sorts of nights.

Probably not this one, oh boy. I mean, if you can, that’d be pretty chill and we could probably hang out and swap stories.

Maybe even start a friendship over it.

I think that’s how those sorts of thing work… You meet someone. You find some common ground. You start chatting, and then bam, suddenly you’re swapping notes in class, sitting at lunch, laughing, trying on dresses… working together to blast a pony turned high schooler turned demon with magic friendship energy.

…And that about sums up everything I know about friendship. As you may have noticed, I don’t have a lot of experience with friendship.

I do have experience with the whole pony turned high schooler turned demon thing.

You know… the one that got blasted with magic friendship energy? That was me. Not pleasant. It hurts… hurts like you wouldn’t believe.

Still, it beats actually being a demon. Sure it sounds fun and from all external appearances it’s a blast.

Inside though? It’s like if someone made a movie of your life and edited it down to a ‘worst of’ reel and then strapped you all Clockwork Orange style to a chair with your eyes held opened and stuff. Man, I love that movie!

Anyhow… bad night.

Oh, you didn’t get to dance with that cute guy you wanted at the Fall Formal? Suck it up. I had to crawl out of a crater. A crater that was made when I impacted the freakin’ ground!

Couldn’t get your makeup right? Cry me a river. I look like I just got hit by a bus and then the bus backed up to make sure the job was done. My hair’s a mess and my leather jacket is all torn up. Probably never going to wear this shirt or skirt again…

You got hypnotized by a demon with the hopes that you would be marched through a magical mirror to another dimension where you’d be a zombie pony doing said demon’s bidding?

…

Alright… my bad.

BUT STILL, you’re probably home right now crying into your pillow or brooding over how things could have been better and that still makes your night better than mine.

For starters, you’re indoors.

I’m not.

Guess where I am.

Come on, guess.

I’M REPAIRING A BRICK ENTRANCE TO A SCHOOL WITH A MASONS TROWEL AND A COUPLE OF DIM-WITS! BEAT THAT!

HA! You CAN’T, can you? I’m Sunset Shimmer and I ALWAYS win… you know… disregarding that whole thing about becoming a demon and being blasted with magic friendship energy. I'll have to put that under the formerly empty box labeled ‘losses’.

Uh, guess I should introduce myself.

Hello.

My name is Sunset Shimmer and welcome to my cruddy life.

That’s me blubbering by the thrashed, brick entrance to a high school holding a masons trowel in the cold, dark autumn night.

Sorry, I’m usually not so disheveled. You know, perfectly kempt long, red and yellow hair, stylish leather jacket that’s not shredded, magenta shirt with boss looking red and yellow sun on it, orange skirt with a magenta and yellow stripe down it and a pair of awesome black boots with a purple flame motif. I’m still wearing all that stuff, it just looks a bit more mangled at the moment.

Anyways… uh… I should probably stop referring to Snips and Snails as ‘dim-wits’. I mean, they are, but they were also the closest things I had to friends… oh man…

I just realized how incredibly sad that is…I knew I should have just stayed in the crater…

“Uh, here you go, Sunset Shimmer…”

I look down at the goofy looking kid that is Snails. Gangly fellow with a cowlick, green hair, green coat over a red shirt, giant red bow tie and khakis. He’s holding up another brick for me.

He’s easy: give him a box of rat poison, tell the idiot its candy, watch the moron stuff his face with them and then be elsewhere while everyone figures the poor dolt committed suicide or was just stupid enough to eat rat poison. Snips goes the same way.

Oh, sorry… Have a plan to kill everyone you meet and all that… Man, humans are grim…and cool… You’d never find a pony coming up with solid advice like that.

“Sunset...?”

“Oh, sorry Snails, I was lost in thought…thanks!” I say as I take the brick and try to smile earnestly. At least, I hope that looks earnest.

I glance over at Snips. He has spiky orange hair and is wearing one of those dorky t-shirts made to look like a tux and blue jeans.

“Uh…hey Snails…Snips…” I say, getting my, very likely now ex-, minion’s attention.

The two look at me with inquisitive expressions.

I put on my best sad, apologetic expression, “Hey… I’m really sorry about turning you guys into demons and well… pretty much my entire treatment of you two since… well since we first met.” I say. Bizarrely enough, I mean it, too…

The two give me a look as if I just grew an extra six feet and sprouted bat wings from my back... uh… Again. It was a long shot, but a girls gotta try, you know?

… Wait... are they… They’re actually smiling…

“Awww, it’s okay Sunset Shimmer,” Snails says.

I… what?

“Yeah!” Snips agrees. “It was pretty cool being turned into demons.”

WHAT?! ‘PRETTY COOL’?! WHY DIDN’T I GET THE ‘PRETTY COOL’ FEELINGS WHEN I TURNED INTO A DEMON?!

Uh, well...Guess I better seal the deal here, at least.

My eyes start to water up and my lips start quivering, “You… you guys!” I cry as I lean down and wrap my arms around my trusty minions.

I can’t believe they're are still my trusty minions!

Oh… “…sniff…” Oh geez! “…eh…heh…eh…wuaa... ” I’m really crying here!

I think… I think I’m actually touched! I’m just…totally sobbing on these guys’ shoulders.

OH GOD, THEY’RE HUGGING ME BACK!

“…Sniff…eh..he…whua…WHUAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!”

I CAN’T TAKE THIS. I’M SO RELIEVED! I’M BLUBBERING ON THE SHOULDERS OF TWO OF THE WEIRDEST, STUPIDEST, LEAST POPULAR KIDS IN SCHOOL! AND I’M HAPPY FOR IT!

I’M SOoOoOoO PATHETIC!

“Alright, I think that’s enough work for tonight.”

I flinch as I hear Principal Celestia’s voice ring out. I break my embrace with Snips and Snails and turn.

Oh…it’s not just her… It’s Twilight’s friends, too…

Oh God… I know I don’t ask much…Mostly because I come from a different world where we don’t really have you as a concept and I can’t be sure you exist…but if you do exist and you are listening…

Please, kill me right now.

The stupid crater will be a sufficient grave and the stupid magic mirror an adequate headstone…

I pensively stand and stare out at the principal and five girls.

In case you were wondering, Celestia’s murder plan involves me luring her into her sister’s dark office and bludgeoning the human equivalent of my insufferable old teacher to death with the flagpole Vice-Principal Luna keeps in there. I’d wear rubber gloves, of course. It’s great, really. Rumor has it Luna has always been a bit jealous of how goody, goody Celestia is so loved by the students here. So, motive’s there.

Uh…I have plans for the other five, of course, but I can save sharing those for later… Speaking of Twilight’s collection of eager Fall Formal filchers, they walk over to me.

I try to collect myself as best I can. My eyes are still watery and the whole trying to rebuild the entrance to the school thing had really helped add to the ‘homeless girl who just went a few rounds with a bear’ look I have going on.

Fluttershy looks scared to even be near me, no surprise.

Pinkie Pie has this giant, goofy grin plastered on her face. Also, no surprise.

Rainbow Dash and Applejack glare angrily at me. I guess that’s to be expected.

Rarity looks me up and down like someone should call the fashion police and have me arrested…

Alright, I know I said I’d save this, but Rarity’s plan involves wrapping a designer scarf around her neck, closing it in a car door as it takes off and seeing her neck snap. Ideally, she’d already be wearing a scarf.

Rainbow Dash approaches me. She’s got this look in her eyes like she might just deck me, not that I’m under an illusions that I wouldn’t deserve it. She levels an index finger at me.

“Monday. Cafeteria. Be there, no arguments!” She barks out at me.

I nod, “Sa…sure…”

“Oh this is so exciting!” Pinkie exclaims. “We have a new enemy turned friend! A frienemy!”

“Now hold your horses there, Pinkie,” Applejack said. “We still need to make sure that Sunset Shimmer is really serious about turnin’ over a new leaf,” Applejack continued.

Hey! I resent that remark. The horse part, that is…I wouldn’t even give me a second chance if I was in their shoes.

I swallow my pride. Okay, my pride is currently in critical condition at the bottom of a crater, but you get the idea…

“I…really want to try being friends with you all…” I say. It’s sad how much I actually mean that. Twilight Sparkle had shown me another way. A way where you make friends and then they help you shot demons with magic. The magic of friendship. The saddest part here was I don’t even want the whole, ‘being able to shoot things with magic friendship beams’ thing. I mean… that’d be pretty chill, don’t get me wrong… But, I just want their acceptance now.

Being turned into a demon? Turned back? Crawling out of a crater? The whole thing puts things into perspective. I had achieved a state where not only would no one have cared if I had died that night, they would have celebrated.

Now that hurts… and that’s loneliness… And I know I don’t want to feel that way ever again.

“…Please?” I add. “I’m really sorry for what I did to all of you… I just want a chance to… sniff… chance to… ma… make it up to all of you…”

Oh geez, here come the tears again. Come on, Shimmer… hold it together.

“…Sniff…heh…whuaaa…”

WHAT DID I JUST SAY?!

Rainbow Dash pauses and actually looks sorry for me. Looks like losing my cool and bawling like a crybaby is paying off.

“Uh, look…” Rainbow Dash says as she rubs the back of her head. “We’ll catch you Monday, okay?”

I nod again. “… Sniff… Uh-huh…” I squeak out.

I glance over towards the rest of the group. They’re giving me the same, sorry look. Well, even if this isn’t a start to a beautiful friendship, it’s a start. A sad, pathetic, rather moist start.

“Awww… someone needs a hug!” Pinkie declares. She bounds over to me and before I know it, she wraps her bare arms around me and presses her glittery-dress clad body against my torn-up clothing wrapped one.

It actually feels… nice.

“Come on, everybody!” Pinkie says excitedly. “Group hug!”

… What?

The other four glance at each other awkwardly and looked back at Pinkie with expressions that asked, ‘Do we have to?’

Pinkie just beams excitedly.

The other four glance at each other again, exchange shrugs and walk over to me and Pinkie. They wrap uneasy arms around us.

I never asked for this.

“It’s okay, Sunset Shimmer…” Pinkie murmurs softly, “…we’ll take care of you.”

Alright, no one has said anything like that to me before… I tear up again and this quickly leads to more sobbing.

The five girls around me actually tighten their grip.

Well, this is a bit overwhelming. Nice, but overwhelming… I think… I think I’m going to throw up.

“Alright girls,” Celestia calls out. “I think Sunset Shimmer could use a little space.”

Thank you, Celestia! … Wow, it’s been a long, long time since I even thought that…

The girls loosen their grips on me, take a few steps back, and dried my eyes again.

I glance back up at the girls; all their expressions have softened substantially. I guess I look a far cry from the demon that damaged the school and tried to march an army of teenagers into another dimension.

“Don’t worry, Sunset,” Applejack says with an earnest smile, “if yer really serious about giving friendship a try, we’ll be there for you.”

I nod my head. “Uh-huh…” I say meekly. Sorry, intelligent responses to this whole friendship… thing is taking some work at the moment…

Fluttershy just gave me a small smile and a nod.

“Maybe when we meet we can do something about that outfit of yours…” Rarity says, motioning out to my clothes.

SCARF! CAR DOOR! NECK SNAP!

I plaster on a small smile and nodded at Rarity. It’s not the time to get angry with these five. I mean, I did pretty much try to kill them a few hours ago and they still actually spoke to me. A little commentary on my, admittedly, thrashed and dirty outfit isn’t quite enough to make me break from this great sobbing, pathetic wreck of a person thing I have going on.

The five wander off, smiling, laughing and going on and on about what a great, exciting night they all had. Lucky saps… Okay, so I was jealous. You would be too if you were in my place.

‘Honk, honk!’

Celestia, Snips, Snails and I glance over to a mini-van that pulls up. Snips’s and Snails’s ride home.

The two look at Celestia with fearful eyes.

“You won’t tell our parents about this,” Snails asks, “will you?”

“Yeah,” Snips chimes in, “my mom would probably ground me for a year if she found out I turned into a demon and tried to help enslave the school…”

Celestia glances at the ruined school entrance then back towards the two trembling high schoolers. “I think this will be the school’s little secret for now…”

Snips and Snails both breathe a sigh of relief.

“Yeah,” I add, “I doubt there’s even a law on the books for turning into a demon and trying to force minors through a dimensional portal.” It probably wasn’t the best time to be snarky, but I have blubbered enough for one night. It’s starting to get to me. I have some sort of reputation to maintain, at least.

Celestia just shoots me a bemused look and turns back to Snips and Snails, “We’ll discuss your punishment later.”

The two’s expressions go from relived to mildly worried as they nod. They turn and start walking towards the mini-van.

“Bye Snips! Bye Snails!” I call out. Supposedly, I’m forgiven, but I’m not going to take any chances. These two are stupidly loyal to their own detriment, but I’m not eager to find out what their limits are.

They both turn and wave at me.

“Bye, Sunset Shimmer!”

“Yeah, catch you later!”

I wave and watch the two enter the mini-van.

Celestia turns to me, “You need a ride?”

“Well… I thought I’d be knee deep in the corpses of my enemies in another dimension at this point, so… yeah…” I answer. Once again, probably not the best thing to say given the circumstances, but I need to keep my spirits up. Also, I don’t feel like walking home or braving public transit; not looking and feeling like this anyways.

Celestia just chuckles and shakes her head, “Come on, I’ll drive you home.”

She and I walk over to her white, electric sedan. Uhlg… I can’t stand how much of a goody, goody she is. Just like her alicorn counterpart, always looking out for everyone and everything and just has to be everyone’s mom.

I get in the passenger’s seat, buckle-up and proceed to rest my elbow on the car door and my fist on my chin. I stare out the window. Not that looking spaced out is gonna help me here. Celestia and I both know the price of this car ride is a lecture.

“Where to?” She asks.

I rattle off an address that Celestia inputs into a built in GPS system. The vehicle hums almost whisper quiet as she pulls out of the school parking lot and into the street.

I continue to stare blankly out at the city as street lights pass overhead. The light illuminating me, my clothes and the sorry state both are in before retreating into darkness and repeating the process over and over again. Celestia gives me just enough time to dwell on the oncoming speech. Probably something ridiculous like, ‘Now Sunset Shimmer, there are better ways to express yourself than turning into a demon and enslaving your schoolmates.’

“Sunset,” Celestia says, “I wanted to talk to you about something.”

Here we go… “Yes?” I reply still looking out the window.

“Some of the other students came up to me during the dance. Seems there are quite a number of accusations of you bullying and manipulating others.”

I turn and fix Celestia with a genuine look of shock, “THAT’S what you’re going to lecture me about?! Being a cruddy, manipulative high school student?!”

“Well, I was thinking of bringing up the whole demon thing and destroying part of the school, but it all seemed a bit ridiculous to talk about in this manner,” Celestia explains.

… Walked right into that one…

“Besides,” Celestia continues, “I got the impression you had learned your lesson there, and I’m not really in charge of making sure demons don’t destroy the school or enslave the student body.” She gives me a stern look, “I am, however, in charge of making sure my students treat each other with respect, and you are still one of my students.”

I pause and mull over the irony here for a second. Looks like I was still Celestia’s student in one form or another, even if it wasn’t Sun Butt’s…

I shake my head, “That’s all over now. Twilight undid the biggest mess I caused, and I doubt any of the other students are going to put up with me after this…” I muse.

“Well, that’s good,” Celestia replies, “but it doesn’t necessarily mean you’ve learned your lesson…”

“Look, I’m sorry, okay!” I say in a frustrated tone. I calm myself down a bit, “It…all just seems so… petty now… running around, ruining friendships, intimidating high schoolers… frickin’ high schoolers! And for what?! A collection of cheap metal crowns?! Some plaques? A little moment of glory where everyone has to smile, clap and pretend they like me instead of wishing I’d just go to a different school or die or something… All just so I could pretend I’m better than everyone else. WELL I’M NOT!” I might be looking at Celestia as I say all this, but I’m really just screaming at myself in case you hadn’t figured that out.

I turn from Celestia and stare down at my hands and clench my skirt tightly, “I’m… sniff… I’m not…” Oh, here we go…

“I’m worse than all of them…sniff…eeh…worse than any one of them. I’m…emm…I’m just some impatient, angry little student who wasn’t satisfied with what she had in her own world and came here so I could prove to everyone I met that I was somepony special…” Whoops, slipped a bit there, “…and when I was done with that, I was going to march back and show everpony just what a great, fantastic ruler I could be! All just ‘cause I felt my teacher snubbed me, and I wanted to prove her wrong. Well, NEWS FLASH, I’m not any of those things, I never was going to be any of those things, ‘CAUSE IT TURNS OUT I’M JUST A FREAKIN’ MONSTER!” I lift my palms up to my face and unleashed the waterworks again, “WHUAAAAAAAAHAAAAHAAAHAAAAAAA!”

So… uh… bad night.

Celestia puts a comforting hand on my shoulder. As much as I dislike miss perfect ruler of the school, I need all the support I can get. Besides, it’s nice she feels sorry for me instead of trying to figure out how exactly you get rid of a teenager who was literally a fire shooting demon just hours ago… I try to put a lid on my sniveling as much as possible.

“It’s alright, Sunset Shimmer,” Celestia says in that soothing, maternal voice of hers. “You’ve got people who care about you, and you’ll have a lot more if you just try.”

I wipe the tears from my face. “Sniff… Thanks…” I say meekly. What else can I do? The possibility that I might be forgiven and accepted is all I have at the moment.

Celestia stops the car and peers outside at a modest looking apartment complex. “Is this it?” she asks.

“Yeah… thanks for the ride… See you Monday, I guess…” I reply as I unbuckle my seatbelt and open the car door.

Celestia nods, “Is it just you alone here?”

I pause as I stare out at the apartment building. “I am alone…” I reply. Cliché, but it sums my feelings up rather nicely.

I close the door behind me and walk on. I guess Celestia watches me the entire time since I don’t hear that quiet little car of hers pull out into the road.

I make my way to my apartment through the dimly lit complex. It isn’t much, but I don’t need much. Just a place to rest and scheme my grandiose plans of winning elections that end in gaudy crowns and fake smiles. I unlock and open the door to my apartment and step inside. Home again, home again, jiggity-jig.

I don’t bother to turn on the light. I just use whatever meager light that that comes from the complex outside.It’s not much to look at, anyhow. It’s just a living and kitchen area that’s pretty much the same room with a desk, couch, and an assortment of electronics. In the back there’s a bedroom and a bathroom.

Oh yeah, the walls are covered in various awards, 1st place ribbons and shelves full of trophies all with my glorious name engraved somewhere or another.

I close the door behind me and drop the keys on the kitchen counter.

Time for a nice relaxing night of…

“AaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

…flipping the buck out.

I stomp over to the wall of plaques and slam my arm against it, then slide it across. This sends the wood framed items to the ground. I reach out for ribbons and tear them one by one from the wall, throwing them on the floor and grinding my heels into them. My trophies also end up in heaps as I reach over and clear entire shelves in one, swift movement of my arm.

I hate them, hate myself. I had built a shrine to me and now it’s all just a reminder of what a failure I am.

I turn to my desk where my collection of crowns sit neatly displayed. “GRRRRRAAAAAH!” I shriek, making my way over to them then hurling them to the ground one by one.

I catch my reflection in the large mirror on my desk and send my fist glass-ward… And then I stop before I make a bloody mess out of my hand. The tantrum isn’t helping me, it’s just giving me more things to deal with. Plus, if I don’t stop screaming and throwing things around, someone is bound to investigate, and I’ve had enough contact for one evening.

Tears streaming down my face, I break eye contact with my reflection and step over crowns and plaques on the way to the bathroom.

I’m sure a nice, warm shower will make me feel better.

-ooooooo-

“WHUAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAAAAAAAAHAAAAAAAHAAAAAAAAAAA!”

Spoiler alert: It didn’t.

Yeah, I’m pretty much just huddling in a ball in the corner; hugging my knees to my chest and bawling the entire time the water pours over me. At least no one’s here to see me this time around.

Well…I think I’m just about cried out at this point, time for bed…

-ooooooo-

I dry off and change into my pajamas. A long sleeved, magenta top with the same boss looking sun on it and long, orange pajama bottoms with a yellow and magenta stripe down the right leg. I mean, why mess with perfection, right?

I lift the orange covers and slide in between the sheets.

One nice thing about all this is I’m completely exhausted and should have no trouble falling asleep. It’s also nice that the night is finally over. I close my eyes and quickly fall asleep, a nice calm relaxing…

…sniff…

…Hell.

I smell brimstone and my eyes shoot open as I realize I’m no longer in bed. I’m resting on what seems to be a barren wasteland of desolate, hot rocks and fiery pits as far as the eye can see. I’m also back in my normal clothes. Small comfort, they’re no longer shredded.

Well, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised to be here, except for the part where I don’t remember dying.

I fearfully look out into the vast expanse of unforgiving looking landscape.

“Well, that was pathetic,” A voice echoes out.

Wait, I know that voice, it’s me… but… I turn and there I am. All 12 feet me… Leathery bat wings, green eyes set in a dark void, pointy ears, hair that shoots straight up like a column of flame with a tail to match.

“Ya…you…” I stammer out.

My demon self looks down and grins maliciously at me, bends down and picks me up with her claws. The claws cut through my jacket, my clothes and into my flesh as I just stare wide eyed into the face of evil. My face.

“Hello, Sunset Shimmer,” the demon coos. “Welcome home.”

This bad night competition you and I are having?

Well, I’m winning.

I’m winning so hard it hurts.

Chapter 2: Busy Saturday

All That ShimmersChapter 2: Busy Saturday-ooooooo-

Well this is less than ideal. Though, admittedly, the criteria for ideal has changed a few times tonight.

First it was marching into my old dimension and establishing just what a great and fantastic ruler I could be. Then it was more making myself that ruler, regardless of how great or fantastic I was at it (Spoiler Alert: I wasn’t going to be either of those things).

Next it was simply getting through the night while establishing at least one person cared about me…hit a bit of a low point there.

At no point, however, was being held aloft in the sharp claws of my demon self ever a plus in any of those situations.

Hello.

My name is Sunset Shimmer and welcome to my cruddy life.

...Probably going to be a pretty short story by the looks of thing. I don’t think my demon self wants to shoot the breeze or play a relaxing game of chess with me. The fact that I’m now bleeding were her claws have cut into me is a pretty good indication there.

Also, there’s a chance I’m already dead. There’s not a ton of places that match the description of ‘barren, fiery wasteland’ that the living visit.

“Why, me!” the demon says, “I’m hurt…not as much as you are, mind you…I thought you’d be happy to see me.”

Turns out demon me is every bit as snarky as me. I’m beginning to see why I don’t have many friends.

“Wa… where am I?” I stammer out. Okay… I may be a bit more terrified here than I’m letting on…

“Silly Sunset Shimmer,” the demon coos, “I already told you! You’re home!”

I take another quick glance at my surroundings, “But…this isn’t Equestria!”

“You don’t say?” the demon replies as it smirks and raises it’s eyebrows.

Okay, that was a pretty dumb thing to say, admittedly.

“Sunset, Sunset,” the demon tut-tuts, “when has Equestria ever felt like your home?”

She has a point, well… eight digging into my flesh… but disregarding those, I never quite felt at ease back in pony land. Though, I just thought that was because it was pretty dang hard to find anyone I considered my equal. Still, this place isn’t exactly filling me with the ‘warm and fuzzies’.

The demon knits her brow at me, “Look, I can see this is a little hard for you to take in, so I’ll make it simple.” She flashes me a wicked smile full of dagger sized teeth, “Embrace me, and we can take over this pathetic planet, and, in another 30 moons, we can march on Equestria and make it our own!”

“I’ve had enough hugs for one night, thanks,” I force out through clenched teeth. YES! Still got it.

The demon frowns at me, “I’m not talking about that ridiculous friendship garbage you think is going to make you happy. I’m talking power, here. Unlimited power!” She says, smiling wide once more.

Maybe it’s the pain, or the likely unintentional reference, but I wince, “Thanks Emperor Palps, but I tried the whole demon thing and it didn’t work out so well. I’m going to have to pass.” This is probably going to end in a painful death, but I don’t really like myself very much at the moment so…

The demon pulls her the side of her lip up into a grimace, “A pity. And I thought I could do us a favor and avoid having to break you down…”

I utter a painful, guttural sound as the demon tightens her grip. Her razor sharp claws cut to the bone and the point of her claws start to stab through my abdomen.

Well… At least I died doing what I love: snarking people I don’t like. And as much as I hate myself, boy, do I hate demon me.

The claws continue to tighten as blood soaks my clothes and then one manages to find a gap in my ribs. I’m guessing it also finds my heart, ‘cause I black out in a hurry.

I give a startled yelp as my eyes shoot open wide and I raise a palm to my head. My breathing starts out heavy and heaving like the engine of a train, my heart scratching against my chest with hard and painful thuds. Gradually, as both my breathing and heart-rate slow back down to normal, my mind snaps back to reality, where I'm alive, in one piece, and wearing the same PJs I went to bed with with the bonus that they're now soaked in a cold sweat.

Though, it's nice to be alive. I'm pretty surprised how relieving that feels. Sunlight is pouring in through the windows illuminating my bed, the light tan walls of the apartment, and me.

I quickly roll up my sleeves and follow this up by lifting my top up a bit to examine my stomach. I don’t seem to have any deep lacerations or puncture wounds that would indicate I just had a few major arteries and vital organs sliced up.

Was it really just a nightmare? But why did it feel so vivid? Why do I remember it so clearly? I really can’t just dismiss this… I’ll have to go back over my notes, probably dig deeper…

I throw the covers off me and frown. It seems I’ll need to do laundry if I don’t want to spend tonight in my sweat soaked sheets. Lovely.

Ulch…and I had been avoiding laundry day for so long on account of me thinking I wouldn’t need clothes for much longer.

First things, first. I hop out of bed, and walk barefoot out of the bedroom… “OUCH! SON OF A…” …and put my foot directly onto last year’s Fall Formal crown.

I glower at it and the mess I caused. I knew that tantrum would just mean more work for me. I move my foot over and push the mass of crowns away from my desk into the heaping pile of crushed first place ribbons, chipped plaques, and bent trophies. I then pull out the office chair in front of my wooden desk and start opening drawers. I also lean over and grab a couple books from a nearby bookshelf

Soon, my desk is full of scribbled notes I pour over as I scan the books, seeing if there was anything I missed.

Both books and notes have been in this world a very short period of time. The books I… uh… checked out of the Canterlot library. I didn’t really have long to sort out the whole ‘Element of Harmony’ thing when I came back to Equestria. I thought the crown would transform me into an alicorn…or whatever the human equivalent was. I didn’t think I’d go all Satan’s rule 63 counterpart on everyone. All I could really confirm is that the Element of Magic would unlock some hidden power within me. I was hoping for something a bit less… murdery.

Anyhow, my research here isn’t giving me anything else to work with, and I can’t just pop back into Equestria to grab more books.

Guess it’s the internet next, something I can do while I get my clothes and sheets in order. But, before all that, breakfast, and I might as well get a workout in. I'm a bit curious to see what the news has to say about the wrecked entrance to the school and the giant crater anyhow.

I manage to scrape enough milk and cereal together for a small breakfast. There’s not a lot to eat in the apartment, once again, didn’t think that’d be an issue for much longer. Dishes are also piling up. Sensing a pattern?

I put on a sports bra, a magenta tank top, an orange pair of shorts, and some tennis shoes and hit the workout room. Keeping pretty is a tad more involved in this world than Equestria. One doesn’t tend to spend as much time walking, for one. I’ve made it a habit to hit the treadmill while watching a little news.

The workout room consists of a few treadmills, a few more cardio workout machines, a couple of weight machines, some free-weights and a few flat screen TVs on the walls. It’s not much to look at other than that; the décor being little more than white walls and a full length mirror.

I step onto a treadmill, turn it on, and start jogging in place. I grab a TV remote that’s sitting on the machine and turn on the TV in front of me.

“…Investigators are still piecing together what happened at Canterlot High School…” Pay dirt. “…but experts are tentatively saying…” Natural gas explosion, come on natural gas explosion… “…that a meteorite…” DANGIT!

Wonder if that’ll stick or if they’ll come up with something different. I doubt any experts will suggest ‘rampaging demon’, unless one of them happens to be a priest… Anyhow, most of the rest is a few scattered interviews. Vice-Principal Luna makes up some boring story about hearing an explosion, wisely stating that it happened after the dance. She’s usually at the school pretty late, she’s a good choice for a cover-up.

Her murder plan is basically the same as her sisters. Not very inventive of me, but I always figured I could just start a nasty rumor regarding any number of students that routinely get to visit the ‘dungeon’ to be interrogated by the VP before the deed.

Anyhow, after a bit of a run and a bit of TV watching, I head back to my apartment.

Hmmm… Dishes or laundry? Ahhh…The wonderful choices one gets to make when they’re not a super-powerful demigod princess. Even being a demon is starting to seem like a better option at this point.

I opt to get the dishes out of the way then move on to making a few trips to the laundry room...

… And then it hits me… I have absolutely nothing clean to go outside in… ‘Evil and malicious demon queen of Equestria’ is starting to have a much nicer ring to it.

Let’s see, my choices are my sweaty gym clothes, my sweaty PJs, my torn up clothes from last night, or the clothes I was wearing the day before that; excluding all the other sets that have been marinating in dirty clothes darkness for several days, of course.

I wonder if traveling through dimensions has magic clothing cleaning powers? I open my hamper and fish out the top set of clothes and give them a quick sniff…No, traveling through dimensions does not magically clean whatever I’m wearing at the time.

Well, going to the laundry room gross and sweaty is probably a great way to stop guys from trying to chat with me… Ugh, but my appearance is one of the few things I still have going for me… guess it’s a shower and clothes from two days ago for me… At least the smell of already dirty clothes that have been sitting on top of my hamper might keep the men at bay…

I spend the next few hours surfing the internet on my laptop in between doing loads of laundry. The internet proves not to be a ton of help, sadly. There’s no shortages of female demons to learn about, and quite a few that have to do with sleeping and even harming people in their sleep, however they’re methods lineup with the symptoms of sleep apnea or sleep paralysis. Not so much slicing people up in their nightmares.

Also, I’m fairly certain Deady Cougar isn’t actually real…

I sigh. If only I could get back into Equestria to check a few books there, there’s no telling if the world has anything like what I turned into last night, but hopefully I can at least come up with something to combat it if I get the books to go over.

I make a note of a few books that might provide a bit more detail. Looks like it’s a trip to the mall for me. I need a new jacket anyhow.

I’m not opposed to getting the books digitally if it means I can get started immediately, but I’m still used to long nights studying spells surrounded by open books for cross referencing, and good tablets are expensive, I only have the one and my laptop.

You may be wondering how I can afford all this. I came here initially with little more than the saddlebags on my back and a pile of bits with a few gems here and there. Turns out those bits and gems were worth a hefty sum in this world. Not enough to live it up, but enough to get some necessities, some nice to haves, with plenty left over to get by on rent and food for a many, many moons.

In turn, this world has a few items that are rare and rather expensive in Equestria while being pretty easy to come by here. My last trip was at least fairly lucrative, if nothing else. I should be able to cruise by unemployed for another 30 moons until the portal is open again.

…Assuming this demon inside me isn’t real or I’m able to control it and it doesn’t kill me before then.

Let’s go look for those books, shall we?

I change into a fresh set of clothes and grab my tablet, throwing it into my handbag. It’s going to be a long, cold trip to the mall on public transit. Looks like a new jacket is step number one.

I continue to do a great job of avoiding social contact with anyone until I hit the boutique in the mall.

I walk in and immediately dive out back into the mall walkway.

Rarity. She just HAD to be at the mall today… Okay, well… it’s Saturday so that makes sense, but I don’t think I’m mentally prepared to deal with a reunion.

I glance inside again, keeping myself out of sight from the purple haired woman. She's chatting fashion with a woman behind the counter. There’s a perfect jacket replacement on display, too!

Man… it is so frickin’ cold outside! But I really want to avoid having to talk to anyone… I guess it’s the bookstore then…

I once again make my way down the mall walkway until…

“I just love malls! Don’t you love malls?!”

“Sure, Pinkie…”

Pinkie Pie and Applejack. Today is the day that just keeps on giving…

Pinkie Pie’s little death plan involves a firework mishap, Applejack’s an accident with some farm equipment. Occupational hazards are always a safe bet. Anyhow, I should make myself scarce…

“Oh there’s just so many stores to visit! And things to look at! Oooo! Oooo! We should hit the food court later!” Pinkie says.

“Sure, Pinkie…” Applejack replies in a somewhat bored tone.

They’re coming out of a store directly in front of me. I put on a panicked expression and dive into the nearest store. Uhhh… Which just so happens to be a toy store… I hope no one from school sees me… Well, at least those two aren’t likely to come in…

“Oooo! Toy store!” Pinkie says excitedly. “Let’s go in there next!”

OH, COME ON!

“Sure, Pinkie…”

Pinkie continues her endless prattling, “Did you know, contrary to popular belief, that a food court isn’t where food goes to stand trial for food crimes?!”

“Uh, Ah’m pretty sure only you thought that, Pinkie,” Applejack replies.

I make a break for the action figure aisle. Pinkie’s just about perfected the art of being super girly, there’s no way…

“OOOOO!” Pinkie exclaims excitedly, “I wonder if they have the new Mega Rangers figures in!”

I stare at the collection of box figures in front of me that all read ‘Mega Rangers’ and smack a palm against my face. Seriously… is it too late to return all the gifts today is giving me for a refund?

“Ah’m still not sure what you like about them tight wearin’ weirdoes.”

I dive out of the aisle and attempt to sneak around the back of another, making my way for the exit.

“D’uuuuh~,” Pinkie replies, “giant robots are awesome!”

I can practically hear Applejack roll her eyes as she says, “If ya say so…”

Point of order, Hayseed; giant robots are, in fact, awesome. Anyhow, I pull a Solid Snake and make my way out of the store, then put some much needed distance in between me and the toy store.

Come on…bookstore, bookstore, bookstore… I make it into the bookstore without running into anyone else.

Yes!

I make my way to the Religion/New Age section. Sadly, mall bookstores aren’t exactly known for their big sections on demonology. Shame really, if my internet research is anything to go by, they’re missing out.

“Uh…Hi, Sunset Shimmer…” a mousy voice says.

Why?!

I turn to look at Fluttershy, she’s noticeably less terrified than last night, though still visible pensive to be in my presence. I wish I had a bear or tiger or, more sensibly, a large angry dog to sick on her and make a clean break here, which, coincidentally, is also her murder plan.

I gave her a quick glare and whisper, “I was never here…” I do not want to be caught by anyone looking up books on magic, someone might get the wrong idea after last night.

“Erm…uh…okay…” Fluttershy says sheepishly.

I turn and…

“Heeeeeeey~ best frienemy!”

SON OF A…

“Oh, hi Pinkie Pie, hi Applejack,” Fluttershy says.

Trapped.

“Uh…Hey girls…” I say.

Don’t make note of the section I’m in, don’t make note of the section I’m in…

Applejack makes note of the section I’m in and looks at me with a raised eyebrow, “Doing some magic research?”

DANGIT!

“Uh…no I… just came for…” I grab a random book from the New Age section, “…THIS!”

Oh, please don’t be incriminating, please don’t be incriminating… I hold up the book in front of me and sneer at the title, “The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment,” I practically spit out.

Applejack gives me a quizzical look.

“I didn’t know you were into Spiritualism, Sunset Shimmer…” Fluttershy says.

“Suuuure,” I reply trying to smile convincingly, “just uh… trying to get in touch with the inner me… uh… the good inner me, that is…” Smooth Sunset, real smooth…

Pinkie gasps loudly and her already wide smile grows wider. “I LOVE Spiritualism!” she cries.

“Oh?” I ask.

“Oh, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes!” The bubbly pink teenager replies. She smiles wide at me, “I’m even getting into fortune telling!”

“Uh… fascinating…” I offer.

I take a quick glance at the bookshelf, none of the books I’m after appear to be here anyways. Sadly, I might be stuck with the book in my hands.

Applejack shakes her head, “Ah don’t see why you’re into this stuff, buncha mumbo-jumbo if ya ask me…”

Pinkie puts a pout on her face.

It’s my turn to cock an eye at Applejack, “Seriously? You had horse ears and a tail less than 24 hours ago and blasted a demon with the power of friendship, and you have trouble imagining magic is real?”

Applejack just glares at me.

Pinkie and Fluttershy start giggling.

“Well, that don’t mean this spiritual enlightenment or whatever is a thang, now does it?” Applejack shoots back at me.

I smile. “You’re right Applejack,” I say, as I put the book back, “it was probably a pretty silly book anyway…”

Applejack actually looks a little surprised that I put the book back so readily.

“A.J.,” Pinkie says in a chastising tone, “you shouldn’t just put down people’s beliefs like that!”

Wait… am I… am I not the bad guy here? This might be my chance to get in good with everyone…

“Uh, sorry Sunset Shimmer… I didn’t mean nothin’, I’m sure it’s a really interesting book…”

I’m not.

“No! It’s fine, not exactly what I was looking for anyways…” I say holding my palms out. “I’ll just pick something else out…” I scan the bookshelf again. Uh wow… there’s pretty much nothing here that’s not feel good, self-actualization or something that wouldn’t label me as an entry level dark magician. Not really interested in the former, and I don’t want the others to think I’m the later. Not after last night, anyways.

I turn back to the trio of girls with a smile, “You know what? I’m not really seeing anything else, uh… maybe I’ll just leave it for now.”

Fluttershy just looks at me blankly.

Applejack looks a little nervous oddly enough.

Pinkie looks crestfallen. “See what you did, A.J.?” she asks, motioning out to me. “Now she’s all nervous because you think she’s weird!”

“Ah didn’t sayI thought she was weird!” Applejack insists.

I smile, “Well, I’m a unicorn from another dimension,” I remind them, “and that’s pretty weird.”

The three pause and look at me as if I just grew a horn out of my head that casts spells. Uhhh… maybe that wasn’t the best thing to…

“Pfft… HehehehehhehheHAHAHAHAHA…!”

All three burst into laughter. Jack-pot!

“Hehhehhehheh…Ya got me there, partner…” Applejack says.

“Hehehehehehe… See,” Pinkie exclaims, “she’s not so bad!”

Fluttershy just smiles and nods.

Pinkie Pie suddenly excitedly reaches out for my hands, “I think someone could use a Tarot reading~!” she sings out.

Applejack opens her mouth to say something, but then seems to think better of it.

“Tarot reading?” I ask.

Pinkie gasps, “You mean you’ve never heard of it?!”

I shake my head.

Pinkie beams at me, “Well, let Madame Pinkie Pie be the very first to take you on your maiden voyage of card based fortune telling!”

Fortune telling, again? I could probably do with some insight into my future, but I’m not sure if ADHD incarnate here is going to actually give me anything accurate…

“Sorry, but I have to…”

Pinkie once again looks crestfallen and opens her sky-blue eyes wide, giving me a puppy-dog look that even makes me a little jealous. Anyway, ‘I have to’ what, exactly? Look through this useless bookstore? Not buy a jacket because I don’t need any more awkward conversations? Go shopping for microwave dinners because I suck at cooking? I guess I can go home and begin my research, but I think I’d be passing up an opportunity to get in good on this friendship deal.

I smile and change my tone, “…You know what? I think I’d love a Tarot reading.”

Pinkie’s lips pull open wide, and I think I hear them make an actual ‘squee’ sound.

“Hurray!” she cries as she quickly heads towards the exit, holding one of my hands tightly. Applejack and Fluttershy just shrug and follow us.

Looks like I’m being kidnapped by the Friendship Express. Oh well, hopefully something good will come out of today…

Chapter 3: Misfortune

All That ShimmersChapter 3: Misfortune-ooooooo-

Pinkie drags me through the mall towards the food court as Applejack and Fluttershy walk briskly behind us to keep up. Spending time at the mall with these three was not on the agenda, but I could use something to take my mind of transforming into a demon and potentially being possessed by said demon.

She drags me past the clothing shop Rarity was in and I glance in and whimper quietly.

Pinkie stops to look at me then towards where I’m staring, “What’s wrong?”

I shake my head, “Nothing…” Of course that was a lie. Looks like someone beat me to that nice jacket. I really could have used a win today. Also, it’s really frickin’ cold out.

“Something the matter?” Applejack asks as she catches up with us.

I shoot her a glare. “It’s fine!” I snap out. Geez, can’t anyone just mind their own business, here?

“I was only askin’,” Applejack replies.

I break eye contact and stare at the floor, “Sorry…” I say sheepishly. Uh… excuse, excuse… “…I’m don’t do a lot of hanging out…” Well, it’s not much of an excuse, but at least it’s true.

To my surprise, Applejack puts her hand on my shoulder and smiles at me, “It’s alright Sunset Shimmer, that’s what we’re here to fix.”

Fluttershy gives me a small smile and a tiny nod.

Everyone must have made one heck of a promise to Twilight, the amount of slack I’m getting cut here is almost embarrassing.

“I think it’s time for a group hug~!” Pinkie sings out.

I was afraid she’d say that.

Pinkie steps up and wraps her arms around me. Applejack and Fluttershy do the same, with substantially less hesitation than last night.

“Alright, I’m hugged… thanks…” I utter. “You can all stop now… no seriously! STOP!” As nice as these girls are to me, I really wish they’d pace themselves better…

-ooooooo-

Cards fly between Pinkie’s hands as she shuffles with incredible dexterity. These aren’t just regular playing cards either, they’re about an inch longer and a bit wider, yet she’s practically juggling the whole, massive set in and out of sleeves, her collar, and even her hair like she does this for a living.

As interesting as that is, I can’t help but stare at the purple wrap around Pinkie’s head that’s pinned with a red broach and a giant purple feather.

I nod to her headwear, “So, you just carry that around with you wherever you go?”

Pinkie giggles as she curls the fingers on her left hand and rapidly fires off cards into her right, “Of course not, silly!” She glances at the ceiling and flicks her free hand upwards, “Only on days where I’m going to be telling someone’s fortune.”

I cock a suspicious eye across the large, round, food court table, “You knew you’d be telling someone’s fortune today?”

Pinkie grins as cards begin to disappear down her right sleeve, “Well, I wouldn’t be much of a fortune teller if I didn’t at least know that!”

Walked…no…sprinted headlong into that one.

Applejack and Fluttershy giggle as they sit with us at the table. Applejack is sitting next to me, no doubt as a bit a buffer for the meek little Flutters. I fight the urge to tell them to shut their yaps and force a probably not all that sincere sounding chuckle.

Pinkie reaches under her headdress and pulls out the full deck of cards.

Fluttershy begins softly clapping. Obviously, she’s impressed with Pinkie’s show. Honestly, the sheer dexterity and sleight of hand expertise here is really something else. I guess it’s no surprise she can play an obscene amount of instruments all at once. Pinkie is the reason I’ve avoiding competing in the schools talent shows like the plague, she always runs away with the whole thing. Trixie has something of a grudge because of this, though I never had need to sort out how to use that…

Pinkie sets the deck neatly in front of me. “Alright, now split the deck into three piles,” she says.

I comply, picking up about a third of the deck and setting it to the left of the pile; then I repeat the process, setting the new set to the right.

“Now, pick up the top card from the first pile and lay it face up in front of you,” Pinkie directs.

I do. A card labeled ‘THE TOWER.’ Is my reward. A large, white tower sits in the middle of the card. It’s on fire as a bolt of lightning knocks a crown off of it and a man and a woman appear to be falling from the burning structure.

“Guessing this isn’t a very cheery card…” I utter.

Still smiling, Pinkie nods. “Yeah, it pretty much stands for misery, destruction, and all around unhappiness.” she informs. “That and also possibly a collapse of an important view or belief.”

“Lucky me…”

Applejack chuckles.

Pinkie gives me a closed eye smile, “You are lucky, the first card is your immediate past.”

I rest my elbow on the table and bring my hand up to my chin, this whole exercise suddenly becoming more interesting. That might have been coincidental, but with the meaning and a crown right on the card, it’s a pretty interesting coincidence.

“Next card, please!” Pinkie says as she grins a wide toothy smile. “This one’s your present, or possibly even you!”

I repeat the process, cringing as I lay the next card in front of me. The card is labeled ‘THE DEVIL.’ A red half-man, half beast with batwings and big goat horns takes up the majority of the card, with a naked couple of horned humans or demons of some sort chained to a pillar the beast is standing atop of.

Applejack’s chuckling increases.

I, on the other hand, am probably starting to lose a little bit of color in my face. My pensiveness doesn’t seem to go unnoticed.

Fluttershy whispers a quiet, “Applejack…” and gently nudges the blond haired girl with her elbow. She also throws in a nod towards me. All of which stops Applejack’s sniggering.

Pinkie, likewise, looks across the table at me with concern. “You know… maybe this was a bad idea…” she reaches for her cards.

I reach a hand out and gently grasp her wrist. “Tell me what the card means…” I say monotone.

“Oh, uh…erm… violence, rage…the er…evil side of people that eats them from within…”

I cringe, and retract my hand. That was a little too on the money.

Pinkie forces a smile on her face, but the look in her eyes is telling me it’s not totally genuine. “It could also mean great financial success!” she offers.

Well, that’s also rather on the money… no pun intended.

I reach for the third and final pile. “I guess this is my future, right?” I ask as I glance up at Pinkie.

“Umm-hmm!” Pinkie replies cheerfully.

I grab the top card and place it in front of me.

… The card reads ‘DEATH.’ At the bottom.

Hello.

My name is Sunset Shimmer and welcome to my cruddy life.

You can actually see it get worse by the minute at this point.

Anyhow, the ‘DEATH.’ card doesn’t disappoint, a skeleton in black armor rides a white horse past what I’m guessing is a dead man as others plead and fall in front of it.

I just stare at the spread in front of me, either this is the most depressing deck of cards in recorded history, I’m just that lucky today, or this demon inside me is real and I’m not going to like what it has in store for me.

“Oh, goody! The Death card!” Pinkie exclaims as she claps her hands together.

I look up at her like she’s lost her marbles… you know… not that I figured she had many to begin with.

The bizarreness of Pinkie’s reaction is enough to break my fixation on the cards and I glance at Fluttershy and Applejack. Flutters there looks about as shaken up by this whole thing as I feel, and Applejack is giving Pinkie the same look I am.

“Now, I may not be much for this fortune tellin’ stuff,” Applejack begins, “but how the heck is that a good thing?” she demands motioning to the card.

Thanks Hayseed, saved me the trouble.

“Well, death means change!” Pinkie explains. “You know… something is going to end…” Pinkie examines the spread in front of me, “Something big by the looks of things…”

“How can you tell?” I ask.

“Oh, well you see, you drew only Major Arcana, so that means your fortune is extra, super, special important!” Pinkie suddenly gasps, “Maybe it’s the evil inside you that dies!”

“Yeah, or just me…” I mutter out.

No one laughs… actually, that might be for the best. It wasn’t very funny to me, either…

Pinkie whimpers from across the table then suddenly snaps her fingers as a smile returns to her face, “Hunger!”

“Come again?” I reply.

“How hungry are you?” Pinkie asks.

My stomach answers for me. Treacherous organ, stomach growls are not something cool, aloof girls are supposed to do… Though, I guess I’m supposed to be dropping that whole side of me since it didn’t really bring me anything but a damaged outfit, even more disdain from my classmates, and self-loathing.

Pinkie beams at me, and in what appears to be one smooth motion, both cards and head wrap disappear from view. And before you could utter ‘hammer space’ she has me by the hand and is dragging me off towards the food stalls.

Pinkie treats me to whatever I feel like eating, which in this case happens to be probably several hour old Chinese food that’s been kept warm by heat lamps. As snarky as that sounds, it’s better than the microwave and instant noodle stuff I usually eat, and leagues better than anything I could cook myself. It’s nice to have someone buy my lunch again, hasn’t happened since I broke up with Flash.

…

Alright, since he broke up with me.

We all return to the table with lunches; Pinkie having zoned in on the unhealthiest food the mall has to offer, in this case a couple corn dogs and French fries, Hayseed opted for a hamburger, and Flutters got herself a salad.

We sit and shoot the breeze, or rather, they shoot the breeze. I mostly just listen in. I have almost no experience actually making small talk at a meal. In Equestria, I spent most lunches surrounded by books and scrolls, mostly ignoring my food as I memorized spells and continued my research. Here, most my lunches resembled something more like a mission briefing where I’d give the latest set of orders to Snips and Snails or whomever I’d conned into doing my will. If there was nothing to plan? I’d pretend to be morose and get the two to go on and on about how great I was.

Man… it’s a damn good thing my magic doesn’t work and I can’t go back in time a week. I’d go back with a knife or maybe even a gun and end my past self’s life in an instant. Universe ending paradoxes be damned.

Ugh… I bet little miss Perfect Princess Twilight Sparkle never had to deal with any of this, she probably spent loads of time hanging out with her friends when she was Sun Butt’s student and never had to think about going back in time to see what a complete nimrod she was.

“Uh…Earth to Sunset Shimmer?”

“Hmmm?” Pinkie breaks me out of my depressing trip down memory lane and I realize everyone’s staring at me.

“I asked you what your favorite lemur was!” Pinkie informs.

… How long did I spend in memory lane?

Applejack seems to notice my confusion, “Sorry Sunset Shimmer, when Pinkie’s steering the conversation you kinda have to hold on tight with both hands.”

“I tried to pick a species,” Fluttershy explains, “but they’re all so adorable! I just couldn’t!”

“I know, right?!” Pinkie agreed.

“Oh well…” I wrack my brain, attempting to pull some information out on Lemurs.

…

…I know nothing about Lemurs.

“Er… I like the… red ones?” I offer. Oh, please say there are red furred Lemurs! Please say there are red furred Lemurs!

“You mean the red ruffed lemur?” Fluttershy asks.

YES! Jackpot! I smile and nod my head up and down vigorously, “Yeah! They have such… distinctive fur!”

“Oh! I know, right?!” Pinkie exclaims. “Their little black faced and tails on either end of that red fur!” Pinkie smiles and hugs herself as she rocks from side to side. “I could just cuddle one forever!”

“Oh, yes,” Fluttershy agrees, “and the white on the top of their heads with the fluffy tail? I can see how that would be someone’s favorite.”

“Well, it’s nice Sunset Shimmer knows somethin’ about lemur’s, ‘cause I know about as much about ‘em as I know about space shuttles,” Applejack says.

“How much is that?” Pinkie asks.

Wait, you actually had to ask? Anyhow, I quickly turn, break my smartphone out, and frantically do a search for ‘red ruffed lemurs’ so I can contribute to the conversation without sounding like a moron. Meanwhile, Hayseed has to explain the whole lemur and space shuttle comparison to Pinkie.

About a minute later and suddenly we’re just talking and talking about how awesome red ruffed lemurs are and I’m rattling off scientific names like I have a book on lemurs that I read every night before going to bed. I may not have known almost anything about lemurs until today, but I’m an expert at memorization.

Eventually, the conversation drifts and I keep my head in it this time. Despite Pinkie’s tendency to randomly jump topics I mostly manage to keep us talking about things I actually know something about, movies, wrestling, current events that don’t have anything to do with demons or mysteriously damaged school buildings. I think I’m actually getting the hang of this friendship stuff! It all goes really well until…

Pinkie’s face lights up, “Hiya, Rarity! Hiya, Rainbow!” she says as she waves.

I feel a deep pit in my stomach form and my relaxed expression turns pensive as I turn to face the approaching girls. I think someone just walked over my grave. Pinkie Pie was easy to win over, heck the girl wanted to be my friend. Fluttershy was never going to be difficult so long as I could convince enough of the other girls to like me. I thought Applejack would be difficult, but between her earlier blunder at the bookstore, Pinkie’s insistence, and a few well-placed jokes from me, I think I got her. Rarity and Rainbow Dash are another story entirely.

Rainbow Dash was always going to be difficult… to win over as a friend I mean. If I were to kill her I’d just arrange for some sort of track and field javelin related incident. An athlete cut down before she was even an adult, tragic…

Rarity’s even worse, she has even more reason to hate me than the rest of the group, and that’s saying a lot.

Maybe I should break into uncontrollable sobbing again. That really worked out for me last night.

The rest of the group exchanges greetings as Rainbow Dash and Rarity approach with bags and bags full of clothes. Rarity is giving me a perplexed look as if asking, ‘Why are you here?’ Rainbow Dash’s expression looks more like a demand for an explanation.

“Maybe I should go…” I offer. I could potentially befriend the whole group here and now, but I was hoping to divide and conquer a bit as far as winning them over. It’s a strategy that seems to work well enough for turning friends against each other, I figured it would work for making friends, too…

“Awww, it’s okay! They won’t bite!” Pinkie says.

“Actually, I dare say this is perfect,” Rarity says as she approaches the table and sits next to me.

Uh-oh… if I where Rarity, how would I plan to kill me? Uh… Probably wait until I was elected Princess of something or another and drop a stage light on me… Guessing I won’t be murdered in the middle of a busy mall food court. Still, I’m woefully outnumbered here.

Applejack grins, “You got enough clothes there, R.D.?” she asks as the rainbow haired girl sits in between Rarity and Pinkie.

Rainbow’s face flushes a bit and she glares at Applejack, “Shut up! These are all Rarity’s! She bumped into me and dragged me from clothing store to clothing store.”

“Just keeping up on the latest fashion,” Rarity says, “and I do so appreciate your help.”

“Ya knew we were gonna meet at the food court, ya coulda just headed up here,” Applejack says.

“Well, I couldn’t just leave her to carry everything herself… even if I sorta wanted to…” Rainbow Dash says. She looks past Rarity and shoots me a glare, “What’s she doing here anyways, I thought we weren’t going to deal with her until Monday?”

I wince, this could get ugly.

“Rainbow Dash…” Pinkie says, “Now be nice, Sunset Shimmer was just at the bookstore to find something to improve herself!” Pinkie turns to me. “Weren’t you, Sunset?”

I turn to Pinkie and nod my head up and down. Pinkie, I think you just shot right to the top of my friends list.

“Wait, seriously?” Rainbow Dash asks in disbelief.

“I nod, yeah… though I couldn’t really find what I wanted,” I say. Still technically not a lie.

Fluttershy smiles, “She really is turning over a new leaf.”

Wait, I have Flutters on my side already? Maybe this will be a heck of a lot easier than I thought.

“Yeah, she’s been downright pleasant for the most part,” Applejack says.

Hayseed, too? Maybe I’m not so bad at this friendship stuff.

Rainbow Dash just glowers at me. She doesn’t buy it, but I’m guessing she’s starting to realize she’s outnumbered.

“Well, this is all fine and good…” Rarity begins.

I tense up and wait for the other shoe to drop.

“… But there’s still something we need to address here,” Rarity says.

I turn and look at her. Why did she have to sit right next to me?! I shift in my chair pensively. As well as everything is going, Rarity could potentially just remind everyone how horrible I’ve been to them, I’m sure that’d be enough to kill the pleasantries in a hurry.

“Ya…yes?” I stammer out.

Rarity knits her brow, “Oh, I think you know, dearie…”

And there’s the other shoe… I swallow. Might as well go for broke here. As nice as the other three are being, I’m sure there’s still plenty of bad blood between us all. “Look…I’m really sorry about last Spring Fling, everyone… I shouldn’t have turned you all against each other just so I could win,” I mean it, too. As I said to Celestia, it all seems so petty now. “And… I’m really, really sorry about the video Rarity…” Snips and Snails snuck into Rarity’s boutique while she thought she was alone. Turns out Rarity is rather er… theatrical when she thinks no one is looking. It made for a pretty funny video that killed her chances at the Princess title.

“I had to wear a wig for weeks afterwards, you know,” Rarity says as she continues to attempt to bore a whole through my skull with her eyes.

“I remember… I’m really sorry…” I say.

“And a lot of us didn’t even talk to each other for almost half a year,” Rainbow Dash adds.

I pout slightly, “I said I was sorry…” I glance over everyone’s faces. Despite the progress I’ve made today, this has clearly opened up old wounds and while Pinkie, Fluttershy, and Applejack aren’t giving me the same death glares Rarity and Rainbow Dash are, it looks like the reminder that I sabotage their friendships might have put them back on the fence. I’m in trouble here…

…But maybe…

“Hey look… I’ll help you run for Winter Formal,” I offer.

Pinkie Pie beams at me, Fluttershy is smiling again, Applejack grins and nods, and Rarity and Rainbow Dash just look like they heard me say I was going to donate a kidney to someone.

Bull’s eye.

“What!? No way!” Rainbow Dash exclaims. “You’re not going to run this year?! But you run every year!”

“And for every dance, I might add,” Rarity says.

I shrug, “Why would I? Everyone at school hates me.”

“Oh, Sunset Shimmer, Not everyone hates you,” Fluttershy insists.

“Uh, they kinda do,” Rainbow Dash retorts.

“Can’t argue you with ya there…” Applejack adds.

“Rainbow Dash! Applejack!” Pinkie says in a chastising tone.

“It’s alright, Pinkie,” I say. “I know it’s true… I mean… How could anyone blame them?” I lay my arms on the table and rest my chin on them as my expression goes morose, “Even if we disregard last night, and let’s be honest, no one at school will… I spent the last couple years manipulating everyone so I could win those dances. Rarity wasn’t even the only one I stepped over to get to the top.” I sigh, “I turned myself into the most feared student at school. Now that everyone’s unified against me, I’m just the most loathed…” I bury my head in my arms. As thick as I’m laying on here, I mean every word.

There’s a brief pause of silence and then I feel a hand cover one of my own. I look up, Rarity is now smiling at me as she rests a hand on mine. “I forgive you,” she says.

I give a small whimper and a nod as my lip starts to quiver, I might actually start crying here. This is all going way better than expected, but I didn’t realize just how much emotional investment I had in making friends with these five. Although, the cynic in me wonders if it’s just because I got blasted by their friendship beams and somehow subconsciously crave their attention, now.

“GROUP HUG!” Pinkie cries as she raises to her feet.

Okay, I don’t want it that much!

“Sit down, Pinkie,” Rarity commands gently, “there will be time for that later.”

Pinkie pouts and sits on her chair.

I breathe a quiet sigh of relief. I can’t believe Rarity saved me here.

Rarity looks at Rainbow Dash. “Satisfied?” she asks with a smile.

Rainbow Dash shrugs, “Eh, as long as she keeps out of trouble and makes good on her promise, she’s alright with me.”

It’ll do for now, I’m sure she’s not the only one here who will be on their guard. I mean, I would if I were in their shoes… Oh, who am I kidding? I wouldn’t even suffer my own presence in their shoes.

“Well, since we’re all here, anyways” Rarity says, “I propose we bump a few agenda items we planned for Monday to right now.”

Pinkie excitedly pumps her fist into the air. “Here, here!” she says enthusiastically.

The other three nod in agreement.

I really hope I’m not in store for some sort of unpleasant friendship initiation ritual.

Pinkie grins wide at me and stands up, making her way to my side of the table. “Now close your eyes~,” she says.

This is only confirming my fear. “Uh what are you… HEY WAIT!” I cry as the pink haired woman covers my eyes with her hands.

“Fluttershy, can I have your item?” Rarity asks.

???

“Of course,” Fluttershy replies.

I hear rustling, “Uh, Rainbow Dash, be a dear and check the other bags. I’m not finding it.”

Finding what?

“Didja have to buy so many clothes?!” Rainbow Dash whines as the rustling increases.

“Keeping up with fashion is hard work, darling,” Rarity says.

“Pffft… you should try keeping up with sports, sometime!” Rainbow Dash retorts.

“Hmph,” Rarity replies, “well I’m afraid there’s some hobbies I just don’t find that interesting.”

“Hobbies?!” Rainbow Dash says defensively.

“Uh, Rarity?” Applejack says, “I think sports is a bit more than a hobby to Rainbow Dash.”

“Thanks A.J.,” Rainbow Dash says, “but I can handle this myself.”

Applejack sighed, “Jus’ trying to help.”

“I got this!” Rainbow Dash insists. “Sports is more than a hobby to me, Rarity! That be like saying that Fluttershy taking care of animals is just a ‘hobby’.”

Uh… what’s going on?

“Well, I dare say that Fluttershy’s love of animals is a tad more significant than your interest in sports…” Rarity says.

“Interest?!” Rainbow Dash cries.

Rarity continues, “…wouldn’t you say, Fluttershy?”

“Uh… erm… I don’t think…” Fluttershy says meekly.

“Now, why you gotta go and drag her into this for?” Applejack asks.

“Oh! Are we arguing?!” Pinkie asks excitedly. “Can I join in?! Argue, argue, argue! Bicker, bicker, bicker…”

Oh God, make it stop!

“Pinkie, that’s not helping right now,” Applejack says.

“I’m pretty sure that’s impossible,” Pinkie replies, “I am a helper.”

“Pinkie,” Rainbow Dash says, “sometimes your help isn’t always that helpful.”

“WHAT?!” Pinkie shrieks.

OW, my poor eardrums!

“Erm… You can be a tad overzealous, sometimes…” Fluttershy admits.

“A ‘tad’?!” Rainbow Dash asks. “More like a ‘ton’!”

“But… but I just want everyone to be happy!” Pinkie protests.

“We know, dearie,” Rarity says, “but you don’t always go about it in the right way.”

“But… but…” Sounds like Pinkie’s a bit shaken up here. Feels like it, too. Her hands are starting to shake slightly as she continues to cover my eyes. It’s…unpleasant to say the least.

“Now, ya’ll don’t need to pick on her like that!” Applejack says.

Rarity sighs, “Oh there you go, rushing to everyone’s defense but mine…” Rarity accuses.

“Well, you started it!” Applejack shot out.

“I most certainly did not!” Rarity replies. “The first stone was clearly cast by Rainbow Dash.”

“Was not!” Rainbow Dash declares.

“Was too!” Rarity retorts.

Wow… no wonder all it took was a few e-mails and some misinformation to break up this group. Past me would have reveled in this. Present me is now stuck in the eye of the storm, and has someone’s sweaty palms rubbing against her eyelids.

“Wait, I didn’t see Rainbow Dash throw any rocks…” Pinkie says.

“Uh, Pinkie?” Fluttershy says, “It’s an expression.”

“I KNEW THAT!” Pinkie asserts loudly (Ow again, by the way). “I’m not stupid, you know!”

“Erm…I never said you were stupid,” Fluttershy says.

“Well, you did just now!” Pinkie protests.

“But… that’s not what I…”

“Pinkie, are ya picking on Fluttershy?!” Applejack asks.

“Erm… I can speak for myself, you know…” Fluttershy says.

“ME?!” Pinkie cries shrilly (seriously, I think my ears are ringing…) “Why does everyone always assume Fluttershy is the innocent one?!”

“Uh, ‘cause she’s kinda a doormat?” Rainbow Dash says.

“…Seriously, cut it out…” Fluttershy says as irritation creeps into her voice.

“Don’t tell me I there’s actually a nerve to hit in quiet, mousy Fluttershy?” Rainbow Dash asks.

“Rainbow Dash, I’m warning you…” Fluttershy says.

“Rainbow Dash, darling,” Rarity begins, “maybe you shouldn’t…”

“Wait, I wanna see if pushover poster child here actually has a spine or not,” Rainbow Dash replies.

Ouch, even I thought that was harsh.

To my surprise, Fluttershy actually growls, “Grrrrrrrrr, Rainbow Dashwhy, you’re just a… just a big… ol’… meanie!” Fluttershy screams out.

“Yeah, you tell her Fluttershy!” Pinkie says. “Oh wait, I’m still mad at you!”

“Ooooh, Pinkie Pie forgot something, what a surprise!” Fluttershy says.

The quivering in Pinkie’s hands increase.

“Uh, Fluttershy… Don’t you think you’re being a tad venomous here?” Applejack interjects.

“Well, apparently everyone just expects me to be a spineless doormat and pushover! Well, I have plenty of nasty opinions on all of you, too!” Fluttershy exclaims.

“Oh, this oughta be good,” Rainbow Dash says as if she’s going to enjoy Fluttershy’s list. “Let’s hear it.”

“Well, for starters…”

Oh, I do NOT want this to escalate. “SHUUUUUUUUUUUUUT UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUP!”

Thankfully everyone shuts up and stares at me… I mean… I think they’re staring at me. I still can’t see anything.

I take a few deep, calming breaths as my chest puffs in and out, “Sorry, but you guys are giving me a migraine and on top of that Pinkie’s palms are really sweaty.”

There’s another beat of silence and then a chorus of laughter and giggling.

“Hahahaha! I can’t believe Sunset Shimmer is the level headed one here,” Rainbow Dash says.

“Hehehehe, I know, right?!” Pinkie says, “Boy is my face pink.”

“Hehehehe, I think you mean, ‘red’, darling,” Rarity says.

“I know what I said,” Pinkie says cheerfully.

“Hehhehheh, Pinkie, maybe there’s another way to keep her eyes covered,” Applejack suggests.

“Oh! I’ve got just the thing!” Pinkie says. “Why didn’t I think of this sooner? Here Fluttershy, swap with me.”

“Oh, ah… okay…” Fluttershy says.

Finally! There’s a quick exchange of hands and… Holy geez! Fluttershy’s hands are actually worse than Pinkie’s! Guessing the girl was clenching her fists for a while there. Thankfully, Pinkie wastes no time in getting something wrapped around my eyes. My guess is she remembered her head wrap.

“Thanks,” I offer.

“You’re welcome!” Pinkie says.

The rustling resumes.

“Oh!” Rarity exclaims, “I’m terribly sorry, Rainbow Dash… seems the item was in my bags.”

“Eh, no biggie,” Rainbow Dash says.

“Erm, I’m sorry I said sports was just a hobby, too,” Rarity adds.

“It’s all good… I’m sorry I picked a fight with you,” Rainbow Dash replies. “Uh… sorry I called you a doormat, Fluttershy.”

“That’s okay, Rainbow Dash, I’m sorry I lost my head there and called you a meanie,” Fluttershy says. “Pinkie, I’m sorry I made fun of you.”

“Ah, that’s alright,” Pinkie says. “I can be a real scatter brain, sometimes” she admits.

“You don’t say…” I utter. Please say that wasn’t out of line, PLEASE SAY THAT WASN’T OUT OF LINE!

Thankfully everyone giggles and laughs again.

“Shoot everyone,” Applejack says, “I’m sorry I got into it with all ya’ll.”

“And I’m sorry that… well… sorry I don’t have anything to apologize for, for a change,” I say with a smirk.

More laughter. Maybe I should use my power of snark for good more often, it’s oddly fulfilling.

The group quickly exchanges a few more apologies as the rustling continues. Finally, the blindfold is taken off and, ow… I scrunch my face up and squint as my eyes adjust to the fluorescent glow of the mall food court. My vision adjust and I spy a pair of brightly colored, perfectly wrapped boxes in front of me, complete with expertly wrapped bows.

I stare up at the five friends in confusion, “Should I check for ticking, first?”

They all laugh again. Though, I was half serious there. It’s pretty hard to believe they’d get me anything that doesn’t explode or spray noxious fumes at me.

“Come on! Open them! Open them!” Pinkie Pie says as she bounces up and down excitedly. I’m not sure if I should take that as a sign that they’re more or less likely to explode.

I grab the smaller and shred the paper off the box. It’s almost a shame given how well Pinkie wrapped this. I’m actually starting to get a little jealous of the girl, she seems to be a woman of many talents and she’s an expert at all of them.

“Fluttershy got you that one!” Pinkie informs.

I glance at Flutters who seems a tad nervous. Likely scared that I’ll judge whatever’s in the box and take it out on her if I don’t like it. The former is unavoidable, but I resolve myself to not do the ladder, no matter what stupid, animal themed… oh… Hello? What do we have here?

I pull out a black sunglasses case. Didn’t see that one coming, let’s hope the shades aren’t dorky or gaudy… I open the case and…

Wow… these are actually pretty chill! I mean, I don’t think they’re a named brand or anything, but it doesn’t look like she skimped on them either. I don’t know if she overcompensated to please me or what, but I ain’t complaining.

“She likes them! She likes them!” Pinkie declares.

I guess my grin was pretty hard to miss. I turn to Fluttershy and give her an earnest smile and an equally earnest, “Thank you.”

Fluttershy smiles back at me, “You’re welcome, Sunset Shimmer.”

“Oooo! Oooo! Next one! Next one!” Pinkie cries.

“Alright, alright…” I say as I reach for the larger box, “Eesh, I’ve known cocker-spaniels with less energy than you.”

Pinkie gasps.

Uh-oh, maybe the dog comparison was a bit much.

“HOW DID YOU KNOW MY FAVORITE BREAD OF DOG?!” Pinkie asks in her shrill voice.

Wow, today sure got better in a hurry, wait… did she just say…

“Pinkie, I think you mean ‘breed’ of dog,” Fluttershy corrects.

“Unless she knows a lot more about how tasty dogs are than we do,” I suggest.

Fluttershy covers her mouth and gasps, everyone else bursts into laughter. Even Flutters drops her hand enough to show that she’s blushing slightly and giggling.

Rainbow Dash shakes her head, “I wish you’d have come around sooner, Sunset. You’re a riot.”

And I do believe that’s five. Sunset Shimmer 5, Friendship 0… or maybe it also gets a 5… Guess we’re all winners, here (but mostly me).

Anyhow, I grab the box.

“And that’s from the rest of us!” Pinkie informs cheerily.

Huh, I wonder what it could be, Flutters spent a lot on her own. Actually, I wonder why Fluttershy elected to not get in on the joint gift. Everything becomes crystal clear as I open the box and my heart gets stuck in my throat and my eyes open wide and even feel water form in my eyes. I can hardly believe what’s in front of me.

Inside the box is the same, perfect, stunning, badass leather coat I saw in the shop. Rarity must have been the one to snag it. I take it out of the box and just marvel at it. It’s even better looking up close.

“Hehehehe… She’s speechless!” Pinkie says.

Rarity smiles at me, “We originally got these as a sign of good faith on our part, but you’ve been such a good sport today, I guess you can say you earned them.”

Applejack nods, “Eeyup.”

My bottom lip starts to quiver and more warm water starts to well up behind my eyes.

“Oh my gosh! Hehe… She’s actually crying!” Rainbow Dash says.

“Sniff… I’m not crying!”

I am crying…

“GROUP HUG!” Pinkie announces.

This time no one stops her.

Oh well, it’s a pretty small price to pay for a new pair of sunglasses and an awesome new jacket.

-ooooooo-

The girls invite me to spend the rest of the day with them, and I don’t refuse. Everything else is pretty uneventful, though I pick up the bill for dinner and milkshakes on my own accord. Gifts or not, I don’t want to feel like I owe them anything, and it was money I figured I’d be spending on a new jacket anyhow. What’s also nice is most of the girls know how to drive and even have their own cars, so I get to avoid public transit for the rest of the evening. Something I haven’t been able to do since I broke…I mean Flash broke up with me.

Not going to lie, it was pretty nice… though Pinkie might have some sort of group hug addiction. Still, she was nice enough to help me go grocery shopping which added a chatty surrealism to the mundane task I had not known was possible. She also drove me back to my apartment in her small, pink compact car.

“Goodnight, Sunset Shimmer! I had a lot of fun hanging out with you today,” Pinkie says.

“Yeah, me too…” I reply. “Uh… you can let go now.”

“Ooops! Hehehe…” Pinkie unwraps her arms from around my body and lets me get a breather in. “Do you need help with your groceries?” She asks.

I pick up the brown grocery bags that are at my feet, “I got it, thanks!” I wouldn’t mind so much, but I don’t want Pinkie to see the mess I made of my apartment.

“Alright,” Pinkie says, sounding slightly disappointed, “See you Monday, okay?”

I nod and smile, “Of course!” Surprisingly, I’m actually looking forward to it. I can’t remember the last time I had so much fun, or if I’ve ever had so much fun.

“Bye-bye!” Pinkie says as she waves her hand enthusiastically.

“Goodnight, Pinkie!” I say as I walk towards the complex.

“Goodnight, best frenemy!”

I just smile and shake my head as I make my way back to my apartment. I don’t even make it all the way before my phone starts vibrating. I get to the door, set down the bags, and pull out my phone to see Pinkie has texted me, ‘SLEEP TIGHT!’ along with a plethora of emoticons. I text her a quick “You too.” Wow, being her friend is going to be tiring.

I’m tired, but happy all the same. I feel accomplished, a little giddy, and loved… well liked at least… It’s a feeling that stays with me as I put away the groceries, clean up the sad pathetic state that is my apartment, shower, and get ready for bed.

I climb into the covers and rest my head on the pillow. I think this might turn out to be the most relaxing sleep I’ve had in a long, long time. I close my eyes…

…and my nose is immediately assaulted with the smell of sulfur.

I knew there was something else I was supposed to do today…

Chapter 5: Double Sunday

All That ShimmersChapter 5: Double Sunday-ooooooo-

“Uh… hey, Sunset,” Snips’s somewhat raspy voice says from the phone. “I’m actually going to see Snails soon… I mean, you remember what day it is, right?”

“Don’t be stupid!” I yell into my phone. “Of course I know what day it…” My expression softens up slightly. Of course, it’s Sunday. “Oh right… church,” I mutter.

I hate church. Not for any particular religious or anti-religious reason mind you. Though, admittedly coming from a world where I was once the main pupil of an immortal god-princess probably has messed with my perception somewhat. I hate church simply because it’s something that I can never get around on Sunday. Snips and Snails’s parents insist the pair go to Church every Sunday, and this often leads to Bible studies, bake sales, charity drives, summer camps… just a whole bunch of activities my minions have to go to that I can never get them out of.

“Fine!” I huff out. “Tell him there. I guess I’ll meet you two when services are over.”

“You can always come, too, you know…” Snips offers. He does this every time.

“Pass,” I say simply, like I do every time.

Snips chuckles. “Hehehe… What’s wrong? Afraid you might burst into flames if you walk through the doors?” Sails says, like he does every time.

The awkward silence that follows is new, though. Normally I dismiss the overused joke and reiterate that I want the pair ready to go as soon as I show up. This time, Snips little joke actually stings a bit given recent events and my current situation.

“Uh… Sunset Shimmer?” Snips says tentatively. “I’m sorry… I didn’t mean…”

“It’s fine!” I snap out. “Just make sure you both are ready when services are over… There aren’t any stupid bake sales or anything I have to work around today, are there?”

“Uh, noooo…” Snips responds. In a somewhat unsure tone.

“What is it, Snips?” I ask as I roll my eyes.

“Uh well… What exactly are we doing?”

Normally I’d yell at Snips and tell him that I’ll explain everything to him and Snips when I see them. Especially since I usually have to explain things two or three times anyhow, and it gets a bit tedious. This time, I sense Snips might be pensive about me getting up to my old tricks.

“We’re looking for books,” I answer.

“Uh… that’s it?”

“Yeah, that’s it.”

“Oh, okay then. See you after Church, Sunset Shimmer,” Snips says cheerfully.

“Yeah, bye,” I say as I hang up the phone.

I sigh to myself. Guess I can at least take the time to work out, or something.

You might be wondering about the church Snips and Snails go to.

Religion is a bit different in this world than Equestria, likely because deities aren’t walking around in broad daylight here. At least, not that I’ve seen…

Snips and Snails attend a Church where the primary figures are an omnipotent god, simply known as ‘God’ and his divine son made flesh, Fixer Christ. ‘Fixer’ probably because he was the son of a carpenter, with Christ being a title. The name seems, shall we say, convenient, for a figure whose primary role seems to be something of a savior.

Until recently, I’ve barely paid any attention to their religion. Only learning enough so I don’t like a complete idiot if the topic comes up. The religion is the most practiced on this world, and it’s somewhat ubiquitous in this country with most people believing and practicing to some degree. Not knowing the basics would sort of make me look like I came from a different planet…

Anyhow, as I mentioned, the religion is now getting a little more attention from me. Information on demons and how to deal with them seems to be mostly related to works from either Snips and Snails's religion or its precursor. The Star Swirl the Bearded of this world is a figure of great importance in both religions, and seems was something of a magician here as well.

No one I’ve met seems to be able to perform magic… real magic anyhow. Some clever sleight of hand, sure. But I’ve never seen anyone shoot a fireball or anything. The magic that Star Swirl the Bearded performed seemed rather ritualistic, a far cry from the instant satisfaction of levitating an object or teleporting. Not my forte, but they’re the best leads I have and living with this thing inside me isn’t exactly an option I want to entertain at this moment.

Anyhow, The Key of Star Swirl the Bearded is the top book on my list of things to find today, followed by The Lesser Key of Star Swirl the Bearded, and a handful of other books with names I’m not yet sure how to pronounce on account of their names not having a translation.

I go to my desk and break out some stationary. It’s a big city, there’s quite a few bookstores to scour, and the three of us will mostly be riding busses to get around. Once that’s done, I’ll hit the gym, take a shower, get dressed, and move out. I’ve got a big day ahead of me.

-ooooooo-

Dressed in my usual attire plus the new coat, new sunglasses, and a large, black handbag, I tap my foot impatiently as I wait in front of the long, single-story, brick church that Snip and Snails are currently in. Both seem to be taking their sweet time. Mostly elderly and middle-aged churchgoers are leaving at this point, the usual simple greetings and polite nods have giving way to asking me about the accident at school. Thankfully I have the same cover story Vice Principal Luna gave about no one being there at the time and it’s the weekend, so it makes sense that I haven’t seen the damage besides what the news had to report. Other than that, it’s business as usual; polite greetings I return amongst offhanded comments that I should I join services next week. I doubt these same people would react this way around me if they know what I did just a couple nights ago.

Somehow this whole standing in front of a church thing has me more uneasy than normal. Loitering in an area where I stick out like a sore thumb as people come out and acknowledge my existence for whatever reason has never been a very high on my list of things I like to do, but somehow this feels weirder than usual. I suspect it’s simply because of recent events that maybe I’m developing a psychosomatic aversion to churches.

Wait… If I’m somehow of cognizant of it then does it actually make a lot of sense for it to be psychosomatic? But… I mean… I can’t actually be having some sort of real, physical aversion to churches, can I?! That would be--

“Uh… Hey Sunset Shimmer, sorry we’re late,” a nasally voice calls out. “Nice shades.”

“Yeah, Sorry Sunset Shimmer…” a slow, somewhat dumb sounding voice adds. “I like the new jacket.”

I snap out of my contemplating and turn towards Snips and Snails.

“What the heck, guys?!” I exclaim. “You kept me waiting for forever!” Not really, actually. Though, me getting annoyed at having to wait for them is pretty standard. I might have made it a point to be a little nicer if this wasn’t so important.

“Sorry, but we had to change!” Snails says.

“Yeah, our parents get really upset if we mess up our church clothes,” Snips adds.

They’re both dress in their regular street clothes. For Snails, A green, V-neck sweater with black trim with a purple snail emblem on it all over a red shirt; a pair of khakis, and red tennis shoes. For Snails, a black t-shirt with a pair of scissors printed on the front; jeans, and green tennis shoes. Scissors on his shirt aside, Snips always dresses normally enough. Snails on the other hand…

I sigh before I address Snails, “Snails, you always look like you just physically assaulted a second-hand store!”

Snails looks down at his clothes and then back up at me. “What! It’s totally me!”

I roll my eyes. “Oh it’s you alright. You’ve managed to turn ‘clueless’ into something you wear!”

Snails puffs out his lips and pouts slightly.

“Aww, leave him alone Sunset. Snails can wear what he likes. Besides, I like it,” Snips asserts.

I fold my arms. “Yeah, well, you would.”

Snails smiles at Snips. “Thanks buddy,” he says as he holds out a fist.

“Anytime, pal!” Snips says enthusiastically as he holds out his own fist and taps it against the top of Snails.

The two do their stupid fist bump ritual while I roll my eyes as hard as I can at them. Not that they can see me doing this with the sunglasses on, but I’ve done it enough time that it’s pretty clear I’m overflowing with silent disapproval.

It may not look like it, but this is pretty much the three of us saying ‘Hello’. Pleasantries aren’t my forte unless I’m faking. The nice thing about Snips and Snails is I don’t really need to be mindful of my behavior around them.

“Are you two done being stupid?” I ask. “No, don’t answer that… look we have a job to do and I don’t want to waste all day in a church parking lot!”

“Alright Sunset Shimmer,” Snails says, “so uh… what are we doing exactly?”

“I already told you!” I growl out. “We’re looking for books! This is why I hate explaining anything to you two over the phone!”

Snails pipes up. “Yeah but… uh… we don’t exactly believe you…”

One of my eyes begins to twitch in anger as I glare out the pair of dunces in front of me. “Why wouldn’t you believe me?! Why would I lie about that!?”

“Well, you’ve never asked us to do anything like that before,” Snips says.

“Yeah, it sounds kinda… weird!” Snails says.

“What? Looking for books is somehow weird?!” I exclaim. I mean, sure it’s a bit strange regarding what I’m looking for, but the act itself should be innocent enough.

“So, we’re really just looking for books?” Snips asks.

“Yes!” I exclaim. “How is that so hard to believe?!”

“Well, I don’t think you’ve ever asked us to do anything that didn’t have to do with winning a dance or something else.” Snails says. “Are these books going to help you win a contest?”

I’m slowly losing my patience here. Granted, I have very little when it comes to these two, but still. “Uhhhg! NO!” I exclaim as I throw my arms into the air. “This has nothing to do with winning a contest of any sort! I’m through trying to win stupid contests! I have more important things to worry about at the moment.”

Snips and Snails look at me like I’ve just completely lost my mind. Well, maybe I have, but they shouldn’t think that until we somehow get past the idea of LOOKING FOR FRIGGIN’ BOOKS!

“Are you feeling alright, Sunset Shimmer?” Snails asks.

“No, I’m not feeling alright!” I snap back. “Instead of going off and doing what I want to do, which is going looking for some books, I’m stuck here explaining myself to you knuckleheads!”

“Well, I mean…” Snails continues. “Did you really mean what you said? No more contests?”

“No!” I shake my head. “I mean ‘Yes’! GHAAA!” I raise my hands and ruffle my hair in frustration. “I’m getting stupider the more I talk to you! No more contests!” I declare as I stomp my foot on the ground.

Snips and Snails exchange another glance.

“Well, she sure sounds like Sunset Shimmer,” Snails says.

“What do you mean ‘she’, don’t tell me you two idiots are humoring the idea that I’ve been replaced somehow…!”

The pair give me a double dose of blank stares and utter a couple of stupid sounding “Uhhhh…”s.

“Oh my GOSH, you two! What the heck?! I need you two to help me find some books and suddenly it’s a federal case?!”

“Well, maybe you can prove it’s you!” Snips suggests.

“Yeah! Prove it!” Snails chimes in.

I grumble angrily to myself. “Do you want me to go over all the embarrassing things I know about you two?! I mean… I have a list of those. Literally!” I exclaim as I throw my hands out. “I literally have compiled a list of all the humiliating things you two have done!”

Snips and Snails look at each other and shake their heads.

“Well, that won’t work,” Snips says.

“Yeah, won’t work,” Snails agrees.

“WHAT?! Why not?!” I roar.

“Well, you wrote them down,” Snips says.

“Yeah,” Snails agrees.

“I mean… if someone took your place they could have just found your list and told us the things on it,” Snails reasons.

“WHAT! BUT THAT… I MEAN…” As stupid as this whole exercise is, he has a point. An anger inducing, infuriating point. My body starts to shake in anger. “I AM JUST SO ANGRY RIGHT NOW… I COULD JUST… UHG… KILL YOU BOTH AND MAKE IT LOOK LIKE AN ACCIDENT!”

The two look at each other with a small smile and nod. “It’s her,” they say in unison.

My eyes shot open wide from behind my sunglasses. “WHAT?! THREATENING TO KILL YOU TWO IS WHAT TIPPED YOU OFF?!”

The pair of idiots shrug.

“Well, yeah…” Snips says.

“You always do that when you’re really mad at us.”

I begin to take a number of deep, not so calming breathing. “Huuuufffff… puuuufffff… Don’t tell me…huuuufffff… puuuufffff… Don’t tell me you morons actually planned this?!”

The two exchange a confused glances.

“Planned what?” Snips asks.

“Yeah… Planned what?” Snails adds.

I smack a palm against my face. “Oh… I get it, you two are just naturally good at making me angry… Remind me why I hang out with you two?”

“Uh… ‘cause we always do what you ask?” Snips suggests.

Well, he’s not wrong.

“Yeah,” Snails chimes in, “even after you turned all evil and stuff a couple nights ago…”

I wince. I know Snails didn’t mean anything by what he said but his words cut me deep and I feel my stomach churn just a bit. I didn’t realize how just how much the comfortable, but irritating feeling of routine had kept me going the last few minutes, but Snails words remind me that things are not normal at the moment. If anything, I should feel lucky these two are talking to me, not the other way around. And that stupid church is still making me feel uneasy!

I ball my hands into fists and turn away from the pair. I’m just so angry, and frustrated, and more than anything I just want this thing inside me gone! Also, I feel something wet and hot trickle down my cheeks. I’m crying again. Lovely.

“DuuuUUUuuude!” Snips says. “Not cool!”

“Huh?” Snails replies. “Oh, sorry Sunset Shimmer. I didn’t mean…”

“It’s FINE!” I snap out angrily as I quickly lift my sunglasses and wipe the tears from my face. I have a feeling there’s going to be a lot of me asserting its fine around these two when, in fact, it’s not fine… “Can you two please just focus long enough for me to give you two instructions?”

“Sure, Sunset Shimmer,” Snips says.

“Yeah, Sunset Shimmer,” Snails says.

I turn back and nod. “Good,” I say as I reach into my handbag, pull out a folded sheet of line paper and hand it to Snips. “This is a list of places you two will check and books we’re looking for.”

Snips unfolds the sheet of paper and he and Snails both look it over as stupidly as possible.

They both knit their brows as they continue to stare at it.

“Gee, Sunset,” Snips says, “I thought your writing was getting better, but I can’t read half of this.”

“Yeah, me neither,” Snails agrees.

“What?!” I protest. “I spent a long time making sure it was legible for you two idiots! Give me a break! I’ve only had hands for a few years!”

Snips and Snails pause then begin laughing. I relax slightly, too. It’s oddly liberating now that quite a few people know my secret.

“Hahahahahehe… Alright,” Snips says, “It’s just that”—he turns the paper to me and points at a line—“I don’t think this is a word.”

I look at it. “Sefer Yetzirah? Yeah, it’s a real word, it’s just in another language.”

Snips turns the sheet around and looks it over again. “Oh?”

“YES!” I exclaim irritably. “Look! Just go to the places on the list! And check the stores for sections on religion, thaumatology, demonology, or Kabba…”

“Whoa, what?” Snails say.

I smack my palm against my forehead. “What is it now?”

“Did you say demonology?” Snips asks.

I pause. “… Is that a problem?” I ask.

“Uh, well… aren’t demons, you know… evil?” Snails says.

“Yeah, I mean… now we all have experience being demons, and kinda cool or not, it doesn’t seem like a good idea to be messing with them.”

Snips and Snails usually only question what we’re doing up to the point where I have to explain everything. Here they seem pensive to even be helping me. I guess I can’t blame them… This would seem suspicious even under normal circumstances.

Time to come clean. “I’m not ‘messing’ with them, I just need to understand them better!” Okay, so more like rinsed, I guess…

“But, Sunset,” Snips begins, “I don’t think it’s a good idea to be playing with dark magic… it’s uh… unholy.”

“Yeah, unholy…” Snails parrots.

“No, you see, these books are about using good magic to control bad magic!” I insist.

The two look at the list skeptically. “Really?” they exclaim in unison.

“Look!” I say as I step behind them and point at the first few entries on the list. “See! Star Swirl the Bearded! He’s a good guy!”

“Huh… I guess she’s right,” Snips says.

“Of course, I’m right. I’m always right!” I exclaim.

The two look up from the list and narrow their eyes at me in in a ‘You’re kidding, right?’ fashion.

Uh… looks like there’s a line I can’t use around these two anymore.

I sigh and dig through my handbag, pull out a wad of cash, and hand it to Snips. “Just go to the places on that list, look for those books, send me pictures . If you’re unsure of anything and meet me at the usual place, capisce?” We’d cover more ground alone, but these two work better as a pair. Which is to say, they’re absolutely useless by themselves.

The pair nod and parrot back “Capisce” to me.

I glance at the Church. “One more thing. Uh… wait here…”

“Sure, Sunset,” Snips says.

“Yeah, sure.” Snails says.

I begin slowly walking towards the church, the building never particularly bugged me before, so why now…? Somehow getting closer and closer makes the act of walking seem harder. Like I’m getting slightly heavier with each step. There’s also a vaguely nauseating feeling that’s increasing. My body is telling me to turn back, but my curiosity and strong desire to prove that this is all just in my head is urging me forward. I walk forward to the wooden, double doors and I reach my hand out for of the bronze door handles. The handle is one of those that you grasp while depressing a lever at the top with your thumb. Nothing out of the ordinary for a church, but my heart starts beating faster as I reach out for it.

I place my hand around it and… nothing… Well, okay, not exactly nothing. Somehow the metal feels uncomfortable against my skin. Like it’s prickly, but my hand didn’t catch fire, or begin to melt or anything. I slowly open the door and the suddenly it’s like a wave of the nausea hits and my body feels really heavy. My vision blurs and I let go of the door handle, falling to my hands and knees. I start breathing heavily, panting even as sweat drips off my face and onto the walkway in front of the door.

Snips and Snails rush over to me, each grabbing and arm and helping me to my feet.

“Are you okay, Sunset Shimmer?!” Snips exclaims.

Snails just looks at me with a concerned look on his face.

“I’m fine!” I snap out. I begin to direct us away from the Church, allowing Snips and Snails to support me as we walk away. “I just…uh…” I scramble for a plausible explanation that doesn’t involve me developing some sort of aversion to holy places. “Felt a little ill and wanted to get some water…”

“Oh!” Snips says. “How about I go inside and get…”

I reclaim my limbs quickly. “No… I feel better now… thanks.” I walk away from the church, towards the bus stop. Snips and Snails follow. I feel better physically, and there’s no way in Heaven or Hell I’m going to risk drinking water out of the church. However, this has my worried. Demon me’s words began to echo in my head…‘Silly Sunset Shimmer~, you can’t get rid of me. I’m in you, I’m part of you!’

I had assumed it was a bluff to get me to not even make an attempt to get her out of me. I still believe that. I mean… if she’s in me, it would make sense that I can’t just waltz up to holy places… but what if she’s not bluffing? And if she is part of me, what does that mean exactly?

I shake my head, clearing it slightly. No, this is what she wants. She wants me to second guess what I’m doing. She might even have a little control over my body and is messing with me at strategic times just to get me hesitating.

Well, I’m a master of head games, too. It’s not going to work. I just need to get the right information and then it’s back to Hell for her, and back to sleeping soundly for me.

We walk up to the bus stop with near perfect timing as a bus pulls in front of us and opens its doors wide.

“Get in losers,” I say as I step into the bus, “we’re going shopping.”

Chapter 6: The Dregs

All That ShimmersChapter 6: The Dregs-ooooooo-

“There’s one!” Snips says excitedly as he points and he and Snails stare out the bus window.

“Ooo! Ooo! I see one! I see one!” Snails says as he also points out the window.

From the seat across the aisle from them I sigh and shoot them an irritated glance. I’m going to regret asking, but… “What the heck are you two nimrods doing?”

“We’re playing Spot-the-Car!” Snips informs cheerfully.

“Yeah! Spot-the-Car’!” Snails echoes.

From behind my sunglasses, I knit my brow at the two. “You mean like spot the red cars or the cars with out-of-state plates?”

“No, any car!” Snips says.

I knew I’d regret asking. “Okay… just… what?!” I say in disbelief. There’s stupid, and well…

“There’s a car! There’s a car! There’s a car! There’s a car!”

…and then there’s these two. “You know the sad part here is that if I killed you two, I would go to jail!”

“Ah, come on, Sunset Shimmer,” Snips says. “Relax a little bit!”

“Yeah! Relax!” Snails parrots.

“Relax?! How can I relax when… uh…” Don’t say anything about the demon in me. Don’t say anything about the demon in me. “… the entire school hates me!”

The two pause and consider this.

“Well, not the entire school,” Snips reminds.

“Sure! We don’t hate you, Sunset Shimmer!” Snails adds.

“Oh good-eee,” I reply sarcastically. I’d wonder how my life had become this, but this is pretty much a normal Sunday for me. Snip and Snails are the only two people I’ve met so unburdened by intelligence that they follow me without question. Well, up until now… There’s been a few questions today. Though, it’s not like I’m tricking them into to doing anything objectionable… at the moment.

“Oh! There’s another one!” Snails says.

“Ooo! Ooo! I see another,” Snips replies.

I sigh to myself. “What I wouldn’t give for the telekinetic ability to explode the pair of your heads…” I mumble.

Just a few more bus stops to the transit center and then I’m free… at least for a little bit…

-oooooooo-

As mentioned, we part ways at the transit station and go on our merry ways to opposite ends of the city. Honestly, I’m a little more worried than usual that these two can do as I ask. Looking for books should be easy enough, but it’s pretty outside our normal modus operandi, and none of these titles are exceptionally easy to find… if one discounts the internet of course.

So we begin our not terribly interesting journey where the two overcompensate for their incompetence by sending me pictures of just about any book they find with a weird title, which so happens to be quite a few given the sections we’re all looking at culminating in lots of angry text messages from me. So much for the sweet taste of freedom.

Hours later and I’m combing through more spiritual self-help books, tired, hungry, and irritable when my phone beeps at me. I pull it out of my handbag and am greeted by yet another strange looking title that has nothing to do with what I’m looking for.

Gastropds4Life: is this 1?

ShimmeringBeauty: Alright, first of all, ‘one’, second of all ‘no’.

Gastropds4Life: 1 wat?

ShimmeringBeauty: You can’t see this but I’m rolling my eyesas hard as I can at the screen right now.

DoubleBladed: how bout this?

ShimmeringBeauty: NO! And would it kill you both to type like you had half a brain between you two? Allday! ALL FREAKING DAY I’ve been subjected to textsthat look like something from before my time on thisplanet full of ridiculously lazy people.

Gastropds4Life: wat do u mean?

ShimmeringBeauty: How could you even ask that?! Howis it not obvious to you two dimwits that you both text like you have to push the numbers upwards of three times to get the letter you want.

DoubleBladed: ss we have smartphones

Gastropds4Life: hehe ya who even has a dumbphone

anymore?

ShimmeringBeauty: Exactly! Pinkie types better thanyou two! Except she fills the screens with obnoxiousemoticons.

Gastropds4Life: like this? :) :( 80 :B 0_0 0_0 0u0 }:)

:3 D:B :33 >:] ::::) :o) 38) (;≧Д≦) (ಠ益ಠ;) <) D: u_u tUMUt

ShimmeringBeauty: Yes, for the most part except I’m pretty sure you made up about half of those.

DoubleBladed: wait when did u talk to Pinkie?

ShimmeringBeauty: Yesterday! I ran into her and her friends at the mall. We hung out and exchanged phone numbers and everything. In fact, I’ve been politely declining little invites to things all day! God, that girl is insatiable!

DoubleBladed: u mean u actually made friends

already and didnt tell us?

Gastropds4Life: :(

ShimmeringBeauty: I didn’t tell you because it hasnothing to do with getting the books I need!

DoubleBladed: were both really happy youve made

friends! this is a big step for u!

Gastropds4Life: :)

ShimmeringBeauty: YOU! Y – O – U! HOW IS THATHARD TO DO?! YOU BOTH HAVE FULLY FUNCTIONALKEYBOARDS THAT POP UP WHEN YOU TYPE JUST LIKEME! EVEN IF YOU CAN’T WORK THE SLIDE FUNCTIONI KNOW YOU TWO CAN AT LEAST TYPE! YOU WOULDN’THAVE EVEN MADE IT INTO HIGH SCHOOL IF YOU ACTUALLY WROTE PAPERS LIKE THIS! HOW MUCH TIME DO YOU TWOACTUALLY THINK YOU’RE SAVING BY TYPING LIKE THIS?!AND IT’S NOT LIKE EITHER OF YOU HAVE ENOUGH GOINGON THAT SAVING YOUR PRECIOUS MILLISECONDS MEANSYOU’LL BE DOING ANYTHING PRODUCTIVE OR FULFILLINGWITH YOUR MISERABLE LIVES! I SWEAR, IF ONE OF YOUUSES ‘U’ AGAIN I’LL END YOU AND REPLACE YOU WITH ATRAINED MONKEY. NO WAIT! FORGET THE TRAINING EVEN!

Gastropds4Life: :(

DoubleBladed: u type fast

ShimmeringBeauty: That’s it! That is IT. When wemeet up, I’m killing you both.

Gastropds4Life: :’(

ShimmeringBeauty: Sad faces won’t save you this time! My mind’s made up!

Gastropds4Life: :’( :’( :’( :’( :’(

ShimmeringBeauty: Oh shucks. You found my weakness! Spamming me with sad faces.It’s like my heart just grew three sizes over here!

Gastropds4Life: really? :)

ShimmeringBeauty: No.

Gastropds4Life: :’(

DoubleBladed: fond 1

ShimmeringBeauty: Bizarre pet names won’t save you either.

DoubleBladed: wat? I fond 1 of the books

ShimmeringBeauty: It’s ‘found’, nimrod, and show me.

Snips sends me a picture of the book and to my great surprise he managed to locate a copy of The Key of Star Swirl the Bearded, the book I was looking for the most.

ShimmeringBeauty: Nice work. I guess you both getto live after all.

Gastropds4Life: :)

ShimmeringBeauty: Stop it.

DoubleBladed: Next store?

ShimmeringBeauty: Forget it. We’re already scraping the dregs as it is and I’m starving.I’ll order the rest. Let’s meet up for some food.

Gastropds4Life: sweet

DoubleBladed: sweet

I put away my phone and take one more look at the spiritual book section in front of me. There’s basically nothing here that’s of any direct use. This was mostly true of all the other stores I checked. However, something catches my eye. I pull off a deck of Tarot cards of the shelf and examine it. It appears to be the same deck Pinkie used when she did a reading for me. A potentially prophetic, and equally potentially lethal reading.

Well… at the very least I guess it couldn’t hurt.

Speaking of injury, something else catches my eye. I glance at the religious section and notice a few of the books are sporting religious symbols. I wonder…

I slowly make my way to the section and spot a large Bible with a small cross on it. Tentatively, I reach my index finger out and poke the cross in the center.

Nothing. No light headedness, nausea or anything of the sort… Guess whatever is going on with me isn’t quite as straightforward as some sort of vampire like negative reaction to holy symbols.

I lift my sunglasses onto my forehead and take the Bible and open it. Randomly scanning pages and flipping through it. My vision doesn’t seem to be blurring or anything… Maybe if it was printed in its original language it would have some physical effect on me? I’ll have to dig into this a bit deeper. It might give me some clues as to how I need to move forward here. I put the Bible back.

Huh… I guess one of these wouldn’t hurt to have on hand either… But why the heck are there so many?!

A quick search on my tablet shows me there are several translations and even versions that have or don’t have certain chapters (or books, more accurately) depending on what denomination they’re printed for. Fascinating I suppose, but I’m not here to dig deeply into the nuances of each different branch. I figure out which version will give me the most to work with and find a recent translation that won’t remind me that reading Shake Spear’s work gives me a headache whether it’s from this world or my own.

After I’ve sorted out a suitable copy for my needs, I purchase it along with the cards and add it to a modest collection of reference books on demons I found while looking for things on my list. The reference books won’t tell me how to deal with a demon in detail enough that I might banish it outright, but maybe they can help me figure out if the thing inside me is a known demon and give me a few tips.

After a bit more bus riding I meet up with Snips and Snails at our usual hang out, An out of the way Italian restaurant that does pretty decent food. No other kids from school thinks to go here, so it makes for an ideal location to meet up away from potentially prying eyes. Plus, we’ve gone often enough that we’re recognized on site by the staff and treated pretty nicely. The whole thing has a nice gangster vibe to it that I can’t help but dig.

I walk in and a waitress simply nods in the direction of a booth. Snips and Snails have undoubtedly arrived before me. I walk into the restaurant and the pair of them are inhaling soda like it’s going to be declared illegal tomorrow and chowing down on free bread.

They’re both also keeping themselves busy. Snips is occupying himself with scissors and a book full of different colored construction paper. The kid’s a wiz at creating things with just scissors and multicolored paper. Likewise, looks like Snails found himself a book on, you guess it, snails… It’s the one topic he’s well versed in. So much that he can occasionally break out scientific terms that the teachers and I don’t even understand until he explains things to us. He also seems to be doodling something, three guesses as to what, and the first two don’t count. It’s is shame neither of their special talents are particularly useful for winning most competitions.

Snails shoots me a mildly annoyed look. “Where the heck were Sunset Shimmer? We waited forever!”

“Yeah! Forever!” Snails parrots.

“Sorry,” I offer as I sit across from them. “I figured out another book I wanted and had to do some impromptu research before picking a copy,” I explain.

Snips and Snails look at me as If just grew an extra six feet and sprouted… Uh, wait. I used that one… They look at me like I just grew an extra head. Not sure what the big—

“Did you just apologize to us?!” Snips asks in disbelief.

“Yeah! You even explained yourself,” Snails adds.

Oh… well… They have a point. Usually, I would have just yelled at them both to mind their own business… Not sure why my impulse was to be nice, or at least, not horrible to them. Maybe I’m starting to subconsciously feel a bit grateful that they’re sticking with me despite all I put them through.

A waitress comes and pours me a coffee without having to ask me and leaves me a couple sealed, plastic shots of half & half. “I can explain myself if I want!” I snap back. Stupid minions… it’s not like I actually like you, or anything…

“Alright, alright, Sunset Shimmer,” Snips says defensively. “We were just wonderin’… Here…” Snips grabs a bag that’s sitting next to him and hands it over to me. In it is the book they found to me and most the money I handed to them.

I pull out the book and flip through it. Prayers, various circles for summon demons and making them obey you, detailed rituals of how to purify everything from water to fire. Exactly what I was looking for. “Nice work, you two,” I say offhandedly. They at least did better than me, and I even gave them the ‘B’ list when it came to the stores.

Snips and Snails stare at me as if… uh… okay, they’re just surprised again, I guess.

“Did you just say ‘nice work’?!” Snips exclaims.

“Uh… are we sure it’s really Sunset Shimmer?” Snails adds.

“Well… she seems nicer and not eviler… but maybe mirror world Sunset Shimmer is actually nice and she’s just pretending to be mean to trick us!”

“Can we please notmake a big deal out of every single time I don’t feel like yelling at you two? I’m starving and would rather eat and start studying than deal with your inane prattle all evening!”

“Well… she still sounds like, Sunset Shimmer…” Snails says.

I irritably reach for a menu and start scanning it. “Just figure out what you both want to eat before you give me enough time to figure out how to discreetly poison it.” Not that I’d actually do that here. Too many people have seen us together and the evidence would certainly point back to me… Also, I guess I kinda, sorta don’t want to kill off the only two people I know I can count on. Even if they are unbelievably irritating.

The two look at each other and shrug. They pick up a menu and begin looking it over.

“Should we do mozzarella sticks again?” Snips asks.

“How about French fries?” Snails replies.

They’re splitting an appetizer, a telltale sign that they’re broke. Typical.

I sigh as I look up from my menu and address the two idiots, “Look… since you two actually managed to find the book I was looking for the most, dinner is on me.”

Both Snips and Snails look at me in disbelief. “Really?!”

I roll my eyes. “Yes, really.” I’m not sure if I’ll ever quite get the hang of being nice, but I’m at least getting the hang of repaying a favor.

The two still seem to be in some sort of state of disbelief that makes them slower to act than usual.

“Can we order dessert, too?” Snips asks.

“Yeah! Dessert!” Snails adds excitedly.

“Fine! Whatever! Just stop talking, already!”

“… And you sure you’re not some sort of pod person trying to replace Sunset Shimmer?” Snips asks.

Snails nods in agreement.

I glower across the table at the pair of nitwits. “I’m trying to give all this friendship stuff a chance! Please don’t make me regret it!”

“Wow! Thanks, Sunset Shimmer!” Snips says with a smile.

“Yeah! Thanks!” Snails says as he also smiles.

“You really are turning over a new leaf!” Snips says.

“You, maybe you should try helping out at the next bake sale!” Snails suggests.

“I’m just trying to be a little nicer!” I explain as I hold up my fingers to signify a small amount. “I’m not trying to reinvent myself into some sort of goody-goody!” Not to mention I currently have more pressing matters to work out than changing my image. I can worry about what the school body of Canterlot High thinks about me after I’m sure this thing inside me won’t kill me or turn around and kill the school body. Neither is ideal even if either one would solve the whole issue of what the school thinks of me.

Snips and Snails shrugs and go back to picking out something to eat, both enjoying the rare freedom of getting their own menu without having to agree on a single, cheap dish.

I spend most of dinner going over my new books and ordering a few online as well as purchasing digital copies. Between the books I have, my tablet, and my laptop back home I should be able to get some decent cross examination going tonight.

I’d say the three of us enjoy a pleasant evening of dining together, but it’s actually a lot of me telling my idiot minions to be quiet as I try to absorb a plethora of unfamiliar phrases and information and eat pasta at the same time. Still, it feels oddly routine. It’s somehow comforting that my life hasn’t completely changed… yet.

After the two finish their desserts they feel compelled to thank me.

“Thanks, Sunset Shimmer!” Snails says. “That was really friendly of you,” he says with a grin.

“Yeah! Friendly.”

“Yeah, yeah,” I say dismissively without bothering to look up from my book. “Don’t get used to it.”

“We should do this again sometime,” Snips says. “It was kinda fun not having to follow anyone around and take videos of them… even if we have gotten some pretty funny videos!”

“Hehe, yeah,” Snails agrees.

“Fun for you two nimrods, maybe,” I shoot back. “I’m the one who has to keep you both in line!” Also, there’s a better than not chance my life is actually at stake here. I’m sure they’d focus a bit more if I told them that, but I’m not desperate enough to start letting anyone know I might actually have a real demon inside me.

“Awww, cheer up, Sunset Shimmer!” Snails says. “It’s not all bad.”

I cock an eyebrow at him. “It’s pretty bad! I turned into a demon and then mind controlled pretty much the entire school!” Guess I’m still preoccupied with Friday night… Neither of them had even brought it up…not directly, at least. “In fact, you two should probably avoid being seen with me at school. You were already unpopular enough as it was… Actually hanging around with me would probably kill any chances you two have of recovering from this… or worse…” Geez, I must be getting sentimental here. I’m actually looking out for these two idiots.

The two idiots exchange quick glances and look back at me.

“Awww, we’d never leave you alone, Sunset,” Snips says.

Snails shakes his head back and forth. “Yeah, never.”

Uh… wow… wasn’t expecting that. I quickly stand up, push my sunglasses down over my eyes before either of them can see me get teary, and use some of the money Snips and Snails returned to me to pay for the meal plus tip, keeping track of the amount was fairly trivial. “Uh, fine, whatever… It’s your social lives,” I say quickly. “What do I care if you both screw it up?”

Snips smiles at me. “Oh, I made this for you,” he says as he opens his book of different colored paper and slides a perfectly cut and constructed rendition of my cutie mark on a sheet of magenta paper towards me.

I was wondering why the little twerp was staring at my chest more than usual tonight.

“Yeah!” Snails chimes in “And I made you a drawing!” Snails sails says as he hands me a sketch of a surprisingly well-drawn cartoon Snail, not unlike the one on his shirt, that’s smiling happily back at me.

I calmly take both pieces of paper, stare at them, and carefully…

“Hic… sniff… heehhh…”

… completely loose it. I manage to keep my touched sobs to a dull roar, but the sunglasses can’t really hide that I’m bawling my eyes out here.

“Aww, don’t cry, Sunset Shimmer,” Snips says.

“Yeah, don’t cry,” Snails adds.

Damn it you idiots, you’re not really supposed to talk when these sorts of situations happen… You two are as bad as Pinkie…

They both get up and wrap comforting arms around me as I wrap an arm around each of them and continue to emit a series of rather pathetic sounds.

Damn it, why do they have to care? It would be so much easier if they abandoned me. If Twilight and her friends abandoned me. IF the whole frickin’ world just abandoned me. Okay, yeah… I wouldn’t be crying right now if I weren’t happy they all actually seem to care, but I still wish I wasn’t making a scene at my favorite restaurant.

“Don’t worry Sunset, it’ll be okay,” Snails assures.

I want so desperately to believe that, but I know things aren’t over yet between me and demon me. I’ve only begun to make any sort of progress and it’s incredibly unlikely I’m going to sort everything out before I need some sleep.

“Yeah… sure…” I say sheepishly as I break our touching embrace. “Uh… look… I’ll meet you both outside… “

“Sure, Sunset Shimmer!” Snips says cheerfully.

“Yeah! Sure!” Snails says.

“Uh… hold onto these, will you?” I say as I hand Snips the items he and Snails presented to me.

“Hehe, no problem!” Snips replies as he carefully takes the sheet from me.

I quickly collect my things walk away and head for the ladies bathroom. I walk in and look at myself in the mirror. Thankfully I’m not wearing a ton of makeup or anything, but I’m still a bit of a mess. I set about fixing myself in front of the mirror.

That was embarrassing. Touching, but embarrassing. I’m really not used to this having people care about me… like really caring. Despite that, I can’t seem to help but crave it at the moment. Maybe it has something to do with the magic, rainbow, friendship beams I got shot full off? That would certainly be a convenient, if unsatisfying, explanation. Then again, I’ve also begin to realize there was something hollow about the type of attention I was seeking before. This whole experience made me realize that no one really cared about me… Okay, Snips and Snails apparently did, but I hadn’t figured that out until now… Celestia seems to care, but I’m sure that’s just out of a feeling of obligation for me as her student. Guess most of Twilight’s friends don’t quite care yet… though there is one possible exception…

On that note, I hear a beep from my handbag and quickly dig out my phone.

PartyHard: You okay? :{

ShimmeringBeauty: Fine. Why wouldn’t I be?

PartyHard: Oh! Well, I was just randomly thinking

about you, and I decided, :O ‘OMG! Maybe a quick one

card reading would let me know how you’re doing!’ :)

so I broke out my Tarot deck and pulled a random card!

It was the five of cups! And I was all like ‘WTH!’ Can you

believe it?! :{ I mean, there are worse cards but definitely

happier ones, too! So I thought something must have

happened and then I decided to text you to see if

everything is okay, but then you said you were fine,

so maybe the card was wrong or I’m misreading it?

@_@

ShimmeringBeauty: You type fast.

PartyHard: :) lol. Tanks! ;P

ShimmeringBeauty: Also, ‘WTH’?

PartyHard: ‘What the Heck’ ;)

ShimmeringBeauty: You’re actually censoring anacronym?

PartyHard: Well, the other one is hecka rude! >_>

ShimmeringBeauty: I see. I’m fine, alright? I’ll seeyou tomorrow, okay?

PartyHard: Are you sure you’re ok? /:-|

ShimmeringBeauty: Totally.

PartyHard: Well… okie-dokie-lokie. :) Just

remember we’re all here if you need to

talk. ;)

ShimmeringBeauty: Don’t worry. I’ll keep that in mind.

PartyHard: That’s all I wanted to know! ^_^

See you tomorrow! XOXOXOXOXO

ShimmeringBeauty: Yeah. See you tomorrow.

I put my phone back and leave the restroom. I’m not ready to trust any of Twilight’s friends. Not even Pinkie Pie who hasn’t let up on her efforts to befriend me despite already making lots of headway there yesterday. Still, it’s an option if I get desperate.

To satisfy my curiosity, I quickly break into my own Tarot deck and pick out the card she pulled for me. The Five of Cups, a cloaked figure stands regarding three fallen cups while two upright cups sit behind him. There’s a river and a castle past that in the background. The guide that came with my cards suggests loss with something left over with a fixation on the loss part.

Huh… not sure the two idiots outside are great recompense for having my dreams crushed, but maybe there’s something to the card… I mean… they’re better than nothing…

I walk outside and Snips and Snails are waiting for me again, this time a bit more patiently than before.

“Sorry,” I offer as I walk up to them, “I had to respond to one of Pinkie’s stupid texts.”

“We weren’t gonna ask…” Snails says.

“Yeah uh… we agreed we wouldn’t say anything…” Snips adds.

Touching, but I’m all cried out for the day. “Well, now you know anyways. Come on… I have another chore I need to do and more reading to do,” I say flatly. “Guess you idiots can keep my company a little longer…” I say as I do my best to keep my cheeks from flushing.

Snips and Snails exchange a quick grin.

“Sure, Sunset Shimmer. Whatever you say,” Snips says.

“Yeah, whatever.”

I shake my head and try to conceal the tiniest of grins. Idiots.

A bus ride later and I pick up a couple new pair of bed sheets to hopefully keep my from the constant horrors of going to the laundry room on top of the constant horrors I’m already dealing with. Snips and Snails can at least help me carry all this stuff some of the way home.

Another bus ride and we part ways. I manage to avoid any more touchy feely nonsense, however I do ask for the cutout of my cutie mark and picture of the snail…

One last bus ride and I’m home. I set up shop at my desk and pour over the books and try to absorb as much as possible, breaking once to hang up the things Snips and Snails made for me. I mean… there’s basically nothing on my walls anymore, I have to put something up.

…

Shut up.

Anyhow, it looks like a few trinkets and miscellaneous things might come in handy here, a silver ring, an iron ring, incense, salt, medals that sport various names or images of divine beings, etc...

It would help if I could figure out if I was dealing with a specific demon, also if said demon wasn’t inhabiting me. The books don’t seem to really deal with self-exorcisms. There is, in fact, a guide online on how to perform an exorcism. It’s a bit more based in faith than ritual then I’m strictly comfortable with, but I guess I can always try it in front of a mirror once I have a few more items.

I stifle a yawn and look over at my clock. It’s getting late and have a lunch date with Twilight’s friends at school tomorrow. Let’s hope the rest of the school lets me live that long. Let’s hope the thing inside me lets me live that long. Though, it seems the demon is more interesting in some form of cooperation… or breaking me down until I don’t have a choice. Uhg… a hollow form of acceptance or not, I think I’m starting to miss fussing over trivial dances, it’s not like the stakes were particularly high if I screwed up.

I wrap up my research for the night, get changed, and attempt to mentally prepare myself for another round of getting made fun of for losing my cool… Also, you know, probably getting stabbed multiple times or sliced up before dying horrifically and waking up covered in sweat.

Hmmm… You know, it just occurred to me that I don’t know if it’s only my bed that triggers my little spiritual journey to the land of brimstone and getting murdered or if it the act of trying to sleep. I just assumed it was the latter. I guess it couldn’t hurt too much to experiment here. I mean… what do I have to lose?

I snag a pillow from my bed and break into one of the new sets of sheets. I quickly setup the couch for an experiment sleep session, lay down, pull the sheets over me, lay my head on my pillow, and close my eyes.

It still amazes me how fast the smell of sulfur hits me.

Chapter 7: Taking a Stand

All That ShimmersChapter 7: Taking a Stand-ooooooo-

As the smell hits me, my eyes shoot open and I’m staring into what is becoming a very familiar, very dull scene. I turn and there I… not am… Huh… that’s new.

“Uh… hello?” I call out tentatively into the empty wastes. I guess demon me is out at the moment? Possibly attempting to flay the skin off some hapless individual’s back, or even bury someone in a pit of burning hot coals? Not that I've even heard anyone else being out here.

I start walking through the vast expanse of nothing and look around. Not exactly a very scenic place. Aside from the odd, somewhat interesting rock formation and the scattered glowing pit, it’s just flat, sometimes sun-cracked earth. Which is a little strange as there doesn’t seem to be a sun here, or at least, I’ve yet to see anything like one through all the gloomy clouds.

I grumble irritably to myself as I stare out into the barren landscape broken up by the odd jagged rock or fiery pit. Alright, it’s official, she’s messing with me. She figured I already got used to a little banter before being julienned or charbroiled so now she’s figured out the most boring way to get under my skin… uh… figuratively. Note to self: Don’t say that last sentence out loud when I see her again.

I do an about face and stared out at more barren landscape, rocks, and fiery pits. Uhg… Why does Hell have to be so unnervingly quiet?! I would have expected some tortured yelling of the damned, or evil cackling from a horde of demons, or maybe—

A bizarre, indecipherable sound suddenly invades the silence. I look up into grey skies and still see nothing. Soon the sound disappears entirely leaving me just as alone as I was, but slightly more confused. … Okay… just… what?

I shake my head from side to side in an attempt to clear it.

Dear Sunset Shimmer,

Please stop mentally wishing for things you will later regret.

Sincerely,

Yourself

P.S. Seriously, what the heck was that?

Whatever it was, it did sound vaguely familiar… Well, no sense dwelling on every little weird thing that happens in this bizarre place. I have a demon to find so it can make fun of me because I can’t seem to go ten minutes without breaking down into a heap of tears. Then it can brutally murder me for a third time.

…Man oh man has my life hit a low point.

“HELLO?!” I call out. Part of me can’t believe I’m walking around trying to hasten my death or pseudo death or whatever. Another part of me wishes I could somehow mentally project a Joyboy to pass the time. My choices are basically to sit and do nothing or track down the only other being I’ve seen in this place. It’s not like I can get a run in or anything like that… I mean, I don’t know much about this place, but given the circumstances in how I keep ending up here, I doubt the environment is conducive to burning calories or building muscle tone.

One of the fiery pits catches my eyes and I approach it. The heat from the fiery lava below warms me to the point of being uncomfortably hot. The smell of sulfur is much worse standing next to it as well. You know, I sort of wonder if I can skip the whole part where I’m shamed for getting all sentimental with Snips and Snails and just fling myself to an early dream death. On the other hand, I know next to nothing about this place… A suicidal act in a place like this might somehow result in actual death.

Well… At least I know at least two people who would probably show up at my funeral… Fixer Christ is this depressing place making me go all morbid. I really hope demon me shows up—

“Well, if it’s her sad and moist crybaby self.”

I jump slightly as my somewhat deeper, lightly echoing voice calls out from behind me.

Dear Sunset Shimmer,

You apparently have a memory roughly analogous to that of a goldfish when it comes to letters from yourself. Stop being so stupid.

Sincerely,

Yourself

Demon me chuckles at the jump and suddenly I just don’t care anymore.

“Oh, did I scare little miss can’t keep a handle on her emotions? I’m—”

“Was that as good for you as it was for me?” I ask with an unamused expression as I turn to face my demonic self. She’s sitting on a rock large rock, but she still towers several feet above me. Still, her face goes from sadistic enjoyment to perplexity pretty quick.

“What? What do you mean?” she asks.

I glance up at the sky briefly and raise my palms in the air. “The whole boring game of hide-and-seek. Was getting a slight jump out of me worth waiting out of sight for so long?” I smirk and point to the pit behind me with a thumb. “Don’t tell me you hid in one of these foul smelling pits writhing your hands together just waiting me for me to come by.”

Demon me scowls. “Now wait a damn minute—”

“Hah!” I exclaim derisively. “That’s a ‘yes’. I’ll give you some props for mixing things up a little bit, but one of us spent a while inhaling sulfur fumes, so who’s the joke on?”

The demon raises her a palm up and a black orb crackles green before turning a flickering orange.

I grin and spread my arms out wide. It’ll be nice to get this over with.

The demon flicks her wrist and the fireball heads for me. I feel its heat moments before it hits the ground beside me. The blast knocks me off my feet and the hot smoke that wafts up from the impact makes me sputter and cough. Guess I’m not as lucky tonight as I hoped.

I look up and demon me is up on her feet, towering above me and glowering down. It seems doubtful that I’m going to enjoy the next few minutes very much.

She bends down to pick me up and I can’t help but wince as her claws cut into my arms. I guess demons don’t need a delicate touch for much of anything, having what seem to be knives for digits doesn’t seem terribly convenient for day-to-day living. On a side note, geez I have a lot of blood… or had, I guess…

She spreads her wings and begins flapping them and soon we’re airborne. Suddenly the mystery of how I’m likely go to go out this time around is becoming clearer and clearer as the ground gets further and further away.

“So,” Demon me begins as she stares me right in the face, “Snips and Snails hand you a couple lame art projects and suddenly you lose your stuff at your favorite restaurant.”

I manage to choke out a response in between grunts of pain. “That…eugh… seems to be the… huff… size of it…”

“It doesn’t have to be this way…” she says darkly.

“No… but…” I pause and try to focus through the pain. “… maybe … ergh… maybe I’m… puff… okay with that.”

Demon me scoffs. “Seriously? Hanging out with a couple of losers? With a handful of girls that drive you up the wall when they get together? Breaking down in a heap if anyone so much as shows you any kind of affection?”

“Ya…yeah…” I stammer out. “I think… huff… I think I’m really onto… eeck… something here…” Despite the pain I manage a chuckle, which makes the shooting pain in my arms that much worse, but it still feels good to laugh about it.

Demon me shakes her head. “Don’t be ridiculous. You know what we can do. We have 30 moons to conquer this entire planet!” She focuses her green eyes that are set in a sea of black on me. “We have power, real power! Given enough time we could march an endless army across that mirror and claim both this planet and Equestria for ourselves! Don’t tell me you think this friendship garbage is worth that!”

“I tried… puff… tried it your way…” Maybe it’s all the blood I’m losing that’s making me feel light headed, or maybe I find a bit of strength inside me… either way, suddenly my arms don’t hurt quite as much as they did a few seconds ago. “And… I didn’t like what I became… Didn’t like how I felt.” I look demon me straight in the eyes. “Little by little, between Twilight’s bizarre collection of friends and those two”—I roll my eyes—“‘losers’, I’m starting to not feel so lonely anymore… And I think… I think that’s all I really want…”

Demon me scowls, closes her eyes, and shakes her head. “We both know that’s not for you, that you won’t be able to make it work.” She opens her eyes again. “You’ll find the kind of power I have to offer is the only thing you can really rely on.”

“Maybe…” I narrow my eyes and smirk. “But you and I both know we’re probably the last pony we should listen to for advice.”

Demon me knits her brow. “Oh? And how do you figure that?”

“Because we only care about what’s good for ourselves… and you wouldn’t be trying to convince me to give up on this if it didn’t benefit you.” For the first time in in the last few days I feel like me again, and it feels good. Mentally and emotionally that is… it’s actually a little excruciating, physically speaking. “So, sorry to disappoint you but… I’m not sorry.” I grin wide as demon me’s face pulls into an angry grimace. “I think I’m just going to go ahead and do what I think is best for me. I’m afraid you don’t fit into that equation.”

Demon me grits her razor-sharp teeth before she continues, “Guess you’ll just have to find out the hard way you don’t have a lot of choice in the matter…”

“Excuse me if I don’t take your word for that…” I look down to see we’re hovering over quite a large fiery pit. I look back up with a wry grin. “Now if you would be so kind as to drop me off here, I think this is my stop.”

I feel the knife-like claws loosen. “So it would seem…” the demon says.

Suddenly I’m in free fall. Yet, I’m still the one smiling up at demon me who is glaring back. Huh, I wonder if I’ll even feel the—

I shriek as I must have hit something solid. I think I hit the side the pit which involves lots of bones breaking, or more likely shattering and then there's a split second where I see the molten rock I’m heading for. I feel the heat on my face, which isn’t nearly as bad as the pain everywhere else and then suddenly I’m back on my couch in a pair of sweat soaked PJs wrapped in sweat soaked blankets. My heart is pounding in my chest and I’m struggling to breath. Little by little, I manage to focus both heart and breath to something resembling normality.

Victory hurts. It hurts a lot, or rather, it did. Though, something like that was probably going to happen anyway. At least I feel somewhat good about what happened before grisly demise number three. Bleary eyed and exhausted I walk into the bedroom and stare at the digital clock on my nightstand. It’s a bit early, I could always get a run in and watch some news before heading to school…

…Yeah, nuts to that. I’m somewhere in between dead on my feet and wanting to deck the first overly cheerful person I see… which will probably be Pinkie in this case. I quickly change into a non-soaking pair of PJs and crawl into my bed. I don’t care if it smells of my sweat at this point. If demon me wants to meet up with me so soon after I gave her a verbal smack down, then more power to her. Anyhow, I kind of doubt she does. I sure the heck wouldn’t.

I close my eyes and for a refreshing return to normalcy I feel myself drift back to sleep.

For what turns out to be a somewhat less refreshingreturn to normalcy, my alarm wakes me. I groggily reach over and turn it off then sit up in bed, my bare feet dangling over the edge. I still feel tired, but at least it’s a tired I can work with.

It seems my attempting to sleep doesn’t mean an automatic trip to the gloomy land down under. Which I guess means that my demon self has some control over when I show up, or she can only do it once in a 24 hour period. I suppose I could also engage in some rousing nap experiments, but I’d also like to figure out a more permanent way to deal with her.

Anyhow, I don’t have a lot of free time to dwell on this at the moment. No, I’ve got to go and attend classes I couldn’t care less about at the school full of people who probably despise me. I sigh to myself and shake my head as I stand up. If it weren’t for the fact that I’m giving this friendship thing a shot and told Twilight’s friends I’d meet them for lunch, I’d probably not show up today… and maybe all the subsequent days after that.

Still, Saturday was fun, if a little grating at times. Additionally, at the very least this friendship stuff seems to actually irritate the demon inside me.

I trudge into the bathroom and glance at my baggy eyed, disheveled reflection. On the plus side: I have two idiot friends and five more smarter, but still almost as obnoxious maybe friends… on the negative side: I attend a school where everyone likely despises me with good reason, and I’m also possessed by a demon that’s painfully killed me in my sleep the last three nights in a row. I hate to sound like a cynic, but it still seems to me my life is at a cruddy point at the moment.

…Oh who am I kidding, I love sounding like a cynic.

Anyhow, giving up is not going to get me anywhere. If this demon who’s using my body as a condo thinks I’m just going to roll over and let her wreck my cruddy life, she’s in for a surprise. I may not know anything about friendship, but I sure know a lot about picking a target and taking them down using any means necessary.

Determined against my better judgment to make an appearance at school, I set about getting ready for the day.

-ooooooo-

One daily routine plus a bus trip later and I’m walking up the path to Canterlot High. Yawning and getting glared at as I go. Yippy-skip.

“Hey, best frienemy!”

“Hey, Pinkie,” I say casually as Pink Girl enthusiastically bounds up to me, a pink backpack slung around her shoulder.

“So are you excited about today?! Are you, are you?! Oh, I’m excited. I’ve never been so excited! Except for the all the times I saw a new student and I was like” –Pinkie cupped her hands under her chin “‘AAAAAH!’ and they were all like” –Pinkie placed her hands on her cheeks—“‘EEEEK!’”

I sigh before I continue, “Pinkie, it’s a little early for me to muster excitement. Maybe, at lunch, huh?”

“Oh… okay!” Pinkie says cheerfully. She grinned wide. “I know you’re just going to love the surprise we have for you!”

I look down at my new leather jacket. “I thought I was wearing it.”

Pinkie shakes her head vigorously. “No, Silly-Billy! We have another surprise for you!” Pinkie’s grin widens to what seems to be the limits of what her face will allow and she sows me a mouth full of pearly whites. “So are you excited now?!”

“Uh…” I stare at Pinkie’s massive grin for a moment. “Sure… and maybe a little terrified…” Mostly terrified.

Pinkie giggles. “Oh don’t worry so much! We’re not going to ambush you, silly!”

“Well…” I look around at the other kids that pass us and continue to shot me dirty looks. “I guess it’s not you girls I’m worried about.”

Pinkie frowns. “What do you mean?”

I motion out to the people around us. “Not sure if you noticed, but everyone is looking at me as if they’d like nothing more to crack my head open. I should know, it’s a look I’ve perfected, myself.”

Pinkie looks around and catches a few of the looks I’m being shot. Though the other students quickly look away as Pinkie glances at them.

“Oh, don’t worry about them! They just don’t know you like I do!”

“I’m sure they know me plenty…”

Pinkie puffs her lower lip out in a pout before her expression explodes in a smile once more. “Here! I know what will cheer you up!”

“Start singing and I will punch you,” I growl out. I probably wouldn’t, but this should defuse any early morning revelries Pinkie was thinking up.

Pinkie paused. “… I know something else that will cheer you up!” she declares as she leans down and pulls her backpack off her shoulder. “I was saving this for lunch, buuuut…”

She digs through it and is quickly up again with a cupcake holder with what appears to be an expertly crafted cupcake complete with multi-colored rainbow frosting. She stands and holds out the holder.

I reach for it and stare for a second.

Pinkie smiles. “Go ahead!”

Well, a ton of sugar might help me get through the early periods, at least. I open the holder, peel off the wrapper to the cupcake, and begin scarfing it down. It’s delicious.

Pinkie giggles. “See! I bet you feel better already!”

I swallow the bit of cupcake in my mouth. “Yeah, actually.” I can get used to this friendship thing if it means more free food out of nowhere.

Pinkie’s not-stop giggle-fest continued. “Hehehe… Frosting face.”

I reach up to my lips and feel something moist. I look at my fingers and it seems I’ve made a little mess of myself. Guess my heads not quite all together yet.

“Great,” I huff out. At least people are looking at me and snickering instead of looking like they want to murder me.

“Here!” Pinkie says cheerfully as she reaches into her hair and pulls out a napkin.

“Uh… That’s okay.” I say as I hold up my hands. Why does this girl carry around hair napkins? “I’ll just quickly wash off in the bathroom before first period.”

Pinkie smiles. “Okie-dokie-lokie!” She waves. “See you at lunch!”

I wave back as I walk briskly away. “Yeah, see you.”

As I approach the school I see that the front entrance is now closed off with yellow caution tape. Well, it does look like something crushed the entrance with magic and not a lot of headway was made repairing it…

I grumble to myself as I walk around towards a side entrance. I can practically feel everyone’s eyes on me with a mixture of hate and amusement as I quickly make my way down the hallway and into the nearest bathroom.

I stare at my reflection in the mirror. I kind of look like a clown that tried to paint its lips in a drunken stupor. Oh well, hopefully I was fast enough that no one got a photo for blackmail purposes. I grab a paper towel, turn on the sink and began washing my face.

I hear the door open, and I smell the faint scent of cigarettes as a girl with white, spikey hair with purple highlights shows up in the mirror in front of me. She’s wearing a brown, bomber jacket over a plain white shirt, and surprise, surprise, she’s glaring at me.

Gilda. Just my luck one of the resident bad girls would walk in.

Guessing I shouldn’t expect a ‘Good morn—

Before I know it, something hard and fast smashes into my left eye and I head straight for the floor. I fling my hands out to catch myself before I slam into the ground.

Sloppy, I should have known someone like Gilda wouldn’t be afraid to work out her anger on me if she got the chance.

I quickly turn and see Gilda is looking down at me with a wicked smile and I know it’s going to be one of those days.

Chapter 8: Bathroom Revelations

All That ShimmersChapter 8: Bathroom Revelations -ooooooo-

My eye is throbbing as I look up from the ground, figuring out what my next move should be. Apropos of my being punched in the face, her ‘accidental death plan’ simply involves me sabotaging her motorcycle. Granted that doesn’t guarantee her death, but motorcycle accidents can be pretty brutal.

I suppose I can try talking her out of thrashing me. “What the heck is your deal?!” I ask from the floor as I put a hand over my recently punched eye. “You didn’t even go to Fall Formal!” Alright, so I’m not trying very hard. Anyhow, if she decks me a few times and I walk around with proof that someone punished me for Friday night, it might get the rest of the school body who hates me, a.k.a. ‘almost everybody’ to leave me alone for a while. A few might even feel sorry for me if I walk around sporting a few bruises.

Gilda glares down at me. “You think just because I was lucky enough to miss out on becoming one of your mind controlled zombies, you get off the hook?”

She bends down and grabs me be the collar of my jacket, hauling me back to my feet. “Hey! Watch it!” I snap out. “This is a brand new jacket.”

She pulls her fist back and punches me right in the face again. My vision blurs on impact and I stumble back against the bathroom wall. Also, there’s now a sharp pain in my lower lip.

I sure hope the pain means this plan is working.

“So Sunset,” Gilda coos out with a smirk, “if you died here, do you think anyone would bother to investigate?”

I narrow my eyes and wipe blood away from my lip which is now split. “You wouldn’t…” Well she might… Her opinion of me wasn’t particularly high to begin with, but she never bothered to participate in most school events so it was a non-issue for me. Now she has a reason to hate me and I’m sure there’s a long list of people who’d love to just see me drop dead.

Gilda snorts out a derisive chuckle. “Heh, maybe we should find out.” She reaches into a coat pocket and pulls out a black handle. A few quick movements of her hand and suddenly the handle folds out revealing a blade.

Suddenly Gilda has a butterfly knife and this plan doesn’t seem like such a good idea. I’m not feeling particularly great about myself, but I’m not keen on being stabbed and left to bleed to death in a high school bathroom. Chances are she’s bluffing, but she has enough reason to actually just stab me that I’m not going to take that risk.

“I’ll scream,” I say in a warning tone.

Gilda blows out a dismissive puff of air. “Pffft, go ahead. The whole school hates you, do you think anyone will actually come to your rescue?”

Sometimes the truth hurts more than being punched in the face. Like right now, for instance.

Gilda suddenly closes the distance between us so she’s mere inches away from my face. She holds the knife up so I can see it. She grins wickedly at me. “Go ahead, scream.”

I wonder if a couple dozen moons of watching wrestling and imaginary training can really be put to use…

I don’t scream, instead I bring my head down hard, aiming the bridge of my crown for Gilda’s face. A target that’s pretty easy to hit at this range. Her nose makes a satisfying crack as bone hits cartilage and she reels backwards.

… Apparently it can.

Before Gilda has time to react I throw a fist out and it catches her in the side of the head. She stumbles back and catches herself on the bathroom counter, the knife slips out of her hand and clatters on the floor.

She turns and looks up at me with wide, surprised eyes as blood flows out of her nose and down her lips. A bruise is already forming around one of those eyes.

I feel my lips curl up almost on their own accord and my eyes widen to take in the scene in front of me. I throw another punch and watch in satisfaction as Gilda’s head jerks to the side from the impact. I had no clue taking her out would be this easy. Had I known I could hit this hard I would have just taken her out immediately.

Funny, as she’s looking up with me, practically begging me with her eyes to stop, I somehow feel I could easily bash her skull in, and I’m having trouble coming up with reasons why I just shouldn’t.

I pull my fist back again.

“WHAT THE HECK ARE YOU DOING!?”

I look up and Rainbow Dash is staring at me in disbelief.

Suddenly a hundred reasons why I shouldn’t punch a schoolmate to death in a public bathroom come rushing at me, even quite a few sensible ones that have nothing to do with the sudden addition of a witness I’d have to account for.

Slowly, I raise a hand to the side of my head and turn to stare at myself in the mirror.

What the heck… what the hell happened just now?

I reach out and touch the mirror with the other hand, the swollenness of my left eye and lip barely register to me. I think… I think I’m going to cry…

Gilda loses her grip on the counter and falls to the floor. The knife clatters again as its pushes out into the center of the tiled bathroom floor.

Rainbow Dash looks down in shock. “Gilda, is that your knife?! Did you actually pull a knife on Sunset Shimmer?!”

Gilda frowns. “I wasn’t gonna… I mean… I just wanted to scare her…”

Rainbow Dash smacks a palm over her eyes. “I can’t…. I can’t even look at you right now.”

Gilda scowls at Rainbow Dash. “So you’re taking the side of the girl who can turn into a demon and tried to mind control most the students here?”

The comment cuts me deep enough that I kind of wish she had just stabbed me. Tears start streaming down my face and I bite my throbbing lip in an attempt to choke back sobs.

I’m not even sure what I am anymore, and it scares me.

Apparently I wasn’t the only one who had a nerve struck by that comment, because Rainbow Dash has Gilda by the jacket collar in an instant.

“YOU LEAVE HER ALONE,” Rainbow Dash screams. “AT LEAST SHE’S TRYING TO MAKE UP FOR WHAT SHE DID AND NOT PULLING FRICKIN’ KNIVES ON PEOPLE!”

“Okay! I get it!” Gilda says as she jerks out of Rainbow Dash’s grip. Still woozy, it would seem, she almost falls back to the ground. Catching herself on the counter.

As shaken up by this whole thing as I am, I admit I’m just a little proud of that.

Gilda attempts to make it look like she planned her little tumble all along by turning the tap on and washing some of the blood off her face.

Rainbow Dash lets out a tremendous sigh. Who came blame her? She just walked into a bathroom only to find a friend of hers about to fillet one of her quasi-friends and both of us have some nasty looking injuries. Not a fun mess to suddenly find yourself in…

Gilda grabs a paper towel and wipes away the blood and water from her face. She quickly realizes the bleeding from her nose isn’t going to stop soon and grabs a wad of paper towels, holding them to her face. “I’m going home… ” she announces as she woozily retrieves her weapon. “If you want to be first in line to have their brain snatched when demon girl here decides she’s done faking playing nice, that’s your business.”

As much as I’d love to say, ‘If I was faking, I’d probably do a better job of being nice’, the part of my brain that’s supposed to automatically deliver snark is still working with the rest of my head to sort out what happened and just how it seemed I would have no trouble, both mentally and physically, caving someone’s skull in with my bare hands. What escapes from my mouth is some pitiful sounding mumbling.

Rainbow Dash shoot me a small concerned look then turns to Gilda. “You are not riding your motorcycle home!”

“Pffft, thanks mom,” Gilda replies derisively. “But I can get—” Gilda is cut off as she apparently finds standing up difficult. She smacks her head on the bathroom door frame as she collapses to the ground, her eyes unfocused and her head wobbling. It’d be funny if it weren’t so pathetic. Truth be told, I’d probably laugh anyway if I were in a better mood.

“You can’t even stand right now!” Rainbow Dash cried. “How the heck are you going to drive a motorcycle home?!”

Gilda woozily stares up at Rainbow Dash. “Well what the hell do you suggest I do?! Call one of my parents? Bet that’ll go over well, provided I can even get one of them to show up at school…”

Rainbow Dash shakes her head as she takes her backpack off. “I can’t believe I’m doing this…” She digs her phone out of her backpack. “I’m calling my dad.”

To my surprise, Gilda’s eyes widen and she seems worried at the suggestion. “Ba… Blaze? You can’t… you can’t tell him I got… uh…” She trails off as she glances at me briefly. She looks back at Rainbow Dash. “You gotta tell him I gave better than I got…”

“You pulled a freakin’ knife on someone! You’re lucky I’m even making the call, let alone making sure you don’t crash your bike on the way home.”

Gilda quickly stands back up to her feet and gives Rainbow Dash a panicked expression. “You absolutely can’t tell him I did that! He’d never look at me the same way again.”

Rainbow Dash lets loose another heavy sigh and helps Gilda walk out of the bathroom. She turns to me as she’s heading out. “Wait here,” she says. “Let me just sort this out.”

I nod weakly. Self-defense or not, it would be nice if this was handled discreetly. Thrashing Gilda is likely to make anyone think twice before cornering me in a bathroom, but I think I did a little more damage than I could just get away with given my current reputation.

Rainbow Dash leaves with Gilda and I’m left to my own thoughts.

I take another look in the mirror. Well I do know one thing about myself, I’m a wreck. I have got blood trickling down my lip and a nice, swollen eye. I begin cleaning myself up.

Still not sure what happened back there. Initially I just wanted to keep from getting stabbed, but for a few moments there, I wanted nothing more to hit Gilda until she stopped moving, and I’m not even sure why.

That isn’t me… it can’t be! It just can’t!

I try to choke back sobs, but fail this time around. I start bawling in the bathroom.

People should pay me during drought season to stand in their lawns…

HA! Take that, me!

“… HeheheheheHAHAHAHAHAHAHAWHOUAAAHOUAAHOUAAHOUAAAAOHUAAAAHUOAAAAAA…”

I hate myself and want to die. I’m sitting here, staring at myself in the mirror with a hand on either side of my head and wishing I had the strength to cave my own head in.

I start breathing short, shallow breaths very rapidly. Alright, calm down… Hyperventilating in the bathroom isn’t going to get me anywhere. I need to figure out what’s going on here.

Is the thing inside me slowly gaining control? Did it take over because I was in danger, or did I somehow allow it to take over for the same reason? I guess I can test these hypotheses in different ways, but I really don’t want to!

What if someone else attacks me and I actually do kill them?! Heck! What if someone just makes me angry enough and I suddenly snap and start beating the heck out of them?!

I’m not a monster! I’m not!

I slump down on the bathroom counter, resting an elbow on the counter, and my head against my palm.

Get a grip. I mean… I spent all day yesterday getting mad at Snips and Snails and didn’t feel an urge to cave their skulls in… Uh… any more than usual, that is… I should be fine provided I can avoid anyone else who might want to stab me.

… Hopefully that’s not too difficult.

I clean myself up a bit more and look up as Rainbow Dash walks back into the bathroom.

“You okay?” she asks.

“Tha… hhehh… thank goodness you got here… If you hadn’t showed up—”

“You would have beaten Gilda into a greasy stain?” Rainbow Dash suggests as she raises an eyebrow.

The fact that she’s probably right sends shivers through my body. If Gilda regained her senses enough to pick up her knife, I might have been in danger. However, I’m not sure how much of a fight she would have put up with a few more blows to the head.

I lose it again almost immediately and start sniffing and sobbing. I guess on the bright side I’m not having to fake distress over this incident, but the fact that I lost control of myself and almost inflicted serious damage or even death to someone is a little too much to bear. Honestly, with the scene I’m making I’d think I’d need to tone it down a bit if I were faking…

“Hey, chill… it’s alright,” Rainbow Dash says as her expression softens. “I uh… I just had no idea you were the wrong girl to get into a fist fight with.”

Yeah, me too…

“Hick… Just go…” I utter quietly.

Rainbow Dash looks at me as if I had just announced I was a unicorn from another world… you know… if she didn’t already kind of know that…

“What?” she asks flatly.

“…Ju—Just go…” I stammer out. “I don’t wa…don’t want to… hhehh… hhehh… huh-huh-hurt you” I don’t want to hurt you…

“Ya—You don’t…hhehh… don’t… owe…” I swallow “… owwa me anything…” You don’t owe me anything...

“So jus—just… just go… ” So just go.

I don’t know if my collection of half stammered, half sobbed out sentences completely get through to Rainbow Dash, but she just folds her arms over her chest and tilts her head.

“That’s not happening,” she informs me.

“Ba…but…”

Rainbow Dash shakes her head. “Look, if I can call my dad for Gilda after she pulls a knife on one of my friends, I’d be a real jerk if I just abandoned you here.”

I feel my heart skip a beat at the word ‘friend’. “But you… hhehh… you barely…”

“Hey, you’re going through a tough time right now,” Rainbow Dash replies. “I get it… uh… kinda… and I’m not just going to abandon you because things are a little tougher than either of us thought…”

I manage to put a lid on my crying long enough to stare at Rainbow Dash.

She continues, “… Like it or not, you’re my buddy, a’ight? And I’m not just going to go away ‘cause you’re having a bad day.”

The lid on my sobbing quickly blows off and I start bawling again. I wrap my arms around Rainbow Dash and start sobbing into her shoulder.

She seems surprised at first, but she returns the hug.

“Th—thank you…” I say quietly.

Rainbow Dash just chuckles and tightens her grip a little. “It’s cool. We’re all here for you…”

I hope that’s true… or rather… I hope what’s wrong with me isn’t enough to drive everyone away. And, if they are dead set on sticking by me… Well… I just hope the ‘dead’ part remains an expression…

Little by little, I think… I think just maybe I’m beginning to figure out what friendship is really about.

Chapter 9: Good Intentions

All That ShimmersChapter 9: Good Intentions -ooooooo-

After a little talking and what I guess was a well-meaning comment that I apparently cry more than both Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy combined, Dash helps me get me head together enough that I think I can attend first period without making any more of a scene of myself than I'm going to by merely showing up with a swollen eye and split lip. She does talk me into seeing the nurse to at least get an ice pack.

I guess it doesn’t matter if I’m even later for first period at this point. I’m late enough that Mr. Donkey is going to give me a stern stare as I walk in… Actually, if I of all people walk in with an ice pack over my face, there’s no telling how he’ll react.

Dash tries to smooth things over slightly as we walk down the green locker-lined hallway. “Uh… Look, I know it doesn’t excuse what she did, but uh… Gilda didn’t exactly have the best childhood…”

“Haven’t we all…” I reply. “Maybe next time if Gilda can forgo punching me in the face or threatening to stab me, she and I can trade sob stories.” Oh, hello again, automatic snark dispenser. Remind me to figure out if you have an off switch besides traumatic experiences.

Rainbow Dash stops walking as her face turns a little red. “Uh… sorry…” she says, obviously flustered by my comment. “I didn’t… I mean… I guess I don’t know—”

I stop, turn to face Rainbow Dash, and raise my palms out at my chest level. “No, I’m sorry. That was uncalled for.” I shake my head. “Besides, I don’t think people need to have bad childhoods to justify pulling a knife on me at this point…” Well aren’t you just a ball of sunshine, Ms. Shimmer…

“Hey, don’t talk like that,” Rainbow Dash says in an slightly upset tone. She walks back up to me and puts an arm around my shoulders as we resume walking down the hallway. “You and I both know you didn’t mean for things to go down the way they did at the dance.”

I scrunch my lips up slightly. “Sure, but I don’t think the rest of the school quite gets it...” I paused before turning and asking, “… Do you think any company makes ‘Sorry I accidentally mind controlled you and tried to march you through a portal so you could do battle with magical horses’ cards?”

Rainbow Dash bursts into a fit of laughter. “HAhahaha… I think you’re out of luck on that one.”

I put on a fake frown. “Dang… Do you think one gift basket for the entire school is enough, or do I need one for each student and faculty member?”

Rainbow Dash continues to laugh. Good, her reaction is actually making me feel a bit better. Maybe the worst is behind me. I mean… I have to believe the worst is behind me. Oh please, oh please, someone tell me the worst is behind me!

Uh… Anyhow, yeah… we get that ice pack… And make our way to my classroom.

“Well, we’re here,” I say as I approach the door.

“Uh… Should I come in?” Rainbow Dash asks.

I roll my eyes. “Dash, we’re at my class at first period, not my apartment. You don’t even need to worry about giving me a goodbye kiss, or anything.”

Rainbow’s eyes go wide and her face turns bright red. “Whoa, whoa, whoa…” she says as she waves her arms in front of her. “I didn’t mean… Uh… I mean… You’re hot and all, but we’re friends and are just sorta getting to know each other…”

I raise an eyebrow. That wasn’t the reaction I was expecting. “Dash, I was just joking.”

“Oh… right…” Dash grins pensively and rubs the back of her head sheepishly. “I knew that.”

I smirk and cross my arms across my chest. “Hot?” I still got it.

Dash swallows and chuckles nervously. “Uh… Look… I didn’t mean to…”

“Dash, I primarily hang out with a couple of guys who spend their free time either being dunces or ogling me when they think I’m not looking. I can deal with one of my friends thinking I’m hot.”

To my surprise, Dash’s next move is to lean in and gives me a hug, and not a quick, short one either. She wraps her arms around me tightly and just stays there. I think my comment somehow actually struck a chord with her.

“Thanks for being cool about this,” she says.

“… Uh… sure?” I reply as I confusedly return the hug, patting her lightly on the back. The things humans make a big deal out of… I don’t think I’ll ever fully understand it all.

Dash and I part and jump as the classroom door suddenly swings open. Mr. Donkey, in his toupee-wearing glory, is on the other side and apparently well beyond glare territory and on to angry yelling territory. “WOULD YOU TWO FIND SOMEWHERE ELSE TO BOND?! YOU’RE DISRUpting…” Mr. Donkey trails off mid-sentence as he notices who he’s yelling at. It probably helps that I look like I just got punched in the face a couple times. I don’t get the scowl about being late, but I don’t get a sympathetic look either. Mr. Donkey simply opens the door wide and lets me walk in. As I do, he loads up his scowl for Rainbow Dash and points down the hallway.

“Uh… right…” Rainbow Dash says sheepishly. “I was just going…”

For the sake of not leaving anyone out, me taking out Mr. Donkey would involve mislabeling some lab supplies. You know… something that would unexpectedly create an explosion. Not that I’m incredibly mad at him or anything. I’m actually glad befuddled silence seems to be all he can muster at the moment.

I look out into the class and it’s a mixed bag of expressions. Some kids are avoiding looking at me as if I might curse them if our eyes met. A few shoot glares and then look away, possibly because of how I look. A few are giving me smug looks as if I deserved what I got.

Can’t say I necessarily disagree with that last part.

Uhg… I hope this friendship stuff can do something about my new found self-esteem issues. I think I’ve stumbled on some sort of ultra-efficient way of making myself feel depressed.

The students start whispering amongst themselves as I sit at my desk. Whispering that’s quickly quieted as Mr. Donkey scowls out into the classroom. It’s going to be a long few hours until lunch…

I manage to get through chemistry and move onto the next period, and then the next. I’m also hearing half whispered rumors as I walk by. Seems a few people saw Gilda depart in the sad state she was in. Obviously they assume we fought and it doesn’t seem like there’s much of a question as to who won. Of course no one comes up to me so I can confirm or deny the rumor. Not that I mind. I don’t want or need the attention that comes with everyone knowing I beat someone’s face in at the moment.

Hopefully everyone will be too put off by the idea I might have thrashed one of the toughest girls in school to try messing with me again… It’s either that or I get attacked by a group of people looking for payback…

…Have I mentioned yet that I kind of hate high school?

Anyhow, I manage to make it to lunch with nothing but people whispering around me and a few weird looks. Of course that immediately changes when I step foot into the school cafeteria.

“Heya, Sunset Shimmer!” a cheerful voice calls out.

“Hi, Pinkie.”

Almost as soon as I greet her, Pinkie is inches away from me and examining my face intently.

“Whoa, uh, welcome to my personal space, Pinkie. Can I help you?”

Pinkie puffs out her lower lip as she examines my wounds. “Are you okay?”

“Fine, why wouldn’t I be?” You know, aside from the parts about me being punched in the face, almost killing a girl with bare hands, and not being fine at all.

“Well you don’t look okay!” Pinkie replies.

“I’ll be fine! It’ll heal up,” I insist.

“Did you really try to sacrifice Gilda to your demonic lords?”

“I… WHAT?!” Apparently the rumor mill is working overtime.

“I heard you tried to carve out her heart with the Ancient Bonesaber of Zumakalis!”

I furrow my brow. “Pinkie… You saw me walk into school this morning. Did it look like I was packing a Bonesaber of whatever-it-was?” I cry as I fling my hands to my side.

“Well no… But you might have summoned it with your eeeeevil magics!” Pinkie says as she raises her fingers and wiggles them about… erm… evilly.

I stare at Pinkie long and hard. I’m not sure if she’s joking or not. If she is, she has a hell of a poker face. “Do you really think I did that?”

Pinkie smiles. “No, but it’s sort of fun to imagine you could do stuff like that!”

“Oh, so you were playing…” One of my eyes opens wide, the other is still swollen. Don’t say it… Don’t say it….

Pinkie’s grin goes full Cheshire. “… ‘Devil’s advocate’?” she suggests.

I groan as Pinkie laughs. She grabs one of my arms and essentially escorts me to the cafeteria line and starts chatting me up about our menu options.

“Awwww, hamburgers again!” Pinkie bemoans as she reaches out for the item she just complained about and puts it on her tray. “I mean… don’t get me wrong! I like a good burger as much as the next girl, but spaghetti with meatballs is just the best! Pizza is so good, too!” She turns to look at me. “What’s your favorite cafeteria option, Sunset?”

“Uh… meatloaf, I guess…” I answer as I also grab a burger. Not like I spend a lot of time dwelling on how great the food at the school is.

“Really?” Pinkie asks in disbelief.

I successfully fight the urge to snap back with, ‘Screw you, pink girl. I like what I like,’ and instead answer with a shrug and “I guess I just really like meat for some reason.” I wonder if she’s a little unnerved that I’ve turned into something of a carnivore now that she knows I used to be a pony. I probably should be myself, however I arrived with my some of my pony coat turned into the dead and tanned skin of another animal. I try not to think about it too much…

Rather than make a big deal about it Pinkie just smiles. “Okay! I just think the meatloaf here lacks something… It’ just a little too plain for my tastes.” Pinkie gasps as if she was just struck by a sudden epiphany. “Hot sauce!” she declares.

I raise an eyebrow. “Hot sauce?” I ask.

Pinkie nods her head up and down as we continue to go through the line. “Hot sauce makes everything taste better!”

I nod my head as we approach the dessert area. “Even dessert?”

Pinkie grins wide. “Especially dessert!”

She has to be messing with me again. I allow a small grin onto my face. “Prove it! I dare you to put hot sauce on anything here and eat it. I’ll pay you back for anything you manage to eat without gagging on.” Friends do stupid stuff like this, right?

Pinkie gives me a look that seems to be somewhere smack dab in between exuberant and crazy. “Really?!” she asks.

Not the reaction I expected. She sounds excited. Still, I’m not one to back down from a challenge, especially if I issued it. Still, I better add some more conditions so she doesn’t try to make this easy for herself. “Totally!” I answer. “But you have to really drench everything in hot sauce!” I bet that’ll at least make her—

Nope she’s still smiling and she’s nodding her head up and down excitedly.

Aaaaaand she’s piling her plate high with dessert items… And now she has a second… no third plate. She’s holding her first in her teeth and has come to pile the other two high with dessert. As much as this might cost me, I can’t figure out if Pinkie is crazy enough to think she can actually eat all this or weird enough that she actually can.

I snag a few bottles of hot sauce and we pay for our meals. Thankfully for Pinkie, there’s plenty of free surfaces to rest lunch trays on as she fishes out her wallet and coughs up a ridiculous amount of money for her ridiculous pile of ridiculous food.

Well, she’s confident, I’ll give her that…

We exit the serving area out into the dining area. A least for a few shining, glorious moments everyone is shooting weird looks at Pinkie instead of me, but I wasn’t interested in that. I search for Snips and Snails and find them sitting at our usual table. They notice me noticing them and both wave emphatically at me. Guess they really don’t care about keeping a low profile about being buddies with me. Oh well.

I nod at them as Pinkie and I make it to a table where the other four of our merry band are sitting. Despite the fact that my lower lip is protruding from my face a bit more than usual and my eye is turning black, they’re starting at Pinkie’s trays piled high with food.

Hayseed is the first to speak up, “What in the Sam Hill is going on here?!”

Pinkie lowers her head to the table and sets her center tray in front of her, she then sets her ‘dessert trays’ on either side of it. “Sunset said she’d pay for all the desserts I could eat as long as I cover them in hot sauce first! Isn’t she the best!?”

The other people at the table stare at me in confusion as I set my own tray down and the bottles of hot sauce.

“Well… it’s more of a bet really,” I say.

Applejack smirks.

Fluttershy giggles quietly to herself. “Oh my…”

Rainbow Dash snickers. “Oooooh, you made a bet thinking Pinkie eats food like a normal person. Hehehe… Glad I’m finally not the only one here to fall into that trap.”

Rarity raises a hand in front of her mouth and titters. “Decided your wallet was a bit heavy, did you?”

I glance to my side at the massive piles of food. “What? She can’t… I mean… even without the hot sauce, that’s an absolutely obscene amount of food!”

The all just shoot me a collection of knowing looks and suddenly it dawns on me I’ve made a terrible mistake.

“Eat fast, darling,” Rarity says to me. “You won’t want to even look at food for a bit after you watch Pinkie eat.”

As if on cue, everyone starts chowing down on their meals. Pinkie starts on her hamburger first. I play along and eat a little quicker than I usually would. If Pinkie really can make short work of those piles of desserts if they’re drenched in hot sauce, I’ll probably never look at food the same way again.

We all quickly eat our lunches and then Pinkie moves on to her dessert. Without me even having to prompt her, she grabs a bottle of hot sauce in each hand. She then proceeds to flood her trays with them. Cupcakes, muffins, apple crumble, jello… Everything and anything on those trays is soon bright red. Even for the sake of the bet, I wouldn’t have forced her to use that much hot sauce.

She digs in, grabbing a cupcake and shovels it into her mouth. She chews a few times and then moves on to the next item, a muffin. Without a single hint of discomfort, she makes short work of that as well and moves on to something else. It’s amazing. It’s unbelievable. It’s sickening. The sweet scent of the food is mixed with the sharp scent of the spicy hot sauce. I glance at the other people at the table and it seems their feelings mirror my own. Rarity and Fluttershy look like they’re doing their best to keep their lunches down. Rainbow Dash and Applejack don’t look quite as distressed, but they’re still pulling faces that seem to be a mix of disbelief and nausea.

Yet Pinkie continues. The hot sauce hasn’t even slowed her down. She’s eating at a pace and with fervency I’d usually only associate with overweight cartoon cats.

Soon the piles are little more than little bits of food marinating in hot sauce, and soon those are gone too as Pinkie cleans her plate. She even starts licking the sugary hot sauce off the trays.

Rainbow Dash chuckles. “Hehehe… You should see the look on your face.”

Applejack utters a short laugh herself. “Heh… It’s a sight, alright.”

Rarity chimes in. “You do might want to rehinge your jaw, darling.”

Fluttershy parts the fingers that are covering her face ever so slightly to look out at me. She giggles quietly to herself.

I come to my senses and realize I’ve been gawking at Pinkie. I close my mouth. Still, that was pretty incredible… stomached-churning, but incredible.

Pinkie finishes cleaning her final tray and sits it down. She stares at me with a giant red tinted toothy grin framed by bright red lips. It’s more than a little disturbing.

You know… after watching that… maybe I shouldn’t be so quick to evict the thing inside me that’s making sure I end up in something that looks like art inspired by Enduring’s Inferno every evening. Otherwise I’m going to have nightmares about this experience for weeks to come.

I fish my wallet out of my handbag and take out a rather large sum of money to cover Pinkie’s spicy dessert spree. Disgusting or not, a bet’s a bet and she earned this.

Pinkie graciously accepts the cash I hand her and retrieves her wallet from that mop of pink curls that seems to double as a dimensional portal where Pinkie keeps everything and anything. She puts the money in her wallet, then returns her wallet to the safety of her hair. She continues to smile at me as she says, “It was a pleasure doing business with you.”

I manage a small smile. “Yeah, yeah. Guess I know better now than to place bets in regards to what you can and are willing to eat.”

Rainbow Dash chuckles slightly. “Heh, you should have talked to me first about what Pinkie is capable of. At least that way both of us wouldn’t have had to learn the hard way.”

Applejack speaks up. “You mean the five of us wouldn’t have had to learn the hard way!” She motions to Pinkie. “I may not have lost any money to Pinkie Pie, but watchin’ her eat is certainly somethin’ I wish I could erase from my mind.”

Fluttershy squeaks out something that sounds like an agreement as she nodded her head up and down.

Rarity turns and looks at me. “Well now that mildly traumatizing event is somewhat behind us, whatever happened to your face, darling?”

I wince. I’ve got to hand it to Pinkie, as weird, gross, and bizarre as that whole thing was, she made me forget I’m some sort of freak who’s also is sporting a couple injuries on my face, at least for a little bit. Still, it seems Rainbow Dash hasn’t told any of her friends exactly what happened with me and Gilda.

…Quick, think of something plausible… preferably something that doesn’t involve me being punched in the face.

I rub the back of my head. “Uh… Mishap in P.E. I got hit in the face with a basketball a few times…” I don’t actually have P.E. this quarter, but it works considering no one out of the group shares any early morning classes with me. Hopefully none of them get too curious otherwise I’m going to have to continue this little lie a bit further than I’m comfortable with.

The group gives me a concerned look. Well, everyone but Dash, she just gives me a small smile and a nod.

“Oh my…” Fluttershy murmurs.

“Why that’sjust awful!” Rarity says. “You don’t think anyone deliberately threw the ball at your face, do you?”

“Uh…” I didn’t think about that, but if anything that’s more likely in my hypothetical scenario given how everyone feels about me at the moment. “… Maybe …” I say sheepishly as I coax a deep frown onto my face.

“Oh no!” Pinkie cries. “Sunset has bullies!”

I sigh. “What goes around comes around, I guess…” On that note, let’s hope I never get attacked by a twelve foot tall demon… Erm… Outside of dreamland…

Applejack speaks up. “Now don’t go beatin’ yourself up. We all know you regret what happened at the dance.”

The other girls nod and hum “Mmm-hmmm”s in agreement.

Applejack continues, “Maybe you oughta tell me which kid or kids threw the ball…” Her eyes narrow slightly.

I hold up my palms in front of me. “Uhhh… I didn’t really get a good look at them… Besides, it could have been an accident! No sense stirring up more trouble unless we know something is wrong, right?”

“Awwwww!” Pinkie says. “She’s even protecting the people that pick on her. She really has changed!”

I purse my lips slightly as I simply stare out at everyone. I hope someone can change the subject soon, this has gone on for a little too long for my taste and is getting uncomfortable.

“Just tell us if things get outta hand, a’ight?” Rainbow Dash says.

I look at her and she seems rather serious. I’m guessing she’s as serious as she is playing along.

I give her a small smile and nod. “Alright, I will.”

Rarity speaks up again, “Would you like me to see what I can do about that eye and your lip, darling? I’m sure I can make it a little less noticeable…”

I open my mouth to speak but am soon cut off by Applejack. “Shouldn’t we wait until later to worry about makeup? She’ll probably just mess it up in a few minutes here.”

Huh? What is she talking about?

“Oh, right!” Pinkie says. “The surprise!”

I give Pinkie a slightly confused look. “Surprise? What…”

Pinkie smiles at me and pulls a familiar purple wrap out of her hair. Looks like it's blindfold time again. At least she remembered the wrap and isn’t covering my eyes with sweaty hands.

I hear the sounds of chairs scraping the ground as everyone stands up. Pinkie helps me to my feet too, and we start walking.

Somehow despite making a lot of headway with this group, this is definitely a bit unnerving. The entire school, including these five…especially these five, have plenty of reason to hate me, and I did beat the snot of a friend of Rainbow Dash’s on top of everything else that’s happened.

“Uh… where are we going?” I ask in a concerned tone.

“You’ll see~,” Pinkie sings out.

That was probably innocent enough, but I start to freak out a bit, I mean… they could be taking me anywhere! In fact… I feel a temperature shift and a bit of a breeze. They’ve taken me outside.

Alright, stay calm… I mean, these are all my friends, right? RIGHT?! They’ve been nothing but nice to me since Friday! They even got me new glasses and a new jacket and everything despite all the horrible things I’ve done to them! It’s not like they’d do this as some sort of elaborate plan so they could gain your trust enough that they could all get rid of me discreetly…

Oh…

Oh no…

“Sunset, pardner. You hanging in there?” Applejack asks. “You’re shakin’ in yer boots!”

“Shaking nothing!” Rarity says. “The poor dear has started crying again!”

I hear Pinkie gasp. “Sunset, are you afraid of the dark?!”

Normally Pinkie’s bizarre leap in logic would warrant some sort of quip from me, but instead I just sob out a response. “No I… sniff… I… hhehhh… hheeehh…”

“It’s okay, Sunset Shimmer,” Fluttershy assures as I feel a gentle hand on my shoulder. “I know this seems pretty scary, but we’re all here for you. We won’t let anything bad happen to you!”

Oddly enough, Fluttershy’s words do calm me, if only because she reminded me she was there. I don’t think she’d have the stomach to even participate in a relatively harmless prank, let alone what I was thinking was going to happen.

“Don’t worry!” Rainbow Dash says as a firm hand lands on my other shoulder. “You’re totally going to dig this surprise!”

I take a few calming breaths and nod my head. I really let my imagination get away from me there… Maybe I need to think about murder a tad less often…

The group leads me around some more. Me fears are further alleviated by the fact that they don’t take me very far. Unless they plan to just toss me in the crater I created when everyone’s magical friendship beams took me to the ground, I think I’m safe.

Soon the slightly moist wrap is taken off as Pinkie exclaims an excited. “Ta-daaaa!”

I’m suddenly staring at the trashed school entrance, and oh boy is it trashed! I must have crushed and moved a ton of rock or more with a mere motion from my hand. If ever there was a sign of the power I wielded and just how strong I was, this is certainly it.

At least by fixing this little by little, I can feel I’m putting that all behind me.

…

…Oh who am I kidding, it blows major plot that I have to fix this!

“Uh… It’s the school entrance…” I reply. “That I ripped apart… and it’s still ripped apart…”

“Well d’uuuuh!” Pinkie says. “It’s not going to fix itself!” she says with a grin.

“That’s why we’re all going to help ya!” Rainbow Dash says.

I feel the corners of my mouth curve up slightly. “Really?” I ask in a hopeful voice.

“Sure as shootin’!” Applejack says as she swings a fist in front of her.

Fluttershy chimes in, “We’re all here to help you, Sunset!”

Gotta admit, a little help might go a long way here. It’s going to take Snips, Snails, and I a long time to rebuild the entrance to the school… Also it doesn’t help that the three of us barely know what we’re doing.

The corners of my mouth continue upward. I’m not sure if we can do a ton with the time we have left at lunch, but it’ll feel good to get a little of this out of the way. I bet it’ll go even faster once we get Snips and Snails to help us.

“Well, enough dawdling,” Rarity says. “Let’s get started, girls!”

Geez, even Rarity is getting into this! I’m actually touched she’d dirty her hands over me. I mean, not so touched that I’m holding back tears or anything…

…Alright, I’m absolutely trying not to cry here…

“Alright, line up girls!” Pinkie says.

Wait… what?

The other girls do as they’re asked and form a line, starting with Rarity, then going to Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, and then me. What the heck are they planning?

Much to my surprise. The girls break into song.

“There’s no need to worry.”

“If we work together, we will be done in a hurry.”

“Uh, girls?” I say. “I’m not sure if sing—”

The girls continue as Rarity picks up a loose brick from the ground.

“All we need to do is to join together and work as one.”

Rarity gently tosses the brick underhand to Applejack, who does the same to Rainbow Dash, who does the same to Pinkie Pie…

“And before you know it—”

… who tosses the brick a little too high to Fluttershy who bends down a little too low…

“—our work will be dooo—”

My eyes go wide as the sounds of two rather solid objects colliding breaks into the groups impromptu musical number. The solid objects in this case being the brick and Fluttershy’s forehead.

I tried to tell to warn everyone that this seemed like a bad idea!

“AIE!” Fluttershy cries as she falls like a ton of… well… you know… something heavy… She falls backwards onto the grass and the rest of us circle around her with concerned looks on our faces.

“Oh my gosh, Fluttershy!” Pinkie exclaims. “I am so, so sorry!”

“OoOoOoOoOh…” Fluttershy moans out as she looks up at us with slightly glazed over vision. “It’s okay, cotton candy cloud… I’m sure you didn’t mean to flood out the vet’s office with chocolate milk…”

The rest of us look at each other, confusion mixing with our looks of concern.

Applejack speaks up, “She’s more confused than a hog in a chicken coop!”

I cock an eyebrow at Applejack then look back down at Fluttershy, “I haven’t spent a lot of time with Fluttershy, or anything, but I’m willing to guess she normally doesn’t talk like that.”

Rarity shakes her head. “That sounds more like something Pinkie would say.”

Pinkie gasps. “Do you think we switched bodies?!”

The four rest of us turn to stare at Pinkie briefly, then back to each other.

“I think she may have a concussion,” I say.

Rainbow Dash leans down and holds up a couple fingers. “Fluttershy! How many fingers am I holding up?”

“Uh, that’s not how you check for a concussion,” I reply.

Rainbow Dash looks up at me. “It’s not?”

I feel my brow scrunch slightly on its own accord. “You’re in just about every sport!” I cry as I fling my hands up in the air. “How can you not know how to check for a concussion?!”

Rainbow Dash scowls at me. “Sorry! Must have been sick during ‘brick throwing day’ at P.E.!”

Pinkie whimpers sadly.

Rarity puts a comforting hand on Pinkie’s shoulder. “It’s alright, my dear. We know you didn’t mean to hurt Fluttershy.”

Rainbow Dash continues, “Look, if you’re so smart, why don’t you figure out if Fluttershy is concussed?”

“Alright, fine!” I snap back. I lean down and stare at Fluttershy. Hoping to see some focus and recognition in those glazed over eyes of hers. “What’s your name?” I ask simply.

Fluttershy, her eyes focus again and she looks at me as if awareness suddenly came flowing back to her all at once. It’s almost as if my simple question has restored her from her dazed state. She looks me dead in the eyes and answers, “Cantaloupe.”

We all hang our heads and utter a few sighs.

“Oh no!” Pinkie cries. “Fluttershy is totally concussededed!”

Applejack sighs. “She’s more mixed up than one of my Granny’s fruit salads, alright!”

I turn and stare at Applejack. “Do you sit up at night coming up with these? I mean… do you write them down or something? Is there a journal of similes you have stashed away somewhere?”

Applejack turns to me with a slightly perturbed look on her face. “What in Tarnation are you talkin’ about?”

I shake my head. “Never mind… Let’s just get Fluttershy to the nurse…” I lean down further and reach for one of Fluttershy’s arms. “Here, someone help me lift her…”

Applejack leans down with me and grabs her other arm.

“Is it safe to move her?” Pinkie asks in a distressed tone.

“It should be fine,” I say as Applejack and I put Fluttershy’s arms over our shoulders and lift her up. “A little rest should help clear her head…”

“I hope so!” Pinkie says. “Oh! I could never live with myself if I killed Fluttershy!”

“Uh, Pinkie, dear?” Rarity says. “I don’t believe concussions are usually fatal.”

The six of us make our way back into the school and to the nurse’s office. Once again, I’m getting a bunch of strange looks, or maybe it’s all of us collectively. I guess two of us practically dragging Fluttershy through the hallways is bound to turn a few heads. I’m mostly glad the other girls are with me so it’s a bit unlikely the rumor mill is going to go crazy here. Fluttershy is practically the absolute last person at this school I would want people to think I beat up. That would be analogous to people thinking I punch out toddlers for fun.

We bring Flutters to the nurse’s office. Nurse Redheart looks up from her desk as we walk in and immediately is on her feet as she sees we’re dragging a student in.

“What happened to her?!” Redheart asks as she walks up and starts examining the red welt on Fluttershy’s forehead.

“She had an unexpected rendezvous with a brick to the head,” I say without thinking.

Everyone turns and stares at me.

“Sunset!” Rarity says, aghast.

Pinkie begins to tear up slightly. “Ba-but…I didn’t mean to hit her with a brick!” she wails out.

“Right!” I say. “That’s why I said ‘unexpected’.”

Rainbow Dash gives me a look. “Uh, I think ‘accidental’ rendewhatever would be a tad more accurate.”

Fluttershy giggled. “Hehehe… rendezvous is such a fun word to say… rendezvous… rendezvous…”

“Oh no, I was just thinking that!” Pinkie cries. “We are switching bodies!”

Applejack raises an eyebrow. “Uh, Pinkie Pie, dontcha think you’d start talkin’ like Fluttershy if that was the case?”

Pinkie pauses briefly and speaks begins speaking in a soft tone, “I’m yellow and shy…” she says in an absolutely dead on impression of Fluttershy. Pinkie’s eyes open wide as and she covers her mouth.

My swollen eye go wide… everyone else’s eyes go wide. She’s probably not switching bodies, but had I not been staring right at her, I would have sworn Fluttershy had just spoken.

“Oh no!” Pinkie exclaims in her regular voice that’s increasingly going shrill. “We have a code ‘Freaky Friday’, and it’s only Monday!”

Fluttershy giggles again. “Hehehe… freaky…”

“It’s getting worse!” Pinkie shrieks out.

I sigh heavily and nod to Fluttershy, “Can we please put her down?”

Applejack smacks a palm against her face. “You just had to phrase like that, didn’t ya?”

I cock my head slightly as I stare back at Applejack. “Phrase it like…?” I stop and think about my wording a bit. “… Oh…”

Tears began to stream down Pinkie’s face. “Please, no! There’s still hope she’ll recover, there has to be… hhehh… hhehh…WHOUAAAAAAAAAAHOUAAAAAAHOUAAAAAAAAAAA…”

Nurse Redheart scowls at Pinkie and puts a finger her lips. “Sssshhhhh!”

“I meant ‘down on a recovery couch,’ Pinkie!” I cry over Pinkie’s hysterical sobbing.

As quickly as Pinkie began shooting tears like a high powered faucet, she stops. “Oh… That makes a lot more sense!”

Nurse Redheart leads Applejack, Fluttershy, and I to a black recovery couch and helps us lay Fluttershy down.

Man, she looks out of it...

“Oooo… is it story time already?” Fluttershy utters.

… and sounds out of it.

Nurse Redheart looks up at us. “Look, I’ll call her parents and make sure she’s taken care of. Why don’t you girls give her some room? Some quiet will be good for her.”

Pinkie frowns. “But what if I start rejecting my host body!?”

Rainbow Dash stares at Pinkie. “Wait, you mean Fluttershy’s body starts rejecting you, or your body starts rejecting Fluttershy?”

“YES!” Pinkie Pie cries.

Applejack and I turn to Rainbow Dash.

Applejack is slightly quicker on the draw, or maybe I say ‘drawl’. “Now why the heck are you encouraging her?”

I nod. “I was just about to ask that!”

“Girls!” Redheart says sternly. “Please leave!”

Pinkie begins to protest. “But…!”

We leave the office, taking Pinkie with us. Pinkie whimpers as Nurse Redheart closes the door as we all exit.

Rarity places a hand on Pinkie’s shoulder. “She’ll be just fine, dear! She just needs some rest.”

“I hope so…” Pinkie says. Her eyes light up. “Do you think she’d feel better if we threw her a ‘Get well soon’ party?!”

I fold my arms over my chest. “Absolutely not.”

Pinkie puffs out her lower lip and begins to pout. “But…”

“Someone who’s concussed needs quiet and rest, Pinkie,” I say.

“Oh…” Pinkie says sadly. “Okay…”

“Hey!” Rainbow Dash says. “Maybe we can take another crack at the entrance!”

I turn and smile. “Sure! The days still young! Maybe someone can get a skull fracture!”

Rainbow Dash shoots me a glare. “I didn’t say we’d try singing again while we do it!”

Pinkie lets out another whimper and looks like she might start crying again.

Applejack joins in on glaring at me. “Now why’d you go and say something like that? We were just trying to help!”

“Sorry if I was hoping help wouldn’t involve a trip to the nurse’s office!” I snap back.

The anger in the eyes pointed at me only increases.

“Now, now…” Rarity says as she gets in the middle of the group and holds up her hands. “We’re all friends here. No need to get short with each other…”

Everyone’s expressions soften a bit.

“Uh, right… ” I say weakly. “I’m just a little on edge, today… I didn’t mean to snap at everyone. Sorry.”

Without warning, Pinkie flings herself at me and wraps her arms around me. “It’s okay, Sunset Shimmer. We know you’re trying your best.”

I uh… I don’t know what to say to that. The idea that even one of the girls is cutting me this much slack is not just tugging at my heart strings, and grabbed hold and is pulling with all its might.

Great… now I’m crying, again! You’d think I’d run out of tears at some point…

“Group hug!” Pinkie cries.

Oh no…

“Girls! What are you all doing gathered in front of the Nurse’s office?!”

Rather than hug me, the girls turn to look at who had just spoken. I quickly dry my eyes and turn as Pinkie loosens her grip.

Vice-Principal Luna is walking down the hallway with her default stern expression.

I’m saved!

Luna looks directly at me. “I am afraid I am following up on word that you attacked a fellow student.”

I’m screwed!

Chapter 10: There When You Need Them

All That ShimmersChapter 10: There When You Need Them-ooooooo-

As Vice-Principal Luna levels a somewhat accusatory look at me, I fight the urge to tense or give off any sign that I’m guilty in the slightest. I had spent the last couple years in this school conning my way out of jams or to get what I want. Giving friendship a shot or not, I’m not about to just lay down and accept detention, or jail, or whatever the heck punishment I might be in for what I did to Gilda.

Before I or anyone else can say anything Pinkie breaks into hysterics. “It’s true!It’s true! I hit Fluttershy with a… with abra-hi-aaa-hiiiick!”

Luna shifts her focus from me towards Pinkie. “Wait. You attacked Fluttershy?!”

Rarity quickly interjects, “Pinkie accidently hit Fluttershy with a brick while we were all trying to fix the entrance.”

Applejack nodded. “Yep, coulda happened to any of us.”

“But it happened to ma-meeeeheeeeehheeeehheeehheheheeehheeehh….” Pinkie cries out in a somewhat literal sense as her speech devolves into more sobbing.

As wholly unnecessary as the scene she’s making is, it’s nice to see someone else turn on the water works for a change.

“Is Fluttershy alright?” Luna asks.

“She’s fine!” Rainbow Dash assures. “Just a little concussed.”

Luna frowns. “A little?”

“I’m sure a little rest is all she needs,” I interject.

Luna turns back to me briefly before addressing us all. “Well, since you all say that was an accident, I suppose I can overlook that issue for now. Truthfully, I am here because I understand Gilda was attacked today.”

“WhouaaaaaHouaaaaaa…What? Gilda…?” Pinkie says, somehow snapping out of her hysterics instantly. She frowns. “But I don’t even own a bonesaber!”

“Excuse me?” Vice-principal Luna says in confusion. “Gilda was attacked by a ‘bonesaber’?”

Pinkie lets out a gasp. “So it is true!”

“I DIDN’T ATTACK GILDA WITH A BONESABER!” I snap at Pinkie.

“I know you didn’t, silly-Billy!” Pinkie replies. “But someone did!”

“Uh… Pinkie,” Rainbow Dash says, “I don’t think anyone attacked anyone else with a bonesaber at school today.”

“But Vice-Principal Luna said—”

Luna clears her throat. “I was merely trying to clarify the situation. I do not believe Gilda was attacked by a ‘bonesaber’.” She turns and looks straight at me once again. “However, I have heard that someone injured her enough that she left the school grounds.”

Quick… Think of something plausible, Think of something plausible…

“No way!” Rainbow Dash cries. “Sunset was with me the entire time before we made it to first period. There’s no way she could have done that!”

Dash, I could kiss you right now.

Pinkie chimes in as well, “And I saw Sunset Shimmer when she showed up to school today!”

Thank God for quick thinking friends…

“She didn’t have a bonesaber on her at all! She couldn’t have carved out Gilda’s heart!” Pinkie added.

… Er… Well beggars can’t be choosers…

Applejack sighs heavily. “Pinkie Pie, would you give the whole ‘bonesaber’ thing a rest?!”

Pinkie frowns. “I can’t because I don’t even have a bonesaber!” She puts on a ponderous expression “…Do bonesabers even sleep?” she wonders out loud.

Luna narrows her eyes at Pinkie. It’s clear she’s beginning to lose her patience a bit. Of course, Pinkie’s not really doing anything more than being scatterbrained.

“Sorry, Vice-Principal Luna,” Rarity says hastily. “Pinkie’s on a bit of a sugar high at the moment.”

I nod my head up and down.

“Oh golly-cheese balls, yeah did I have a lot of sugar! That was almost as much sugar as the time I ate a bag full of sugar!”

There’s another brief pause as we all can’t help but just stare at Pinkie in a mix of marvel, confusion, a dash of disgust, and maybe a pinch of concern.

I place my hand on one of Pinkie’s shoulders. “Pinkie? Remind me to get you a pamphlet or show you a website or something on the dangers of type 2 diabetes.”

Pinkie nods her head up and down vigorously. “Okie-dokie-lokie!”

“Alright then, I suppose she has not done any damage or shown any intentional disrespect… As for the matter at hand….” Luna turns back to me and frowns heavily.

It was now Dash’s word and Pinkie’s somewhat confused prattling against rumor and hearsay. Luna was strict, but mostly fair. I mean… If you exclude the whole debacle with her trying to force mandatory after school activities on everyone. Not sure what that was about, I guess her jealousy got the better of her and she just felt she didn’t have enough to do during the day… I heard Celestia forced her to take some vacation after that. Which was where the sensible aspects of the rumors ended, as it somehow got around that Luna went to Space Camp for 1,000 hours… which is weird on a number of levels including why the length just wasn’t in weeks or days…

… In retro respect, Snips and Snails probably aren’t always the greatest sources of information.

Anyhow, after a brief pause Luna speaks up again, “I suppose it seems you may be innocent this time.”

Wow, talk about a heaping pile of qualifiers. I doubt she’s wholly convinced of my innocence, but she certainly doesn’t have evidence or even reasonable doubt to pin on me unless she’s going to call Rainbow’s bluff. Gilda’s pride is likely going to keep her silent. It also seems very unlikely Rainbow Dash would blow my cover…

Unless she plans to blackmail me… I hope Rainbow Dash doesn’t start taking notes out of my book here…

“See that you keep yourself out of trouble,” Luna says as she points to one of her eyes for emphasis.

I think I feel my poker face crack ever so slightly as it dawns on me this is probably her little way of pointing out she noticed my bruised eye. “I will, Vice-Principal Luna,” I say almost monotone.

With that, Luna turns and begins walking away from us. Glad she didn’t grill me on the eye. If I had to stick with the gym story she could have easily checked my schedule and caught my lie.

Anyhow… I’m sure if I can keep out of further trouble, this whole thing will blow over… Let’s just hope I can keep control of myself so that can actually happen.

“Well, that sure was nerve wrackin’…” Applejack says.

Rarity puts a comforting hand on my shoulder and smiles. “Well, at least you’re in the clear, as they say.”

“Girls! Girls!”

I look down the hallway to see Principal Celestia walking swiftly towards us.

Oh, come on!

I fold my arms across my chest and narrow my eyes slightly at Rarity. “You just had to tempt fate, didn’t you?”

Rarity blushes slightly and titters nervously to herself.

Applejack greets Principal Celestia as she approaches. “Uh… Hey there, Principal Celestia, what brings you here?”

Celestia has a rather serious look on her face, I’m guessing she’s not here on a social visit to all of us.

“NO ONE HAS A BONESABER!” Pinkie decides to yell, probably because she’s Pinkie.

Celestia pauses for a beat then pushes right past Pinkie’s weirdness like a champ. “I heard Sunset Shimmer attacked Fluttershy with a brick.”

“WHAT?!” The girls and I exclaim.

DAMN YOU, RUMOR MILL!

Pinkie quickly comes to my rescue. “Sunset Shimmer didn’t attack Fluttershy with a brick! I did!”

The rest of us tense up. Good thing it’s Celestia and not her sister Pinkie just said that too.

Celestia stares at Pinkie in surprise. “You attacked Fluttershy?!”

“She didn’t mean to attack Fluttershy!” I quickly interject.

“Yeah,” Rainbow Dash chimes in, “it was an accident.”

“Pinkie, dear?” Rarity says as she places a hand on Pinkie’s shoulder. “We really need work on your phrasing.”

“Oh… Oops…” Pinkie says with a sheepish grin. “Yes, I accidently attacked Fluttershy with a brick.”

Celestia gives Pinkie a look that seems lost somewhere in between relieved and confused.

I smack a palm against my face. “She means she threw a brick and accidently hit Fluttershy in the face.”

“Oh…” Celestia replies before turning back to Pinkie. “Why were you throwing a brick?” she asks, her expression drifting more towards confused territory.

“Well, we had just started singing!” Pinkie explains. “It was the brick throwing part of the song!”

It’s a good thing Pinkie isn’t on the debate team…

Applejack speaks up, “We were tryin’ to help Sunset Shimmer fix the entrance.”

“Ooooooh!” Celestia replies. “I see, so this was a construction mishap.”

“A musical construction mishap!” Pinkie says cheerfully.

We all give Pinkie another sideways glance.

“Is that what happened to Sunset as well?” Celestia asks as she looks over my bruises.

“Let’s not talk about me,” I say with a hint of annoyance. “Lets talk about you and why you’re here. Did you really think I’d full on attack Fluttershy, of all people, with a brick?”

For the briefest of instants I’m sure Celestia gives me a suspicious look, but she moves on to answering my question regardless.

Did you see how I expertly changed the subject there? I haven’t spent the last couple years plus manipulating people for nothing, you know…

“Well, I didn’t assume it was all true, but I did want to at least do a follow up. Then I saw all of you gathered in front of the Nurse’s office and had to sort out what was going on.”

“Still,” I cry in an exasperated tone, “I know I haven’t been the nicest person to anyone or even Fluttershy in particular, but that would be going pretty far to actually physically assault her!”

Pinkie has a brief moment where she seems to be attempteing to consume all the air in the hallway before she speaks, “That would be like beating up toddlers for fun!”

Rarity gasps. “Pinkie!”

Rainbow Dash and Applejack chuckle to themselves.

“See!” I say as I motion to Pinkie. “Pinkie gets it!”

Suddenly the door to the nurse’s office flies open and Nurse Redheart is standing their fuming. We all jump a bit and look at her apologetically. Regardless, she scowls out at all of us.

“Would you all go already?!” Redheart asks. “You’re making it impossible for Fluttershy to rest!”

“Sorry, Nurse Redheart,” Celestia says. “I’ll talk to the girls in my office.”

“Good! See that you do!” Nurse Redheart says. She ducks back into her office and quickly but quietly shuts the door behind her.

Celestia leads us down the hall and soon we are all sort of awkwardly standing around in her bright, but not terribly large office. The five of us sort of sandwiched between her bookcase and her large wooden desk where her microphone and speaker for the school PA’s system is sitting across from her white phone. We’re standing since there weren't enough chairs to go around and awkwardly sitting while others stood around seemed like a more comfortable option than the alternative.

Standing behind her desk, Celestia addresses us all once more. “Alright, I appreciate that you girls want to help Sunset Shimmer, and I’m really, very happy you’ve shown such generosity in trying to be her friend. But I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you all to leave the entrance alone.”

My shoulders slump and I stare out grumpily at Celestia. I am not looking forward to repairing the gigantic mass of broken stone and twisted metal!

Rainbow Dash doesn’t seem ready to go down without a fight. “That’s it? Sunset Shimmer just has to repair that huge entrance with just herself and Snips and Snails?!”

Pinkie interjects as well. “But that’ll take like forever and a day! Possibly longer, even!”

“Actually no,” Celestia says as she shakes her head. “I don’t want those three working on it either.”

Wait, what?

The girls mirror my confusion and a few outright state their confusion.

“Oh, I’m so confused!”

Pinkie of course, stating the loudest and clearest…

Celestia explains as she lets just the barest hints of stress enter her tone, “I can’t have a bunch of high schoolers try to repair the brick and stone entrance to the school! Otherwise…” She trails off, “…well, more of what just happened might happen!”

I feel my brow knit slightly as I speak up, “Then why did Snips, Snails, and I have to start fixing it on Friday?” I should probably just count my blessings here and be done with it, but my already atrociously horrible Friday evening was made that much worse…

Celestia turns to me. “The three of you had turned into monsters and terrorized the school! We had to do something to show you were being punished! But now that that night is behind us, I think it’s best we all move on and we let some professionals take care of the entrance.”

Score!

Pinkie puffed out her lower lip. “But… but what if we were very careful and wore hard hats and didn’t sing or anything when we tried to fix entrance?”

I attempt to psychically will Pinkie not to push the effort any further.

Rarity tries a method that’s a bit more likely to achieve results. “Pinkie, dear? I don’t think it’s necessary to talk Principal Celestia into letting us do such a dangerous thing like rebuild the school’s entrance.”

Pinkie, probably because she’s insane, still tries to protest. “But—”

“I’m sorry,” Celestia says, “but I’m afraid my mind is made up. I don’t believe any of you girls are qualified to repair the entrance.”

Applejack speaks up, “She’s got us there… Ah mean… I’ve raised a few barns, but ah ain’t never had to build something completely out of bricks and mortar.”

“Well… how hard can it be?” Pinkie asks.

I feel my brow knit again as I scowl at Pinkie… Kinda starting to wish I could summon that bonesaber at this point… Just a little bit…

Celestia responds, “Well, for starters, do any of you girls know how to install rebar, or glass doors, or even repair giant stone pillars?”

The girls, and Pinkie in particular, all go uncomfortably silent.

A silence Pinkie decides to murder “… We had a song!”

I’m guessing Pinkie could make a career as a contract killer of silence.

Celestia somehow manages a warm smile. “Songs might be enough to help get a jumbled gym ready for a dance, but I think it’s a bit much to fix a building…”

Pinkie makes a pitiful, defeated-sounding whimper as she puffs out her lower lip and hangs her head. She does nod, however.

“So that’s it?” I ask. “Snips, Snails, and I don’t have to work on the entrance anymore?”

Celestia nods. “Yes, but I have a different task in mind for you.”

My mind begins reeling with the possibilities. Based on what’s transpired, it’s very doubtful Principal Celestia will foist anything potentially harmful or dangerous on me, however there are lots and lots of grueling, monotonous, and maybe even repulsive tasks she can give me and it’s not like I’m in much of a position to refuse.

Celestia looks over the other girls. “Girls, would you please excuse Sunset Shimmer and me?”

Wow, it’s so bad she’s asking everyone to leave… This can’t be good.

The girls flash me and each other concerned looks and begin to head towards the exit.

“Good luck, dear,” Rarity says as she quickly places a hand on my shoulder and gives it a reassuring squeeze.

“Yeah… thanks…” I utter quietly.

The girls all quickly make their escape, leaving me alone with Principal Celestia. I stand as stoically as possible, wondering what my punishment will be.

Principal Celestia motions to a chair in front of her desk. “Feel free to sit.”

I almost instinctively respond with a curt ‘I’ll stand, thank you’, but realize there’s nothing to gain by antagonizing Celestia. I elect to sit as she does the same.

To my surprise, Celestia smiles at me. “I’m glad you’re spending time with the girls.”

I shrug. “Yeah… well… guess we all thought friendship was worth a shot…” I smile slightly. “You know… without that part where I’m literally shot with it.”

Celestia’s simply continues to smile at me as she nods. “I’m happy to hear that. It really sounds like you’re trying to put the past behind you and move on.”

“That’s the plan. Make some friends and try to get through high school without turning into a she-demon…” I give a slight, nervous grin. “Figuratively speaking that is…” Well… literally too maybe. But unless Principal Celestia is some sort of secret demon hunter, I’ll keep that bit to myself. I’m guessing she’s not since a half-dozen teenagers were the ones who ultimately dealt with demon me the first time around.

Celestia just nods. “‘Make some friends’, good. That’s what I want to hear. That’s what I want to continue to hear about.”

I give Celestia a blank look. “You want me to start collecting friends? I mean… alright, but I thought I was off to a really good start all things considering.”

Celestia chuckles and shakes her head from side to side slightly. “Oh no, you are off to a good start. You’re free to make more friends, of course, but I’m actually interested in hearing about how things are with the friends you have now and how’ they’ll will continue to go.”

“… You want me to spy on then?!” I cry in surprise.

Celestia laughs this time. A laugh that sends shivers down my spine, something I’m sure Celestia didn’t intend. I haven’t heard that laugh in years, and I’m surprised at the feelings it brings up inside of me. Warm memories of a much happier time. A time when it seemed the sun raised just for me. When I was loved and adored by somepony very special, somepony who treated me like I was special for perhaps the first time in my life. A time where I had everything… everything I should have possibly wanted… And yet it wasn’t enough… I craved more and sought it out, no matter what the cost… If only I knew then what that cost would be… If only I had realized what I had and just how much it meant to me…

“Sunset?” Celestia asks in a concerned tone.

“Hmmm…?” I snap out of my stupor. “Sorry,” I say, “just… remembered something…”

Celestia is silent for a beat as she looks me over. “Well, you can always tell me if something is troubling you.” She smiles again. “Better yet, you can always tell your friends.”

I grimace. “That I’m now spying on…”

Celestia raises her hands. “Oh, no! Nothing like that. It’s not what they do that I want to know about. It’s how ‘what they do’ makes you feel!”

“You want me to talk about how I feel when I’m with my friends?”

Celestia nods and smiles. “Exactly! Or write if that works for you! And not just how they make you feel, but what you learn by being around them! A report if you will.”

I feel my eyes widen. “You’re asking me to write some sort of ‘Friendship Report’?!”

Celestia nods again.

I almost sneer but manage to force my lips into more of a frown. “But that sounds so…so… ‘after school special’, or some stupid plot from a TV show for little girls!”

Still smiling, Celestia folds her arms across her chest. “So, if this topic is so beneath you, I’m guessing you’ll have no problems giving me a complete report on what friendship means right now.”

“Well… I… uh….”

Hate to admit it, but she has a point. I didn’t know the first thing about friendship when Twilight pulled me out of that crater and I barely am starting to understand it now.

“Okay fine!” I snap begrudgingly as I look away. “I guess it beats construction work.”

Celestia chuckles lightly. The sound pulls at my heartstrings a bit, but I poker face my way through it.

“I thought you’d see it my way,” Celestia says. “On that note, have you learned anything about friendship after the events of the Fall Formal?”

I manage to quell my impulse to gripe about the short amount of time it’s been since then and think about it a bit. I mean, Snips, Snails and I certainly had our moments. I spent some time with the girls, especially Pinkie who seems like she’d happily glue herself to my hip if it meant spending more time with me (I make a mental note never to say that out loud, Pinkie is probably crazy enough to actually try something like that), and Pinkie has helped me out a few times.

Then there was today when Rainbow Dash saved me twice… or saved me once and saved Gilda from me the other time… Not to mention all the girls tried to help me fix the school.

“I guess… I guess I’ve learned friends are there for you when you need someone to help you…”

Celestia’s smile begins to widen. “Aaaand?”

I rub the back of my head and think about it a little more. I give out a small, somewhat defeated sigh. “… and I guess I need all the help I can get right now…”

Celestia’s smile widens even more. The woman is practically beaming. “Good, you’ve already begun your journey through the magic of friendship.”

“…I’m sorry, but I can’t believe you just said that with a straight face.”

Celestia just smiles at me and stands motioning for me to do the same. “That will be all for now. Just remember to report back to me when you learn something else about friendship.”

I stand up. “Uh… yeah… sure…” I say in a not so sure sounding tone. “I’ll just… do that…” Like I have a choice.

Oh well, as cheesy as this assignment is, I can’t deny it could be a lot worse.

I return to class. The weird looks and murmuring have only gotten worse since lunch. Thankfully, I actually have Twilight’s—well, my friends in a few classes later in the day, so things are a bit more bearable with them making it clear they at least have my back and I at least make it clear to them Celestia’s alternative to construction work wasn’t too mind-numbingly horrible. We make arrangements to meet after class.

For my last period, I’m alone, sadly. Fluttershy’s quiet company actually would have been kind of nice… But at least by now the weird looks have started to die down a bit. I’m guessing once word got out I had a run in with both Vice-Principal Luna and Principal Celestia and wasn’t put in detention or kicked out of school, the idea that I’m a one woman wrecking machine died down a bit.

As soon as the bell rings, I grab my stuff and make a quick getaway, avoiding any eye contact with anyone and avoiding any trips to the bathroom as I make my way past students. As sad is this sounds, I may need to start timing bathroom breaks at times where one of the girls can hang around with me. At least until things blow over a bit more. The girls are all pretty well liked, hanging out with me notwithstanding. Also, most all the students saw them turn into magical horse girls when they took out demon me, so maybe they’re a little less likely to be messed with in that regards too.

I make my way to the side entrance of the school and head outside into the still bright, sunny day. I almost immediately pull out my sunglasses and put them back on. It’ll be good to not have my bruised eye on display.

I start walking towards the big, white horse statue where the currently inactive magic mirror resides. It seemed like a fairly suitable meeting place for all of us.

Rainbow Dash and Pinkie are already there. Pinkie Pie gives me an excited wave like she didn’t just see me about an hour ago and Rainbow Dash ‘greets’ me in her ‘let’s get down to business’ way.

“So what’s the deal now?” Rainbow Dash asks. “I mean, if you’re not being forced to rebuild the school entrance, what crazy thing is Celestia forcing you to do?”

“Oooo! Oooo!” Pinkie cried. “I know! I bet Celestia’s having her T.A. one of the freshman classes! Oooo! Or she’s having her wear the school mascot costume!”

I furrow my brow at Pinkie. “I already told you she’s making me do something better than construction work!”

Pinkie frowned. “But those sound like fun things!”

“Uh… Alright, well why would Celestia give me a ‘fun’ thing to punish me with?”

“Oooooh!” Pinkie utters as her own brand of realization sets in. “Good point!” she says.

Applejack and Rarity soon walk up, Applejack greeting us all with a “Hey, ya’ll!” and Rarity with a bit more dignified “Hello, everyone.”

Rainbow Dash curls her the fingers of her left hand into a loose fist and places it against her waist, letting her other hand dangle freely. “Well enough with the big mystery, what did Celestia need you for after we left?”

I sigh, hang my head, and mumble something unintelligible.

All the girls lean in a bit closer to me, Applejack in particular raised a hand to one of her ears, “‘fraid I didn’t catch that.”

“She’s making me do friendship reports…” I utter out.

“Ooo!” Pinkie cries. “Like little essays on the meaning of friendship?”

I nod. “Yeah, exactly like that.”

“Heh… laaaaaame!” Rainbow Dash exclaims.

“Uhg!” I reply. “I know, right?”

Rarity speaks up, “So when do you have to write them, dearie?”

“I uhhh… I guess when I learn something about friendship?”

“Well that shouldn’t be hard!” Pinkie says excitedly. “You pretty much know nothing to begin with!”

“Pinkie!” Rarity snaps. “That’s no way to talk to a friend!”

I bow my head, slump my shoulders, and let out a sigh. “No, she’s pretty much right…” I look up at everyone. “I mean, if I did know anything about friendship, I’m sure I could have avoided the whole mess on Friday, or would have thought better of stealing the Element of Harmony from Twilight in the first place.” I return to looking at the ground and the tips of my fashionable boots. “Heck, probably would have thought better of doing stuff that got me removed as Princess Celestia’s pupil and kicked out of the Canterlot Castle back home…”

Hello again self-esteem issues. I see you brought your friend emotional baggage, come on in and enjoy the sounds of uncomfortable silence with—

“Well sure,” Pinkie says, “but if that happened you never would have met us and we couldn’t have become friends with you!”

I don’t know how the girl does it but I’m smiling again. I manage to keep from becoming emotional…

“Hhheeeh… sniff… hheeehh…”

I completely and utterly fail at not becoming emotional as I look up to see everyone smiling at me.

“GROUP—”

I quickly put my finger up to Pinkie’s lips. “Pinkie, if you say ‘group hug’ I may just work out how to summon that bonesaber.”

“Never-mind~!” Pinkie sings out.

The girls all laugh. I just smile at her shake my head. Enough mushy stuff for now.

“Anyone check up on Fluttershy?” I ask.

Rainbow Dash nods. “Yep, I sent her a text and she even replied with a complete sentence!”

Pinkie grinned. “And she didn’t think she was a fruit or vegetable or anything!”

Rarity smiles. “She’s on the mend, it seems. The poor dear just needed a little bit of rest.”

“Good,” I say, “I’d hate for her to be seriously hurt because she was trying to help me.”

Rainbow Dash tosses Pinkie a sideways glance and a grin. “Well, it wasn’t your fault.”

Pinkie puffs out her lower lip in a pout. “Look, I already sent her a ton of messages saying how sorry I was! I even have an ‘I’m sorry’ cake baked and everything!”

I raise an eyebrow at Pinkie, I have a feeling my forehead is going to get some serious muscles from hanging out with this girl. “When did you have time to bake that? You’ve been in class this entire time!”

Pinkie grins mischievously. “I’ll let you in on a secret.”

I flash Pinkie an unsure look and lean forward a bit.

Pinkie leans in and places a hand next to my ear before whispering, “I always have an ‘I’m sorry’ cake ready! Just in case.”

“Ooookaaaay… just… what?”

I feel a firm hand on my shoulder. “Ferget it, pardner,” Applejack says, “That’s just Pinkie for ya… Girl go crazy just tryin’ to keep up with her.”

“Uh… right… Good advice.”

“Well, enough hanging out here!” Rainbow Dash says. “We’ve got something way cooler than hanging out at school planned!”

“We do?” I ask.

“Oooo!” Pinkie cries. “Right, you don’t know! We have another surprise!”

“… One without throwing bricks and/or singing, I hope…” I utter.

Rarity shakes her head. “Perish the thought.”

“Alright, so what is it?”

“We’ve found Twilight Sparkle!” Pinkie says excitedly.

I… I don’t know how I’m supposed to respond to that. “What?! She’s back?!”

Pinkie motions her hands back and forth in front of her. “No, no, no, no, no, no! The other Twilight Sparkle!”

I raise an eyebrow. Man my forehead is going to be ripped! “I wasn’t aware there was more than one.”

Applejack nods. “There sure is, an’ we figured out what school the Twilight from this world goes to.”

“Erm… okay… That’s… nice?” I offer.

Pinkie nods. “Uh-huh! And we’re going to go up to her and try to make friends with her!”

“We… we are?” Poker face, poker face, poker face…

Applejack speaks up, “Yep! That’s the plan! We figured we all had such a blast hangin’ with the other Twilight, that maybe we’d get along just as well the one here!”

The other girls nod in agreement.

“Wait…” I reply, “Twilight is barely gone, and you’re already setting out to replace her with someone else who looks and acts just like her, but technically isn’t her? And that doesn’t feel weird or perverse to any of you?”

Blank expressions, shrugs, and head shakes are the answers I get for my question.

“Just asking,” I say.

“Is everything alright, dear?” Rarity asks.

I sheepishly rub the back of my head. “Uh… Guess I wasn’t expecting to see Twilight or some girl who looks and acts exactly like her so soon.”

Rarity flashes me a slightly concerned look. “Well, if you’re not feeling up to it...”

I hold up a hand. “No, it’s fine… I mean, you five all gave me a chance. I don’t see why I can’t try to give this Twilight a chance. Who knows… maybe I’ll learn something else about friendship.”

Pinkie grins wide, balls her hands into fists, and holds them together under her chin. “Oh, I’m so nervicited! We’re going to all meet Twilight Sparkle two!”

“Pinkie, a word of advice,” I say. “Don’t open up with calling her ‘Twilight Sparkle two’. In fact, we should probably play the whole ‘Hey, you remind us of a magical pony princess we just met’ thing a bit close to the vest.”

Pinkie nods. “Okie-dokie-lokie!”

Ever eager to be some place and doing something, Rainbow Dash speaks up again. “Well now that that’s settled, let’s go collect Fluttershy and make another friend!”

Pinkie Pie thrusts a fist into the air excitedly. “Whoo-hooo! Let’s do it to it!”

“Darn tootin’,” Applejack says as she swings a fist in front of her chest.

“Whahaha!” Rarity cries. “Oh, this’ll be so much fun!”

“Uh… yay…” I say quietly. Guess I can at least be Fluttershy in spirit for the moment.

The girls start walking towards the parking lot.

“Hey, Dash… Hold up a sec.”

“Yeah, Sunset?” Dash says as she hangs back.

I quickly wrap my arms around Rainbow and give her a nice, big hug. Definitely one of the largest given of my life…

… Not that that’s saying a whole heck of a lot…

Dash tenses slightly at first, she definitely wasn’t expecting me to do that. She cautiously starts to return the affection.

“Thanks for having my back, today…” I say.

Rainbow Dash finally seems to relax a bit and returns the hug. “Sure Sunset… What are friends for?”

I chuckle. “That’s what I’m figuring out.”

Chapter 11: Second Chances

All That ShimmersChapter 11: Second Chances
-ooooooo-

I quickly open the backseat door to Rarity’s purple hybrid and hop out. My leather boots tap against the concrete below as I rush to the other side of the car.

Fluttershy gives me a slightly perplexed look as I open the door for her, but gives me a small smile as I offer her my hand and help her out. “Thank you, Sunset Shimmer…” she says in an almost whisper quiet voice. Used to be she’d talk to me like that when she was making her best attempt to defend herself against a verbal assault of some sort. It’s actually surprisingly nice to hear it in a very different context.

I shut the door for her and gently grasp her arm. “Now are yousure you’re feeling up to this?” I ask.

“I’m fine,” Fluttershy assures.

“Alright, but let me know if you start getting dizzy. We’ll make sure to get you sat down right away.” Friends take extra care to make sure their friends are alright when they’ve been injured, right, right?

Fluttershy gives me a meek smile and a nod.

“Uh, Sunset?” Rainbow Dash says as she steps out of the passenger side seat. “She just got hit in the head earlier today, she’s not crippled.”

Rarity steps out from the driver’s side and titters to herself.

Okay… so maybe I’m trying a little too hard. Guess I’m not sure where the line falls for being a good friend and being a little too clingy. I let go of Fluttershy’s arm and give her a little more space as Pinkie’s little pink compact car pulls up.

For whatever reason… Scratch that, the reason is that it’s Pinkie’s car... anyhow, balloons drift out and as the door is opened, stopping as their strings pull taut from somewhere inside the car. Applejack steps out, looking a little paler than usual and a little less sure on her feet.

Pinkie steps out and she’s giggling to herself. “Alright, maybe that many balloons in the car is a bit much…”

“You think?!” Applejack snaps back in an irritated tone.

Pinkie giggles and puts her hands up in front of her. “Alright! No more balloons while driving! I…” she suddenly trails off as she sees me and looks at me almost as if she’s never seen me before. She gasps. “Sunset Shimmer!”

“Uh… Hi… Pinkie? What’s with the—Oh God!” I manage to exclaim in alarm as Pinkie gets a running start and glomps me, nearly taking me to the ground.

“I missed you so, so much!” Pinkie cries.

“We just saw each other fifteen minutes ago!” I reply as Pinkie holds me in a vise-like grip, pinning my arms to my sides “Remember? When we picked up Fluttershy and you squeezed the heck out of her while you cried about hitting her in the head?”

Pinkie gives me another wide-eyed look. “Has it really been that long?!”

I turn and give her fellow… our fellow friends a somewhat pleading look. Though, they seem too busy giggling at my plight to help.

“Yeah, Pinkie does that sometimes,” Rainbow says.

Rarity nodded. “Heaven help you if you ever end up going a few days without seeing her.”

“Goodness!” Fluttershy says. “I was lucky it was just a few hours since I saw her last… Last time I didn’t see her for a few days, she hugged me so hard I had bruises for a week afterwards!”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” I say. “Now uh… can somebodyplease get her to let go of me?”

Applejack walks up and puts a hand on one of Pinkie’s shoulder. “Uh, Pinkie? Ah think you can let go now. Sunset’s certainly feelin’ yer love at this point.”

“Ain’t that the truth…” I grunt out.

“Oops!” Pinkie says as she loosens her grip allowing me to slip out. “Hehehe… Sorry!”

I can breathe normally again. Well, as normal as I can knowing we’re going to meet Twilight Sparkle… this world’s Twilight anyhow.

I take a look at Twilight’s school… The building is not quite the size of Canterlot High, but it’s still big and looks more like a mansion than a school. ‘Heavenly’s School for Gifted Youngsters’ to be exact.

“Now to ask someone about Twilight,” Rarity says as she starts picking out kids that are milling around, no doubt desperate to find someone who might help before Pinkie gets up to them and scares them away.

“AAAAAAHHHH!”

… You know… someone besides the hapless person Pinkie’s scaring away now.

A girl with light purple skin and light orange hair that’s tied up in a massive braid runs screaming past us. She’s wearing the school’s uniform, a black blazer over a white shirt and tie and gray plaid skirt.

“WAIT!” Pinkie cries after the girl. “We’re just looking for someone who’s probably destined to be our best friend forever and ever, and ever!”

“Uh, Pinkie?” I say. “You might want to qualify we’re looking for a particular someone.”

“Oops…” Pinkie says with a sheepish smile.

Applejack shakes her head. “Why don’t you let Rarity do the talkin’?” She suggests. “Looks like she’s more suited to talkin’ to these highfalutin private school types.”

I raise an eyebrow. “Aren’t we sort of ‘highfalutin private school types’, too?”

Applejack gives me a wry grin. “Well shoot, I guess so… But these kids have fancy uniforms and stuff!”

She’s got a point… As incredibly nice as Canterlot High is, this place seems even more exclusive. Figures Miss Purple Perfect would go to a private school that’s even more prestigious than Canterlot High.

Anyhow, as luck would have it Rarity starts walking back up to us while carrying on a conversation with a couple more girls in uniform: a girl with light green skin and long fiery-red hair and a girl with yellow skin and brown hair with a white streak in front. Rarity is chatting them up, no doubt trying to track down the whereabouts of Miss Flawle…

… Man, do I have a chip on my shoulder…

Rarity says something to them and the girls exchange a somewhat knowing glance as they giggle to each other.

“Try the library,” one of them says, still grinning.

“Oh, the school library?” Rarity asks hopefully.

Guess we’ll be seeing little Mi—Twilight Sparkle soon. Well… My heart is pounding at my ribcage like it’s trying to escape, and I feel like my digestive system might just give out at a moment’s notice. But at least it will all be over soon.

The girls shake their heads. “Central.”

…Mother Fu—

-oooooo-

“Well, that was a bust…” Rainbow Dash utters from the front passenger’s seat of Rarity’s car.

Applejack was nice enough to continue riding with Pinkie… After Pinkie agreed to remove all balloons from the cabin of the car.

“Now, now,” Rarity replies, “we have a lead, so it wasn’t a complete waste!”

“Yeah!” Rainbow Dash, you can basically hear the eye roll in her tone. “The Central Library! It’s only one of the biggest libraries in the entire country!”

“Twenty-fifth,” I say casually as I quietly stare out my window.

“See!” Rainbow Dash says as she motions to me.

I simply continue to stare out at the city as building after building passes by. I’m a bit preoccupied on account of not having had a chance to look over my books, digital or otherwise. Breaking out my tablet still seems like a bad idea. No doubt I’d get the odd question regarding what I was reading. I could come up with any number of harmless responses, but who knows when Pinkie will suddenly pop up from behind me and see who knows what…

Hopefully there’s still time tonight to do some research. I’ve barely gotten a chance to look at my books as it is. I really want to stick with the girls since they’re sort of cutting me a lot of slack for Friday night, but I could have possibly killed someone today. I need to nip this in the bud before I become any more of a danger to everyone around me than I already am.

“Hey, wait a minute…” Rainbow Dash says in a slightly suspicious tone. “How did you know that?”

“Hmmm…?” I reply as I turn towards the front of the car.

Rainbow Dash is leaning to her left to get a good look at me.

“I… uh… like to read…?” That’s not some sort of friendship crime is it? Is it?!

Rainbow Dash smirks at me. “Why Sunset Shimmer, are you an egghead?”

I feel my cheeks go a bit warm as respond with a very intelligent sounding “Errr…”

“That’s hardly surprising, dearie,” Rarity says. “Sunset has one of the highest GPAs out of the entire school.”

“She does?” Dash asks in a surprised tone.

“Uh… Surprise?” I say with a nervous smile. I guess Dash not knowing that I have a high grade point average isn’t that surprising, though I’m not sure how she’ll take it. I mean… she certainly values physical prowess over mental…

…

I’d feel a lot better if she’d just stop staring at me.

“Hey, is everything all right?” Dash asks me. “You’ve barely said a word since we left Canterlot High.”

“Uhhh…” Think of something plausible… Think of something plausible.

Fluttershy of all people comes to my rescue. “She’s probably just nervous about meeting Twilight.”

I smile at Fluttershy and nod. “Yeah, that’s it… I mean… I barely talked to the other Twilight Sparkle, and it’s not like most of our exchanges went that well…”

“Hey, no biggie!” Rainbow Dash assures. “I mean… It’s not like you stole from this Twilight.”

I wince. Also… Is it hot in here, or is it just my overwhelming sense of shame attempting to make me internally combust?

Thankfully both Rarity and Fluttershy are quick to leap to my defense. “Rainbow Dash!” they chastise.

“What?” Rainbow asks as she looks back and forth between the two girls. “She hasn’t!”

Rarity continued to give Rainbow a somewhat stern look. “Be that as it may, that’s no reason to throw the whole Element of Harmony debacle in her face!”

Fluttershy nods.

“Huh?” Rainbow says with a confused expression to match. “But I wasn’t…” Dash takes a look at me and seems to notice my face is turning a shade to match one of the colors of my hair (guess which one!).

“Uh… Sorry, Sunset…” Rainbow says. “I wasn’t trying to get on your case, or nothin’…”

I sigh and shake my head. “It’s cool… And I know I haven’t wronged this Twilight… It’s just…” Am I going to have a moment of brutal honesty where I open myself to my new friends and hope I’m not ridiculed for it?

“It’s just that Twilight Sparkle is kind of everything I wanted to be…”

Yes I am.

“Well whatever do you mean, darling?” Rarity asks.

So far so good…

“Well… She’s a princess for starters.”

Fluttershy smiles at me. “Well you can’t help that she was a princess and you’re not…”

“Yeah!” Rainbow Dash agrees. “Who cares if she was born into royalty?”

I shake my head. “She wasn’t. She earned her position through completing an ancient spell from our Starswirl the Bearded… Something I might have had the opportunity to do if I hadn’t decided I already deserved to be a princess…”

“Oh…” Fluttershy says in a somewhat flustered tone.

I power on. “… Not to mention the whole barging into an off limits part of the castle library when Celestia wouldn’t tell me about the mirror portal… Nope! I just had to know, and look up some forbidden spells while I was at it.”

“Uh… Sunset?” Dash says.

Oh, am I on a self-hating roll at the moment! “… And when Celestia caught me, I threw a tantrum! She… hic… she even told me I needed to ‘step back and reflect’… Like she… hhehh… hhehh… Like she still would have given me another chance… And I… I… hhehheeehhh… I practically demanded she make me a princess…”

Rarity speaks up, “I’m sure it’s not as bad as you remember…”

I can feel the increasingly familiar sensation of hot tears streaming down my face, but I’ve gathered too much momentum to stop now. “I literally threw a book at her! I practically demanded she make me a princess! I… hic… I said I deserved to be her equal… if not her better… hheeehh… I actually said that! Her better! Like… hic… like… Like being really good at magic and being her shadow for a dozen years somehow made me qualified to rule an entire race!”

The girls remain silent. No doubt stunned as they realize just how twisted and awful I really am.

Might as well let it all out at this point. My heart already feels like someone impaled it on a burning spear. “I had everything! More than anypony could have possibly asked for, and it wasn’t enough!Hhhehhh... I THREW IT ALL AWAY BECAUSE I CONVINCED MYSELF I WAS SPECIAL! THAT I WAS BETTER THAN EVERYPONY! WELL I WASN’T! AND I’M NOT ANY BETTER NOW THAT I’M A HUMAN EITHER! I’M JUST A SELFISH BRAT WHO THINKS EVERYONE OWES ME THE WORLD JUST BECAUSE MY LIFE WAS HARD FOR THE FIRST FEW YEARS! GOD... I’M JUST… hhheeehhhh… I’M JUST… WORTHLESS!WUOAAAAAAAAAAAHUOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHUOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA…!”

Who needs to be ridiculed for anything? I’m perfectly capable of reminding myself that I’m absolutely horrible. Maybe it’s better this way. The girls deserve to know what a horrible pony… person… uh… pony-person I am, and… and…

…

I think Fluttershy is hugging me.

She whispers to me in a voice so quiet I’m not sure how I hear it over my own hysterical cries, but I do.

“You’re not worthless, Sunset Shimmer. You just made a mistake… That doesn’t mean you don’t deserve to be forgiven…”

Just those barely audible sentences at least remind me that there’s at least a handful of people who think I still deserve to be loved. The agonizing sensation in my heart starts to leave almost immediately and suddenly things don’t seem as bleak.

“…HUOAAAAAAAAAAAHUOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHUOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA…!”

I mean… I’m still sobbing uncontrollably, but now it’s relieved, joy filled sobbing!

“…HUOAAAAAAAAAAAHUOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHUOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA…!”

… Kind of hard to tell the difference, admittedly…

“… Girls?” Fluttershy says as she continues to lean across the backseat and hold me. “Maybe this isn’t such a great idea after all…”

“…HUOAAAAAAAAAAAAAHEEEEHHHEEEHHhhhehh… hic… Na… No… hic…” I manage to reel in my hysterically sad girl routine enough to speak semi-coherent sentences again. “I… hhehh… I can do this…” I probably can’t do this, but I need to try…

Rarity glances behind me. “There’s no sense forcing yourself if you’re feeling out of sorts, dear.”

“Yeah,” Rainbow agrees. “We can track down Twilight anytime. If you’re not feeling up to it then just say the word! There’s plenty of other stuff we can do to kill a Monday night.”

I shake my head. “No… Pinkie was crestfallen when she found out we had to keep looking…”

“She’d understand,” Fluttershy assures.

She’s right of course, but if we don’t find Twilight tonight it’s just going to be another day of me agonizing over our first meeting.

“It’s alright…” I say. “I feel much better now.” This is sort of true. I mean… I’ve shelved the whole self-loathing thing for now, but I’m still not so keen on running into Twilight. Oh well. I put on my best enthusiastic look. “Let’s find Twilight and befriend the heck out of her!”

The other girls giggle, chuckle, and titter.

“Now you’re talking!” Rainbow Dash says.

… Kind of wish I wasn’t so good at faking enthusiasm…

A little bit later and we’ve stopped at the library. This time Fluttershy rushes around to open the car door for me and holds out her hand.

I stare up with a slightly embarrassed smile. I suddenly understand very well how she must have felt earlier. “I’m not crippled, you know…”

Fluttershy just smiles and nods at me, leaving her hand in place. “I know, but we can all use a helping hand sometime.”

As embarrassed as I am, I take Fluttershy’s hand and she helps me out of the car.

Something comes over me and I suddenly have the urge to hug Fluttershy, an urge I act on. Oddly enough, she doesn’t even seemed surprised when I wrap my arms around her.

“Thank you…” I whisper. “For…for what you said back there…”

“It’s okay, Sunset… I know you just want a second chance.”

I think… I think I’m going to cry again.

“Uhg! Stop the mushy stuff!” Rainbow Dash cries. “We’ve got a job to do.”

Fluttershy’s face flushes as we part and I turn and I smile deviously at Rainbow Dash. “Why Dashie-Washie—”

Rainbow Dash looks at me as if I just denounced sports as a concept. “What?! Dashie-Washie?!”

“— I don’t remember you complaining when we were in front of Mr. Donkey’s class, or in the CHS parking lot.”

Now Rainbow Dash’s face turns red. “What?! But that was… I mean…”

“Why, Rainbow Dash,” Rarity exclaims in an aghast tone, though her smile betrays she’s not serious. “How dare you take advantage of poor Sunset so soon after the Fall Formal?! The poor dear is still recovering!”

Rainbow Dash actually looks guilty. “I wouldn’t… I mean I didn’t…”

Fluttershy starts giggling causing me to break character and start laughing. Rarity joins in almost immediately.

Dash’s shoulders slump and she gives us all an embarrassed smile. “Ha ha, very funny.”

“Oh, darling!” Rarity says. “You should have seen the look on your face! Priceless!”

“Yeah, yeah…” Rainbow says. She looks up at me and grins. “You know this means I have to get you back at some point.”

I just smile. “Bring it.”

“Bring what, sugar cube?”

“Awww! Did we miss all the fun stuff?”

Applejack moseys up to us while Pinkie bounds up… I’m not sure Pinkie is capable of just walking anywhere at this point…

“Don’t worry,” I say with an enthusiastic smile. “I’m sure there’ll be plenty of time for fun stuff after we find Twilight!”

WHY AM I SO GOOD AT FAKING THIS STUFF?!

“Well look at you!” Pinkie says as she throws an arm around my shoulders and points at me with her other hand. “All ready to make more friends and everything!”

I nod. “Absolutely.” As am I’m absolutely not ready, but the sooner I start dealing with my issues with Twilight the sooner… uh… Well, it will at least be one less thing I’ll have to worry about.

Pinkie Pie turns towards the massive, multi-story library that occupies a city block. “Quest for finding Twilight Sparkle and making her our best friend forever and ever, take two!”

It’s going to be a miracle if Twilight doesn’t run screaming from us when we meet her.

… Is it bad that that thought makes me feel a little better?

Chapter 12: Running the Other Direction

All That ShimmersChapter 12: Running the Other Direction-ooooooo-

The courtyard of the library stretches before us, two long walkways that go past a small rectangular pool and fountain before leading up to a set of steps lined with tall, thin fir trees that shot straight upwards. Past all that you have the library itself, three main floors to the massive square building topped with three smaller floors. And that’s just what’s visible. There’s another four floors underground.

“So… What now?” I ask as we all stand staring at the massive building

“Well d’uuuuuh!” Pinkie says. “We just go and find her!”

I cock an eyebrow at Pinkie. “Pinkie, the library is huge! Even between the six of us we’ll be lucky to just come across her!”

Pinkie looks out at the library and frowns slightly. “Oh…”

Applejack smiles wide and places a hand on Pinkie’s shoulder. “Don’t you worry none! We’ve got BotherPal all loaded up! We can split up a form a search party!”

“Why that sounds like a fabulous idea!” Rarity says.

“Works for me,” Rainbow Dash says with a shrug.

“Oh… er… okay…” Fluttershy says reluctantly.

“Awwww…” Pinkie utters in a disappointed tone. “But I wanted us to jump out and surprise her! Then throw her a big party right there! They say first impressions are the most important after all!”

As amusing as it would me to watch Twilight Sparkle, even this world’s Twilight Sparkle, flee in complete terror from unknown teenage girls who suddenly jumped out to throw her a party, I feel it’s probably best to intervene.

“Uh, Pinkie?” I interject. “The girl hasn’t met any of us. I think all six of us suddenly ambushing her with a surprise party in a library of all places might startle her just a bit.”

Rarity nods. “We’d certainly all get kicked out as well!”

Pinkie looks slightly crestfallen, but her mood suddenly bounces right back. “Hey!” she exclaims excitedly. “What if she’s met Sunset before?”

We all stop and stare at Pinkie. You’d think the others would be used to the occasionally weird outburst and brush it off, but I’ve quickly learned that Pinkie is really good at saying something so ear catchingly strange it requires further explanation.

“Come again?” I say. “I’m sure I’d have remembered if I had met this world’s Twilight at least after we all met Princess Twilight.”

Pinkie just gives me a big grin. “No! What if she’s met the you from this world! You know… human flavored Sunset Shimmer! Won’t meeting you be a surprise?!”

I feel my eyes go wide. I never considered this. Clearly there’s a Twilight over here and in Equestria, so logically there’s a me running around too…

What if she has met me?

What if it didn’t go well?

What if I’m a total wad?

… Human flavored… er… The me that’s originally here that is… I already know I’m a total wad.

I must look like I’m freaking out a bit, because most the other girls are giving me concerned looks.

“Yo, Sunset!” Rainbow Dash says as she takes a close look at my face. “You alright? You look like you're about to lose your lunch!”

“Lunch?!” Pinkie exclaims. “It’s practically dinner time! Why would Sunset Shimmer be walking around with lunch?!”

Rarity turns towards Pinkie. “She means she doesn’t look well, darling!”

“Oh!” Pinkie exclaims. “Well she does look a little brown in the face.”

Okay… just… what?

Applejack raises an eyebrow at Pinkie Pie. I thought I was good at that, but A.J. looks like she does this professionally. “The heck are you talking about?”

“You know…” Pinkie says. “Green plus orange makes brown!”

Pinkie Pie… I still can’t decide if this girl is a complete airhead or a mad genius…

Fluttershy purses her lip in concern and leans just slightly closer to me. “Are you okay Sunset? You’re not scared that Twilight has met the you from here and that you… uh… erm… she… made a bad impression are you? Because I would be…”

“Na-no! Wha-whatever gave you tha-that idea?” I say.

Smooth Sunny, really smooth… It’s okay… I can do this. I absolutely can do this.

“Sunset, dearie?” Rarity asks. “Are you sure you’re feeling, alright? We’re probably not going to find Twilight from the inside of my car…”

I absolutely cannot do this.

I look back at Rarity through the open door of the passenger’s side. “Uh… Maybe I should keep an eye out for her here…” I say forcing a smile. “You know… make sure she doesn’t leave this way while you all check the library out.”

Pinkie looks disappointed, but the other girls give me small smiles.

“Why that sounds like a fabulous idea!” Rarity says. “And if we do meet her, perhaps we could ask if she’s met… uh… a woman who bears a striking resemblance to yourself and preemptively clear up any misunderstandings.”

I breathe a sigh of relief. “Thanks, Rarity.”

Rarity smiles at me. “Of course, darling!”

Applejack grins at me. “You just wait here and holler at us if you see her.”

Fluttershy also smiles. “We won’t make you talk to her alone.”

I return the smiles and nod. Waiting in the car and alerting the others if Twilight Sparkle walks by is something I can do.

Pinkie has moved on from disappointed and onto concerned. “Are you sure you won’t get lonely sitting in this car all by yourself?”

“I’ll be fine, Pinkie. In fact, I have some reading I should catch up on.”

“Weelllll…. okay!” Pinkie says cheerfully.

“Come on!” Rainbow Dash says impatiently. “We’re burning daylight just standing around. Let’s go check out this nerd haven and find Twilight already!”

The girls began to walk off.

“Now hold yer horses,” Applejack says. “We’ve got plenty of time before the library closes.”

Pinkie gasps. “Applejack! Don’t say that phrase around Sunset Shimmer!”

“… ‘Hold yer horses’?”

“Well, d’uuuuh! Sunset Shimmer might think we’re after her, or something!”

I laugh. The girls laugh. I almost wish I was going with them, but the last thing I want is to meet the Twilight Sparkle here and freak her out because she’s met another version of me. The second to last thing I want to do is simply meet her… This is all a bit sudden for me, but it’s just been a handful of days since I went demonic and trashed the school. I certainly want to keep on the girl’s good sides.

Once the girls are far, far down the walkway, I dig into my handbag and pull out my tablet. I guess I won’t be able to do more than look through one or two of the books I ordered digital copies of, but it’s a start.

I get comfortable in the passenger seat of Rarity’s car and soon I’m up to my eyeballs in chants, symbols, and the names of the demonic.

-oooooo-

I manage to enjoy some relatively quiet reading time while the girls go on their search. I say ‘relatively’ because I have to mute my phone eventually. The act of five teenaged girls trying to coordinate a ‘woman hunt’ in a massive, multi-story library results in many, many messages sent back and forth and we’re all in the same chat conference.

Given the girls are overlooking my past transgressions (and hoo-boy, are they horrible and numerous), I feel it’s better to just to suck it up and remain connected even if it means the texts aren’t so much useful as a distraction from my readings.

For example…

PartyHard: Anyone seen her yet? :?

AnimalFriend: No net yet… She’s not in the animal books section.

2Fast4U: FS u should check more than 1 place imho

AppleBucker: I agree. If Twilight is not in the animal books section

currently, it seems doubtful to me she will visit that area.

AnimalFriend: Oh. Okay.

PartyHard: XD AJ, you type like Rarity talks.

AppleBucker: Why, whatever do you mean, Pinkie Pie?

DiamonsAreForever: Indeed. I’m not that verbose when I speak.

AppleBucker: Pardon me if I believe anything worth taking the

time to write is worth doing correctly.

PartyHard: :( You could have punned! :(

2Fast4U: AJ u waste 2 much time typn

AppleBucker: And your texts are an absolute eyesore.

DiamonsAreForever: Couldn’t have put it better myself.

2Fast4U: f u guys!

DiamonsAreForever: Dearie, you type like a … What’s the

phrase? ‘Brain dead AOLer’?

PartyHard: >_> You really do, Dashie.

2Fast4U: stfu!

AppleBucker: I bet Sunset Shimmer would agree with us.

She is no doubt observing this farcical debacle and cringing

as you commit crimes against language!

PartyHard: :O Word crimes, dashie! The worst crimes of all!

Behind murder. :X

And assault.

And theft.

And Larsoney.

DiamonsAreForever: Larceny, dearie.

PartyHard: That too.

2Fast4U: Watevr

Suny’s probs not evn readin this

AppleBucker: You know we could simply ask Sunset

Shimmer if she is indeed reading this. She is still logged

In after all.

PartyHard: Good Idea! :) Sunset Shimmer!!!!! Are you

reading all this??? :?

ShimmeringBeauty: No.

PartyHard: Oh. :(

2Fast4U: PP your a spaz.

PartyHard: O:<

DiamondsAreForever: If Sunset Shimmer replied,

then that means she is reading this, dearie.

PartyHard: OOOOOOOOOH! ^_^;; Silly me! XD

ShimmeringBeauty: Dash, you type like a tool.

2Fast4U: WTF?!

PartyHard: XD XD XD XD XD

AppleBucker: I erupted in mirth and merriment.

DiamondsAreForever: Hehehe! I told you, dearie!

2Fast4U: STFU guys!

ShimmeringBeauty: Dash, Snips and Snails type like that. Snips and Snails!

2Fast4U: Really?

ShimmeringBeauty: Yes. I don’t know if they think it’s cool or if they think they’re saving time, but it’s pretty much the dumbest looking thing ever.

DiamondsAreForever: Here, here!

2Fast4U: Fine! I won’t type like that anymore.

ShimmeringBeauty: Thank you.

PartyHard: Yay! :D

DiamondsAreForever: Oh thank goodness.

AppleBucker: Finally, we are rescued from the

scourge of Rainbow Dash’s horrendous butchering

of language.

2Fast4U: Whatever! Can we please focus on

finding Twilight?

Hey Fluttershy. Have you checked anywhere else, yet?

AnimalFriend: Yes. But I don’t think she’s in the nature

book section either.

2Fast4U: That’s just the next section over! Can’t

you at least try a different floor?!

AnimalFriend: Oh. Okay.

I open the package and examine the contents. A small paper booklet and the cards themselves. I thumb through the booklet quickly. Looks like the book describes each card… also its reversed meaning…? I guess this means if the card is turned upside-down? Interesting…

I take the cards and shuffle them about. Flipping some upside-down occasionally as I do. I’m not sure if these things really have any sort of magical properties that will give me guidance or prepare me for the future, but at least it’s a welcome distraction from thoughts of dealing with the demon inside me. Not to mention the girl who will no doubt serve as a constant reminder that there’s somepony out there who succeeded where I failed and is now living the life I wish I had…

I sigh heavily.

Yeah, let’s flip a few cards and see what’s in store for me.

I arrange the cards into three piles on the dash in front of me and flip the top card of each pile around, similar to how I did this with Pinkie. My ‘past’ card is the Seven of Wands reversed, a young man holding a staff and fighting off six other staffs. My ‘present’ is the Eight of Swords, a woman tied and blindfolded while surrounded by eight swords. Lovely…

I let out a groan. My ‘future’ card is ‘The Devil’. These cards sure aren’t doing a good job making me forget how much my life sucks at the moment…

Oh well… I look through the booklet anyhow. Seems the reversed Seven of Wands represents ‘Perplexity, embarrassments, and anxiety’. I certainly had all that in spades just a while back.

The Eight of Swords represents a mess of bad stuff. Bad news crisis, conflict, sickness… Supposedly this is my present situation…

I don’t bother to look up the information on the devil… I just put the cards back in their box along with the booklet and throw it in my handbag. I decide to stare at the window with a sad expression instead. Somehow, it seems about the most productive thing I’m capable of at the moment.

Maybe I should figure out some other thing to do in the future if I need to clear my head… Maybe even a bad habit… Like smoking... Just embrace that bad girl persona I have now. Plus it should shorten my lifespan, which seems like a major plus at the moment.

Ugh… I must be the most depressing person on the planet…

“AAAAAAIIIIIEEEEEEE!”

A woman’s scream causes me to jump. She runs past the car, followed by several other people and more and more.

A fire? I don’t hear any alarms.

It’s then I notice a slight feeling of dread. You know… beyond the constant feeling of dread I’ve been feeling lately just for existing. This is different in that it doesn’t feel natural… It feels almost…

… magic?

I check my phone and try to catch up with what’s going on.

AnimalFriend: I’m scared.

2Fast4U: FS. Its just a library! Its just full of eggheads!

There’s nothing to be scared of!

AppleBucker: “It’s”. In both cases you are concatenating

“it” and “is”, so you need an apostrophe.

2Fast4U: See?

PartyHard: XD XD XD XD XD

AppleBucker: Now that was just uncalled for!

DiamondsAreForever: Teehee

AppleBucker: I don’t believe Rainbow Dash needs

Wait suddenly everyone seems to be fleeing the premises.

Did an alarm go off or some such?

DiamondsAreForever: Not that I’ve heard. But everyone

seems to be running here as well.

PartyHard: :O Here too! And I feel kind of strange. Like

tingly, but in a bad way. :(

2Fast4U: What Pinkie said, but less lame sounding.

PartyHard: >:[

AppleBucker: I also feel a vague feeling of unease, but not

so much that I desire to leave the building.

DiamondsAreForever: Still, we better regroup outside.

AnimalFriend: I can’t move. I’m scared.

PartyHard: :O Are you stuck?

DiamondsAreForever: My heavens! Are you in danger?

AnimalFriend: I’m not sure. A man came up here and then

he screamed and I don’t know what happened to him.

2Fast4U: Were r u?

AnimalFriend: Top floor. Help.

PartyHard: We’re coming, Fluttershy!

The chat simply ends at this point.

The me from a week ago would probably stay in the car, or maybe even put some distance from the library like other people seem to be doing. She certainly wouldn’t do something completely stupid like run towards the library, even if her friends were in there (not that the me from a week ago had anyone she’d consider a friend).

As my boots continuously tap against the ground while I dodge the people coming at me, I have to think… As much as I completely loathe the person I was a week ago, she probably had a much greater life expectancy than the me of now…

-oooooo-

I jog up to the elevator and press the up arrow in the now empty library. The button lights up as I take a brief moment to look about. Books are strewn about randomly and it seems just about everyone dropped what they were doing, and pardon the pun, booked it.

The elevator dings and the doors open. I step into the empty elevator and press the top floor button labeled ‘Board Room’.

The feeling is getting stronger now. Some sort of compulsion to run away… Still, I somehow know it isn’t real so the experience isn’t like real fear and more this strange, disconnected idea of fear.

Clearly most to all the other library patrons didn’t feel the same way, but none of my friends seemed to be in the crowd. I don’t know if they understand this feeling is magic, but they don’t seem to be affected either.

Which only begs the question of what’s going on with Fluttershy.

The elevator dings again, the doors open up and I’m suddenly locking eyes with Pinkie Pie.

“Sunset Shimmer!” Pinkie says excitedly.

I barely have time to brace myself before the girl flings herself at me.

“OOOFFF… Hey… Pinkie…”

“We were so worried about you!” Pinkie exclaims.

I gently pry Pinkie off me. “Well I’m fine, how’s Fluttershy?”

Pinkie frowns and motions past the other girls to Fluttershy who seems to be having trouble standing but looks otherwise okay aside from slight discoloration in her face. Rarity is leaning down next to her.

“Hey, Sunset Shimmer…” Fluttershy says as she smiles weakly at me.

“Fluttershy, why’d you even come up here?” I ask. “I doubt Twilight is going to be up in the board room.”

“Erm… well… I was in the elevator and then someone got in in front of the buttons and pressed this one.”

Applejack expertly raises an eyebrow. “Why didn’t you jus’ ask them to hit a different floor?”

Fluttershy blushes slightly and stares at the floor. “Erm… Well… I didn’t want to disturb them.”

Rainbow Dash smacks a palm against her forehead.

Rarity speaks up. “Well, why didn’t you just wait for them to leave, then pick a different floor?”

“Oh!” Fluttershy exclaims, she holds up a ball-point pen as the color starts to slowly return to her cheeks. “Well, they dropped this pen when they left the elevator and didn’t notice… So I walked out to grab it. I tried calling out… er… but I don’t think they heard me. So I thoughtmaybe I’d follow them… uh… But then I thought that might seem weird for me to be following them, so maybe I’d just turn the pen into lost in found... But then I’d have to talk to someone there… so… erm… and then…” The color that had returned to Fluttershy’s face left. “… Uh… and then they screamed really loud… and I got scared and couldn’t move… er… You all know the rest…”

“Oh, silly Fluttershy!” Pinkie says with a smile. “I’m sure they just tripped or something!”

I pause for a moment and think about this. “Okay, but why didn’t Fluttershy see them come back towards the elevator when everyone else started running out the building?”

“Everyone… everyone started running out the building?” Fluttershy says in a fearful tone. She manages to turn another shade paler and Rarity is starting to look a bit on the worried side as well.

Rainbow Dash gives me a smug look. “Uh, d’uh! You’re not supposed to take the elevator in an emergency! Geez, Sunset! I thought you were smart.”

I narrow my eyes at Rainbow Dash and point behind Rainbow Dash. Rainbow Dash turns past the glass encased fire hose and is suddenly a few inches away from a sign that reads ‘Stairs’ with an arrow that’s pointing down the hallway behind us.

Rainbow Dash grins sheepishly and rubs the back of her head. “Uh… hehehe… I retract my previous statement…”

I nod, though the irritated look on my face doesn’t go away. I’m trying to play nice with these girls, but that was just too much.

Pinkie suddenly holds up an index finger in a ‘ah-ha!’ fashion. “Maybe there’s another set of stairs down the hallway, or they even went all the way around the other way!”

I purse my lips slightly. “Those are all fairly plausible explanations…”

Fluttershy and Rarity seem to relax slightly.

Pinkie smiles and starts casually stroll over down the hallway. “We’ll just quickly make sure no one is still up here and—”

Pinkie turns the corner and her hair does something utterly spectacular. With a sound like all the air being let out of a balloon it deflates and goes straight. I’d ask how she did it if it weren’t for the fact her face is doing something equally as impressive for her, being completely gripped by total and utter terror.

“Yo, Pinkie,” Rainbow Dash says. “What’s the hold up?”

Applejack tenses and I feel my body start to go warm and my heart beat in my chest. I didn’t think there was anything that could make Pinkie go quiet, but there is, and she’s looking right at it. Keep in mind this is a girl that helped stare down a twelve foot demon that could mind control people and shoot fireballs.

This can’t possibly be good.

Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and I all exchange glances and cautiously walk up towards Pinkie.

Rarity manages to choke out a “… I’ll just stay here… with Fluttershy…”

Fluttershy almost looks as white as Rarity at this point. It’s probably not a bad idea someone stick with her, especially considering her head injury from earlier today.

“Pinkie?” I say in a concerned tone as we approach the girl. “What’s wrong…? Did you…?” My eyes suddenly wander to where Pinkie is looking and I find completing my sentence difficult.

“Whoa! What the hell?!” Rainbow Dash exclaims.

“Oh my sweet lord in heaven…” Applejack murmurs.

We’re all staring at the windows that look into the board room, or rather the windows that would look into the board room if they weren’t completely covered with a thick, viscous red liquid.

“… Is that what I think it is?" Dash asks.

Applejack swallows. “If yer thinkin’ what Ah’m thinkin’, probably, yeah…”

Desperate for an alternative theory I chime in, “Maybe there was just some sort of crazy Jello party going on in there…”

Told you I was desperate.

Pinkie gulps, “I’ve thrown some crazy Jello parties in the past… and that’s not Jello…”

We all jump as we hear a small click coming from a turning doorknob attached to the door of the board room.

The unnatural feeling of dread is starting to feel a lot more natural now.

Chapter 13: Running the Same Direction

All That ShimmersChapter 13: Running the Same Direction-ooooooo-

“Run!” I shout as the boardroom door slowly opens.

I don’t know what’s going to be on the other side of that thing when it opens, but given the state of the room, it’s unlikely any of us really want to find out.

We all turn and start sprinting towards the stairwell. Well, most of us that is. A brief glance lets me know that Fluttershy is just a step above catatonic mess. Her pupils have shrunk to the size of tiny dots and she’s mumbling to herself. Applejack quickly grabs one of Fluttershy’s arms and drapes it over her shoulders as she drags her along.

Rainbow Dash takes the lead as we round a corner. As I turn, I see a heavy metal door labeled with a big red sign that says ‘stairs’. I suddenly wished I invested a little more time in sports or at least track, though jogging on a treadmill most mornings and not attempting to carry someone who’s going into shock means I’m third, right behind Pinkie.

To my surprise, Rainbow Dash opens the door for us and holds it open.

“Go, go, go!” she says as she motions for all of us to go through the doors.

There is now some sort of heavy, rhythmic thumping noise coming from the hall we just ran from. Sounds like something we don’t want to meet is chasing us.

Pinkie and I make our way past Rainbow Dash quickly followed by Rarity and Applejack who is still dragging Fluttershy along. The heavy steps of our boots against the concrete stairs echo against stone wall in the empty stairwell. My handbag swings against my body again and again as I keep one hand on the metal black handrail and sprint down the stairs. There’s not really time for safety, but the solid concrete steps don’t look like a lot of fun to fall face forward onto.

An inhuman screech that sounds like a claws scraping against a tar covered chalkboard all amplified by a megaphone pierces the air. We definitely don’t want to meet whatever the heck this thing is.

“Rainbow Dash, Hurry it up!” Applejack says.

I pause and look up the stairwell. Rainbow Dash has some sort of mix between terrified and determination on her face as she stares down the hallway we all just ran from.

“Don’t look back, just go!” Rainbow Dash cries. With that she slams the door to the stairwell with her on the side that’s probably occupied by at least one bloodthirsty monster.

“RAINBOW DASH!” Pinkie screams.

I run past Pinkie and reach for her wrist, grabbing ahold of it and pulling her to follow me. We don’t have the liberty of protesting heroic actions if any of us are going to make it out of this alive.

“Come on, Applejack!” I hear Rarity exclaim. “We have to go get help!”

I’m guessing Applejack is having some trouble with leaving Rainbow Dash behind, Pinkie certainly doesn’t seem to be as into the whole ‘fleeing for your life’ thing as me.

We almost make it all the way to the first floor before the slamming of a door several stories above us causes us to pause.

“Maybe it’s Rainbow Dash!” Pinkie cries hopefully.

Suddenly the stairwell reverberates with the sound of heavy thumping and more horrible screeching and I feel Pinkie tense as I hold on tightly to her wrist. Sounds like whatever was chasing us had friends.

“Rarity…” Applejack mutters “… take Fluttershy.” Applejack passes Fluttershy, who basically stumbles in Rarity’s arms.

Rarity begins to protest. “ME?! But—”

I yell up at Rarity, “NO TIME TO DISCUSS THIS AS A COMMITTEE!”

“I AM NOT A COMMITTEE!” Rarity screams back to me.

Applejack begins to run back up the stairs.

“Appleja—!”

“PINKIE, WE NEED TO GO!” I cry as I continue to drag Pinkie along.

One more flight of stairs and we’re at the ground level. I push open a heavy metal door and hold it open just long enough to let everyone through then quickly close it behind me.

I scan the area. The stairwell lead us to a well-furnished, and even inviting under different circumstances, reading area somewhere in the middle of the library. The boardroom is set above the main floors, so of course we’re not lucky enough to be right by an exit.

I quickly run behind one of reading area’s beige armchairs and start pushing it towards the stairwell door. It’s fairly light and it moves easily as I push it over the carpet floor. “Pinkie!” I shout as I nod towards another chair.

Pinkie sees what I’m doing and begins to protest. “But—”

“If Rainbow Dash or Applejack make it, I’m sure they’ll knock! NOW COME ON!”

Pinkie quickly runs to the chair and stacks it on top of mine. Meanwhile, Rarity drags Fluttershy over to a couch and lies her down.

Pinkie and I both collapse against the chairs and attempt to catch our breaths. Rarity does the same next to Fluttershy.

My heart feels like it’s going to explode out of my chest, and I don’t even want to think what’s happening to Applejack and Rainbow Dash. Still, if we stay put we’re going to find out and I doubt that’s an ideal outcome for any one.

“We need to get out of the library,” I say.

Pinkie shoots me an utterly heartbroken look.

Rarity pipes up. “But Applejack and Rainbow Dash—”

“Did what they did so we could get out!” I say forcefully. “If we stick around here we’re just—”

A heavy thuds reverberates against the door causing us to jump.

God. Damn. It.

“Oh! Maybe it’s Apple—”

“Don’t be stupid!” I hiss at Pinkie. “Hide!”

Rarity tries to collect Fluttershy but the girls eyes are closed and she’s gone as limp as a rag-doll. Pinkie quickly runs over to help as I run towards a tall bookshelf. I motion for the other girls to follow. Rarity wraps her arms under Fluttershy’s legs and Pinkie grabs her arms, they both quickly take her over to my hiding spot before gently setting her on the floor.

No sooner are we ‘settled’ then we hear the door slam open the chairs topple and roll onto the floor.

As stupid as it is for me to risk it, I take a quick peek around the corner of the bookcase. I catch a glimpse of a couple of tall, humanoid shaped things which have fingers and toes that end in pointed claws and a few spikes sticking out of their bodies. They also seem to think the fact that they’re a giant walking collection of pointy bits means they don’t need to worry about clothes. I quickly pull my head back before I’m spotted.

Ever the optimist, Pinkie asks “Was it Applejack or Rainbow Dash?” in a whisper.

As if the, no doubt, terrified look on my face wasn’t enough. I shake my head.

We feel the ground shake as footsteps get closer. At least one of those things is coming our way. I glance at the other bookshelves. If we stay low and quiet maybe we can move… of course there’s no way we’d be able to take Fluttershy…

“They’re going to find us…” Pinkie mutters her eyes starting to look a bit like Fluttershy’s before she passed out entirely.

“Pinkie, shhhhh…” I say as quietly as I can.

Rarity stays quiet but her expression matches Pinkie’s.

Think… think… I don’t want to run in with these things…

Much to my surprise, Pinkie comes up with a plan… just not a particularly good one. She quickly stands up and marches right out of our hiding spot.

“HEY YOU BIG MEANIES! WHY DON’T YOU PICK ON SOMEONE YOUR OWN SIZE?!”

Pinkie is not the same size as these things, by the way. They’re all at least seven foot tall and she is, in fact, a high school girl.

“Pinkie, you can’t—Mmmph!”

I place my hand over Rarity’s mouth. Pinkie making a scene isn’t go to do us a heck of a lot of good if Rarity announces we’re all here. I nod to Fluttershy. Rarity may not be in much of a state to care about her own safety, or have much of a reason to care about mine, but she has to care about Fluttershy.

Rarity gives me a sad, serious look as she nods. Hopefully at least the two of us can get Fluttershy out of here and go find help. As long as she’s in trouble, I doubt Rarity will try anything too dangerous.

We keep quiet even as Pinkie screams in terror and frustration as the sound of boots and fists making contact with what sound like thick leather can be heard. The heavy footsteps and Pinkie’s shrieks get quieter as she’s no doubt dragged away.

They must be collecting us one by one… At least, I hope that’s what’s going on. They at least didn’t kill Pinkie on the spot.

We hear the sound of the heavy metal stairway door shut which muffles the screams and steps even more. Soon we can’t hear them at all.

I take a huge breath of air. I hadn’t even realized I was holding my breath.

Rarity shoots straight up. “They took Pinkie!” she cries.

I nod. “Yes… but they didn’t kill her… the must be taking the girls back upstairs…”

Rarity gives me a frustrated look. “Well we can’t just sit here! They must have all our friends!” Rarity narrows her eyes at me.

I hold up one of my palms in the hopes the gesture gets Rarity to calm down even for a little bit. “Look, I’ll just call the police,” I say as I dig my smartphone out of my purse.

Rarity rolls her eyes. “Right, just tell them our friends have been captured by demons! I’m sure they’ll be right over.”

A thought occurs that it might be a good idea to convince Principal Celestia and Vice-Principal Luna to at least come clean with some of what happened when I turned into a demon… You know… assuming unexpected demon attacks are going to become something we need authority figures to take seriously… also assuming we all live past today.

I shake my head. “We don’t have to tell them there’s some supernatural force infesting the library we just need to...” I trail off as I stare at my phone.

Rarity sighs heavily. “Let me guess, you’re not getting a signal?”

“They’re demons!” I cry in an irritated tone as I stand up. “How was I supposed to know they had a magic spell that interferes with cell phones?! Let’s at least try to leave! We can physically track down someone to help if we have to!”

Rarity gives me an angry, disgusted look. “You really just want to abandon our friends?!”

“Well, what else can we do?!” I shoot back as I motion to the unconscious girl below me. “Fluttershy is out and I don’t think either of us could put up much of a fight anyhow! You said it yourself; we need to go get help! We can’t do that if those things get to us.”

Rarity shots me an angry scowl. “I wasn’t thinking straight when I said that!” she exclaims in hushed tone. “From whom shall we get help from at this point? Hmmmmm? The Spirit Spankers?”

“I…”

Dang, that was a good line.

Rarity gives me a sort of probing look as if she’s about to say or ask something kind of stupid and wants to gauge my reaction. “Maybe we’re the most capable individuals to help out here. We’ve certainly dealt with demons before…”

And there it is.

I narrow my eyes. “Yeah. Snips, Snails, and myself. The three of us weren’t exactly veterans at being evil hell-spawn and you had Twilight to help…”

Somehow, despite all the panic and terror, a sudden clarity suddenly comes over Rarity’s face. “Maybe the other Twilight is here…”

“Oh right!” I say sarcastically. “Maybe she got so caught up in her reading that she didn’t run away screaming with everyone else! Assuming that’s not her blood that was used to decorate the board room!” I begin to walk in place for my next bit. “We’ll just stroll about the library avoiding demons until we find her and calmly explain that her other dimension counterpart was able to harness friendship and magic and that we’re sure if she tries, really, reallyhard and we clap our hands for her, she should easily be able to save us from the rampaging killing machines in the library!” I punctuate my rant by flinging my hands in the air as I scowl at Rarity. Then I stop to catch my breath. Between running and arguing, I’m almost completely out of energy.

Rarity almost looks hurt, but she somehow has found her own determination amidst everything that’s happened. “… At least it’s better than running like a coward…” she utters.

I ruffle my hair with a frustrated growl. I somehow need to convince this girl we need to leave if any of us are going to survive this, but she seems dead set on doing any number of things that will probably get us all captured or killed.

Rarity gives me an almost accusatory look. “You do care about our friends, don’t you?”

I feel my face turn hot as I glare angrily at Rarity. “Of course I care! Why do you think I’m trying to get us”— I motion towards Fluttershy – “out of here?! I didn’t have to run into the library when everyone was running out of it, you know! You and Fluttershy would probably be in that frickin’ blood room right now if it weren’t for me!”

Rarity takes a step forward. We’re now inches away from each other and shouting at each other to boot. “You don’t know that for sure! Maybe if you weren’t so set on getting out of here we could have stood up to those things together instead of letting them pick us off one by one!”

“Have you even seen one of these things?! They’re covered in spikes and muscles and huge!” I throw my arms up to emphasize that these things, are indeed, huge. “What’s your plan, Rarity? Make them feel bad about their unfashionable choice of running around in the nude? Let them know that spikes are ‘so last season’?”

Rarity’s face turns red as her cheeks go puffy. Her hands are shaking as she focuses eyes full of frustration and anger on me.

Now, I have given this girl many reasons to deck me in the past, but she looks like she might finally channel anger over months of meddling in her friendships and wrecking her chances at winning the Spring Fling in physical blows directed at my face.

I clench my fists as and hold them at my sides I remembered what happened with Gilda, I don’t want to think about what might happen to Rarity if I try to fight back… At least she probably won’t pull a knife on me.

Rarity shifts her body weight and pulls back her fist.

I wouldn’t have expected it, but I think the girl actually knows how to fight.

I close my eyes. This is going to hurt.

“Girls!”

Rarity and I jump as my eyes shoot open. Thankfully Rarity hadn’t yet sent her fist face-ward yet. We look down to see Fluttershy staring up from us from the floor with a look of motherly concern and disappointment, as if she had just caught her children fighting.

“Stop fighting, please,” Fluttershy says in a surreally calm tone. “I think we need to stay quiet if we don’t want anything bad to find us.”

Rarity and I immediately lower ourselves and try to help Fluttershy up into a sitting position.

“Darling, are you okay?” Rarity asks.

“How’s your head?” I chime in.

“Forget her head! Fluttershy, do you remember where you are? Do you remember what’s happened?”

I narrow my eyes at Rarity. “She just said that ‘we need to stay quiet if we don’t want anything bad to find us’! I think she—”

“Girls!” Fluttershy says again, silencing Rarity and I. She looks back and forth between us. “I think we need to get out of here and get help. I mean… If Sunset Shimmer doesn’t think there’s anything we can do on our own, I don’t think I’m going to be much help…”

Rarity gives a heavy sigh as she and I help Fluttershy to her feet.

“Alright, darling… If that’s what you think I guess we can follow Sunset’s lead.”

I’d say I feel a cold sweat come over me, but I’m already soaked from running, screaming, and being utterly terrified. Still, the fact that I’m suddenly responsible for getting the three of us out doesn’t sit well with me. My latest attempt at leading people didn’t go well… Especially since it wasn’t what I really wanted to accomplish and it failed anyhow…

Fluttershy puts a comforting hand on my shoulder. She must have noticed I wasn’t feeling good about the situation. “It’s okay Sunset, I’m sure you’ll do just fine.”

I nod. Freak out later, get us out of here now. “Let’s get out of here first. Hopefully help is on its way already… I mean someone must have reported all the people running from the library...”

The girls follow my lead as we simply walk away from our current location near the center of the library. With everything that’s happened, I’m not certain if we’re heading towards the main entrance, but all four sides of the library have their own entrance. Before long we’re staring down rows of bookcases, desks with computers, tables and swivel chairs on either side of a book and paper littered trail leading right to two metal doors with the word ‘EXIT’ above them in bright red light.

Our pace quickens. There’s still daylight pouring in from massive windows along one of the walls. At least the three of us can get out… and then we can get help. I’m sure the other girls are alive still…

… They’ve got to be.

We’re all sprinting as we get closer to the doors, trampling papers and books under foot as or desire to get out overrides our concern for the condition of the things under us. As much as I’m sure Rarity or any of us would like to personally help our friends, the idea of being out of this building is a welcome one. Even though we’ve all dealt with giant demons on one capacity or another, outside seems to beckon us with sweet promises of safety and others who can help save our friends.

I reach the doors first and push them both open. I’m suddenly blasted with a dry heat as I stare out across a familiar looking barren wasteland dotted with holes that glow red with fire and heat. All of this under grey skies that seem to cover the already depressing looking landscape in gloom.

The girls quickly grind to a halt behind me. They say nothing, but I can practically feel their shoulders slump to match my own.

Seems today is the gift that keeps on giving… even when you beg it to stop.

Chapter 14: The Best Laid Plans of Unicorns and Teenagers

All That ShimmersChapter 14: The Best Laid Plans of Unicorns and Teenagers-oooooo-

For a while we simply stare out into the vast expanse of barren nothingness. Far away tortured screams sound out from all around us along with many sounds that probably aren’t coming from humans… I’m suddenly not so certain the resounding silence that accompanies this place in my dreams is so bad…

Rarity shakes her head. “We can’t… we’re not actually… You know… down there… Are we?”

“Sure looks that way,” I answer simply. I’m not exactly sure what hopeful things would be appropriate here. Things just went from mind-numbingly horrible to hopeless…

Fluttershy simply lets out a soft whimper as she wraps her arms around herself and begins shaking. Looks like she was faking composure for our sakes and she’s run out of her ability to do so. Can’t say I blame her, I’ve been repressing the urge to burst into tears this entire time…

Rarity walks over to Fluttershy and gently leads her to a swivel chair. “Well what do we do now?” she asks as she looks up at me.

I sigh heavily as I slump against the wall next to the exit. “How the hell—”

Rarity coughs and narrows her eyes slightly.

“… Heck should I know?”

“Well… I just thought… you know…”

I narrow my eyes. “Thought what?” I growl out.

“Well… Out of all of us, you might sort of have the most experience… here… in place like this…”

What hurts the most is that she’s not wrong.

Still, she doesn’t know that and I can feel my face turn hot once again at what sounds like an accusation. “HEY! I didn’t ask to be turned into a demon, alright?!”

Rarity’s face hardens. “No, but you certainly where the one who brought it about!”

“I didn’t know Princess Twilight’s stupid big crown thingy was going to turn me into a demon! I thought it’d make me like her, okay?!”

Rarity releases a short derisive “Ha!” before she gives me a smug look. “You’re nothing like Princess Twilight, and more power certainly isn’t going to turn you into the kind and gentle person that defeated you so easily.”

I’m back on my feet again and storm right up to Rarity leveling an angry index finger. “Listen you fashion obsessed loser. You have no idea what my life was like before I came here. The parts of my life that weren’t spent alone and miserable were spent studying and preparing to be someone who could rule an entire land of subjects which just so happened to be full of monsters and threats this pathetic little world could barely imagine! I spent years focused on that goal and dedicating myself to being the best student I could possibly be! And what did it get me?! Banishment from the only home I ever knew!” I feel like crying, but I feel like yelling even more at the moment. “Cast aside by the pony I loved the most!”

“Hmmm, yes… I can’t imagine why,” Rarity says in casual sarcastic tone that brings my blood to the boiling point.

I pull back my fist, but out of the corner of my eye I catch something yellow and pink before it’s in front of me.

“GIRLS!” Fluttershy cries as she holds Rarity and I away from each other. “Fighting each other is not going to help right now!”

Rarity and I take a few calming breaths and I find a seat far enough away from her that we can converse and but no so close that Fluttershy couldn’t get in-between before either of us gets up to take a swing at the other.

That was close. I don’t know what’ll happen to anyone if I completely lose my temper. Besides, if anyone has a reason to be mad at me, it’s Rarity.

“I’m sorry…” I say. “I just… I just want to put this all behind me and for things to be normal for me at least for a while!” I let out a heavy sigh. “And yet here we are…”

“I know you’re trying, Darling,” Rarity says, “and I’m sorry for antagonizing you… We just need to do something…”

I chuckle. “Maybe you two can secretly follow the demons around to collect something I can embarrass them all with.”

My joke is met with glares from both Rarity and Fluttershy. Guess that one was a bit too soon, even given the current situation.

Ugh… Someone just kill me.

We all jump as we hear a metal door slam open from back in the library.

…Am I just not allowed to even think anything to myself at this point?!

Fluttershy seems to lock up like she just tried to divide by zero in her head. Rarity’s closer to a bookcase large enough to hide behind so I point to it as I run up to Fluttershy. Thankfully, Rarity complies and hides. I haul Fluttershy to hear feet just as we hear heavy footsteps approach accompanied by an inhuman sounding hiss.

Fluttershy goes limp in my arms. The thud she makes as she hits the floor seems distant as the stomping sound of something large gets louder and louder. I dive behind a bookcase next to Rarity and…

…

… Did I just leave Fluttershy right out in the open?

I turn to my side and Rarity’s absolutely disgusted and rage filled glaring confirms that I am, in fact, scum of the earth. It also makes the feeling in my stomach worse. I decide to stare at my boots which are substantially less judgmental.

The sound of another hiss mere yards away from me barely registers as my mind reels over what I just did.

Fluttershy collapsed and my response was to save myself. If this was a test of my friendship under fire, I’m sure I just failed spectacularly.

I don’t think I deserve to have any friends…

… Maybe I really am a monster…

I flinch as I feel Rarity’s hand on my shoulder and turn. No doubt she’s realized I haven’t gotten nearly enough looks reminding my just how terrible I am and…

“Find a way to save us…” she whispers.

I look up in surprise and wipe away tears I didn’t know were there as Rarity gives me a hopeful smile. All this right before she stands up and marches right out from behind the bookcase.

“YOU PUT HER DOWN, RUFFIAN!” Rarity screams as if what she wasn’t drawing enough attention to herself.

I’m in awe. I didn’t think Rarity was brave enough to just yell at something that looks straight out of a mediaeval painting of what lives in Hell but there you go.

Curiosity gets the better of me again and I risk poking my head out slightly to see the outcome of Rarity’s action.

Rarity has marched up to and is trying to lecture something that looks like skin tightly wrapped around muscles and spines in a humanoid shape. The demon has Fluttershy draped over its shoulder. Maybe it’s from her experience dealing with demons already, or maybe concern for her friends is completely over overwriting Rarity’s fear but she just looks angry like she’s about to scold a boy who's gotten a little too ‘friendly’ with Fluttershy. Her bravado fails slightly as the beast grabs her. Rarity shrieks in terror, but to her credit, she does try kicking and punching it a few times. Despite Rarity’s blows, the demons strength is far too much for her to handle and she’s quickly dragged back towards the stairs.

Rarity continues to frantically scream. A scream that grows slightly quieter as I hear thumping footsteps grow further and further away.

I turn and grip me knees tightly as I keep my freak out nice and quiet.

This… this can’t be happening, right? I mean… Okay, weird stuff has been happening lately which is kind of sort of my fault, but that doesn’t mean demons and other mythological beings are just going to crawl out of the woodwork, right?

This is… this is just some sort of bad dream or weird thing the demon inside me is doing to my head, right? … Of course if it is the only way to end it would be to somehow die and hope I wake up.

… Yeah, I don’t think I’m that confident with everything else that’s happened recently.

So… Seems all my new friends have just been captured by demons. Demons that already decorated the windows of a massive board room red using the insides of people for paint. I look down at my handbag. The information to deal with this threat is there, but I don’t have any supplies on hand to actually make the artifacts to the specification the books describe. I don’t think there’s anything I can do for everyone…

I thought things couldn’t get any worse than crawling out of a carter after attempting to march the student body populace of Canterlot High across dimensions for an epic magic pony war, but most my friends being captured and brutally murdered by demons certainly takes the cake.

No keep it together… Everyone is counting on you. Think…. Think… There’s got to be something I can try.

Suddenly a plan hits me. A plan that’s every bit as bad as anything else I’ve come up with today. I dismiss it almost immediately.

I guess… I guess I’ll have to figure a way out of here and carry on with just Snips and Snails… Assuming I can get out of here or ever get over today and the tragic loss of the only other people to have shown me any real warmth and kindness… People who I was probably the last living person they were seen with … But hey, I’m sure the students and staff of CHS won’t leap to conclusions and assume I had anything to do with their simultaneous mysterious disappearances. You know… Even if I did transform into a demon just last Friday…

…

… Buck my life.

I stand up and start looking around. I need something heavy…

-ooo-

My lungs are burning as I clutch the heavy book in my arms against my chest, but I continue to take step after step up the empty stairwell. I did a very quick search for the heaviest thing I could reasonably carry. In this case, I happened to find a rather old, leather bond, gilded edged Bible someone had left on a table. No doubt abandoned when everyone collectively decided to flee from the library.

This book is pretty I’ll give it that. Certainly a lot more care was put into making it then the “red letter” editions at the books store. But carrying this thing upstairs? Not fun. Still, it’s critical to my plan.

What’s even worse is it’s so heavy that I have to keep both arms occupied holding it and watch my footing as there are now bloody foot prints that look like they were left by some claw-toed sasquatch going up and down the stairs. Falling down the stairs still doesn’t seem that appealing to me.

I guess I could have found something slightly lighter for my needs, but part of me finds the particular book appropriate. Plus I didn’t feel I had a ton of time to track down something else.

I finally make it all the way to the top floor and push my body weight against the large vertical ‘handle on the door that opens back to the stairwell the other girls and I fled down not too long ago. As I open it, I’m greeted by the site of more bloody footprints, many smeared buy what I’m guessing where boots dragged across the carpet.

At least I haven’t seen any of the girl’s bodies or something that looks like an exploded person.

I quietly make me way down the hall, much to surprise I hear the muffled voices Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash arguing with someone… Well… things can’t be too bad if the two are just mad and not in hysterics. I make my way up to the firehose. Looks like luck has thrown me a bone, albeit one devoid of any scraps of meat on it whatsoever, and the glass has already been broken. One of the girls must have kicked it while they were dragged down the hall.

I set the Bible down and unfurl the coiled hose onto the floor I then gather up the nozzle in my left arm and turn on the water with my free hand. The house goes plump and I tighten my arm around the end as I can practically feel it fight me.

This is a bad idea.

But it’s the only one I’ve got.

Straining to keep the hose from getting out of my grip, I bend down and take the heavy Bible in my right arm. My arms are burning with the strain of the two items in them, but all I need to do is walk a little further. Hose in one arm, Bible in the other, I continue making my way to the boardroom.

I walk up to the still bloody windows and carefully set the firehose down at my feet then step on it. I then take the Bible in both hands. I’ve done lots of stupid things that seemed smart at the time, but I’m really hoping this is a smart thing that only seems stupid at the moment. I rise the Bible high over my head and throw it at the window. It shatters as the glass proves not to have the stopping power for the heavy book.

With the blood splattered glass finally out of the way, I can see inside. The girls, who are tied to swivle chairs lined up against the opposite window, are staring at me with a mixture of surprise and hope (except for Fluttershy who looks quite unconscious). A small group of very large demons that look like they’re made of muscle, spikes, skin and teeth all growl and hiss at me from the corners of the room. From across the boardroom table, something with a squat, round body held up by dozens of spider legs, and heads of a frog, cat, and human looks at me less like I just broke in and more like I just came in without knocking. Speaking of the table, Twilight… This world’s Twilight is asleep or unconscious and tied to the boardroom table much like one would depict a Mayan sacrifice from a movie or something. The room and the windowed walls around it are just covered in chunky globs of blood and blood soaked wads of clothes like a bunch of people were exploded and it just smells horrible.

The whole scene would seem like a very confusing rock video to me if I wasn’t living it.

I bend down and pick up the firehose.

Time to clean up.

All the conscious girls actually cheer me on as I widen my stance and brace myself for the high-pressure jet of water. I turn the handle on the nozzle and a jet of water shoots out. This nearly pulls the hose from my hands, but I hold on tight.

Demons hiss and hold up their hands as water slams into them.

The girls stop cheering and avert their faces as water goes everywhere.

Spider-frog-cat-thing looks at me in irritation, makes eye contact with a few of his large underlings, and simply nods at me. Before you can say ‘fire safety’, a demon dives through the window and runs a claw through the hose which sprays me with a heavy stream of water that knocks me to the ground. Soon I’m being demon handled by a couple of these tall spiky things which drag me into the bloody and very wet board room. Getting a slightly closer look at these things, it strikes me that while ‘spikes and muscles’ seems to be a main theme, their proportions are all over the place. One that’s holding me looks a bit like a giant shaved monkey, with the aforementioned spikes, and the other more like a giant bipedal pig.

My attention shifts as the demons haul my in front of creature mish mash. It… or he judging by the gaunt male face on the human, places a spider leg under my chin. I cringe as I feel the prickly hairs against my skin before the appendage lifts my face up so the demon can look me eye to eye. “Are you under the impression that demons are water soluble?” he asks in a rather gravely, but easily understood voice.

This would have gone a lot better if I had salt and firehoses shot distilled water... Also assuming Hell has wi-fi and I could have memorized the ritual to make holy water and somehow perform it while holding a firehose…

“I was hoping…” I say simply. I’ve already turned into a demon once this week. I apparently can't step foot into churches, and I have made several possibly mental and one very really journey to Hell. It’s getting harder to surprise me at this point.

I risk a glance at the girls. They’ve managed to cobble together disappointment and reassurance into looks that say, ‘Well, at least you tried.’ Spider-legs suddenly force me to look forward again.

The demon’s lips curl upward. “Still, thanks for showing up. I thought I was going to have to lure you out or track you down.”

Rarity sighs. “Nice work telling the demons about Sunset, Rainbow Dash.”

“Hey!” Dash protests. “Sunset showed up here on her own!”

“Now Rarity,” Applejack says, “Dash was just tryin’ to keep our spirits up by reminding everyone Sunset was still out there”

Pinkie winces. “Was that a pun? Because even I think that was way too soon, A.J.”

These girls… Get them together and suddenly they’re too preoccupied simultaneously being mad at each other while being best friends to care about anything else going on around them. Even if ‘anything else’ is demons and this crazy animal/human chimera thing in front of me.

Wait… I know this demon. “Ba… ba…”

“What the matter? Cat got your tongue?” The cat head hisses as the human head laughs, this sounds a bit like something trying to gargle gravel. “Oh… I kill me…” He turns and looks at Twilight with all three heads then motions to her. “But first, I’ll kill her,” he says with a slasher smile on his human face.

“Ba’al…”

Ba’al turns back to me his eyes going wide. He raises a spider leg to his forehead dramatically. “Oh no! You know my name! I have no choice but to do whatever you want!”

“Really?!” Pinkie asks hopefully.

I sigh. “Pinkie… that was sarcasm. Barely concealed sarcasm at that.”

Ba’al chuckles at me. “Of course it was. It’s practically the language of our people.” Ba’al punctuates his sentence with a wink directed at me.

My blood runs cold. What? Why not say ‘my people’. I mean… he could have meant him and the other demons, but they aren’t talking much. Plus he seemed to be paying an awful lot of attention to me when he said it… Uhg… I need to top overthinking this and figure a way out of this mess.

“Seriously!” Rainbow Dash cries. “What is this even about?!”

Applejack sighs. “Rainbow Dash, if he didn’t tell you the last twenty times you asked, what makes you think—”

“Well,” Ba’al interrupts, “I guess I can tell you now that you’re all here.”

“… Oh…”Applejack says simply.

Ba’al continues. “Sleeping beauty here is a spring of magical energy! Well, all of you are, but she’s by far has the most energy. Energy that can very useful if harvested.”

Rarity gasped. “Are you going to hurt her?”

“That depends… I forget how many hearts do humans have? Just the one? Oh… Well… yes… Unless the rest of her organs can figure out how to make up for the loss of her heart pretty quickly after I carve it out of her chest, I dare say I’m going to hurt her.”

“You leave her alone!” Applejack exclaims.

“If it makes you feel better, I’m probably going to do the same to you five.”

Five? As in… the girls minus me?

“Hey!” Pinkie exclaims. “What about the other people who were here?!”

Ba’al manages to move enough spider legs to do a great impression of a shrug. “They were here when we arrived and I didn’t like the decor, so I did some quick D.I.Y.”

“That’s sick!” Rainbow Dash says.

“You should have seen the place before!” Ba’al replies.

We are being held by something that just used people’s insides to do interior decorating. This does not bode well. Maybe I can keep him talking long enough to think of something… anything.

“Well, what are you going to use the magic for?” I ask.

Ba’al turns back to me and caresses my cheek with a prickly spider leg. It is every bit as unpleasant as it sounds.

“I was going to kill the girls to harvest and harvest their natural magical energies to try and find you.”

Me?! What’s so special about me?! You know… aside from the fact that I’m technically a talking, magic unicorn from another dimension. Wait… Could it be that Ba’al and fiends actually know this?!

“But here you are!” Ba’al continues. “I guess I won’t have to kill all these girls to find you after all! I can just kill and consumer their power for the enjoyment of it!”

I know I shouldn’t expect much from a demon, but this one is seriously sick and twisted.

My expression seems to do all the talking I need to.

“Hmph, and I thought you’d have a sense of humor,” Ba’al says as he turns to Twilight and rears up on hind legs so he’s looming above her.

The girls start yelling, arguing, pleading, begging for Ba’al to reconsider. Somehow despite the noise and despite the fact that we’re surrounded by hellish creatures, I can’t help but stare at Twilight Sparkle. Her hair is a tangled mess placed in an uneven bun… She’s still wearing her school uniform which I guess isn’t that much of a shocker, but it doesn’t look nearly as well kept as the uniforms on the other students we saw, even considering the smears of blood on it. This combined with her hair it gives the impression she doesn’t care too much about her personal appearance… She also decided to come here instead of using her school’s own library and presumably came alone.

Maybe she’s not the popular girl I had her pegged for. I mean… I haven’t talked to her or anything, but she doesn’t seem like she’s just like the Twilight Sparkle that came to this world and united all my… uh… her… our…? friends against me.

My attention snaps back to the matter of hand as a purple glowing black… tear in reality forms in front of the head demon and a sword with a wavy blade floats out hilt first.

Right… Dwell on how popular Twilight is later. If she lives… If I live… If any of us live.

The frog head turns and the sides of its massive yellow lips lift up into a grim smile. “Are you really just going to sit and watch this happen?” it asks in the demons gravelly voice.

One of the girls is chanting “I don’t want to die… I don’t want to die… I don’t want to die…”

… No… Not just one of the girls… Me… I’m chanting that… Despite the horrible mess my life is in, I really don’t want to die… There’s still so much I haven’t done… so much to correct… This can’t be how it ends for me.

I’ve spent years mastering magic and learning what it would take to be a good ruler, and then years figuring out what it would take to get the power I need to be taken seriously by my teacher.

Years of diligence and suffering to be something more than I am.

It can’t end this way.

I won’t let it.

I’m not going to die this way.

I’M NOT!

I try struggling in the grip of my inhuman captors again and it amazes me at how effortlessly I pull my arms free. The simian like spiked covered demon reaches out to restrain me, but I reach out my hand… no… a claw to its face and slice into it as if I just attacked a cooked turkey with a hand made out of razor sharp carving knifes.

I try to scream as I realize what’s happening, but maniacal laughter escapes my mouth instead. Scenes from my past begin to overlay in front of my vision… I’m walking down a hall of Canterlot High school holding photos as claws tear into the pig-like demons chest. It collapses to the ground as I present the photos to a terrified male student wearing thick glasses.

I leap at Ba’al himself and watch razor sharp claws plunge through the soft flesh of the demon, past its necks and into its furry center surrounded by spider legs. The legs thrash and the frog and cat head seem to wail in pain as I feel a thick black ickor ooze out from the wound.

All of this plays out as I’m also staring at a scene of me blackmailing a girl with long purple hair with big, gold rimmed glasses to stay out of some dance or other. She’s bawling as I flaunt my knowledge of some embarrassing childhood event from her past. I can’t even begin to describe how incredibly petty it feels given the current situation.

As the life seems to exit Ba’al, the head of a man smiles at me, even as its eyes grow dim and a trickle of black viscous ooze dribbles from his mouth.

As the purple-haired girl begs me to keep quiet and promises she’ll drop out of the event, I can’t help but think back on some of the things Ba’al said to me and wonder if this is what it wanted all along.

The other demons shriek and howl almost as if I, or demon me, had stabbed them instead. Instead of attacking they double over and seem to implode into a sort of smoky nothingness. The girls all collapse to the ground. Still seemingly pretty shaken up from what has happened, but alive, at least…

Unfortunately the demons I killed, including Ba’al burst into flames.

I can’t control my currently demonic, body, I’m watching myself have a magnificent fight with Flash where I say some absolutely terrible things about him, and now the room is on fire.

This sucks.

I casually stroll over to Rainbow Dash and gently clasp her chin in my claws. I’ve never wanted to scream so much in my life. If those things can tear through a demon’s face without effort, I doubt Dash’s chin and cheekbones will put up much resistance.

“Sunset…?” Rainbow Dash utters in a terrified, yet somewhat hopeful tone.

“Hello, Rainbow Dash,” Demon me greets. “So nice to see you again”— I can feel my lips pull open into a big toothy grin –“and to make you pay for last time, of course…”

Rainbow Dash looks up at me with a look of terror I wouldn’t think the girl capable of as I feel my claws tense ever so slightly.

“HEY! LEAVE HER ALONE.”

I turn as I also yell at Snips and Snails with enough force they actually look scared of me. I catch a glimpse of Pinkie wielding the Bible I threw through the window and everything suddenly goes dark as she swings it at my face.

-oooooo-

“She’s coming to!”

Wha… what?

I open my eyes and I’m suddenly staring up at Fluttershy from her lap as Applejack leans her head over me.

“Ow!” I hear Rainbow Dash cry out.

“Stop moving!” Rarity demands. “Do you want scars all over your face?!”

“Maybe…” Rainbow Dash huffs out. “Might be cool…”

“Rainbow Dash!” I cry. Fluttershy and Applejack barely lean back in time as I sit up.

Rainbow Dash is sporting several vertical aligned cuts around her chin that are bleeding, but Rarity seems to be on the job with a first aid kit. She and Rarity are also soaking wet still. In fact, so am I… Everyone’s clothes are pretty much drenched.

Rainbow Dash smiles at me like I’m somehow not responsible for the cuts that were almost me slicing clean through her face. “Hey Sunny, glad you can join the land of the still living.”

Fluttershy helps me up. We seem to be hanging out in the parking lot of the library next to Rarity and Pinkie’s cars. I glance over at the library. There’s now firetrucks in front of it and smoke pouring out of the board room on the top floor. A crowd of people are now gathered around and watching as firefighters do that thing right in their name. I think some of the people here where even in the library before they ran out of it.

“Now take it easy, Sunset,” Fluttershy says. “You’ve been out ever since the” –Fluttershy shutters— “the boardroom incident.”

Applejack nods. “Fluttershy came too shortly after we all got out of there. We managed to get everyone out before the fire department and police showed up.”

I look at Rarity. “Wait… so we just popped back here?”

Rarity just shrugs. “I’m not about to question our good fortune. I guess the library came back when… you, erm… skewered that ghastly head demon.”

I take another quick look around. “Pinkie?” I ask.

The girls grins sheepishly at me.

Fluttershy speaks up, “Pinkie’s er… Talking to the police for us…”

Applejack nods. “Hopefully a little bit of Pinkie goes a long way and they won’t want t’ talk to anyone else after that.”

I glance towards flashing police lights to see Pinkie in front of a sunglass wearing officer with a beard. Her hair looks a bit waterlogged and droopy compared to its usually perkiness. She appears to be explaining… something… Actually, whatever it is, Pinkie doesn’t seem to be talking about what happened in the library at all… She’s um…

I watch as Pinkie mimes riding a bicycle… No wait… mines riding a unicycle.

She’s um…

A sudden thought occurs to me and I turn towards the other girls.

“Twilight…?”

“She’s fine, sugarcube,” Applejack says. “We got her out of there and handed her off to the paramedics.”

Rainbow Dash shakes her head. “She slept through the entire thing, if you can believe it.” Rainbow Dash finishes her statement with a laugh then flinches. “Ow… It hurts to laugh.”

“Would you hold still?!” Rarity cries as she attempts to apply more bandages to your face. “Sunset… erm… that demon put some nasty cuts on you. You’re lucky you don’t need stitches.”

I wince. “Ididn’tmeanto! Ididn’twantto! I’msososorry!”

“Whoa there,” Applejack says. “Calm down Sunset. You look more shook up than a herd of cattle that just heard a rattler.”

“Well she did turn into a demon again,” Rainbow Dash helpfully reminds everyone.

Applejack and Rarity shoot her a ‘not helping’ look.

“What?” Rainbow Dash says. “I’m just saying it makes sense that she’d freak out after what happened.”

My head is spinning. Everyone’s alright… relatively speaking that is. But the gravity of what just happened is too much. I can’t just pretend we weren’t ambushed by demons who seemed interested in me… Oh, it’s let’s not forget what happened after I went demon mode and got rid of them all…

I raise a hand up to my forehead. “I can’t believe I tried to ka… tried to kill—”

Pinkie walks back up to the group as she brushes her palms against each other. “Well, mission accomplished. The police don’t want to talk to any of us and have no idea what went on in there. Though, one does have a better idea of how to juggle livestock while riding a unicycle. Oh! Hi, Sunset Shimmer!”

How the hell can this girl look at me like I wasn’t intending to kill her just a few minutes ago?

Pinkie just smiles at me. “I’m really happy that you came back to help us! I’m also happy that you stopped being all demony when I hit you in the face with a Bible. Sorry about that, but you looked like you were going to hurt Rainbow Dash! And I know you’d never forgive yourself if you… er… Demon you hurt any of us, so—”

“Pinkie?” Fluttershy interrupts in a half grunt. “Maybe save it for later? I think Sunset just stopped supporting her own weight.”

Applejack quickly grabs one of my arms and places it over her shoulders as she and Fluttershy share the task of keeping me up.

My mind is reeling. I just… I just can’t keep up with everything that happened and girls just talking about my transformation like it was just some little thing that happened on our library field trip.

“I can’t believe I turned into that thing again!” I say to… well to myself mostly. This is worse than bad dreams and needing to keep my temper in check. I’m still a threat… a threat to everyone close to me to say nothing of the planet at large.

“It’s alright! We can deal with that later.” Applejack assures. “The important thing is we all made it out alive.”

“Alright?” I turn staring at Applejack. I can feel hot tears stream down my face. I’m definitely relieved no one is dead, but I’m pretty flippin’ far from ‘alright’. “Alright?! I almost cut up Rainbow Dash! And I don’t think I would have stopped at that!”

“Could have, but didn’t!” Rainbow Dash said. “You saved us all!”

“So?” I counter. “The only reason I didn’t turn around and finish the job those other demons started is because Pinkie hit me in the face with that huge Bible!”

“Sunset, it’s alright!” Pinkie says as she places a hand on my shoulder. “You weren’t yourself! We know the real you wouldn—”

“NO! DON’T TOUCH ME!” I forcefully swat Pinkie’s arm off of me. “I’M A MO-MO-MOWHAA—” I burst into one of my patented freak out cries rather than finish the word.

It’s all too much… I just… I just can’t. I think Pinkie goes in to comfort me, because I feel warm and comforting arms around me and I even let them hold me for a while before I completely flip and struggle free.

I want the girls to get the hell away from me, make me feel better, feel hurt enough that they leave me outright, and not abandon me all at the same time.

At some point I break out of my hysterics long enough to demand someone take me home. I have to do something… I have to try to get this thing out of me before I transform again.

Soon a couple of the girls are forcing me into Pinkie’s car and the next I’m crying and begging forgiveness as one of them puts a seatbelt around me.

Everything’s a blur. I can’t make out what’s going on or even who I’m talking or screaming to through all the tears. My head hurts. My body aches. I need to get home. I have to fix this. I don’t want to live like this.

What is no doubt a rather harrowing car trip later, Pinkie has gotten me back to my complex.

She’s barely stopped the car before I rush out and sprint to my apartment. I slam the door behind me and lock it. I quickly close all the blinds as well.

“Not even going to say goodbye to your… ex-friends…?” A dark, echoing version of my own voice calls out in my head.

“Shut up!Shut up!” I shout back.

“You know they’ll want nothing to do with you after this, right? Sure they were happy enough that none of them died that they tolerated you for a little bit. But after your extended freak out session, you’re probably the last person they want to see.”

“JUST SHUT UP!” I shriek as I practically fall into my desk chair and pull my tablet from my handbag. I quickly bring up the book I was reading earlier; The Lesser Key of Starswirl the Bearded, it’s full of chants and seals all supposed to aid in summoning and controlling demons. Thankfully, I know just the one that should help me control this thing inside me.

I quickly swipe at my tablet until it’s displaying a five point star surrounded by a circle. Several symbols and letters have been writing between the lines of the star and circle around it.

“You can’t seriously think this is going to work, Do you?”

“GET OUT OF MY HEAD!” I cry as I take off my jacket. This is soon followed by my shirt and bra, all which get unceremoniously discarded on the floor.

“Oh no, Nudity! My only weakness.” Demon me says with fake terror.

“You’re going to find this a lot less funny when I finally get you out of me!”

I open one of my desk drawers and pull out a glue stick and uncap it. I then start running it over my chest as I stare at my tablet and try to copy the pentagram, symbols, and words displayed.

Demon me tut-tuts. “You still haven’t a clue do you…”

This is supposed to be on a silver medallion that I wear on my chest. However, since I don’t have a medallion or an engraver, hopefully gluing some real silver powder to my chest will be enough. Thankfully a trophy or plaque or something that warranted a ceremony was on the line for some arts project and I went very far with my supplies to help win it. I pull out a respectable bottle of silver powder and pour some onto my chest to better see what I’ve done so far.

“You’re seriously going to regret this if this silly little thing you’re trying even comes remotely close to working,” demon me says. She continues to laugh and mock me as I apply more glue.

Well, as far as low points in my life go, I’m not sure anything can top (or go under in this case) crawling out of a crater after being blasted by a literal rainbow of friendship (still number one since all my friends, or in all likelihood former friends, are still alive), but arguing with myself as I’m topless and taking a glue stick to my chest so I can apply silver powder has got to be pretty dang close.

Still, I keep at it, losing complete track of time, ignoring how tired and fatigued I feel from everything that’s happened. I have to get rid of thing. I just have to!

“Hey!Wake up!” an unfamiliar voice calls out. Male… but nasally and high-pitched.

“Wha…?”

Great, I must have passed out at some point and I’m cold and my back hurts on top of everything else. The hard feeling against my cheek is letting me know I passed out sitting at my desk.

“Seriously! I could have stayed in my own dimension and a paid a dwarf to drink until it blacked out if I wanted to watch some big, hairy, ugly thing drool all day.”

…Dimension…? Dwarf…? Big?! Hairy!? UGLY?!

My eyes shoot open to glare at whoever is disturbing my uncomfortable, and slightly damp, desk nap.

Make that a whatever. Its skin is blood red, its eyes are glowing red, it has long pointed ears, a pointed chin, and it’s giving me a look as if I’m very much wasting its time.

Its expression softens once it sees I’m awake. “Hello fire-haired… uh… lady?”

I feel my eyes widened. Its lips curl up into a demonic looking smile showing off a mouth full of razor sharp teeth.

“I came all the way here just to meet you,” it says with a mad look in its eyes that when coupled with the smile pretty much screams ‘homicidal killer’.

Please…

Send help.

Chapter 15: A Savior or a Killer?

All That ShimmersChapter 15: A Savior or a Killer? -ooooooo-

“Aaahh!” I yelp as I stand up straight in my chair and lean back, putting some much needed distance between myself in the mouth full of needle-like teeth that was inches away from my face.

The owner of the teeth cringes slightly and his pointed ears twitch at my high pitched outburst. “Ugh… definitely a female. Watch the sharp tones, lady.” It lifts an arm causing its outfit made of interlocked chains to jingle slightly. Flicking the end of one of its ears, it gives me a sour look and says, “Some of us don’t like the caterwauling of other species in heat.”

Okay… just… what?

I look the thing up and down… mostly down. If I was sanding, the deep red… guy? would only stand a little taller than my waist. Even sitting, it only comes up to the sticky, silver demon control symbol that’s in between my exposed breasts.

…Wait, what?

I feel my face go hot as my relatively young human sense of modesty kicks in and I cover my chest with an arm.

The thing’s eyelids seem to tighten and it gently rolls its whole head. As someone who is completely fluent in all forms of snark, this was clearly the little guy’s equivalent of rolling his eyes. “Oh calm down. You humans are always so concerned about who sees you naked as if anyone else actually cares.” He looks back and gives me a sideways smirk. “Sorry lady, my type isn’t nearly as tall, hairy, or lumpy.”

As nice as it is that I’ve met a guy…like thing who won’t stare at my chest, I start scanning my floor for something to cover up with. All the blinds and drapes are closed and I’m only getting some hints of sunlight through the windows. Still, I pick out the crumpled black mass of my leather jacket in the dim light. I walk over, put it, on and zip it up. The short little pointy looking thing gives me a sideways grin full of sharp teeth. He seems to be enjoying my reactions much more than actually seeing me topless.

I give him a longer look. He’s decked in chainmail that covers his chest, arms, and even goes down to his legs. His ren-fair get-up is reinforced by a slightly worn rawhide backpack that looks to be loaded with a few daggers, trinkets, and one miniature sized, but no less painful looking, mace. He’s humanoid in shape with a rather inhuman head and arms that go down past his knees.

It’d been a pretty weird few days, so I skip past ‘What are you?’ and move right onto “What the heck are you doing in my apartment?!”

“I already told you! I came here just to meet you! I know as dumb as you look,”—

Hey!

--“you’re smart enough to almost not botch up a control circle! Don’t tell me you can’t remember a few seconds ago!”

“Wait…” My mind reels as I try to remember last night… In my desperation to rid myself of the demon inside of me could I have…? “… Did I summon you? You’re not like an imp or my familiar or something that has to do whatever I say, are you?”

The little guy gives me a blank stare, quickly retrieves his mace, and then swings it into my frickin’ shin!

‘CRACK!’

“OUCH! MOTHER FU—”

‘THUD!’

I reach for my shin and hit the ground like a sack of potatoes that where just hit in the damn shin! If potatoes or sacks had legs and… you know what? This hurts like a beeotch! Cut me some slack.

Mr. Shin Obliterator leans down slightly and gives me an annoyed look. “Did that answer your question?”

“Pa… painfully!” I answer through clenched teeth. GHAH! Fixer Christ does that hurt! I rub my shin and the pain seems to ebb ever so slightly. I don’t think it’s broken, but I’m going to be walking with a limp for a little bit.

Mr. Manners and Bone Bludgeoner simply waits with an impatient look on his face as I slowly stand back up.

“Was that—” The pain becomes too much and my leg starts to give out. I quickly reach a hand out to grab my desk chair before I hit the floor again. “OW… Was that really necessary?”

“How would you act if you just met someone and they asked if you where their new slave?”

I frown slightly. “Violently…”

The creature grins slightly and nods. “Exactly.”

“Ugh… Fine…” Maybe I should start with some more basic questions. “Do you have a name?”

It gives me a serious look and pulls out a dagger. Oh please don’t tell that was a bizarre tiny monster faux pas and I’m about to be stabbed…

It begins to answer me. “Yeah, but to properly pronounce it I’d have to cut your tongue in six places,” the thing makes a few quick cutting motions with its knife.

I sigh. “Well, what should I call—”

“Hahaha!” The little guy cuts me off with a nasally laugh. “I’m just messin’ with you lady! The name’s Gaaabooo.”

Ugh… I can already tell this is going to be tons of fun, an obvious psychopath with a twisted sense of humor. Either we’re going to get along swimmingly or one of us is going to be dead before the day is out. Hmmm… Speaking of which, I need to think of plan to off this guy… You know…

…Just in case.

“Don’t even think about it.”

I jump! Ow! My shin! Oh please tell me Gaaabooo can’t read minds! Oh please… oh please…

“Grrr…” Gaaabooo lets out a short, irritated growl as if he’s losing even more patience with me.

“Er… You can’t read minds… Can you?”

Gaaabooo chuckles and smirks, showing off some of his pointy teeth. “No, but you were making the ‘I wonder how I can kill this guy’ face.”

I frown. “I…There’s a face for that?”

“Sure! I make it every time I meet someone new!”

“… If you make it, how do you know…? ”

Gaaabooo does his whole-head eye roll again. “I meet a lot of people in ridiculously shining and reflective armor, alright? Do I get to ask any questions?”

“You just d—”

“I will give you a matching bruise on your other leg and maybe just keep swinging if you finish that sentence,” Gaaabooo says in a tone of someone stating a fact rather than someone making a threat.

I clamp my mouth shut. Even if I have a good two feet on this guy, he’s armed and I’m not. Plus he may be able to magic my face off... In this case, probably less a quick, literal face banishing and more the blasty ‘Why’d I try to make out with that belt sander?’ way.

Gaaabooo lets out a thoughtful “Hmmmmmm…” as he scrunches his brow and stares intently at me. IT looks like he’s simultaneously deep in thought and trying to explode my head with telekinesis.

Good God, is that what I look like when I come up with a plan to subtly off someone? No wonder I began to have trouble getting along with people after the first year here.

Gaaabooo’s expression eventually gives way to a demonic grin.

I sigh. “Okay, so how’d you kill me?”

“I’d burn you to death with the righteous fire of war.”

“… That’s not very subtle or likely to detract much suspicion from you.”

“Lady, I can travel through dimensions. I don’t know what passes for the local authorities in this backwards place with next-to-no magic, but I doubt the local constabulary would be able to follow me, let along figure out where I went.”

Er… Guess he has a point.

Gaaabooo surveys my desk and the area around it, a few of the books I got are open complete with pictures of demon seals and illustrations of the big nasty’s themselves. “Plus you’re clearly messing with demon magic. They probably figure you just offed yourself in a botched summoning.”

Or figure a dumb highschooler went bonkers and… well… set herself on fire trying to actually do the things in these books… but close enough, I guess.

… This isn’t actually helping me right now.

“Look, Gaaboo, what—”

Gaaabooo gives me a rage filled glare. “It’s Gaaabooo! Get it right or pay the price!”

I hold my hands palm forward in front of me. “Okay… Gaaabooo… Just what do you want?!”

Gaaabooo shrugs. “Fire, destruction… you know… the usual.”

Lovely, I’m playing surprise hostess to a homicidal arsonist. “I meant with me! Why’d you come here just to meet me?!” I seriously hope the answer isn’t ‘Fire, destruction… you know… the usual.’

Gaaabooo gives me a slasher smile. “Because you’re making things interesting here.”

Well… that was cryptic. My forehead tightens. “Exactly how much do you know about me?”

“Well… You’re a lady and obviously a complete amateur at dealing with demons.”

Grrr… He’s not wrong… but ‘grrr’ just the same.

“And you seem to be the epicenter of this world’s latest manaclysms.”

“Manaclysms?”

Gaaabooo’s eyes wander to my nice leather couch and he wanders over, slinging his backpack off and sitting it next to him. “It’s when a world encounters a sudden increase in magical energy. Yours had not one but two big hits in the last several days,” he points at me, “and you were there for both.”

“I see…” As worrisome as it is that Gaaabooo knows all this, it dawns on me that my change with the crown and the ensuing battle is what lured those other demons here… Oh great, don’t tell me I’m now a walking target for these guys!

Goblin smiles wickedly again… In fact, I’m not sure he knows any other way to smile. “I’m not exactly sure of the details, Lady, but you must be really eager to cause some mayhem the way you’re just up and changing to a full-blown demon like that.”

Like that’s what I want to happen!

I narrow my eyes. “I have a name, you know.”

“… Is it Bacon Hair?”

ALL MY HATE! The first and last person to call me ‘Bacon Hair’ had a MeTube video published about them that was so embarrassing, they didn’t show up to school for a week… Somehow I doubt that’ll work on Gaaabooo here. “My name is Sunset Shimmer,” I say through gritted teeth.

Gaaabooo narrows his eyes. “Your name is long and tedious. Hey, do you have any bacon?” Gaaabooo licks his lips. “It’s tasty.”

You know, every time I feel I’ve discovered the zenith of suffering, something just has to come along and prove me wrong. “You can just call me Sunset.”

“Hrm… I think I prefer ‘Sunny’ or just ‘Lady’.”

“Ugh… fine…” Just so long as it isn’t ‘Bacon Hair’. “And look…” I unzip my jacket and pull the sides just enough to show the symbol I spent last night trying to get right. “I’m trying to do something about the crazy transformation that turns me into a violent, murder-hungry megalomaniac.”

Gaaabooo stairs intently at me. Uh-oh… I don’t want to set the little guy off again. My shin’s in enough pain as it is! “Uh… No offense…”

Gaaabooo pulls the left side of his lips open into a pick-axe smile. “None taken. Best compliment I’ve gotten in a while.” Gaaabooo gives me a serious look. “Still, you’re going about this all wrong.”

“… Oh?” Maybe the little maniac will be good for something anyways.

Gaaabooo nods and flicks an index finger out in my direction. “First off, you’re missing a curl to the top of the topmost symbol there.”

I look down at my chest and grab my tablet. Turning it on, I can see he’s right. What I have looks like an upside-down cross. What is supposed to be is more like a ‘J’ and cross hybrid that’s been flipped upside down.

I put down my tablet and reach for my glue stick and silver powder to correct my mistake

Gaaabooo continues to speak as I drag the glue stick over my chest, “Second of all, drawing that symbol on your chest is about the stupidest thing you could possibly do.”

I don’t have time to enquire why. Gaaabooo’s words reach me a moment after I sprinkle on more silver dust. The instant they complete the symbol, my world starts spinning as well as my insides. The swirling, nauseating feeling of traveling through the portal between here and Equestria has nothing on this. I immediately break out in a sweat, my head explodes into pain, and the contents of my stomach surge upwards to escape the prison of misery my body has become. Amazingly, I manage to stumble-sprint to my small bathroom moments before seemingly everything that was in my digestive system shoots out my mouth and into the toilet. When it’s all out, I just continue to dry heave as the feeling persists and agony clamps onto my head like the world’s largest vice.

This…

This is torture…

No… this is worse than torture.

I… I’m dying… and the stupid symbol I drew on my chest is…

The symbol!

Through the haze and anguish, I slap my right on hand on my chest and smear the glue and silver. It slides off easily with the extra help of the bucket of sweat that now coats me. The pressure in my head subsides into a dull throb and my insides stop doing somersaults as my internal organs decide they can safely reside in my body after all.

I take a few haggard breaths and grip the side of the toilet with me right arm, pushing myself up with both. I flush and struggle to raise myself up to my feet then stumble across the blue tiled bathroom to a sink with a mirror over it.

My hair is now soaked and clinging to me and there’s a silver smear across my chest. I’m breathing deeply and staring into my reflections’ red, veiny eyes as tears stream from them. In short, I look like hell… in a much less literal sense than what that tends to mean these days.

I turn on the sink then scoop some water into my mouth, gargle, spit, and repeat the process. Next, I scoop more water to actually drink since I feel incredibly dehydrated. I grab my mouthwash that’s on the sink counter then gurgle and spit that. Finally, I shovel even more water to clean out my mouth and drink.

Finished, I stumble back out into the main room, trudging over to my desk chair before collapsing into it.

That. Sucked.

Gaaabooo is still simply sitting on the couch. Surprisingly, rather than smile as if he was enjoying my suffering, he has a sort of intent interest on his face, like he just witnessed the results of a science experiment.

“Wa… Why?!” I exclaim. “Why did that happen?” My tone is getting increasingly desperate. I look down at my chest then back up to Gaaabooo. “That was a protection and control seal for demons!”

Gaaabooo nods. “It sure was!”

“Then why did it make me feel violently ill?! It was supposed to help me with this thing inside me!”

Gaaabooo’s eyes widen. “Thing inside of you? Lady, what the hell are you on about?!”

‘Hell’ is exactly what I’m on about. “The demon that keeps taking control of me!” I exclaim. “That… that’s possessing my body and giving me messed up dreams! I’m trying to get rid of it!”

Gaaabooo’s eyes widen briefly as a look of realization sets on his dark red face. He closes his eyes and shakes his head. “Sunny, you don’t get it.”

My voice hits a fever pitch of panic and frustration. “What?! What is it I don’t get?!”

“You’re not possessed by a demon.” Gaaabooo opens his eyes and it’s as if the bright red orbs are boring a hole straight to the core of me. “You are a demon.”

Chapter 16: Inner Journeys

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Chapter 17: Intervention

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Chapter 18: Bad Habits

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Chapter 19: An Existential Us Crisis

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Chapter 4: Woke Up On the Wrong Side of the Hellish Landscape

All That ShimmersChapter 4: Woke Up On the Wrong Side of the Hellish Landscape-ooooooo-

Home again, home again, jiggity-jig.

Not that I’m sold on the idea this barren wasteland full of lava and thick with the smell of sulfur is actually my home. I may not remember the first few years of my life clearly, but I distinctly remember them being full of less fire…

“Welcome back.”

…and less demons.

I turn and there I am again. Well, demon me or the demon inside me. She’s hovering several yards away with folded arms and smiling at me with her fanged teeth as she chuckles.

I just shot her a sort of unamused look. She killed me once, or at least it sure felt like she did, and I’m still here. I’m guessing I’m not in any mortal danger, but probably in for a pretty painful evening.

Still grinning, the demon turns green irises set against a pitch black void up at the sky and places a claw against her chin. “Let’s see…” she coos, “… I think my favorite part of today was when you almost lost your breakfast during a group hug… No wait,” she says with a smile, “actually it was when you had to pretend you actually cared about lemurs.” She tilts her head and purses her lips as she stares at me, “No, actually… the part when you started crying when you got your new jacket,” she smiles wickedly at me “that was definitely the high, or should I say ‘low’, point of the day.”

I sigh and roll my eyes as I fold my arms over my jacket. Not sure what I was expecting, but it’s my old one. My new one has a few less studs in the collar and more prominent, metal buttons. Must be some sort of mental projection thing like out of a Sci-fi movie where people are hooked up to computers or something…

“Are you going somewhere with this?” I ask snidely. “I have a full day of figuring out how to get rid of you, and you’re kind of cutting into my sleep here.”

Demon me gives me an open mouth smirk that shows off her fangs. She flies down in front of me, kneeling so she’s roughly at my level. I’m reminded at how big I…erm… she is and it’s a bit unnerving to say the least.

She flicks out a large claw and holds it under my chin. I suddenly regret the whole ‘cutting into my sleep crack’, especially as she flicks the claw up. For me, this was something of a nice power move to jar whoever I did it to into noticing who they were dealing with. In this case, the claw cuts up my face, through my lips, and slices my left nostril. I quickly raise a hand over the left side of my face as pain shots through it and blood starts pouring out. The idea that this meeting probably won’t be fatal is suddenly not as comforting. This hurts.

Hello.

I’m Sunset Shimmer and…

… You know what? You probably get it by now…

“Silly Sunset Shimmer~,” the demon practically sings out, “you can’t get rid of me. I’m in you, I’m part of you!” The demon chuckles softly and raises back to her full height. “Go ahead. Buy your little books and try whatever spells or rituals you find. You know you’ll just screw it up.”

I look up at demon me with a glare, “I don’t think so. Magic is something of my forte, remember?”

“Was, maybe,” demon me says, “but you haven’t used magic in a long time...” she stares up briefly and cocks her head slightly, “well, aside from the day before yesterday, of course.”

I shake my head and point an index finger at demon me, “Mark my words, I’ll find what I need to get rid of you and then it’s back to nice, restful sleep.”

“Ah, yes. And back to your great, big plan of a nice, quiet life of hanging out with friends, talking about primates, going to birthday parties?” Demon me rolls her eyes, “Sounds riveting…” she says sarcastically.

I try frowning, but the shooting pain in my face turns my expression into a grimace. Aside from staving off soul crushing loneliness, what exactly am I trying to accomplish?

“We both know that isn’t you,” the demon says. “You never had any friends back in Equestria, and you never made any here. Do you really think having friends is suitable replacement for your ambition?”

I spit out a gob of blood, “My ambition was become a princess! Not march into Equestria and take over!”

Demon me snickers, “You make it sound like the two are mutually exclusive. What were you going to do when Celestia was inevitably displeased with the power you gained and denied you and stature of you own?”

This shuts me up in a hurry. I always just hoped the crown would turn me into an alicorn and then after my big, ‘I told you so!’ moment, Celestia would be all smiles and suddenly I’d have a title and kingdom of my own, or something… I retrospect, probably not a likely outcome given how I would have come about my transformation. In all likeliness, I’d probably end up angrily challenging Celestia for the throne when she snubbed me. Judging by how well things went here with an elementless Twilight and crew, I have a pretty good guess how that might have turned out…

Demon me chuckles, “Anyhow, you’re out of practice when it comes to magic. Maybe you should get some help?” She grins, “I suggest a young priest and an old priest.”

I narrow my eyes at her. Dang, that was a good line.

She taps a claw against the side of her face thoughtfully, “I guess I’ll have to prepare a bunch of nasty things to say… work out my timing with spinning my head around, that sort of stuff…”

“It’s not going to matter because I’ll get you out of me myself,” I declare.

The demon gives me a knowing smile, “Sorry, but it won’t work, removing me would be like trying to remove a vital organ and seeing how long you could last without it.”

“Forgive me if I don’t take your word on that,” I reply.

Demon me raises her hands in a shrug, “Go ahead then, it’ll be worth it just to see the look on your face when you find out it what trying to remove me will do.”

I am starting to lose an awful lot of blood. Pretty sure she cut me to the bone with that little claw flick. “Seriously, was there a point to this little visit?” I ask. “I’m starting to get light headed here.”

The demon cocks her head and smiles at me. “Point?” She leans down and simply pokes me in the stomach with a dagger like talon. It pierces a couple of inches, and I let out a pained gasp and fall to my knees. I use my right hand to cover the puncture wound as more blood slowly seeps out of me.

I glance back up at her, and make a mental note to avoid words that can result in sharp, pun related injury. “Wha…why?” I stammer out. It’s about all I can manage at this point.

She grins at me as she flaps her wings and puts some distance between us once more, “Because it’s fun! Much more entertaining than watching you pretend you care about Twilight’s friends or see them as anything more than resources to be used and thrown away when they’ve outlived their usefulness.”

The words cut much deeper than any wound she’s inflicted on me. It’s actually quite possible I’m not cut out to make and have friends. I managed to calculate and bluff my way through today, but who knows if I can keep it up? As much as I want Twilight’s friends to like me, I’m honestly not sure if I like them… or even if I’m capable of liking them.

“Oh, poor Sunset Shimmer,” the demon says in a soft mocking tone, “did I hit a nerve?”

Guess I’m not doing a good job hiding my feelings with all the effort to keep my blood inside my body. “GO TO HE...aven,” I say, narrowly catching myself before I said something stupid… or at least stupider than the thing I did say. Hey, cut me some slack. It’s getting increasingly harder to stay focused, let alone conscious.

The demon just shakes her head, “You really should just give it up. Abandon this friendship garbage and accept that I’m who you’re destined to be. It’ll be quicker,” she smiles at me again, “and you’ll be happier.”

I sneer at her, “I think I’ll take my chances with people who don’t have a habit of slicing me up.”

The demon rolls her eyes as her smile remains plastered on her face, “Have it your way~!” She holds her hands out in front of her and her palms begin to glow green. Black beams shot out from the glow and meet in front of her, creating a fireball that grows wider and wider. I can do nothing but stare at the large ball of flame as it’s hurled in my direction.

I scream as the flames touch my body. An excruciating, burning sensation envelops me and then my eyes shot open as I sit up.

It’s morning, and I’m in bed. Bonus points, I’ve soaked another pair of PJs and my blankets again.

Swell…

I do a quick feel of my body. On the plus side, I don’t seem to be cut anywhere and it’s rather likely my skin is still attached and not burnt to a crisp.

I feel rough. The last couple days and nights have been a whirlwind of activity, sure, but I’m starting to sense the demon’s visits are affecting my sleep somewhat. She mentioned breaking me down. I wonder if this is all part of it.

Well, no time to sit and dwell on exactly how this all will go down. I’ve got to sort out how I’m going to get out of this mess before I’m a heap of sleep deprived, angstridden sadness, or worse; a giant, magical, ice-blooded killer.

I throw my sweat soaked sheets off me and hop out of bed. My options are leave them for the day in all likelihood that I’ll be sleeping in that disgusting mess tonight, waste another hour or two on laundry, or buy a few spare sets to avoid either of those things and maybe minimize trips to the complex’s laundry mat and having to scrounge up cash and quarters if this continues.

The later sounds more appealing at the moment. I got sidetracked and lost a day already, I need all the time I can get.

The mall was a bust, but I wasn’t expecting much from it. There’s a few other bookstores in town. The used bookstores in particular might have the odd item here and there and I can probably get digital copies of anything I want to start with.

I grab my phone off my nightstand and consider my options. I already had a sizable portion of the school’s contact info saved for one reason or another… Alright, so those reason where almost always blackmail or manipulation related to me winning whatever it was I wanted at the time. However, in this case, I may have a few options to consider.

I dismiss most of Twilight’s friends as options immediately. Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and Rarity are likely to be skeptical at absolute best regarding my predicament. Fluttershy would probably faint on the spot if I told her what was happening, and might continue to do so if I she was expected to look through books on demonology and dark magic. Pinkie Pie I actually consider briefly; she’s definitely more open minded than anyone else in the group, and between her eagerness to be my friend and her sheer craziness, she’d probably take whatever I say at face value… Unfortunately, I don’t know how great she is at keeping secrets. Given she practically never stops talking ever, I’m guessing she’s not that great at it.

I scroll through my contacts and stop dead in my tracks as my eyes catch a particular name, ‘Flash Sentry’. Flash, like pretty much all my boyfriends before him, was a means to an end. That being said, Flash could further my goals better than any of the boyfriends before him. He was popular, well liked, had the coolest car out of the entire student body. He helped softened my image for a while with that ‘nice guy’ personality of his. Trouble was, my demanding nature and tendency to treat people around me like slaves who should be grateful that they even get to look at me wore on him. Usually my social stature, looks, ability to fake moments of human warmth, and made up sob stories will keep a guy interested until I no longer have a use for them.

Flash, unfortunately, never really stopped being useful, and I ended up getting attached without really noticing. Sadly, this didn’t result in me altering my behavior, and Flash, who actually had quite a bit going on for him, eventually dumped me.

That night, I probably ran through just about every fake emotion and made up tragic incident from my childhood before it dawned on me that Flash had caught on to what I was doing some time back. Which probably explained why he was breaking up with me in the first place. I’m ashamed to admit I actually pleaded with him to give me another shot. When this didn’t work, I tried another tactic…

… Turns out angry screaming and throwing things is not an effective trick to keep someone in a relationship with you.

The following days were spent coming up with various plans and schemes to get Flash back. Most of which were dismissed when I realized how ridiculous they were. The few I did try just resulted in embarrassing and somewhat painful moments of being rejected anew, and the last one I had to abandon because I could never pull together the resources or timing to get Flash and I stuck in an elevator together…

I almost convinced myself to go through with my plan of sabotaging the breaks on Flash’s muscle car as a final act of revenge, but realized that I’d probably be suspect number one after his untimely demise. I had a feeling I’d regret the action, anyhow.

I push my thumb against his name, go to options, and hit the delete button.

A message on my phone asks me if I’m sure and reminds me the number will be permanently deleted. I sigh, hit cancel, and backtrack back to the contact menu. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve done that. Who would have thought the mighty Sunset Shimmer was just as susceptible to ridiculous post break-up nonsense as anyone else?

Anyhow, I’m wasting time. I know exactly who would be willing to help me here… At least… I hope they’re willing…

I scroll down to the ‘S’s and hit a name.

“Snips? I need you to call Snails,” I say as my voice instinctively slips into ‘business mode’, “we’ve got work to do.”