"Another night..." - Prolouge
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"...Not a mother-truckin' wiiiink..." Sunset whined, expelling a loopy side of her she only lets out rarely through a day. She tapped the screen of the blaring phone, blasting out an annoying alarm before silencing. She hadn't slept for three days straight now, and her phone just oh so proudly announced that it was six again, and time for her to start up her weekday.
Sunset held a clockwork morning, despite her erratic nights. By six, her phone sounds off and she rolls out of bed, still mostly dressed from the day before, onto the floor of a dusty bedroom. The sun would be either barely up or barely down, casting yellow and blue shadows accordingly. By six-o'-five, after shortly rummaging for her boots (despite the fact that she rarely put them anywhere besides next to her bed), she's in her dingy bathroom, inspecting the dark patches under her eyes.
Today, she looked like she had been socked with a crowbar in each.
She'd cover her sullen face in cheap, but effective, makeup, smearing a bargain brand that hit it's one-in-a-hundred chance of working under her eyes, across her nose, and around her cheeks. She does well, falling into a rhythm formed through months and finishing at six-ten.
Then, she's out the door, passing by and through alleys of slummy buildings with her bag over her back. Sometimes a knife in her jacket; Canterlot had a dark side that Sunset had no interest in falling more victim to than she already has.
Sunset sighed. It was darker today and the air was cold. That meant that the school itself was going to be blazing with the heaters on full-throttle. It wasn't going to be easy to focus today. Yesterday, she told herself to take a break from tormenting the school for just then, but it looked like she'll have to muddle through another day looking like she's losing her touch.
Which she wasn't.
Sunset walked down the street...
...her hands in the pockets of an old sweatshirt. The gray jumper came with the apartment, hung up in a forgotten closet next to mostly empty hangers. Perhaps she had to shake out the spider corpses the first time, but besides that, it was... functional. The sleeves were worn around the edges and faded along the underside, and the neck was ripped down the middle. The material itself was ever-so-slightly itchy on warmer occasions, granting a scratch during milder seasons every so often.
On colder night walks, however, it was better than any thin shirt or barely-lined leather jacket.
It was probably twenty outside, the moon seeming to suck out the warmth the sun left during the day. When she sighed into the cold, the air wisped into a column of steam, floating away with the slight wind. Sunset thought of dragons from home and their smoke, wisping like her own breath off into the sky. A small ping bounced around her stomach. Home was a long ways away, and she felt every mile of the distance in her head, every day...
...Every night...
There were plenty of neon signs along the road, but Sunset finally came along her big blue 'X' marking the spot: A shoddy 'OPEN' sign in the window of her "favorite" store, Junky Jack. In all honesty, it was her best choice for only the relative deals and varying products. It was obviously somewhat of a hail-mary pitstop for rushed drivers who missed the last substantial market. Either way, it was close to her flat and had five-dollar deals on twenty packs of diet cola. Good enough for her.
Bing Beep
Sunset broke the door sensor's beam as she pushed into the single room of a store. Junky jack wasn't exactly the most high-end super in town, but it was used enough to keep it afloat. Skuff marks littered the isle floors, small dips in the cheap tile every so often, and small unkempt repair jobs showed that while it wasn't thriving, it was working.
Once, Sunset met the manager, a laid-back, jolly thirty-year-old. She liked him fine, and once he picked up that she basically visited every evening or so, the two started talking. Every time she sees a small dirty puddle or the likes, she always hears the man; "Hey, at least the place is being used enough to run it down."
Sunset smirked as she made her way to the side, off where the counter sat. The guy was the closest thing she got to a friend in her time around Canterlot. Her face dropped like the lead ball in her stomach, though, once she saw the new cashier.
"God damn it."
Sunset was decently well versed in the more colorful aspects of human language, and she was glad when she heard the voice of Lightning Dust breathing out seven different curses as she scampered towards the back room. Sunset didn't bother calling out. It was too late, both in the sense of her would-be clerk out of earshot behind the thick office door, as well as the time.
So she waited.
For about fifteen minutes.
She needed that soda.
"Why didn't you tell me!?" Lightning Dust was yelling at her newer manager, a young man not much older than her named Wright.
"What? What's happening?" Wright was looking through a couple papers on a stolen school desk before his new employe started ranting about some "demon girl".
"Sunset. Shimmer. Is out there!" Lightning was leaning into his face by now. Wright just blinked.
"...Okay. Did she, what, ask for me or something? What's the deal?"
Lightning's eye twitched. "Y-you... You. Know her? You don't hate her!? But everyone hates her! She hates everyone! She- she's probably stealing stuff, like right now! 'Cause she-"
"Wooaah. Did you see her steal something?"
"Well, no, but-"
"So you're just assuming she's stealing."
"Ye-!"
"That's kinda mean, Dusty."
"B-!"
"How would your mother react?" Wright was suppressing a devilish grin. "Assuming something of someone like that. That kind of stuff leads to racism."
"I-"
"I don't condone that. You're fired. Grab a slushie on your way out, if you want."
The room was quiet.
"Ok, but seriously, just get her soda. It's Thursday, so it's soda day. She should be nice enough."
