The Sunbutt Has Been Doubled!

Getting out of school after this horrible day was the easy part. Luckily, Sola's popularity made it easy to slip out of the doors at the end of the day fairly unnoticed, aside from a few goodbyes and hugs and whatnot. Sunset's main question was if she was really using magic to draw all these people into her, and if so, it obviously did not work on those who could posses magic themselves. At least, strong magic.

Come to think of it, Sunset had not seen Rainbow Dash or the others at any time today besides lunch and the few classes she had with one or even two of the girls. They seemed to be unfazed by Sola's magic, if she was using any, but if not, they just had more sense than the other students here. The possibility of her using magic was really high, because even the Dazzlings were unfazed by her allure.

Sirens and allure. Those two words fit together a bit too well. Sunset had done her studies on mythology as well.

She got to the outside of the school where the three Siren girls were already waiting for her. She at first was a bit startled, then unsure as to what to do, still traumatized from what Sola did to her earlier. She hid her arms behind her back in an attempt to look cute, pinched her arm to drive the negative thoughts away, and put on a big smile.

As she suspected, Sonata smiled right back. "Sunset Shimmer, you're just adorable!"

That was highly unexpected.

"Uh... hi girls! Ready to head back to my place?" Sunset began, maintaining the smile she had plastered onto her expression. "We can head back now!... if..."

"Quiet," Adagio quickly demanded of her, then closing her open palm to symbolize a shutting mouth. "We're listening in on any after school noise. Who knows if or when a fight could break out, 'cause you know that spells a good meal for us Sirens." Adagio gave her trademark evil smirk, but Sunset beat it down with a simple question:

"Why?"

The big-haired Siren turned quickly to Sunset, who blushed and began stammering like a child caught in an act. "What did you just say to me?" she questioned her in a growling tone.

Sunset caught herself before she went too far in backing away from Adagio, holding her arms up to her chest to almost shield herself from any onslaught of Adagio's incoming wrath. "I was only asking why you Sirens' only eat negative feelings. Can you not eat other things?"

Sonata squealed with excitement and rose her hand to speak. "Ooo! Dagi! Can I tell Sunny about that one time where I raided a taco place and ate all the tacos? All the tacos?!"

"No," Adagio replied coldly, shutting down Sonata's enthusiasm and rendering her blue and embarrassed. Turning again to Sunset, Adagio began her explanation to the girl's prior question,

"That's how it's been for a thousand years, and that's how it'll be for the next thousand years. It's never changed and it won't now... well, for Aria and I, that is. Who knows what's going on in Sonata's head on this matter."

Sonata appeared to be chasing a butterfly and trying to catch it.

"To be honest, as fun as she is to have around at times, she can be a real pain when it comes time to do as Sirens do. She's grown too accustomed to this world and its ways."

Sunset exhaled deeply in a sigh and looked down to the ground and rock below, kicking a small rock into a crowd of slightly bigger rocks. "But..." she said lowly, "if your meal does not come, do you go hungry for the day?"

"Well, yeah, of course," Adagio replied, crossing her arms and leaning on the wall of the building. "There's nothing like a good taste of discord, y'know?"

Sunset shook her head at that. "No, I don't know. I don't know at all." She then looked to Sonata, who had failed trying to catch the butterfly and had grown slightly sad. She wondered if Sonata felt like an outsider to her Siren sisters, if they really appreciated her like they should have. If they did at all. She felt a deep empty sorrow for whatever despair Sonata held within her being. On the outside she was chasing that butterfly, but on the inside she was chasing the love and appreciation of her Siren sisters.

This gave her an idea.

Aria sighed with frustration. "Another night of starving half to death, I guess. Let's just head back with Sunset--"

"Wait!... You don't have to starve," Sunset finally said with a wave of sudden enthusiasm. "I know exactly where we could go and you can still enjoy a good meal the way you like it, as well as trying something new!"

"That's sounding dumb already, like anything you say can ever sound smart," Aria remarked, receiving a hand on the shoulder by Adagio, whose look told her at least give it a try. Aria blushed and groaned like an angry teenager going grocery shopping on a Saturday morning would. "Fine," she murmured.

"Okay girls! Let's go now!" Sunset exclaimed to them. "Hopefully, I have enough money for all four of us..." Then she let out a nervous chuckle and began sweating at the forehead. Sweet Celestia, please let me have enough money.

Sonata looked up in awe at the tall red letters spelling Chinese words which she knew she could not read for the life of her even if she tried. The building itself was almost shaped like a takeout noodle box with a red dragon design stretching down for the dragon's open mouth to be used as a door.

Aria looked as if she were about to puke and merely shook her head in shame. "Is this the best you can do, Sunset Shimmer?"

Adagio looked rather unimpressed. "Oh well, regardless of how repulsive this place looks, she promised us a good meal that we can surely enjoy. I say we trust her on this and simply follow her footsteps. We want to become good friends, don't we?" She took Sunset's hand and looked to her in a seductive fashion, fitting action for the Siren which she was.

Sunset blushed and smiled. She's being too nice for this to be true, this is all an act, Sunset thought, giving in to holding hands with Adagio as they walked in. The tables were red, wooden, and rather close to the ground, dining area was full of paintings of various scenes in nature and of the gods which controlled them, and the bathroom was right behind the farthest seat in the building. The ordering room, conveniently placed next to the entrance, had a colorful menu of Chinese and far east Asian cuisines which could only be ordered from here if one wanted it done in a quality that would rival the taste of food originally from far east Asia. Of course, the Sirens were far too confused and uninterested, save for Sonata, to even begin to fathom ordering anything from this seemingly repulsive menu.

A small quarrel between two siblings broke out; and immediately the Sirens began listening in.

"No fair!" the youngest sibling, a boy who appeared rather feminine in the face, cried out to his older sister, who was pushing him back from a fortune cookie she held opened in her free hand. "That one was mine! You're stealing all my luck!"

"Too bad," the sister said with a giggle, reading from the fortune, "Sometimes the ones who seem the worst to you are the ones you can find yourself to love the most." She stuck her tongue out at the paper and crumpled it up, putting it in the shirt of her younger sibling. "Ew, you can have it."

"Th-that's not nice!" he cried, reaching into his shirt and pulling out the fortune, holding it close to him. He looked almost as if he were about to cry. "If... if only that fortune were true..."

Adagio saw the quarrel between them and felt a strange feeling within her chest. A sinking feeling, almost like she were drowning under a sudden wave of pressure she could not shake off of herself. She sighed it off and shook her head, beginning to think a bit deeply about this situation she was currently in. The thoughts confused her and drove her into a submission she never knew she could have. She was mainly questioning herself on as to what she felt submissive for.

"Feeding off of small quarrels, I see?" Sunset said, turning her head around to see the sirens drawn completely in to the quarrel like fish hooked on a line. They had not even heard what she had said to them.

Adagio caught herself from the trance she was in and sighed deeply, placing a hand upon her chest, feeling the area where the gem used to be.

"It's just not the same without it," she said in a melancholic tone. She turned to Sunset, only to see her ordering the food, then she turned to her Siren siblings and led them to a table to sit down, sulking over memories of the past. How easy it was to get a hold of disharmony themselves. But now, it was like having to have to be served. The meals had to come to them, and if one did not, they could not eat.

Sonata exhaled deeply upon taking her seat, and she leaned over the table to lie upon it. "Adagio... will we ever get back to Equestria? If these humans call it homesickness, then I think I got the worst case of it, eh..."

Aria groaned. "For once, Sonata's right... well...." she tried to say something, but was too hardened to do so. She uncrossed her arms and leaned back, one arm over the back of the chair so she could watch Sunset order the food and talk to the man whom was working with her order. "Hey, girls... I say we ditch her. I'm not liking this plan of hers, at all. You really aren't considering becoming friends with this dumb bimbo, are you?"

Adagio sighed and looked down to the colorful, swirling designs of the carpet below her feet. "I... I was, actually... No, I am."

Aria gasped. Sonata kind of squealed.

"Look, I was bent on betraying her in any way possible, actually. I hated the idea, I swear to you I did. But,--" Adagio blushed and bit her bottom lip a bit. Her eyes almost seemed to flutter. She then stopped herself and cleared her current posture, straightening herself and blushing even harder. "I'm more concerned about us finding any way to get us home. If it means becoming friends with her, then I'll do it."

Aria slammed her hands on the table in raving anger. "What the *hell*** do you mean, Adagio?!"

"Aria, quiet yourself!" Adagio shouted back at her, calming herself down and getting Aria to settle down as well. "Look, if we become friends with Sunset and actually learn something from this horrible experience, then we get to go back to Equestria, right? Sunset's a pro at making friends by now, so she can tell if someone is faking it, I'm sure. You forget she's an Equestrian like us. Odds are she already knew of our plan to betray her in like, some damn Judas scenario. When we go back, we can't continue living the life we had, we simply can't."

"And why is that? Why can't we?!" Aria cried, her looks of anger and aggression turned into ones now full of fear and defense. "Wh-Why do we have to change our lives for her? What are we getting out of this?"

Sonata looked to Aria, tears slightly building in her eyes. "Aria!" she whimpered, placing a hand on Aria's shoulder in an attempt to comfort her. Being a Siren, she could feel deep into Aria's being; she felt a hard exterior of anger and wrath, but upon digging deep into Aria, she began to feel nothing but sadness and a thirst, the same thirst, that homesickness which Sonata herself said to have had. She felt the same feeling in Aria.

Aria slapped Sonata's hand away, shouting loudly at her, "Hands off, you idiot!"

That was when people began leaving.

"Girls, stop that!" Adagio commanded them, trying to separate the two before Aria had the mind to lay her hands on Sonata in any attempt to harm her.

Aria pushed Adagio's hands away and rose her fist at her, about to punch her in the face, but Sunset sat the plates of food by each and every one of them. The aroma of rice and the sweet and sour sauce from Aria's plate, then the barbecue sauce from Adagio's plate, then the soy sauce from Sonata's. All three were pleased to see a meal before their eyes: rice and barbecue chicken for Adagio with a side of egg rolls and broccoli; rice smothered in soy sauce and shrimp for Sonata with a side of broccoli and cooked sliced carrots; rice smothered in sweet and sour sauce and thin slices of steak with light bbq sauce, being overpowered by the sweet and sour sauce. And of course, with a side of broccoli.

This presentation of food was enough to get them to stop and marvel at the beauty before them. At least in this new world they needed not to fear about eating meat. Apparently, Sunset was still a vegetarian, as no meat was on her plate of rice, broccoli, and egg rolls whatsoever.

"That quieted you, didn't it, eh?" Sunset chuckled, taking her seat. She looked around at the rest of the restaurant around them and noticed it was completely empty, save for the remaining four of them and the workers. "Nice job, scaring everyone off like that. You girls must have put a lot of effort into the performance of yours. Either you were really arguing, or you just wanted some alone time with me." She laughed after saying that, showing it was merely a lighthearted joke.

Sonata giggled, of course she would be the first to do so, ready to take the chopsticks and dig in, despite not knowing how to at all. She even held them improperly, trying to get one of the shrimps from her plate into her mouth, but wad unable to firmly capture it with the eating utensils. "Ugh, this is too hard!" she groaned, throwing the chopsticks down on the table. She crossed her arms and pouted like a three year old, blushing heavily while she did so. "I just wanted a shrimpy..."

"Aria," Sunset said to the siren sitting directly in front of her at this table. "Look... I know you want things to go back to the way they were, but I'm sorry to say that was well over a thousand years ago. Things in Equestria aren't like they used to be, y'know? Things have changed, demon beasts released, the whole place has gotten used to beasts and having to deal with them. Especially in Twilight and the others' case." She took Aria's hand with her own. "Don't you see? I can't send you girls back in the state you're currently in. I don't want anything to happen to you if you try to plan another strike. There may be far worse consequences than banishment this time. You could be sent to the moon, imprisoned in stone, disintegrated, blasted off into the distance, sent to Tartarus, trapped within a labyrinth! I couldn't live with myself knowing I could have done something, anything I could have to prevent that from happening."

Aria caught what Sunset was saying. She turned to her with a look of burning wrath. "Are you saying I'm weak? Do you think that us Sirens are too weak to defend ourselves?!"

"Aria, no!" Sunset tried to tell her, but Aria stood up and stormed out of the building. Sonata almost got up to stop her, but Adagio halted her.

"I'm afraid we can't do anything at this point," Adagio told her, getting her to sit back down. "Let's just let her be and try to enjoy this meal, I suppose--"

Sunset ran after her as quickly as possible. Aria caught sight of Sunset coming for her, and she began running away. Sunset, not being blinded by anger like Aria was, found that she could possibly catch her in a short amount of time. Running down the sidewalk of a busy street, Aria scanned for anything she could use to her advantage, and she knocked over a garbage can in an attempt to slow Sunset down. The girl merely hopped over the obstacle.

"Athletic, aren't ya?!" Aria screamed, cutting off into a dark alley and continuing to run, but Sunset was still hot on her tail. "Dammit girl! Hop off!"

Aria found herself in the middle of a street, with cars speeding straight for her, unable to stop in time, only able to honk their horns and avert their direction to at least dodge the girl in their way. She stood there, ready to accept her fate, finding it more of a suiting end than befriending a pony and losing a past which she worked so hard to preserve. She saw it as a trophy she'd work till the end for, to obtain the past life of being a true siren, living in Equestria and causing great disharmony with her sisters. What would a life alone in this human world bring for her? She could only see a blanket in death, to cover herself in with this cold world. She was ready for it to end.

"You wanna bring me back? Over my dead body," Aria muttered under her breath, ready for those to be her last words, until Sunset tackled her out of the way and managed to push her and herself out of the incoming traffic, sparing them both from what would have been a messy scene on the streets, accidents and only more death and destruction.

Sunset pinned Aria down by the arms, but the siren got one arm free and smacked Sunset in her face. Sunset merely turned the other cheek.

"There! Are you happy now?!" Sunset screamed at her, bringing her other cheek closer to Aria. "Don't you want something to hit? Huh?! Bringing her fist up to your own sister, and all you can do is slap me? Go ahead! I've got my other cheek to you, why don't you hit that one too?!"

"St-stop! Stop yelling at me!" Aria screamed, closing her eyes and losing the will to keep her hands up any longer, letting it fall to her face in her sorry attempt to cover it.

"I know you want things to go back to the way they were, Aria," Sunset said, realizing that she too wanted that very same thing this morning, "but you have to see that times have changed, Equestria has changed! Those ponies aren't the same ones you were dealing with a thousand years ago! You can not waltz into that world, cause mayhem, and think you'll get away with no consequence! That didn't work then with Star Swirl, and it sure as hell won't work now!"

She noticed that Aria had begun crying.

"Don't you think I know that?!" Aria screamed at her, escaping from Sunset, only to fall to her knees then curl up in the fetal position. "I... I just didn't want to go it all alone... I don't want to change, because there's no way anyone will want to be friends with us after what we've done. You don't understand how it is! When they see me, all they'll see is a demonic siren! They'll look at our cunning Adagio, that adorable Sonata, and the hot-headed Aria, and all they'll see are monsters... that's all we are to them. So I said fuck it! I'll just get my power back in Equestria, find another gem, and with my sisters we'll show them that these monsters aren't anything to be taken lightly!"

Sunset rubbed Aria's shoulder, then down her back, getting her to calm herself. "I've been down that same road, Aria," the girl said, almost with a giggle. "You remind me so much of myself not too long ago... back during the Fall Formal, I too became something horrible... something I could have refused to become. A she-demon... I'd look in the mirror, and that'd be all I saw. Regardless of how much redemption I'd receive, I thought that deep down on the inside, I'd still be seen as that horrible, ugly demon... and not even as a real girl anymore..."

Aria sat up and wiped her tears away. "Easy for you to say... you became a demon... I was born one."

There was a long silence between them. The cars drove past, and the sun was steadily getting lower and lower. Sunset could only imagine what Adagio and Sonata were doing alone right now. Maybe wondering where they were? Wondering what had happened? If they'd ever come back? Sunset did not want them to worry about their sister either.

Sunset sighed, about to stand up so she could help Aria do the same, but the silent Aria embraced her tightly. She began crying loudly into Sunset's chest and burying her face deeper into her jacket and shirt. Sunset was taken by surprise, but then simply sighed and hugged her back.

"Aria, you said that I was implying you weren't strong enough," Sunset said calmly, stroking her hair and her back. "But... finally coming to terms with having to change something for the better is one of the strongest things anyone can do... I don't see you as a demon, Aria... I see you as a friend. Those Sirens you ran from, they see you as sisters... I don't want you to lose any of that..."

Aria still could not find anything within herself to say. She simply continued letting it all out, letting her past go, letting that image of her being a helpless demon burn away with the flames of time. She wanted to give it a try. She truly wanted redemption.

to be continued