Daybreak

Getting ready for school that morning was harder than usual. Not only did Sunset Shimmer's body ache in more places than she cared to count, or even thought possible due to the work over the weekend, but also because she was having an internal dispute as to what she should do. The first thing that came to mind was to move out of the apartment; it had been rented with stolen money anyway, and she didn't need that haunting her along with her recent upstart. She knew it wasn't a particularly smart decision, but as she packed her backpack she found herself sitting at the edge of her bed fumbling for her key. She wasn't sure how long she sat there staring at it, but it was long enough that she was nearly late for school.

When she arrived at the building, the drew up short once she noticed a huge crowd of students gathered around the newly-repaired front of the school, looking on as murmurs of confusion sputtered through the crowd. It had been utterly destroyed not three days ago; Sunset couldn't blame them for being confused about how it had been fixed so quickly. For the second time in five days, she was keenly aware of how close to breaking her back felt.

"Just play it cool, Sunset Shimmer." Sunset tried to calm herself as she made her way through the crowd - which had managed to part an opening for her as she recognized the fearful looks in her fellow students' faces. The day was off to a bad start already. "Just... play it cool."

Aside from her brooding emotional state and the constant feeling of far too many eyes watching her, the day went by without incident. More than once, she found herself contemplating looking for help, but even the girls she had come to know as the Freshman Five - as it wasn't long after the Freshman Fair that year when she had broken them up - seemed to have every intention of keeping their distance, and in spite of Twilight Sparkle's assurrance that they would be able to help her learn the wonders of friendship, without Twilight there, they shunned her as much as everybody else.

The only relief she found throughout the day was at lunch, when her solitude in the corner of the cafeteria hall was interrupted by the only two people she had confided in since coming to the human world: Snips and Snails. She managed a faint smile at that, but kept eating in silence even as they sat down.

"Nice work on the front, Sunset Shimmer." Snails offered, his voice slurring ever so slightly with his praise. At the very least, he was straightforward, and he was fairly good at breaking the ice.

Sunset Shimmer sighed. "Thanks." She looked up to the rest of the students mingling. "But I still have to make things right for the rest of them."

"Oh c'mon." Snips cut in. "You fixed all the damage you caused, what more do you want?"

"It isn't the same." Sunset insited, her hand coming down on the table a little harder than she would have liked. "I fixed one day - no, twenty minutes of damage. What about the last two and a half years?"

Snips had nothing to say to that. Snails rarely had anything to say anyway, and that was no exception. The voice that did have something to say caught her off guard, and she nearly slid right out of her chair in alarm. "Then y'all'd best get to workin' on it."

"Applejack?" Sunset blinked, turning her head to look at the junior cowgirl. "What are you doing here?"

Applejack shrugged, taking a seat; Sunset Shimmer noticed she didn't have a food tray with her. "Pinkie Pie says y'all've been lookin' broody all day, said someone aughtta try talkin' to ya."

Snips and Snails exchanged a look; Sunset Shimmer nearly came out of her chair again, but was quickly put back in her place. "You done wrong, Sunset Shimmer. Just 'cause the school's fixed up dun't mean y'all're makin' things right."

Sunset nodded, taking it all in with a sigh. "But how do I-" She started, but Applejack was already on her way back to her friends. Almost comically and with a resounding thud, Sunset's forehead crashed to the table in front of her.

* * * * *

The rest of Monday didn't manage to merit any mention; the daily monotony was, to put it simply, entirely routine. Tuesday wasn't any better, but in between classes, she bumped into Rainbow Dash, who seemed altogether in the sort of hurry that demanded quick moving, but she did manage to stop and see who it was she nearly ran over. The pale blue junior frowned once she saw who it was, but came down to help Sunset gather up her dropped books anyway.

"Thanks," Sunset offered meekly, pulling the books and a handful of notes close to her chest as she stood up. "I umm..."

"Don't wanna hear it." Rainbow interrupted her, subsequently ignoring Sunset's groan of protest. "I bumped into you, I helped you get your stuff back together. As far as that goes, we're even."

Sunset blinked. "But-"

"Nuh-uh." Rainbow Dash shook her head. "You've still got a lot to make up for if you think you're gonna get away with the past two years."

"But Twilight said-"

"Twilight Sparkle..." Rainbow began, every word deliberate, "-said my friends and me could teach you about friendship, and I'm gonna teach you that if you want to make friends, you gotta be able to make all that mess up to 'em."

Sunset Shimmer grimaced. Sensing that she had gotten the point, Rainbow Dash turned and kept on down the hallway.

* * * * *

Another night of the same nightmare later, and Sunset awoke to find herself violently ill. The nightmares had not gotten worse by any means, but after most of a week with her only rest driving the point home of how horrible she had been, she couldn't take any more, and the stress was coming off poorly for her health. There was no way she could take to going to school after starting the day off as wretched as it was. Instead, she decided to get her laptop and look over a collection of notes she had retained from her studies in Equestria. Of the Elements of Harmony, of Princess Celestia's personal history, of magic in general. Trying to remember when life was not entirely about her cruelty and manipulation.

She didn't know how long she sat there reminiscing over her old life as a private student of Princess Celestia's, but her reverie was cut by the sound of her doorbell - which, she noted, was the first time she had ever heard a doorbell in that world. She nearly fell out of bed.

Standing at the doorway was Fluttershy, her face half-hidden behind a curtain of bright pink hair and she gave the slightest squeak as Sunset opened the door, as if just seeing her had somehow frightened the most kindhearted girl in the entire school. Sunset didn't know what to think; there was no way Fluttershy could have known where she lived...

"Oh, good." Fluttershy said, her voice barely above a whisper and her posture and expression clashing obtrusively with any belief of anything good going on. "You're okay."

"Um... yeah. I woke up sick. It was bad, but nothing too serious. How did you..."

Fluttershy squeaked again, backing away a little. Sunset cut herself off and leaned against her doorframe. "The others were worried, so I thought maybe I should see if you were okay. Uhm... I'll be going now." Fluttershy nodded, already turning to leave.

"Fluttershy, wait!" Sunset called after her, but she was too late, and frankly she didn't have the energy in her to chase the softspoken girl any further than her porch.

* * * * *

Thursday proved to be the best day of the week so far. Sunset Shimmer went out of her way before school even started to seek out Principal Celestia to investigate a suspicion. It had always seemed to her that she was a lot like Princess Celestia, for as similar as someone could get to resembling a magical princess from Equestria without having any semblance of magic. What prompted her to seek her out however, was a recollection of pony mythology - specifically, the Mare in the Moon. If Celestia could be so similar, and she was in fact Vice Principal Luna's older sister, then it stood to reason that something had happened between them, and they had still gotten along after the fact. It was a ridiculous gamble, but Sunset Shimmer needed to have some knowledge on where she could start. Instead, she only confirmed a sense of sibling rivalry stemming from being born ten years apart.

Resigned yet again, Sunset Shimmer went about the rest of her day as she normally would have, keeping the day before's encounter with Fluttershy and the resulting questions it raised top in her mind.

"Sunset Shimmer!" The voice was a high-pitched one, behind which was an easily recognizeable junior student with an arguable addiction to sugar. As Pinkie Pie skipped up to her, she stopped with a wide smile. "How've you been?"

Sunset was dubious, but the ecstatic energy that seemed to simply ripple off of Pinkie Pie managed to prompt a small, sheepish smile. The wave of awkward and embarrassing relief made her feel somewhat empathetic for Fluttershy, almost spontaneously; she seemed much like the same, except all the time. "I've... been..." Sunset started. "...Having problems." She admitted.

"Well of course you have, silly!" Pinkie giggled, giving Sunset Shimmer a noogie that was neither called for nor exactly comfortable, but it was still a more friendly gesture than she had gotten from anyone else so far. "You're still living in the past and being all wishy washy about all the stuff that happened then!"

"How can't I?" Sunset Shimmer retorted, sweeping her hand out to the rest of the school. "It's not like I can take back two and a half years of what I did."

"Nnnnnope!" Pinkie Pie agreed, giving a little bounce. "But you're just looking at it alllll wrong. You've gotta take your eyes away from behind you and put them back in the front of your head, where they belong!"

Sunset could only imagine she meant to say 'stop dwelling in the past', but there was one thing she knew Pinkie Pie was not, and that was 'ordinary'.

"If you can't fix the past, you've just got to make the future better!" Pinkie went on. "Like pie! If there's nothing you can do to fix it, you can still make it better!"

"Wha-?"

"Not the pie, silly." Pinkie Pie scolded, Sunset's question not even started to leave her mouth. "Well, yes the pie. You can't make the pie better, but you can add more good stuff to it."

"But-"

"Then it'll be good pie with good stuff with it! Like ice cream and whipped cream and strawberries and powdered sugar and-"

"I think I get it." Sunset interrupted her, putting a hand on the bubbly student's shoulder to keep her from gushing any more. "And, thanks, Pinkie."

"Oh, don't thank me now." Pinkie Pie giggled. "You can thank me when it pays off!" But with that, she skipped away, leaving Sunset Shimmer feeling as if she had been given the missing puzzle piece in a still-unsolved puzzle.

* * * * *

"Well, I guess that makes it your turn." Sunset Shimmer approached Rarity, who appeared to be waiting for her Friday on her way to lunch.

"Whatever gave you that idea, darling?" Rarity questioned, prompting a raised eyebrow. "Have you been looking in on what we've been doing?"

"Huh? No..."

"Well, it turns out you're right. I was waiting for you." Rarity announced, right as an announcement came over the intercom from Principal Celestia.

"Good afternoon students, and happy Friday. I just wanted to remind everyone that the secret santa exchange will be starting today, and going on through next week. If you want to participate, just take a name from the wreath hanging in the cafeteria. That is all."

Rarity looked dour at the news, but she quickly brightened up and zipped into the cafeteria, coming back with a dozen named sheets in her hands - four of which Sunset Shimmer recognized as each of her closest friends in the school. "Now, where was I?" Rarity smiled.

"About to begin, I think." Sunset blinked, amazed by the tenacity with which Rarity elected to freely participate.

"Well, I'm certain by now you've noticed we've each been keeping an eye out for you like we promised." Rarity began. At Sunset Shimmer's nod, she continued. "And we each want to help, but what you don't seem to realize is that you're not going to get anything done by sitting and crying in a corner all day."

"What?" Sunset stammered, taking a step back. "I haven't -"

"Of course not, darling. It's just a figure of speech." Rarity smiled beautifully, leaving Sunset Shimmer feeling, yet again, impossibly humbled. "But if you want to make a difference for the better, you can't just expect someone to give better to you, either."

Sunset said nothing. Rarity took the hint, smiled again and stepped into the cafeteria. "Now come on darling. You don't want to miss lunch. That's a poor way to recover from a sick day."

As Sunset Shimmer stepped in, she noticed only two names still hung on the wreath spanning the east wall of the cafeteria; her own, and Rarity's. Neither were a surprise; no one wanted to give the school's mascot of fear anything on top of her reputation for demands, and no one had anything to give - nor the means to get anything to give - that would meet Rarity's standards of a gift.

Peeking over her shoulder to ensure Rarity wasn't looking, Sunset reached up and pulled the junior beauty's name from the wreath. An idea was quickly forming in her mind, as if the puzzle she imagined from the day before had just been pieced together at the edges to make its frame. Now she needed to act on it, to fill in the space in between.