The sun was already setting when Sunset Shimmer made it home that day. It had felt like a long last day of school, but she was glad to finally be done with all that studying and for lack of a better word, bullying.

She was trying. She was honestly trying to right all the wrongs she had done in her last few years in this world. She didn’t blame the others for doubting her change, but it still hurt.

She was sorry. How much more sorry did they want her to be?

Dropping her soaking bag by her door, Sunset walked up the stairs, leaving wet footprints all over the floor, which she would have to clean up later. She began removing her still drenched clothes and dropping them impassively on the floor on her way to her room, glad to finally be out of them.

Trixie and her goonies had caught her off guard on her way out of school that day. Sunset had emerged out through CHS’ front doors when a giant water balloon the size of a small car was dropped on her. It burst with an almighty splash, sending her tumbling down the steps until she was on her bottom, not even sure what had just happened.

After that, Lavender Lace and Fuschia blush had restrained her as Trixie tried to slap the confession from her that she was kidnapping and killing the missing kids.

Sunset rubbed at her sore right cheek. “I may have been bad, but I wasn’t that bad…”

Entering her room, Sunset dragged herself over to her cupboard and grabbed a fresh towel, giving herself a wipe down. Did she deserve everything that was happening to her?

Yeah, I probably do…

She’d done some terrible things in her quest for power, like splitting Twilight Sparkle’s friends apart. To think that they were the only people in school who accepted her after she tried to take over CHS…

As the sun began to get lower and lower, shadows began to grow longer across Sunset’s room. The girl shivered, and it wasn’t from her lack of clothing. She had never once enjoyed the sight of shadows in the corner. It always felt as though someone was sitting there, watching, waiting for a time to strike. This was probably part of when she was the backstabbing power hungry witch she was, always thinking someone was about to kick her off the top, but it seemed to carry over even now. Walking to her wall, Sunset flicked the light switch on, bathing her room in a bright white light and banishing the shadows.

With a sigh of relief, Sunset went back to toweling herself dry, resuming with her hair. Now she knew what it felt like to be teased and bullied. She had never considered the welfare of others in her quest for power, but since Twilight Sparkle had defeated her, she now knew true power didn’t lie in strength. True power came from friendship. Unfortunately, making friends wasn’t all that easy, seeing as no one but Twilight’s friends made the effort to do so.

“Oh, Sunset. You’re in a pickle, aren’t you?” she said to herself.

At least now with summer rolled around, she had some time to herself. Some time to ponder on her actions and perhaps also time to figure out how to win back the trust of Canterlot High’s student body.

That suddenly made her think of Flash Sentry, her ex-boyfriend. She’d targeted him as her boyfriend a year ago because of his popularity and his looks, but he’d left her once he found out how big of a bully she was. For some reason, he too wasn’t teasing her like most of the other students, but not like he really talked to her either. Perhaps he was still sour that she had used him, but didn’t want to join in with the rest of the bullying.

She was busy wallowing in her own self pity when her lights suddenly went out. Sunset froze for a few seconds as darkness enveloped her vision. Thankfully, the sky outside was still orange, and managed to cast some light in, but the shadows along her wall had grown longer, creeping closer to her.

Sunset Shimmer rushed to her light switch and flicked it down, then back up. The lights didn’t come back on.

“Great, is this a power trip?” Sunset walked to her window and looked out. Her neighbours still had their lights on. “Huh.”

Then a worse thought came into her head. What if this was a prank by Trixie or one of the students to get back at her? That sent a shiver down her spine. What if they had set up cameras in her home to record her reaction?

Sunset clutched her towel to her body and blushed. She hadn’t been wearing anything for some time now. If videos of her naked body got out, it would certainly be disastrous.

Sunset walked around her room, discreetly trying to find out where the cameras were. With the shadows getting longer as the sun got lower, it didn’t help to make Sunset feel less paranoid. What if someone was hiding in her room already, waiting for the right time to strike? What if-

“Sunset…”

Sunset bolted upright and caught movement in the corner of her eye. For a while, she didn’t dare to look at it. But she soon forced her head to turn to her left, but when she focused her vision in the corner of her room, there was no one there.

She let out a sigh of relief and even laughed to herself. “Silly girl. It’s just the shadows… Just the shadows…”

There was a reason shadows scared her, and it was scares like this that made her wary of them. But then there was that voice. Someone had called her name. Or had she imagined it?

Suddenly, cast against her wall in the direction she was facing, Sunset saw a long skinny arm emerge from behind her, rising higher and higher, its fingers hovering over her shadow’s head. This couldn’t be a trick of her eyes.

Sunset shrieked and turned around, but there was no one behind her. She flipped her head back to the wall, but the shadow of the arm was also gone.

“I’m hysterical. That has to be it. I’m just tired after a long day and people are still trying to teach me a lesson. Yes, that must be it.”

“Sunset shimmerrr…”

The raspy voice came again, this time almost like a whisper right beside her ear.

Sunset jumped and spun about, looking all over her room, her eyes darting back and forth. They settled on the wall when the shadow of the arm rose from the shadow of her bedpost, reaching for her again.

“No!” Sunset turned and scuttled back.

There was still nothing behind her, but this time, the shadow of the arm didn’t disappear. It was still there, reaching for her, though Sunset couldn’t see anything that would cast that shadow.

A second arm shot out from her desk’s shadow, inching towards her from the opposite direction. Then from the shadow that her window frames cast, more arms emerged, attached to some kind of bulbous growth that looked almost like the shape of a head.

“Sunset Shimmeerrrr…”

One of the arms grabbed her shadow’s neck, and Sunset immediately felt something cold and icy pressing down around her own neck, unable to breathe. Another grabbed her right arm, which was pulled away from her neck by an unseen force.

“N-No… Th-this isn’t…” Sunset croaked, trying to free herself.

All around her, the shadows of the setting sun crept closer and closer, conjuring up more shades of evil, populating her room with creatures imaginable by the mere human.

The hand around her neck unclenched from her neck and grabbed her other arm instead, holding her in place as she gagged and coughed, breathing in as deeply as she could to regain her lost oxygen.

“Light…” Sunset gasped. “Gotta get to the light!”

Sunset looked to the switch on her wall. She didn’t know if flicking it would help, but she didn’t have any other options. She had to try, but there were so many shadow creatures all over her room. Her heart was hammering in her chest and she struggled to draw breath. The shadows were closing in on her body and she felt as though she couldn’t get enough air. A shadow creature loomed over Sunset, its mouth cracked open in a hungry grin, revealing teeth that looked like spikes in the shadows on the wall.

“Oh, Faust, no! Noooo! Please, stop!” Sunset shrieked.

Sunset struggled, against her unseen attackers, but she could not break free.

“Fear… I can taste it…”

Before her, instead of the shadowy figure with fangs, it was now a clown. A physical, real clown. It held out a red ball to her and grinned.

“Why fight it, Sunset Shimmer?” he said. “Take the ball. Come join me. We all bounce. You can bounce too.”

“N-No, nooo!” Sunset screamed and yelled, trying to get free. “Help! Help!”

It couldn’t be real. None of this was real. Sunset watched with horror as the clown’s teeth became sharp, like that of the shadow earlier. Dream. It must all be a dream! Please, wake up!

“That’s right… Fear… Oh, sweet fear…” The clown opened its mouth bigger and bigger until even the sides of his face split open, dripping blood down his painted white face.

Sunset screamed again and closed her eyes, waiting for the inevitable. Then there was a sudden click and the shadowy arms around her had disappeared, allowing them to drop down to her sides.

“W-What?” Sunset cracked her eyes open, flinching as they were greeted by white light. She soon began to open them again, slowly this time.

Her power had returned. Somehow her power had returned!

Sunset ran her hands all along her body, almost not believing she was alright. The shadow creatures all around her had all vanished, including the frightening clown that had been about to eat her.

“I’m alive… I’m alive!” Sunset began to laugh, but that laugh soon turned into a cry of relief. She really thought she was going to die, but electricity returning to her home had saved her in the nick of time. She didn’t know if it was dumb luck or if someone had intervened, but she was too relieved right now to put too much thought into it.

Lying down on her side, Sunset covered her face and let her tears flow, not bothering about the expanding pool of warm liquid that wasn’t coming from her face.

She was just glad she was alive.

The moon was high in the sky when Flash Sentry parked his car outside his home. It had been quite the eventful day since meeting the girls outside in the pharmacy. He had readily volunteered to send Rarity back, with Fluttershy coming along just in case.

Rarity had been babbling on and on about ooze coming into her boutique from outside and then chasing her out, but other than that, it hadn’t been particularly clear what she was trying to tell them.

After arriving at her place, the three of them had a look around, trying to find the cause of the ooze, but other than a few scorch marks on the carpeted floor, there hadn’t been anything else that looked out of the ordinary.

After making sure everything was as it is, Flash was about to go when Rarity wailed about not wanting to be alone, so in the end, he had dropped both of them off at Fluttershy’s place before heading back.

Whatever had happened to her wasn’t just something any of them could wave off. He wanted to get to the bottom of it, but he didn’t even know where to start besides asking Rarity about it.

That wasn’t going to happen anytime soon. Better to let her recover anyway…

Strange ooze spilling into the shop and causing burns? Flash had never heard anything quite like this. And then the ooze having some kind of sentience and pursuing her? Now that just sounded a little far fetched, but after what Sunset Shimmer had done, turning into some kind of fiery flying demon, perhaps it wasn’t all the far fetched after all.

Remembering what Sunset had become sent chills down Flash’s spine. It had been a freaky experience, especially the mind control, and not to mention, she looked like a demon right out of one of Series King’s horror stories. She resembled nothing of the beautiful girl he had dated and he actually had nightmares for a week after that.

The huge red and black wings, the claws, the fiery evil face…

“Ergh…” Flash shuddered.

But he was glad that was all over. It was thanks to Twilight Sparkle and the others.

Twilight…

It was already a while since the Fall Formal and that was the last time he got to see her. It made him wonder if he would ever get to see her again.

Somehow, he doubted he would get what he wanted. After all, she was from an entirely different world. Their dance was probably just a once off thing, though he wished it could’ve been more than that.

Getting out of his car, Flash walked down his pathway to his home, his hands in his pockets as he thought about Twilight.

He had been so deep in thought that at first, he hadn’t noticed the gust of wind that blew over his head. Flash looked up, but saw nothing out of the ordinary.

Then to his right, there had been the flap of wings and he turned his head to look. Again, there was nothing.

“Huh, must’a been a bat,” Flash told himself. “Or maybe an owl. The owls here are weird.”
Something flew by him again, then again. The third one clipped him in the face with a wing and Flash fell to the side, using an arm to keep himself up.

“Ow!” He rubbed at his head. His eyes widened when his hand came back with blood.

There was a sort of a scratching sound and Flash looked up. In front of him, between his home and himself was a round-shaped creature. Something he’d never seen before. It had wings like a bat and a tail sticking out behind it, but what made his hair stand on end were its four red eyes, looking back at him, unblinking.

Another two landed beside it, gazing at him with their red ominous eyes as well.

“N-Nice bat-thingies…” Flash said, scrambling back a few paces. He didn’t know what this was, but by just standing there before him, it made the hair on his arms stand up.

There came a stretching noise from somewhere within them, but Flash couldn’t tell where it was coming from. It kept growing in volume, but the flying things continued to stand there, watching him with an eerie stillness. If he wanted to get home, he would have to get by them. The question is, could he?

As Flash sat there thinking about what to do, the stretching sound got louder and sounded like it was just in front of him now. Then with a startling tear, the creatures’ bodies ripped in half and sharp fangs sprouted all around the inside of the two halves, held together by the skin at the back. A growl emerged from the darkness of their new mouths and the creatures spread their wings and took flight. Right towards Flash.

“No! Go away!” Flash scrambled to his feet, almost tripping a few times. He had to run past them to get to his house, so that was out of the question. The only other safe place he could think of was his car.

Talons grabbed at his sleeves, tearing through cloth and flesh as he ran, but Flash pounded at them with his fists, getting them to dislodge from his arms, his speed not decreasing.

Pressing the unlock button on his car keys, Flash ripped the driver’s door open and jumped in, slamming it shut as one of the creature’s legs tried to rip his face off, trapping it inside.

Flash pulled on the door, leaning back as far as he could as the creature’s talons opened and shut, trying to get him. Its gaping mouth attacked his window, trying to get through, but it didn’t get a good position to sink its teeth through it.

“Just leave me alone!” he cried, still unable to get the door shut.

With no other choice, Flash inserted the car keys and turned them, spurting the vehicle to life. With one hand still on the door, Flash stepped down hard on the accelerator and shot out of his driveway, speeding along the road, swerving left and right, trying to get the creature to leave.

Letting go of the door for a second, Flash jammed hard on the breaks and watched the creature spin forward, its talons leaving the inside of his car long enough for him to shut the door. It landed on the hood of his car, its mouth opened like a psychotic smile, and before he could react, the other two bashed their heads at his side windows, cracking them.

Flash put his car into reverse and spun it around, then driving in the opposite direction. Looking at his mirrors, the two flying monsters continued to follow after him, while the other one hung on to his car’s hood with its talons.

He looked down at his speedometer, his car already approaching fifty miles per hour. And still the creatures kept up, not losing speed. In fact, they were gaining on him, with one smashing its head into the boot of his car. Flash felt the whole vehicle jump as he fought to keep control of the wheel and his mind.

He needed somewhere safe to go. And if he were to even leave his car, they would surely catch him and devour him. If he couldn’t leave the car, where else could he go?

Flash’s heartbeat was thumping in his chest, threatening to break out like those xenos from the Xeno films. It took all of his willpower to keep driving and to stay away from those creatures.

“Flash Sentry… Tasty Flash…”

He looked at the monster on his hood and its smile somehow widened. It lifted a foot and plunged its talons back into his car again, and again, and again. It was making its way closer to him.

“No, no! Stop! Don’t come any closer!” Flash jammed on the brakes, but the monster held on tight.

“Oh, but why, Flash? I can’t devour you without getting closer…”

Suddenly, the flying monster was no longer there. Instead, a full-sized clown had taken its place, its feet planted on his car’s hood, with one hand, still with razor sharp talons, stabbed into the hood.

“You don’t like flying creatures, Flash? What an odd fear,” it chuckled ominously. “If you don’t like them, why don’t you come with me? Down where I’m from, there aren’t any.”

Flash stopped the car, his mind spinning and unable to comprehend what was happening. When did this clown get there? He didn’t even see the flying monster leave.

Suddenly, the clown’s smile widened and he thrust his head against the windshield, cracking it. When it withdrew its head, Flash could see its mouth had widened, splitting at the sides and revealing a few rows of dagger-like teeth. Blood dripped down from where his skin tore, but he didn’t seem to notice.

Noticing the situation he was in, Flash kicked his door open and lunged out just as the clown smashed its head completely through his windshield, his head vibrating and shaking like a crazed machine, his teeth tearing his seat into shreds. Flash could only imagine what would’ve happened to himself if he had still been sitting there.

The clown spat out a mouthful of leather and foam, and retracted its head from inside the car. “Off sooooo soon?”

He bounced off the car hood and did a bow, claws springing out from under his gloved hands, almost as long as kitchen knives.

“Come here, Flash. It’ll be fun. I’ll make you bounce too. You want to bounce, Flash?” The clown released a maniacal laughter, then screamed horrifyingly and rushed the boy.

Flash screamed like a little girl and ran down the road, trying to put as much distance as he could between himself and the clown.

“This isn’t happening, this isn’t happening!”

Flash just ran and ran, like he had a sackful of diamonds with the devil close behind him. All the while, the clown followed along, almost bouncing as he laughed maniacally, somehow keeping up with him.

“Come play with Nickelfool! I promise there will be lots of fun!”

“Leave me alone!”

Suddenly, a blinding ray of light shot out from the darkness before him.

Turning his head back to the front, Flash only had enough time to throw himself back a few steps as a car stopped in front of him, its tyres screeching on asphalt as its driver jammed on the brakes. He had fallen when he jumped away from the car, but Flash was quick to spring back on his feet and ran over to the driver’s window, which was already rolled down.

“Flash? What’s going on?” It was Lightning Dust, a senior from school. He had never been more relieved to see a familiar face. “What are you doing?”

“There’s this crazy clown! It’s trying to kill me!” Flash’s voice broke, almost hysterical sounding.

“What clown?” The girl raised an eyebrow.

“That!” He pointed where her headlights were shining, but to his astonishment, there was nothing there.

“Have you been drinking, Flash?”

“But… But… It was there. It was after me…” The guitarist blinked his eyes rapidly. “T-There were flying mon-monsters and they had teeth as sh-sharp as kn-knives. And then the cl-clown…”

Lightning Dust gave Flash a long, scrutinizing look. “Look, what you choose to do in your free time is up to you, but try not to get high in a place that endangers other people, ‘kay?”

“Get high?” Flash exclaimed. “No, Lightning Dust! I’m not on anything! There was this clown, and it was trying to kill me! I can prove it!”

Lightning Dust looked skeptical, but sighed and relented. “Fine. Where’s this proof then?”

“B-Back at my car,” Flash said, pointing back down the road.

Lightning Dust followed Flash’s finger. “How far did you run? You just ditched your car?”

“It’s way back there,” Flash said apologetically.

“Well, I’m not walking all the way there,” She popped open the passenger side door. “Get in. I swear, if this is some prank…”

“It’s not!” Flash said earnestly. “Just follow the road; my car should still be back there.”

As Lightning Dust put her car into gear, Flash Sentry thought back to the flying monsters. He shuddered. He had no wish to encounter them again, but if he was going to prove he wasn’t crazy, he would have to go back there.

A short drive later, Flash’s car came into view, right where he had left it.

Lightning Dust slowed her car down and finally parked it on the side of the road.

“Huh,” she said, looking at the hole in the windscreen. “That’s a lot of damage, all right. How did you get a break that bad, anyway?”

“It wasn’t me,” Flash insisted. “I love my car. I wouldn’t trash it for anything.”

“Hmm. True...” Lightning Dust got out of her seat and walked up to Flash’s car and examined it. Flash followed warily behind her. “Man, did you drive into a chainsaw or something? Your seat is totally shredded.”

“I told you, it was the clown!” Flash threw his arms up.

“Just what kind of clown can do this to your car?” Lightning looked at him and snapped her fingers near his eyes. “Are you sure you’re not on anything?”

“I’m not! Honest! There was a clown! Come on, how often do you even see clowns out here? I know what I saw. I’m not high!”

“Gee, okay, slow your horses.” Lightning Dust looked at the wrecked car. “Whatever it is, I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation for all this. A prank maybe? After all, you were Sunset Shimmer’s boyfriend. For all anyone knows, you helped her rise to power. Someone must be out to get you too.”

“You really think someone would go to all that trouble just to give me a scare?” Then Flash touched at his head and arms where his injuries were. “Then how about these? I got attacked by those flying monsters. See?”

“I don’t know, Flash. But I don’t see anyone else out here. Do you?”

The guitarist looked around. “No, but-”

“I think you should just head home for the day. Whatever’s going on in your mind, you should go cool down and let it wear off. I’ll send you home, but you owe me a favour, got it?”

Flash nodded. Had he really imagined all of that up? He had the cuts on his head and arms to prove something happened, but there was nothing else. The clown and the flying monsters were gone, as though they had never been there in the first place.

And then there was his car. He didn’t know how he was going to explain his way out of this one, but whether imagined or not, something had damaged his car. He felt his heart sink as he put together how much repairs would cost. Several months’ wages, at least.

“Hey! You going to stand there all day, or are we going?” Lightning Dust honked her car’s horn, jolting Flash back to the present.

“I’m coming, I’m coming,” Flash said as he slid into the passenger seat.

Author's Note

Sorry, this took a while, but I hope y’all enjoyed it!

Cheers!