Over the next two years, Arianna and Sunset’s gang grew in number and in strength. Sunset, now going by the moniker Sofia Speranza, confided in her new ally Arianna Bolt about her past, how she used to be a unicorn pony and had arrived in this world through a magical portal which was now closed after a falling out with her former mentor, though she didn’t see a reason to give her the full backstory. Arianna gave herself the task of coming up with the name for the gang.

“The high school’s mascot is the Wondercolt,” she’d said one day. “Maybe we could go with that?”

Sunset didn’t take much time to think about it. “I don’t know, Dash. That sounds more like a boy band than a street gang.”

“I got another one: the Rainbooms.”

“That’s better. Like an explosion.”

Their first two recruits were Phillip Smith and Diane Pinkerton, both of whom were initially going to be in Gilda and Arianna’s gang, but followed Arianna after she left. Contrary to what Sunset had led Gilda to believe, they’d only recruited Phillip and Diane after that afternoon chat with Gilda.

Phillip – who went by the name Flash while in the gang – was an athletic kid, strong and agile for his age due to regular karate and guitar lessons, where Arianna had met him. His naturally jet black hair would sometimes appear to look blue, depending on the light. His parents were financially well off and liked giving their son gifts. The Smiths were the unknowing source of the Rainboom’s funding, at least until the gang started earning its own money.

Diane Pinkerton – nicknamed Pinkie due to her surname and the fact that she always wore a lot of pink – had been one of Arianna’s friends for years, though Arianna hadn’t told Sunset much about her, other than her frizzy black hair and that she was a strange girl.

“First thing you should know is Diane has very frizzy black hair. It’s so frizzy it’s literally impossible to keep is straight longer than a few moments. Second, she’s... weird, but in a good way. She’s hyper and friendly, but weirdly lucky all the time.”

“Sounds like she could be a good distraction if we need one.”

Arianna grinned. “Oh, she’s great at creating distractions. We would have sleepovers sometimes and she always got the babysitter distracted enough to let me slip out to hang out with Gilda for a few hours. Babysitter never realized a thing."

“Either she’s really good at what she does, or your babysitters are all pretty dumb.”

“I like to think it’s a bit of both."

As prepubescent teenagers, there wasn’t much the Rainbooms could do. They knew they had to start taking up odd jobs so Phillip’s parents wouldn’t notice he wasn’t using his allowance as often as he had been. Most jobs they took were providing protection for children's birthday parties, which usually entailed breaking up fights, cleaning something up, or getting a parent if they couldn’t fix a problem. It wasn’t hard work, but it was work nonetheless.

One of the first things the Rainbooms did was forge identification and documentation for Sunset as Sofia Speranza, a natural-born citizen who was orphaned when she was ten. With these in hand, Sunset was able to eventually open a bank account for herself and one for the gang which they would all contribute to, with the eventual plan to make that account independent of any of them in order to keep their future crimes unconnected to their personal accounts.

All the while, Sunset never forgot the portal in the marble pedestal, and what lay beyond it.

~~~~~~~~~~

Spring is a beautiful time of year. Snow melts, exposing the grass to grow bright and green. Animals large and small that spent the winter hibernating begin to wake up and scavenge, often with baby animals in tow. Birds that traveled to warmer climates begin returning, bringing with them sweet songs while sitting in the budding trees.

None of these were on Sunset’s mind. It was April, and most of those things had already happened the month before. Sofia, instead, was walking toward the marble statue in front of Canterlot High School, the statue she’d passed through almost two and a half years earlier. She had followed the moon cycles, counting each one until today, the first day of the thirtieth moon.

After waiting for some cars to pass the intersection, Sunset hurried across and made her way to the statue. As she had dozens of times before, she looked at the stallion on top of the pedestal, carved as if it was rearing back to attack something with its front hooves. If she had noticed the horse on top the night she arrived, she might have been afraid that the guards had followed her through the portal to bring her back to face justice.

Sunset zipped up her coat and looked up into the sky at the moon. Although it was still day, the moon still appeared in the sky, one of the many differences between this world and Equestria, where the sun and moon were moved with magic and were never in the sky at the same time.

Sunset placed her palm against the cold stone pedestal, and after a moment her hand pushed through. She quickly pulled her hand back, not wanting to alert any ponies near the mirror that someone was on the other side. The worst case scenario would be if Princess Celestia was looking at the mirror when she put her hoof through. She’d definitely be screwed if that happened.

Sunset leaned against the corner of the statue’s pedestal, one of the non-portal services and let out a soft sigh. Today was going to be the day she returned to Equestria, but now that it had arrived she was having second thoughts. The portal was open for three days, but could Sunset really justify leaving the gang she’d helped build, especially when they would be starting high school at Canterlot High the next fall, where they could continue recruiting new members and growing in strength.

As much as she didn’t want to admit it – especially to Princess Celestia if she was about to come through the portal any second - Dash was becoming more than just her ally, but her first real friend. Back in Equestria, Princess Celestia had tried teaching her about friendship.

[Princess Celestia walked with her student down one of the castle halls. “Sunset Shimmer, I have heard that you’re not getting along well with the other students. We’ve talked about the fact that personal relationships –”

“Personal relationships?” Sunset scoffed. “Who needs anypony? The most important thing in life is to be the best.”

“We’ve talked about friendship and its importance before,” Celestia continued, “and we’ve discussed that you need to start opening yourself up to new friends.”

Sunset had dismissed friendship, and yet here she was in this world, starting to make friends and coming up with other reasons to stay in this admittedly dystopian world.

“That’s the real issue here, isn’t it?” Sunset asked herself. “I have to decide between returning to a nearly perfect world where I’ll be a fugitive for assaulting those guards and unable to achieve my destiny, and this world full of crime and corruption but I’ll be with my first real friends while forging my own way to my destiny.” Sunset chuckled. “And just like that, I’ve made my decision. Destiny, here I come.”

Sunset walked away from the statue, back across the street. She wouldn’t pay attention to it again until that September when she, Arianna, and other Rainbooms would be enrolled as freshmen at Canterlot High School.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was the day of Canterlot High School’s Freshman Fair, a festival for the new students of CHS where they could meet their classmates and discover student groups they could join such as sports teams, drama club, and bands. Police officers were positioned all throughout the school’s front lawn to ensure the safety of the students, but even so many students barely ventured past the groups they were interested in before returning inside the school.

“Looks like no one feels like mingling,” Sunset said.

“Yeah, that’s pretty common in Canterlot,” Arianna replied, not looking up from the signup sheet for the soccer team she was signing up for. Crime is everywhere.” She stood up and whispered low to Sunset, “And I’d bet anything at least half of these cops are on the mafia’s payroll.”

“If not all of them, that is,” Sunset added. She looked around and recognized Phillip’s hairstyle across the courtyard. “I see Phillip. No doubt Diane is nearby too. I’m gonna go over and see what he’s up to.”

“Meet you inside the school, then?”

Sunset nodded and cut across the grass to the other side of the courtyard, ignoring the rest of the booths for the school’s sports teams. She found Flash by the martial arts booth.

“Hey.”

Flash looked up from the signup sheet and smiled. “Good to see you, Sofia. How’ve you been?”

“Good. Have you seen Diane around yet?”

“Might as well pick a booth and start walking around,” he answered. “I’ve seen her a few times, always at a different booth. This one, band, sports, gardening club... it’s almost like she wants to be part of every club.”

Sunset laughed. “If anyone were able to join every club, it’d surely be her. But we’d better stop her before she does. Today’s also about finding more recruits for our own little group.” She stood up on her toes, looking around for Diane’s easily recognizable frizzy hair. “What are you signing up for, anyway? Don’t you already know karate?”

“I do, but this isn’t karate,” he answered. “It’s an Indonesian form of offensive martial arts called penkak sillit.”

“Pencak silat,” the girl at the booth corrected his pronunciation.

“Sorry, pencak silat. Thanks. A lot of martial arts have similarities, but each type is useful in different ways.”

“Karate is defensive,” said the girl at the booth, eager to convey her knowledge on the subject, “focusing more on blocking attacks, whereas pencak silat focuses more on using your whole body to attack. It can even incorporate weapons.”

“That’ll be useful. Anyway, when you’re done, meet up with Arianna inside. I’ll keep looking for Diane.”

She turned away and started walking around the courtyard again, looking for her ally, but it wasn’t too long before she realized she kept getting drawn toward the statue of the stallion.

“We meet again, Mr. Stallion.”

“You talk to statues too?” Sunset heard a familiar chipper voice behind her, and turned around to see Diane.

“Hello, Diane. Where’ve you been?”

“Looking at all the different booths," Diane replied. “Did you know there’s a student group for breeding carniverous plants?”

“I didn’t but that seems like an odd group to advertise to incoming freshman.”

“I know, right? I’m gonna try to join all of them.”

“All right, just make sure you have time for our own student group.” Pinkie looked at Sunset and blinked. After a moment of hesitation, Sunset continued. “The Rainbooms?”

“Oh, yeah, totally. I always have time for everything I do.”

“Lucky girl, you are."

Arianna appeared at the end of the aisle and hurried toward Diane and Sunset. Her eyes looked like they were filled with a combination of determination and fear. “Sofia, we might have a problem.”

“What is it?”

“You know how pretty much everything in this town is controlled by the Melodia crime family?”

“Uh, duh.”

“What’s up?” Diane asked.

“One of our classmates is Octavia Melodia, daughter of the Melodia patriarch!”

Sunset put her hand to her chin. “That could cause some trouble in the future. Where is she?”

“She just walked into the school, escorted by two associates. I already told Phillip to tail them.” Arianna answered. “Her dad can definitely afford to send her to Crystal Prep Academy, plus it’s much closer to where they live. The Melodias might be up to something. Do you think they heard about our group?”

“I don’t see how,” Sunset replied. “We’ve been pretty secretive about it the last couple years. The only people who know are the four of us. Well, and Gilda, but we haven’t heard from her since she and Arianna went their separate ways, and she doesn’t seem all that bright. As far as we know she’s not connected to the Melodias in any way.

“Let’s act normal around her for now,” she continued. “We’ll keep an eye on her and I’ll talk to her before the week is done. That should give us some time to gather information, and me some time to figure out what to talk to her about.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sunset and the other Rainbooms tailed Octavia through classes as they had planned. All four were lucky enough to share a lunch period together, and even luckier that Octavia was in the same lunch period. Octavia was still escorted by her father’s associates, even during lunch, which gave Sunset an idea, and she didn’t even need a second day of following her to get it.

“Flash, stay here,” she said, carrying her tray to the table they were all at but not sitting down. “Dash, Pinkie, and I will go sit with Octavia and introduce ourselves.”

“What about the associates?” he asked.

“That’s why I’m bringing Pinkie. I’m hoping we’ll be lucky.”

“You know,” Arianna said, “most organizations don’t rely on getting lucky. It’s kinda a surefire way to lose.”

"We’re not relying on getting lucky,” Sunset replied, “we’re relying on being lucky. There’s not much difference, but there is a difference.”

“Good luck, then,” said Flash, who returned to his meal. The three girls made their way across the lunchroom toward Octavia and the associates. As they approached, they realized that aside from the associates, the crime boss’s daughter was sitting alone at her table; the other students, it seemed, were afraid to approach her with them surrounding her. One of the associates noticed the approaching girls and signaled to his partner, who turned around and held out his arm to stop them.

Diane smiled and held out her hand. “Hi! I’m Diane! What’s your name?”

The associate was caught off guard and looked over at his partner.

“It’s okay, guys,” Sunset said. “You can relax. We just saw this girl sitting alone and wanted to be friendly.”

“It’s all right, sirs,” said Octavia. Sunset expected an Italian accent given her family, or the same accent as everyone else, but instead it sounded British, which made Sunset curious. “They’re thirteen years old. There’s a very low chance they’ll turn out to be threats during lunch period in their first week of high school, they’re nothing you cannot handle.”

“Very well. We’ll be close.”

“Thank you.” The two men moved to the other side of the table and let the girls sit together. Sunset and Arianna sat down across from Octavia, and Diane sat closer to the associates.

“You never got around to telling me your name,” she said. Sunset chuckled.

“And thank you as well,” Octavia continued. “Father wanted to make sure I was safe here.”

“Your father is Salvatore Melodia, patriarch of the Melodia famiglia, right?"

“I was hoping nobody would know so soon.”

“It’s a bit difficult not to make the connection when you arrive escorted by some of his employees.”

“Why are you here, anyway?” Arianna asked. Sunset gave her an annoyed look, which went unnoticed. “Your dad’s filthy rich and can afford Crystal Prep, plus it’s closer to where you live, isn’t it?”

“Father thought it best to enroll me here,” Octavia replied. “He’s concerned about what the Crystal Prep students might do to me if they knew I was his daughter. Many of them are part of the other crime families in the region, and some of them would jump at the chance to hold me for ransom.”

Now there’s an idea, Sunset thought to herself.

“Sounds like what you need are some friends,” Sunset suggested instead. “Kids your age who can help keep you safe so you don’t have to have an escort every day.” Sunset glanced over to the two associates, who had somehow become enthralled with Diane doing sleight of hand tricks. Sunset smiled back at Octavia and held out her hand. “I’m Sofia Speranza.”

Octavia smiled and shook her hand. “Italian?”

“Full-blooded, as far as mia famiglia knows,” Sunset lied. “Could be some Spanish in there, but we don’t really know for sure. This is Arianna Bolt next to me, and the charming girl entertaining your bodyguards is Diane Pinkerton.”

“Pinkerton like the British detective agency?”

“As far as we know, she’s not related,” Arianna replied. “Her family doesn’t know much about their history.”

“That does bring me to my next question, though. I expected you to sound Italian because of your family, or without an accent, but you seem to have a British accent. Did you go to primary school in the United Kingdom?”

“Yes, actually. My mother is from Cambridge, and I lived with her until I was eight.”

“Your father being overprotective again?”

“Actually, that was my mother’s idea,” she responded. “She wanted me to experience a life away from my father’s business before returning here.”

“That was a good idea.” The girls ate some of their food before Sunset broke the silence again. “Hey, I’ve got a great idea! Your father wants you to be safe here, right? Why don’t we help with that?”

“I’m athletic and agile,” Arianna said, “Diane is... well...” They all looked at Diane, who was somehow still distracting Melodia’s associates. Arianna pointed her thumb at Diane. “She can do that.”

“We also have another friend in our little group, Phillip,” Sunset added. “He’s into a lot of the things Arianna is. And then there’s me. I’m the smart one.”

Octavia looked at her. “I hope that’s not boastful hubris.”

“Not at all. I’ve always gotten top marks on all my assignments and tests.”

Octavia finished her milk box and smiled. “It feels good to have friends so quickly. I’ll have to speak with my father about this, but I’m sure he’ll agree.”

Sunset smiled. “It was good to meet you, Octavia.”

“Likewise.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“See you tomorrow, Octavia!” The Rainbooms waved as a limo approached in front of the school at the end of the school day and the associates ushered her inside. Arianna turned to Sunset. “She’s pretty nice. I was expecting her to be a snob.”

“She’s the daughter of a high-ranking mafioso,” Sunset responded. “Nice or not, her family is an obstacle our gang will have to deal with if we’re going to be the best.”

“We’re thirteen and barely turning a profit offering protection for little kids’ birthday parties.” Phillip stated. “They’ve got money, muscle, and influence. What are we going to do against a family that’s been responsible for most of the organized crime for the last several decades?”

“Not much. By all accounts, they could kick our asses,” Sunset said. “But we have the element of surprise on our side. As long as we keep playing the long game and don’t let on that we’re planning to destroy them, we’ll have the upper hand.”

Sunset turned to face the school and put her hand out to lean on the base of the statue. She felt the cold, lifeless stone on her palm, and was reminded of the last time she touched it that previous April when the portal had been open. She forced herself to not look at the statue again. “Look forward to the school, capos,” she said, using the Italian mafia’s word to describe the captains of groups of the mafia’s soldiers. “This is where the Melodias start to lose their chess pieces. This is where our careers begin.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A few days later, Principal Celeste Welkin was doing paperwork at her desk in her office at the school. A strand of her long blonde hair fell into her face, and she brushed it behind her ear. There was a knock on Principal her door, and she looked up at the clock, noting that it was after school hours.

“Come in," she said, and two students, Sofia Speranza and Arianna Bolt, came in. “How may I help you?”

Sofia seemed to hesitate, lagging behind Arianna, then spoke up. “I’m sure you're aware that one of the freshmen this year is Octavia Melodia, of the Melodia crime family?"

“I am,” Celeste stated. “Her father came to me personally to enroll her. I was nervous when I learned she’d be escorted by some of his soldiers until he can be assured of her safety.”

“Then you might be glad to know that we already gave him that assurance,” said Sofia.

Celeste looked at her with a shocked expression. “You did? How on earth did you manage that?”

“It was as simple as offering to be her friends,” Arianna said. “We also may have convinced her to agree on behalf of her family that the school grounds would be a neutral zone where gang violence will be quickly dispatched with. We also plan on getting the other crime families and street gangs who operate in the area to do the same.”

“That’s... rather impressive, considering you’ve only been attending this school for a week.”

“I was top of the class at my last school,” said Sofia. “I’ve learned to work quickly and efficiently in whatever I do.”

“I’m glad you took the initiative to solve what could have been a difficult decision on my part,” Celeste said. “It’s always good to see young students as ambitious as you.”

“Thanks for seeing us after hours, Principal Welkin." Sofia and Arianna turned to leave. Arianna passed through the door, and Sofia stood in the doorway for a second before turning to the principal. “You... remind me of my old tutor,” she said with a mix of bitterness and pain.

“Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”

Sofia hesitated before responding. “I don’t know anymore.” She quickly left the office and let the door close behind her.

Author's Note

The chapter title translates to "To have your hands in the dough", in other words, "to have connections".

Fun fact: I chose Phillip as Flash's human name a few months ago, but it was only while writing this chapter that I decided to look up the etymology. Turns out "Phillip" is derived from the Greek name that means "lover of horses," and now I can't imagine any other human name for Flash. He dated Sunset, a pony, and he had a crush on Twilight, another pony.