Wax Earplugs

by ReedHoarse

Rating: teen
Tags: Sunset Shimmer, Romance, Equestria Girls, Adagio Dazzle
Length: 6034

Sunset is certain Adagio hates her. Adagio is certain Sunset wants her. Sunset is about to learn how sirens flirt.

Sunset is certain Adagio hates her. She's both wrong and right about that, and is about to learn a thing or two about sirens and romance.

Adagio is certain Sunset wants her. She's wrong about that. For now.

Winner of the Sunset x Adagio competition.

Published 2021-11-13 11:30:00 UTC
Last updated 2021-11-13 11:30:00 UTC

Wax Earplugs

The door loomed in front of Sunset Shimmer. She really didn’t want to do this.

She looked at her phone again, at the message Adagio Dazzle had sent her last night.

[20:27] Sunset Shimmer, you’ve wasted much of your already limited mental capacity on learning how to do human things. I need that knowledge. Come to our apartment.

[21:11] Please

This had been completely out of the blue. She hadn’t spoken to Adagio since Starswirled, and here she was asking for help. It wasn’t something she could ignore. Much as she wanted to.

She wasn’t a hundred percent sure this wasn’t a trap of some sort.

She knocked.

The door soon opened to reveal Adagio. Her hair was tied up on top of her head in the largest pineapple Sunset had ever seen, hanging down and covering up most of her face. The scrunchie that held it in place strained to keep it all together.

Adagio blew at her hair, failing to move it more than an inch. She looked Sunset up and down, “So you actually came.”

Sunset gave the warmest smile she could muster given the circumstances, “You reached out. I could hardly ignore that, it’s not every day I get an opportunity to teach the magic of friendship to a, er…”

“A glorious twenty foot flying sea monster?” said Adagio, looking very human at just under Sunset’s height. Despite this, there was no trace of irony in her voice, and she held herself with the confidence that dared her to disagree.

“I was gonna say an unrepentant villain, but that works.”

Adagio leaned against the doorframe, “Let me make one thing clear, Sunset Shimmer. This isn’t a friend thing. Even if sirens did friends, your friendship would be so worthless to me as to actually depreciate the value of my own.”

Sunset blinked, “You, er, really don’t know how friendship works, huh.”

“And I never will.”

Sunset had to stifle a chuckle, “I know you think that sounds badass, but it’s kind of the saddest thing I’ve ever heard? Anyway, why’d you invite me over if it’s not ‘a friend thing’?”

“I only graced you with an invitation to my home because I needed someone who knows about human things.”

“And of all the people in the world, you asked me,” she said, raising an eyebrow.

“Your life is so depressing that I decided to take pity on you. Savour my presence while you can. Besides, now that I don’t have my magic, you’re the only one pathetic enough to come running when I whistle.

Sunset nodded in understanding, “I’m the only person you know besides Aria and Sonata, aren’t I? And you call my life depressing.”

Adagio looked indignant. Nobody could look indignant like Adagio. It was as though the entire world should be bowing in apology at the offense it was causing her.

“I know plenty of people,” she said.

“Oh yeah? Name one.”

“Pinkle Pea.”

Neither her face or voice betrayed even a hint of uncertainty.

“A for effort,” said Sunset, “You gonna let me in?”

Adagio stepped aside in a way that made it clear she was doing so under protest.

It was a studio apartment, mostly a living room and kitchenette. A couple couches faced a coffee table, and every surface was covered in plates and mugs. Dirty dishes spilled out of the sink, across the counters, and onto the floor. In the corners, and below the couches and chairs, hair of various shades was caked into the carpet.

Sunset experimentally tried picking one of the cups off the coffee table. Some of the wood peeled away with it.

She hastily put it back down, wiping her hand on her jeans and turning to Adagio. She looked so clean and confident, and Sunset had trouble seeing how this proud, beautiful woman fit into this room she felt gross just existing in.

“You live like this?” Sunset asked.

Adagio crossed her arms, pink eyes piercing into Sunset, “We have no magic, remember?”

Sunset stared at her, allowing a long pause before she spoke.

“So?”

“So we can’t get people to do what we say anymore, obviously.”

“I- You don’t just need lessons on friendship, do you? You need to learn to be human first.”

“Nobody needs that, Sunset Shimmer.”

Sunset snorted and indicated the apartment around her, “You clearly do! Have some self respect, Adagio, pick up a vacuum!”

“Are you volunteering?” Adagio strutted up to Sunset, letting her hips sway from side to side and plastering a smile on her face, “You’re trying to be my friend, aren’t you? I would be oh so grateful if you cleaned my apartment for me!”

Sunset matched her smile, “Not a chance. I’ll help you, but that means you actually doing some of it yourself.”

Adagio gave her an innocent look, “But Sunset Shimmer! I’m just a siren, I don’t know how to do the work of lesser species!”

“Then I’ll show you how, Adagio! It’ll be fun!”

“You’d do that for me?” Adagio’s face stretched into an exaggerated look of wide-eyed wonderment, before it snapped like a rubber band back to its usual unimpressed expression, “Let’s just do what you came here for. The benefits of having you clean our apartment are far outweighed by the cost of having you around for longer than necessary.”

“Aw, come on, Adagio!” Sunset teased, “You’d learn the value of hard work without magic and that working with others can be fun! That’d be two friendship lessons in one, kind of a big win for me.”

“Hard work is meaningless when an easier tool can be used to achieve the same outcome, and as you seem determined to demonstrate with every breath that leaves your body, hell is other people,” Adagio appraised her critically, “Using the word ‘people’ loosely, anyway. I’ll be back in a second, I need to get something.”

Adagio marched into an adjoining room.

Sunset cracked her knuckles.

Yep, Adagio was going to be a challenge, but everybody deserved redemption. And as a student of the Princess of Friendship, Sunset knew the one-size-fits-all solution that would be perfect for helping her.

Besides, Adagio had already taken the first step by reaching out. Sure, it was to ask Sunset to do something for her, but this was Adagio Dazzle, the fact that she was asking for help instead of demanding or manipulating was huge.

She would make Adagio her friend, no matter how much of an asshole she was determined to be.

Adagio re-emerged, pulling the scrunchie out of her hair. It exploded outwards to its full poufy glory, its volume exceeding that of the rest of Adagio combined. Sunset was always impressed with Adagio’s hair. It must take actual hours to get it looking that good.

Adagio held a bundle of papers that she flung onto the coffee table. She took a seat on the couch and patted the spot next to her, looking up at Sunset.

Sunset examined the couch. Its entire surface was covered in stains, rips, and, of course, hair. She wasn’t sure what its original colour was, but it sure wasn’t the current one.

“Adagio, that thing looks like you dragged it in off the street.”

“Then you’ll feel right at home on it.”

“And having said that, I feel like I should be apologising to the street.”

“Do you want to help me or not?”

She briefly tried to come up with a way of sitting down without actually touching the couch, gave up, and took a seat.

“So what is it you actually want help with?” she asked, wanting to think about anything but the grossness she was sitting on.

“Like I said, we’re used to just getting whatever we want. We don’t know all these human things like ‘how to use money’ and ‘how much things cost’. We make all our money from gigs and we never seem to have enough.”

“That’s… a good point actually, how are you paying for this apartment?”

A smug and almost sinister smile crept onto Adagio’s face, “Who says we’re paying for it?”

Sunset’s eyes went wide. A hundred scenarios played out in her head, all of them terrible.

“You- you didn’t hurt the owner did you?”

“What? No, the owner lives abroad,” she stuck her nose up at Sunset, “Go ahead. Laugh. We’re reduced to breaking into houses and running away when the owner comes back like normal people.”

Sunset wasn’t sure if Adagio was messing with her or not.

“Please tell me you don’t actually think that’s how housing works for normal people.”

“Maybe not for you,” Adagio said with a mocking look, “I bet you actually pay for your place. You know, maybe I shouldn’t be asking you for financial advice.”

Sunset looked around the room, suddenly very self conscious of being here. No, it was probably fine. Even if Adagio was telling the truth, it wasn’t like the owner would just happen to come back while she was here.

She shook her head and gestured at the papers, “Fine, one thing at a time, what is all this?”

Adagio picked up a piece of paper and slid up next to Sunset. Really close, actually, her body pressed right up against Sunset’s like she was trying to crush her. If Sunset didn’t know any better, she might assume Adagio was awkwardly trying to be friendly with her, but the action just came across as weird and vaguely aggressive.

Sunset gave her a questioning look, but Adagio just continued like nothing unusual was happening.

“I’ve been trying to write down everything we spend money on,” Adagio said, gesturing to the paper.

Sunset mentally shrugged and took the paper. She frowned.

“Adagio, what is this?”

“I just told you. I wrote down everything we actually paid for.”

“Sure, but this is just a list of stuff? Like here, this entry just says ‘bread’,” Sunset scanned the page, “Which is also the only food you’ve bought? The rest of the page is just hair products?”

“For the third time, it is a list of things we bought.”

“Okay, but for example, how much did you spend on bread?”

“Ugh. So much. You know we have to keep eating food now? Not just for fun, we have to do it all the time,” Adagio began waving her body from side to side, repeatedly bumping into Sunset, “All because you wouldn’t let us feed on the human cattle.”

Sunset tried to form words, but all she could do was look on in confusion at Adagio. She started in alarm as Adagio flopped onto her back and began pushing herself slowly across Sunset’s lap. She was giving Sunset a sleepy-eyed look.

It was almost intimate, but was too far removed from any human body language for Sunset to be anything except confused. It was like an alien trying to mimic human behaviour. Which, she supposed was at least half right.

“Okay, what are you doing?” Sunset asked.

“You are truly the most wretched being I’ve ever met, Sunset Shimmer,” she said, lowering her voice and wiggling from side to side.

Sunset slowly scooted away from her to the other end of the couch, sliding Adagio off of her. She’d expected Adagio to be hostile, but this was just weird.

“What the hell is going on, Adagio?”

Adagio, still flat on her back, looked up at her in frustration.

“I thought that was pretty clear.”

“Not even a little.”

“I’ve been very obviously flirting with you ever since you got here!”

“What? No, you haven’t!”

Adagio picked herself up, “I didn’t know you were this dense. I called you pathetic and depressing, and said I hated being around you.”

“Those sure are all things you did!”

“And you implied that I wanted to learn about friendship! Me! A siren! And that I should clean up after myself, and pay for things!”

“Yeah, those are things you should do!”

“You’re still doing it! How else am I meant to interpret that? So obviously I made a move on you.”

Sunset shook her head, “You mean aggressively shoving your body against me and sort of, sliding across my legs? You think that’s how humans flirt? I mean, I suppose you were close, but-”

Adagio’s face once again took on an expression of total indignity.

“How humans flirt? You think I’d-” her face melted into a grin, “Oh, I see. Very good, Sunset Shimmer. You know exactly how to get under my skin.”

She slid close to Sunset again, who held out a hand, stopping her.

“Okay, if I’m reading the situation correctly, you think that insults are flirting? And,” Sunset considered the way Adagio had waved about and slithered across her, “Oh, right, you’re a twenty foot sea monster.”

“And don’t you forget it,” Adagio pushed Sunset’s arm aside but stayed where she was, “Anyway, siren flirting is much more nuanced than just insulting each other. It’s a beautiful dance of passionate hatred and disgust, as we provoke each other and feed off each other’s negative energy. Normally there’d be singing, but that’s obviously off the table.”

“You do know that we don’t do that, right? Humans or ponies, we don’t feed off of negative energy? You can’t even do that anymore.”

“Obviously, but I’m still a siren. Why, how do humans flirt? I bet it’s dumb.”

Sunset tried to figure out how the conversation had got to this point, and failed.

“I don’t know, make suggestive comments, physical contact- less aggressive physical contact anyway, er, can we back up here, why are you trying to flirt with me?”

Adagio smiled. It was a smile of genuine admiration.

“Because of all the people in this world, you are the single most pathetic being I’ve ever had the displeasure of sharing an epoch with.”

Sunset struggled to reconcile her sultry tone with the words, “Which is… good?”

“Despite coming from a world abundant in magic, you choose to live among these magicless cattle for the sake of friendship. You could go back to Equestria at any time, any time, something that I would kill for, but you choose to stay here. And that, Sunset Shimmer, that disgusts me to the very core of my being.”

If Adagio had been talking about anything but how much she hated Sunset, that tone coupled with her deep, powerful voice might have set Sunset’s heart racing.

“On top of that,” Adagio continued, “you are one of only people in this world with magic, and yet you use it exclusively to help other people. You seem to delight in doing normal, human things, like going to school and working. You could have everything, and choose to have nothing, and I can’t decide whether it’s out of stupidity or some kind of friendship-induced delirium.”

Adagio slid up to Sunset once more, pressing against her side and twisting her body at an odd angle to look up at her.

“Sunset Shimmer, when I think about you, every brain cell I possess screams in impotent horror, and tries to reject the knowledge that you exist.”

Sunset let Adagio do her thing. It wasn’t exactly unpleasant, and didn’t come across as flirtatious even in light of this new context. It was more like having a large yet clumsy snake attempting to coil itself around her.

Adagio’s words did leave Sunset baffled, however. She couldn’t figure out how on earth she was supposed to interpret them. Obviously Adagio was flirting with her in her siren way, but Sunset couldn’t tell if she was supposed to take what she’d said literally.

On the other hand, no matter how she interpreted the words, it was easily the most passionate thing anyone had ever said about her, which was firstly kind of sad, and secondly left her with a whole tangle of confused feelings. She could handle Adagio hating her, that’s what she’d assumed the situation was before coming here today. But how would she feel about Adagio liking her?

She shook her head, “Are you- are you saying you actually feel those things, or do you like me and that’s just how you show it?”

“Oh, I assure you my feelings are genuine, Sunset Shimmer.”

“Not making things any clearer!”

Adagio grimaced and withdrew, “You’re really spoiling the mood, you know that?”

Sunset gestured in frustration, “I’m not clear on what the mood is supposed to be. You want me to hate you? Or to pretend to hate you and secretly like you?”

Adagio kicked her legs up onto the coffee table, crumpling the long-forgotten papers.

That reminded Sunset of why she was here in the first place, wasn’t she supposed to be trying to teach Adagio friendship? What was she supposed to do under these circumstances? She wanted desperately to write to Twilight for guidance, but even if she had the diary with her, she doubted the princess had ever had this problem before.

No, wait, there was an easy way to solve this.

“Adagio,” said Sunset, “can I use my powers on you?”

Adagio eyed her with suspicion, “Your rainbow laser pony powers?”

“No, my empathy powers. Remember I used them on you at Starsw- oh, wait, of course you wouldn’t remember that.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Basically, I can read other people’s thoughts and feelings. Can I use that on you?”

Adagio looked horrified, “Absolutely not!”

Sunset clenched her fists. It couldn’t be easy could it? She wanted desperately to understand what Adagio was feeling so that she could decide how she felt herself. Now that the idea was out there, did she want Adagio to like her romantically?

“Fine,” Adagio said, apparently reaching a conclusion, “why don’t you show me how you’d flirt with me.”

“Sweet Celestia,” Sunset put her head in her hand as images of stroking Adagio’s face and running her hand through that giant, soft looking hair filled her mind, “Hold on, no! I’ve seen you flirt with people. When you sung in the cafeteria at CHS, you got really touchy-feely with like, half the students.”

“That’s called dancing, Sunset Shimmer.”

“Oh wow, you really do need lessons in being human.”

“I told you, nobody needs that.”

“You apparently do! Okay, so like, caressing people, touching them slowly? Especially their faces, and getting your face close to theirs, that’s really intimate.”

“That’s ridiculous,” before Sunset could react, Adagio slid over to her and cupped her chin in her hand, drawing her own face close to Sunset’s. She had one hand on Sunset’s leg to support herself as she stroked her jawbone with her thumb, “You’re trying to tell me that this is flirting.”

As weirdly clinical as Adagio’s actions were, a jolt of electricity still ran up Sunset’s spine at the contact, throwing her already tumultuous feelings into further confusion.

“Er. Wow. Yes. Yes it is.”

“Really?” Adagio considered this, “This actually explains a lot.”

“Are you gonna. Er. Let go?”

“What? Oh.”

Adagio let her arm drop and pulled back. She drew her legs up onto the couch, lost in thought.

Sunset found she could breathe again, which she apparently hadn’t been doing. She held one hand to her chest as though that would still her racing heart. Her face and leg still tingled where Adagio had been touching her.

She wasn’t sure where to go from here. Her objective was still to teach Adagio friendship somehow, right?

Frankly she was shocked that after a thousand years in this world, Adagio didn’t know how human body language worked. It made sense she supposed, if Adagio only saw humans as a food source, and could get everything she wanted from them with magical mind control, then what reason would she have to really pay attention to them? But still, Adagio had a human body.

Quite a nice human body, Sunset noted.

Was this the first time in a thousand years Adagio had tried to have any kind of physical intimacy with another person? Okay, it was kind of an honour that she’d chosen Sunset then. But more importantly Sunset remembered how touch starved she’d been when she first arrived in this world.

Admittedly Sunset was a pony, and pony and human body language was pretty similar. They were also a species so given to displays of physical affection that other creatures made fun of them for it, and Adagio was a siren, a species that literally eat hatred. But she still had the body of a human. Surely she would be getting lonely by now?

The image of Adagio as a giant sea monster clumsily caressing Sunset’s face with stubby hooves sprung unbidden into her mind.

Sunset shook off the image, and considered how she’d feel if she tried to hug someone for the first time in a thousand years, and they rejected her. Adagio had to be feeling incredibly isolated in this world, living among people she barely thought of as people.

She had the other two sirens didn’t she? Though most of the time they didn’t seem to even like each other. Sunset could never figure out exactly what their relationship was.

Sunset swallowed. Friendship or romance, whatever her goal was here, it was clear what Sunset needed to do.

She hesitated for only a moment before she moved closer to Adagio and wrapped her arms around her in a hug.

Adagio barely moved in response.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

“Hugging you,” Sunset said, suddenly unsure that this was a good idea, “Is it, is it doing anything for you?”

“Is this supposed to be a form of flirtation? The human equivalent of coiling around one another? Because I see people hugging in public all the time, so if it is, humans are even more revolting than I thought.”

Adagio sat limply in her arms. Sunset was immediately regretting this. She was at an awkward angle, and a curl of Adagio’s hair was tickling her nose.

“I don’t know about that,” Sunset said, “but it is a display of affection. Er, usually platonic affection, to be clear.”

They sat like that in silence for a few moments.

“What exactly were you hoping I’d get out of this?” Adagio said.

“I was sorta kinda thinking that maybe the reason you hate humans is that you can’t relate to them? That maybe if you accepted that you’re basically a human now, you’d have some empathy for them?”

“And how, Sunset Shimmer, does this foolish notion of yours explain why you’re hugging me?”

Sunset swallowed. She tried to figure out how to explain her reasoning.

“I thought that If you’ve never been shown physical affection as a human, then, I dunno, it might help you accept that you sort of are a human? Er, let you internalise the fact that you’re no longer really a, what was it? A twenty foot flying sea monster?”

Another few moments of silence. Adagio wasn’t trying to remove Sunset, which made her reluctant to let go. On the other hand, Sunset desperately wanted to itch her nose or at least move to a position with less hair. If such a position was possible while hugging Adagio.

“Well that was a pretty stupid thing to think, wasn’t it?” Adagio said.

Sunset was jarred by the venom in her voice. Adagio got angry sometimes, but when she did it was more of a quiet, spiteful anger. This was barely contained rage.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m starting to think it probably was.”

“Because regardless of what you think, I am a glorious twenty foot flying sea monster.”

“Oh.”

Adagio’s voice had started trembling ever so slightly.

“And sirens don’t do platonic affection. Only you mewling prey creatures need to huddle together in fear.”

“Sure,” Sunset tightened her grip.

“I am made to be adored and feared. I am the reason you vainly seek safety in numbers, the reason you derive comfort from the touch of another, needing to assure yourself that you’re not alone in the world.”

Sunset didn’t dare say anything.

“I may have lost my body, I may have lost my magic, but I am not, and never will be, a human.”

“I understand,” Sunset croaked out.

“So no, this hug is not ‘doing anything for me’.”

Adagio had tensed up. Her breathing was deep and ragged. But still she made no move to remove Sunset.

Sunset asked, “Would you like me to let go?”

“Don’t you dare.”

Adagio’s voice cracked on the last word.

Sunset held on. Hugging Adagio felt like hugging a plank of wood or a piece of furniture. Still,there was no way she could let go of her after all that, even as her hair continued to tickle her nose.

“So, here’s an idea,” Sunset said, “I’m a, you know, a weak prey animal, and desperate to try to get you to accept the magic of friendship. So, completely for my sake, could you, maybe, hug me back?”

Adagio didn’t reply, and Sunset was worried she’d pushed her too far.

“Very well. I’ll take pity on you, Sunset Shimmer.”

Adagio shifted, hesitantly hovering her arms around Sunset, before at last leaning in to hug her.

Sunset used the opportunity to rub her nose. Sweet relief.

Adagio was wooden, her arms stiff. It was uncomfortable for Sunset, and clearly also was for Adagio. It reminded Sunset of how awkward she’d been as a human at first.

If she wanted this to be any less uncomfortable, Sunset would have to take the lead.

She pulled her legs up and laid them across Adagio’s. She readjusted herself so that she could take on a more relaxed posture. As she’d hoped, Adagio also relaxed a little, resting her chin on Sunset’s shoulder.

It felt unreal to be hugging Adagio Dazzle like this, to see her acting so vulnerable. Adagio was normally such a larger than life personality. Her presence filled entire rooms, her every movement like a choreographed performance. She acted, well, like she was a twenty foot sea monster, and the world around her responded in kind.

But here she was, stiffly huddled in Sunset’s arms, just another human like her, a little skinny and smelling of conditioner and hair spray.

And earlier she’d tried to seduce Sunset.

How did she feel about that now that things had calmed down? At the time she’d been weirded out, but looking back, it was almost sweet. Kind of dorky even, just an awkward attempt at flirting.

Adagio sniffed, her voice weak, “If you breathe a word about this to anyone I will murder you.”

Sunset stifled a giggle. She was about to respond, to assure Adagio she wouldn’t, when she got an idea.

“What? You don’t want me telling people how much of a human you’ve become?”

Adagio tensed, and for a moment Sunset thought she’d read the situation wrong. To her relief, Adagio actually relaxed further than before, wriggling about to get comfortable.

She purred into Sunset’s ear, “You truly believe that don’t you? Oh what a wretched little thing you are, Sunset Shimmer. Were you fooled into thinking this was for anything other than your sake? Not everyone seeks to debase themselves like you have.”

Sunset’s pulse quickened. Adagio’s deep, commanding voice spoken directly into her ear resonated with something inside of her, making her shiver ever so slightly.

“No, you’re right actually. A siren could never hope to be a human.”

Sunset felt Adagio’s body shake with a deep chuckle. A pleasant knot formed in the pit of her stomach.

“Is that really the best you can do?” Adagio said, “Just so you know, you’re supposed to make me hate you, not pity you.”

Sunset shuffled about, moving one hand up around the back of Adagio’s head, losing it in the mass of soft curls that grew there. She shifted so that her forehead came to rest against Adagio’s.

Her brilliant pink eyes were just a little bit puffy, but otherwise her half-lidded gaze and slight smile gave away nothing but her usual self-assured confidence.

“My mistake,” Sunset whispered, “I must have gotten that impression after you showed me how you live.”

Adagio closed her eyes and took a long, deep breath through her nose, holding Sunset tighter and tensing slightly.

“Better?” Sunset asked.

“That was passible.”

“I have to admit, siren flirting is fun.”

“There might be hope for you yet, then. And I’ll confess, your human displays of affection are… okay.”

The two of them had loosened up, comfortably wrapped in each other’s limbs. They’d finally managed to negotiate themselves into a position that felt natural.

Looking at Adagio now, feeling the warmth of her body, and the softness of her hair, Sunset suddenly found that she had the answer to how she felt about Adagio flirting with her.

Sunset smiled, “They get better.”

She angled her head to the side, closed her eyes, and kissed Adagio.

At first Adagio was unresponsive, but before long she returned the kiss, breathing deeply and heavily.

Sunset couldn’t quite trace the sequence of events that had led to this moment, how a series of weird miscommunications had brought her to where she was, kissing Adagio Dazzle. But now that she was here, she was happy she was.

The princess might not approve. It wasn’t like she’d gotten Adagio to accept the good word of friendship. She still saw humans as cattle.

Get out of my head, Twilight, just let me enjoy this, she thought.

The kiss was gentle at first. Then Adagio leaned further into Sunset, the kisses building in a crescendo that ended with Adagio pushing her down onto the couch. That was certainly unexpected, but not unwelcome, and Sunset was happy to let her take the initiative.

All of a sudden Adagio broke the kiss off, pushing herself off of Sunset and scrambling over to the other end of the couch.

Sunset blinked, sitting up. Her heart was still racing from the kiss, and now from the fear that she’d hurt Adagio somehow.

“Woah, are you okay?” she asked.

“Yes. I’m fine,” she snapped.

Sunset fought past the spike of irritation she felt at Adagio’s obstinance.

“Okay. It’s just, you kinda backed off all of a sudden, so…”

Adagio shot her an annoyed look that softened as she looked away.

“This is,” Adagio said slowly, “very strange for me.”

Sunset felt a pang of guilt, “I’m sorry, I thought you were having fun, I didn’t realise-”

“Oh, don’t be like that. I’m responsible for my own dumb feelings, Sunset Shimmer.”

She could be so frustrating, Sunset thought. She struggled to stay mad as she watched Adagio draw up her legs and hug them to her chest.

“Hey, Adagio?” Sunset said.

“Hm?”

“Just so you know, the offer to use my powers is still on the table. To read your emotions.”

Adagio bit her lower lip, still looking annoyed.

“I suppose it can’t be any more painful than having you slowly trick me into talking about my feelings. Do it.”

Sunset gently reached out and took Adagio’s hand. It was tense, like she might snatch it away at any moment.

“Are you sure?” she asked.

“Yes. Just get it over with.”

Sunset nodded and activated her power.

Emotions are not a clear cut thing. Sunset had truly come to realise that since getting her power. People were never just happy, or sad, or angry. Every person was just a big confused cocktail of different feelings.

Adagio was mostly excited and scared. She was having fun with Sunset, feeling a blend of affection and hate, though she processed the hate as a positive thing in the context of Sunset, always close to tipping over the line to its opposite. Adagio wanted to keep hugging her, kissing her, and more.

She was also terrified of accepting any of it, of accepting that she was enjoying the physical affection, and that she actually liked Sunset as a person. She was terrified because she felt it meant accepting that she wasn’t a siren anymore, that she was, to some degree, a human. A thousand years of denial made for a heck of a lot of dissonance.

Sunset let go. Adagio eyed her suspiciously.

“You look weird while doing that,” Adagio said.

Sunset wasn’t sure how to respond.

“My first instinct is to hug you, but I’m really not sure if that’s what you need right now,” Sunset said.

Adagio considered this, “No. But you can go back to holding my hand if you like.”

Sunset took her hand. After a moment, Adagio curled her fingers around Sunset’s. Sunset gently stroked her hand with her thumb.

They sat in silence for a while, Sunset trying to figure out what to say.

“Hurry up and say something,” Adagio muttered.

Sunset realised Adagio was gripping her hand hard.

“I,” What could she say? “I don’t know how to express myself in a way you’ll understand, that’ll translate to you as a siren. But I think you’ll understand me saying that I like being around you? That I’ve had fun with you today, and want to keep hanging out with you like this?”

Adagio wrinkled her nose, “Alright.”

“And, at the risk of scaring you off,” Sunset took a deep breath, realising too late that she probably shouldn’t have implied that Adagio could be scared of something, “I like you. And, I don’t know how to help you reconcile the human and siren parts of you, but I want to try.”

Adagio’s face completely screwed up in disgust. Her leg jittered. She looked away.

Sunset wished Adagio could just have reactions she could properly interpret.

“I think I understand why humans like hugs so much,” Adagio said.

“What? Why?”

“It means you don’t have to look at each other’s faces while you say such revoltingly embarrassing things.”

Sunset carefully formed the words, “Do you want me to look away?”

Adagio tapped her foot against the floor a few times. Then she slid over to her, laid her legs across Sunset’s, and rested her head on Sunset’s chest. Adagio’s hair tickled the bottom of her chin as she curled her arms around her.

“It’s weird that,” Adagio muttered.

“What is?”

“Arms. How you just snake them around me so naturally. It’s freaky, actually. Weirdo.”

“Are you complaining?”

Adagio said nothing, and after a while planted her face firmly into Sunset’s shoulder. She said something, too muffled to make out.

“What was that?” Sunset asked.

She moved her head a little to the side, “I said I hate you. In a siren sort of way. And,” she said something else, once again too muffled for Sunset to hear, followed by, “In a human sort of way.”

Sunset just held her close. There wasn’t anything she could say that wouldn’t scare her off.

Okay, so Adagio was a bit of a mess. Sunset wasn’t going to magically fix her with a couple of hugs and a friendship lesson or two. For a thousand years, she’d been repeating the same pattern, trying to do the same stuff she’d done when she was a siren, never learning anything. Even now, she’d written an entire song about every day being the same. She was irritable, even cruel sometimes, and completely misanthropic.

But what the hell, Sunset was also a huge mess of a person when it came down to it. When Princess Twilight had found her, she’d also been stuck in a rut, so obsessed with getting the respect she thought she deserved, that she’d repeatedly bullied her way to winning a bunch of popularity contests to become a fake princess.

And maybe asking for Sunset’s help with money was only a pretext to get her to come over here, but Adagio had at least acknowledged she had a problem to get help with. She’d reached out, and even, however grudgingly, admitted to having a human emotion. She could change.

Sunset took another look over the apartment. This place definitely wasn’t helping her.

Adagio really did need lessons in being human, or at least in how to live in this world. It would be a struggle, but Sunset would be there to help her. Hopefully the rest would come with time.