I Am a Monster

Chapters

The Start of It
Awoken
Meetups
Funny Seeing You Here
Obsession
Satiation
Dealing With It
You Look Like Hell
All Is Forgiven
Time Flies
Our Past Is Not Today

The Start of It

Sunset Shimmer had always ignored the looks she got. It had somehow gotten harder when the school wasn’t trying to hide their disdain for her.

Her few friends didn’t appear to have sat down yet, so she sat near their customary place—near enough to talk to any of them that thought it’d be nice to talk with her, but not so close as to disrupt any of the other students that wanted to talk to one of the five, as had happened several times. Sunset had felt so guilty when they walked away…

Someone sat down at her other side. Sunset looked up in surprise to see the school’s local DJ, Vinyl Scratch sitting down besides her, looking somewhat awkward. At least, as far as body language was concerned, given that Vinyl still wore the massive goggles that were her signature item.

Sunset decided to let her talk at her own pace.

Most of the students who came to her demanding apologies for how she’d acted hadn’t done so around her five friends, and only rarely in the cafeteria. But with how Vinyl was acting, that didn’t seem to be what she was here for.

“So…” Vinyl cleared her throat. “You’re, like, from another world, right?”

Sunset was smart, and began to have one or two ideas what this might be about. “Yeah.”

“So, are any of the, like, traditional fantasy monsters in...um...your home...world?”

“The country I am from is called Equestria,” Sunset corrected, trying her best at being gentle. Modulating her tone wasn’t hard, actually—she’d already been doing that for years before her reformation. “As for the question...for the most part, yes. We’ve got manticores, dragons, gryphons—though the latter two species object to the term ‘monster’, in the rare cases where they interact with ponies.”

“Aren’t...aren’t gryphons supposed to eat horses?” Vinyl asked slowly.

“Historically speaking, gryphon raids have been uncommon,” Sunset replied, trying to remember all the details from Equestrian history. She’d excelled at it, like everything, but it had been a great many years since she had lived in Equestria. “Gryphons have never had anything resembling a unified city, except for their one and only king, but that was centuries ago. For the most part, I’m not sure what they eat nowadays. I don’t think they’re obligate carnivores, so…” She paused, then looked into Vinyl’s goggles. “Sorry, am I rambling?”

“I did ask,” Vinyl chuckled. “That is fascinating, though. Are their other creatures? You mentioned manticores and gryphons, so, what about other mythologies?”

“I know there were hippogriffs, at least at one point,” Sunset said. “Trade with them ceased abruptly two to three hundred years ago. It’s remained a mystery since. Manticores aren’t common. Then we have cockatrices, a few legends related to sphinxes, I think I remember a reference to sirens one time, but that was really ancient history and I don’t really remember that. Oh! You’ll get a kick out of this—there is a Cerberus guarding the gates of Tartarus!”

Vinyl seemed like she’d been about to ask a question, but stopped abruptly. “I’m sorry, Tartarus? I thought...it was the land of rainbows...and unicorns, and the magic of friendship…”

“It’s used as a magical prison,” Sunset said. One that I probably would have been sent to if Princess Celestia hadn’t chosen to send Princess Twilight…

“Are there vampires?”

Her line of thought broken, she blinked, looking at Vinyl. “Vampires?”

“You know, the--” She swept one arm in front of her like she was wearing a cape. “—‘I vant to suck your blud’ type,” she said, in an exaggerated Transylvanian accent.

Sunset laughed at her theatrics, then stopped when she thought it might be rude. Vinyl was grinning, though, ear to ear. “I’ve been reading Twilight,” she said. “That, and I found Concrete Blonde’s collection of vampire music, so I got curious.”

“As far as werewolves are concerned, Equestria’s seen head nor tail of even the faintest myths of werewolves,” Sunset said. “Given that it means ‘man-wolf’, I assume there’s never been anything like that in Equestria. As far as vampires? We have myths over there, but there’s never been any concrete evidence.” She shrugged. “I have a theory that humans have myths pertaining to Equestrian creatures because every once in a while, one finds its way over here and…” She gestured to herself. “Well, doesn’t turn into a human.”

“Huh. That sounds plausible enough. Seems too convenient that the portal out front turns everything that comes through into a human, anyway.”

Sunset nodded. “Especially as it was a specially crafted relic, too. If there was a naturally occurring portal somewhere…”

“Then it might lead to something coming through, yet retaining its true form and not--” Vinyl gestured at her. “--turning into an Isekai protagonist.”

Sunset chuckled. “Well, in oh-so-many words, yes.”

Vinyl turned back to her food, seeming to think. Sunset decided to let her, turning to her own plate and deciding to finish her food before she had to return to class.

“I’d love to keep chatting about this sometime,” Vinyl mused. “It all sounds neat.”

As if a word like ‘neat’ could possibly describe the intricacies of interdimensional travel. Sunset smiled, then said, “Yeah, neat.”

As Sunset stepped out of the school, she almost had a spring in her step. Given that she’d been noticeably feeling upset here lately, Fluttershy took that as a good sign.

“Hey, guys,” Sunset said, waving as she got close. “We still up for movie night?”

It was almost a running joke, at this point. Sunset had, at first, assumed they didn’t really want anything to do with her, so that was her code of asking if she was welcome. She’d never really stopped asking, but they could tell it was a slightly different edge now.

At least, they hoped so, anyway.

“Of course!” Rainbow Dash exclaimed, punching her shoulder excitedly. “Though you and Vinyl talking about vampires over there probably put a spin on what Rarity was choosing tonight.”

“Please, Rainbow,” Rarity said. “I was on the verge of choosing it anyway. Sunset merely made up the deciding factor.”

“Uh huh, if you say so,” Applejack said, folding her arms over her chest. “Sunset, you need a ride?”

Sunset nodded. “If—if you don’t mind.”

“’Course not, sugar! You’re great company to have around!”

Sunset nodded, but didn’t look convinced. Watching her struggle with herself made Fluttershy almost want to laugh sometimes.

Compared to how Fluttershy herself used to act, Sunset Shimmer’s bullying was downright tame. Like Rainbow Dash’s playful punches, or Pinkie Pie’s spontaneity.

“I’m bringing popcorn marshmallows!” Pinkie exclaimed. “So I’ll need to stop by my house before we start, because we can’t have popcorn marshmallows without syrup!”

Fluttershy let out a quiet giggle.

“Popcorn—” Sunset blinked, frowning. “How the hay…”

“If you haven’t learned by now, it’s best not to ask questions,” Applejack said, putting a hand on Sunset’s shoulder. “Who’s place we watching at?”

“Who’s place are we watching at,” Rarity corrected. “Pinkamena’s was last time, Fluttershy’s the time before that…”

“My place this time, right?” Rainbow Dash suggested.

“It’s a bit cramped, though, for six people,” Rarity pointed out. “Perhaps my place?”

Applejack turned to Sunset. “Maybe we could sit at your place, Sunset. Though, now that I think about it, Ah’m not sure exactly where ya even live.”

Sunset suddenly shifted, looking tense and awkward as everyone stared at her. “Well, um, it’s a cheap, crappy house a short walk away from here. And—it’s smaller than Rainbow’s place, so…”

Applejack frowned at that, but said nothing.

“Then let’s do my place this time,” Rarity said decisively. “Not that you’re place isn’t lovely, Sunset, I’m sure it is, but six of us in a place even the size of Rainbow Dash’s is a bit much.”

Sunset nodded enthusiastically. “My place suits my needs, but, um, I’m afraid it doesn’t suit much more. I could pay for the popcorn this time!”

“If it’s my house, then I refuse to let someone else pay for the popcorn,” Rarity said indignantly. She was supposed to represent—generosity, was it? Was that what Princess Twilight had said?

Yes, and Fluttershy was kindness. Which she found kind of funny.

Fluttershy opened her mouth to say something, but Applejack interrupted. “Everyone else have a ride?”

“Um, I think I could? If it wouldn’t...be to much of a bother,” Fluttershy asked, trailing off towards the end.

“Course it wouldn’t! My truck seats three just fine!” Applejack said. “We’ll meet up at your place, Rarity. And I know you won’t let me pay for all the popcorn, but Rainbow and I eat the most of it, so I’ll pay ya for one of the bags. I insist.”

Rarity opened her mouth to object, then shrugged. “Fine, darling. I’m in too high spirits to argue you down from this one.”

Applejack’s mouth quirked up—to date, Rarity hadn’t yet succeeded at talking Applejack down from paying for one of the bags. But she said nothing, just moved into the driver’s seat. Fluttershy began moving to the back seats, but ran right into Sunset. Sunset’s eyes widened briefly, and she said, “Oh, um, I’ll just take shotgun, then. If—you don’t want it…”

Fluttershy didn’t want it. She shook her head. “I tend to be more comfortable in the back,” she said, opening up the door and sliding in.

Sunset sighed in relief, getting into the shotgun seat and buckling herself in. Applejack began pulling out, then turned her eyes to the road ahead of them. “Let’s see...she lives in the fancy part of town, right?”

“The mansion with the purple roof,” Sunset agreed. Sometimes, she seemed to hate taking any form of leadership positions, but Fluttershy knew that wasn’t the case. Sunset was afraid of herself.

Fluttershy related to that.

“Right, right,” Applejack muttered. “Like, I get farmhouses, right? Me and my kin all live in there. It can get up to eight or more people in one house. But why the hay do four people need a house big enough to fit a tractor in?”

Applejack had the tendency to replace ‘hell’ with ‘hay’, and...a certain other word with ‘buck’. Fluttershy found it funny, and wondered how Applejack would react if she spouted off some of the ones she knew.

“Er...I hate to say this, but I grew up in a castle,” Sunset pointed out.

Applejack seemed surprised. “What? I thought taking the crown was so you could be royalty.”

“I wasn’t royalty,” Sunset said, somewhat snappishly. “Wasn’t then, and never will.” She shuddered from the idea. “But I was the Princess’s personal student. Think of it like a fancy dorm room. With….my own personal maid. Did I mention that this ‘dorm’ consists of almost six different rooms?”

“Rainbow’s house barely has six rooms,” Applejack breathed.

“I suppose it’s just a matter of comfort,” Fluttershy said, seeing that Sunset wasn’t liking the conversation. “Some people might find the giant manors convenient, while others might get scared by all the empty rooms.”

Sunset nodded slowly. “Yeah. I...didn’t used to get that. When people—ponies—said they preferred smaller houses, I normally thought they were trying to trick me somehow.”

Applejack was silent for a minute. “This might be a touchy subject, Sunset...but...do you actually have a house right now? You’re not living, like, in some abandoned warehouse or somethin’ like that?”

Sunset was silent for a minute, then actually laughed. A good sign. “Of course not! I do have a house! I might have, um, absconded with a few jewels and such before leaving Equestria. The Equestrian bit is not an accepted form of currency round here, nor are they pure gold, as I quickly discovered. But the jewels are quite a bit more valuable here than in Equestria. Enough so that I afforded, well, a small and crappy, but cheap, house.”

Applejack nodded. “A’right, but I’d still like to take a look at it tomorrow, after school. If it’s too bad, Sunset, you can stay at my place—Lord knows we have the extra bed.”

“I wouldn’t want to impose--”

“You living in a dirty, rundown house without any necessities would be me imposing on you!” Applejack retorted. “It’s nice that you’re making a very good effort to change, girl, but try and have some self-worth.”

“O-kay. I’ll try.” Sunset let out a breath. “But please, I’ve been living there for almost six years now. Try and have some faith, okay?”

“I’ll head along with,” Fluttershy said. “We can all hang out, play some games…”

Sunset seemed to perk up slightly. “Oh, that sounds fun.”

Applejack pulled to a stop outside Rarity’s house. “Yeah, three friends sitting round, lookin’ out for each other, having fun...exactly what good friends do!”

Fluttershy felt the magic before she saw it. A direct pulse of magic ran through the car, and a small, circular rainbow ran around all three of them, for a single second, then disappeared.

And far off in the distance, Fluttershy heard something shatter. Something priceless. Something she needed.

Applejack looked up in alarm. “What in tarnation?” she demanded. “Was that--”

“I—I don’t know,” Sunset said. “I majored in all magic but friendship magic! I—I don’t think it even did anything, right?”

“The car’s still workin’ fine,” Applejack said, patting the radio. She pulled out the keys, and the car turned off. “It’s not powered by rainbows now, I guess.”

“I don’t know what that was. Fluttershy!” Sunset spun around quickly, and she and Applejack both sighed in relief when they both saw she was still sitting there. “You okay?”

“Um, I think so?” Fluttershy shrugged. “I do need to use the restroom, but, um, that’s all, I guess.”

NO IT WAS NOT ALL THE DAMPENER WAS SMASHED THE DAMPENER WAS SMASHED--

Applejack laughed. “Well, I guess we’ll have to wait and see. Maybe we hold off on giving speeches on the value of friendship for the time being, eh?”

“Call me crazy,” Sunset said slowly, unbuckling her seat belt, “but...Princess Twilight gave that whole speech and all right before she blasted me with the Elements. I thought she was just being dramatic, or trying to finally get a friendship lesson through this thick skull of mine, but...what if that triggers it?”

“We’ll ask the others,” Applejack decided. “Come on, let’s head in.”

Fluttershy managed to exchange one or two pleasantries with Sweetie Belle and Rainbow Dash—Rarity and Pinkie Pie hadn’t arrived yet—but she quickly excused herself and made her way Rarity’s closest restroom.

She stumbled inside, closing the door behind her. She looked into the mirror, and opened her mouth wide.

Upon a reflexive motion she hadn’t done in so long, two long, four inch fangs slipped out of her upper jaw, and her eyes turned a dark, deep red.

It shouldn’t have been possible. The dampener—it should be keeping her from having any of the normal signs of vampirism! But she’d felt it break. Friendship magic had released her powers back to her.

And with it, the old curse. She felt the familiar hunger, rising inside her. Her bloodlust.

Author's Note

In terms of giving credit to inspiration, this fic came about when I saw the video "Different View of Shyness" by Killme2paza on YouTube, which put Fluttershy as a vampire pretending to be shy so she could learn to be kind (at least, that's how I interpreted it into my writing).
This lead to me getting the idea to make a full series out of it, with a "different view" for the different characters, except primarily in the Equestria Girls setting. (I guess because I like Sunset Shimmer?) If all goes well, do expect me to write more of these, and if you guys would like a sequel, leave a comment! No promises that I will make a sequel, and I will mention it if a story is closed off and will NOT have a sequel.

Awoken

"The secret side of me, I never let you see, I keep it caged but I can't control it."

Skillet "Monster"

As Fluttershy returned to the main group, she forced herself to look calm. She’d done so before, right? Besides, she could easily manage her bloodlust for a single night. Her teacher had said that a vampire who couldn’t was nothing more than a walking corpse. The expression could have been taken literally or figuratively.

What Fluttershy couldn’t figure out was why friendship magic had decided to destroy the dampener. It didn’t make any sense! Was...was it alive, or was it just following what it did? Code like, ‘if magic relic is hampering friend A, destroy magic relic’?

To what extent would that even work?

Applejack and Rainbow Dash turned to look at her, both of them looking perplexed. Rainbow Dash said, “Fluttershy, I know you used to sing occasionally, but...do you still play instruments?”

Briefly, a memory of her singing a cappella on a stage in front of a crowd of vampires wearing masquerade masks flashed before her eyes, before she realized Rainbow Dash was talking about when she was a kid and Fluttershy looked like one. “Yes…” Fluttershy said tentatively.

“Do you...grow an extra foot of hair and pony ears?” Applejack asked slowly.

“Maaaaaybe?” Fluttershy drew out. She hadn’t known what that was about. She’d assumed it was the magic of friendship being weird with her vampire-ness, but if they had it, too…

“Awesome!” Rainbow Dash said. “I mean, I was kind of wanting to show off with it sometime, but...if all of us have it, we could, like, start a band or something!”

“We need to see if Rarity and Pinkie do the same,” Applejack said. “This still wouldn’t explain the weirdness in the car, but it would help ease my mind a little.”

Equestrian magic, on the loose? None of them know what it is, or what it was doing? Yeah, probably fine.

Sunset looked like she was about to say something, but decided not to. Fluttershy almost called her on it, but decided to let her be.

After all, I’m going to have enough problems of my own… Sunset could, and would already have to, work out a lot of her struggles on her own. Fluttershy had to believe in her.

“Rarity gets the pony ears!” Sweetie Belle chimed in. “I saw her when shew as playing that...um...the thing with the keys? Like a guitar-shaped piano?”

“A keytar?” Rainbow asked slowly.

Applejack frowned. "Is it really called that?"

The rest of the time waiting for Rarity and Pinkie Pie, which wasn’t long anyway, was filled with inane chatter that Fluttershy couldn’t bother herself to focus on.

Breathe in, breathe out. Accept the hunger. Accept the thirst. It is part of you.

But it shouldn’t have been.

Breathe in, breathe out. Accept the hunger--

BUT I DON’T WANT TO!

Her eyes opened, and she found herself drawn to the movie. She’d watched the occasional vampire flick over the past couple of decades, and they all got most of the details wrong, but she’d always disliked the ones that painted vampires as more monstrous. My Roommate is a Vampirecertainly had some monstrous sides to the vampires, but they were almost romanticized, and most of the things the main vampire did were mostly just her doing something wrong, with those decisions being completely unrelated to her vampiric nature.

At the same time, the red eyes was pretty spot-on accurate...especially with when they came out…

Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out…

“Fluttershy, is the movie bothering you?” Rarity asked quietly, hoping not to disturb the other movie watchers.

“Not really that much,” Fluttershy lied. “Besides, it’s your movie turn, so I’ll stay here.”

Perhaps it was good that the vampires in the movie weren’t as monstrous as real vampires were. At least Rarity hadn’t chosen one of the darker ones, though Rarity rarely chose things without a happy ending.

Though, Rarity’s interruption seemed to help. She had friends, and if friendship got her into this mess, then thinking about her friends would get her out.

She managed to control herself for the rest of the movie, listening to a few of her friends talk about their favorite scenes or characters.

“When she punched the disapproving mother--” Rainbow Dash laughed her head off. “It was awesome! Like, take that, snooty rich person!”

“Rainbow, that was aggravated assault,” Applejack pointed out.

“Well, yeah, she certainly looked aggravated,” Rainbow said. “These actresses did a really good job. I wonder what I’ve seen them in before? I swear they looked familiar…”

Sunset let out a loud snort of laughter. They turned to see her, staring at the back of the DVD case, and she looked up, suddenly blushing as she saw their attention. “Well, uh, I know why the night princess looked familiar at least.”

“Go on,” Pinkie Pie said, tossing one of her ‘marshmallow popcorn’ things into her mouth. How she threw it when Fluttershy’s fingers were still stuck fast together from the syrup, she'd never know.

“Because the actress was Vice Principal Luna, Sunset said, pointing to the back of the box. “Luna Regalia.”

Rarity took the case, squinting at it. “My word! I almost didn’t recognize her!”

“This movie was made almost ten years ago,” Applejack breathed. “Hoo-wee, she was an actress?”

“I wonder if we could find other movies with her in it?” Rarity said.

“I’ll see if maybe I can track a few down,” Sunset said. “I’m good at finding things out on the web.” She sobered up immediately after she said that. “Um...I mean…”

“It’s okay, sugar. This is quite a bit different from what you used to do, and some of those skills are certainly gonna come in handy.”

Fluttershy managed a fake yawn, hoping it sounded realistic. “Oh, dear, it certainly looks quite late,” she said. “I should get on home now."

“Is it—my word! Sunset already!” Rarity leapt out, looking out the nearest window. “I always forget how short the days get…”

“Fluttershy, I’ll give you and Sunset a lif--” Applejack cut off. Fluttershy was gone. “Uh, where’d she go?”

Luna yawned a bit, finally coming down to the kitchen, seeing Celestia hard at work making pancakes while humming softly. One of the good things about immortality—her body burned a lot of energy, and most energy was stored safely away without causing her to put on large amounts of weight.

That meant a lot of pancakes.

“Do we have syrup?” Luna asked, opening the fridge and looking for the milk.

Celestia let out a mildly indignant sound. “Well, princess, I’m sure we have some in the pantry. After all, I wouldn’t want all your pancakes going to waste again because you wouldn’t eat them without syrup.”

Luna scoffed. “’Twas two centuries ago. I would assume that you would have gotten over a joke.”

“Well, since you’ve kept asking me every single day, it would be hard to forget,” Celestia said. “And I would assume that the four hundred years since Shakespeare was alive would allow you to drop the ‘thee’s and ‘thou’s.”

“Well, I would assume--” Luna closed the fridge door, then jumped back, seeing Fluttershy standing right behind it, barely managing to cut off a curse.

Celestia looked up from her pan, eyes widening in surprise. “Hello, Fluttershy. Is there something we can do for you?”

“The dampener,” Fluttershy said, a somewhat gaunt look on her face. “It broke last night. What happened?”

If it had been in one piece, Luna thought, then Fluttershy wouldn’t have been able to sneak into their place so thoroughly. She looked to Celestia, who opened one of the kitchen pantries. She frowned, then pulled out a few, brown shards of a material that wasn’t quite ceramic. “I’m not sure,” she said. “What exactly happened?”

“The bucking magic of friendship happened,” Fluttershy said, almost a growl in her throat as she sat down in one of their spare chairs.

A moment of silence passed. “’Bucking’?” Luna asked, naturally focusing on that part.

Fluttershy blinked, then sighed. “Blame Applejack,” she muttered. “I think Equestrian magic between me and my friends destroyed the dampener.”

“Why would it do such a thing? And how? We must admit, that though we’ve seen our fair share of otherworldly things, the magic of friendship is somewhat new to us.”

“I’ve only had friends the past…” Fluttershy let out a breath through her teeth. “...ten years? Fifteen? Times flies. But since we helped Princess Twilight blast Sunset Shimmer with the Elements of Harmony, the friendship magic has apparently not gone away, even with the portal closed.”

“Perhaps because the portal was closed,” Celestia mused, setting two plates of pancakes in front of her sister and their guest. “Maybe without the portal, the magic can’t return to Equestria.”

“We could theorize all day about what happened, and why,” Luna interjected, “most of it would be conjecture, and only one of said theories would be truth. So, rather than spend an entire day coming up with falsehoods, let us discuss what we should do.”

Fluttershy let out an obnoxious giggle, then said in a fake aristocratic tone, “Verily.”

Luna raised an eyebrow at her.

Fluttershy suddenly seemed a lot more interested in her pancakes, cutting off a piece of them and eating it.

Without syrup.

Celestia put the prerequisite condiment on the table, and Luna began drenching her pancakes in it. “The chief thing that must be addressed is that, since we can’t figure out why it happened, simply acquiring another dampener is out of the question. The likelihood of it shattering again makes it not worth the considerable effort it is to acquire a new one.” She took a bite of her pancakes.

Fluttershy nodded. She’d most likely already had that same thought.

“Have all your vampire powers returned?” Celestia asked, sitting at the table with her own plate.

Fluttershy nodded. “I believe so, though there’s a number I didn’t test. My wings, the stare, and a few others.”

“The dampener...it was supposed to be for vampiric fasting, right? In times when it was too dangerous to go out and feed?”

Fluttershy nodded. “Very rarely used, but yes.”

“But you also said it wasn’t safe to use long-term, like you’ve been doing,” Luna said. She popped open her milk carton, then took a swig straight out of it.

Fluttershy didn’t comment on Luna’s table manners. “Yes,” she said slowly. “It could cause damage if used for more than two or three decades.”

“How long have you been using that one for?” Celestia asked.

“Roughly twenty-three years.”

“Then it stands to reason the magic of friendship might have been trying to keep you safe,” Celestia thought. “Besides, have you considered that you really don’t need it to keep yourself under control now?”

Fluttershy raised an eyebrow.

“Well, what I’m saying is you’ve come a long way, Fluttershy,” Celestia said gently. “From who you used to be, to someone who functions as a physical embodiment of kindness. You have friends who care about you, and who wouldn’t want to see you hurt yourself with the dampener. You’ve hidden away your anger, but you’ve also hidden away a part of yourself, Fluttershy. One that maybe you don’t like, but hiding something like that away won’t help you any.”

“Are you...seriously saying...that I go around...without any sort of dampener?” Fluttershy asked, incredulous.

Celestia nodded. “I should have talked you into dropping it years ago, Fluttershy. It’s been obvious to me that you don’t need it to control yourself.”

“Yes I do!” Fluttershy burst out. “You remember what I was like! I was a monster, Celestia! I hurt people! I threw a car at you!”

“And I forgive you for that,” Celestia said, “just as you and your friends forgave Sunset Shimmer for all her actions.”

“Cease this for one moment!” Luna pointed a finger at Celestia. “You’ve forgiven her for throwing a car at you, but you haven’t forgiven the pancake incident a scant two years prior?”

“Of course. Fluttershy changed her savage ways,” Celestia said coldly. “Yet, anytime I even think about making pancakes when we don’t have syrup…”

“Pancakes needeth the sweetness!” Luna said, banging her fork into the table. “The sweet gifts of the maple tree are practically made for the ingestion of--”

“A-hem,” Fluttershy interrupted pointedly.

“Ah, right. Forgive me, Fluttershy. You simply prodded an old wound between the two of us.” Luna glared once more at Celestia, then continued. “The fact of the matter either way is that we don’t even have a way to give you another dampener. The vampires that are left in America stay far away from us. And none of the living ones would even think about selling such an item to us—nor you, either, given your reputation.”

“You will need to start feeding normally again,” Celestia said. “But as long as you do so regularly, there won’t be any troubles, right?”

Fluttershy bit her lip, not answering.

“I’m thinking we have an opportunity here, as well,” Luna said. “If you remember, dear Fluttershy, Vinyl Scratch doesn’t know much about her powers. If you would consider it once more, perhaps you could teach her?”

“I’ll consider it,” Fluttershy said slowly.

“Of course. It can wait until you come to terms with this,” Celestia said with a smile. “For now, you should finish your breakfast and head to school. Were you going to tell your friends?”

“Not unless I have to,” Fluttershy said slowly. “We’re still trying to figure out why we all grow pony ears when we play instruments, and helping Sunset adjust. It would be awful of me to just drop that in there as well.”

Celestia looked like she didn’t believe that was the whole problem, but she didn’t press the issue. “Was there anything else you’d like to discuss?”

“We watched My Roommate is a Vampire last night. They liked your acting, Luna.”

Luna coughed on a syrupy, sticky lump that inexplicably lodged itself in her throat. She quickly washed it out with some milk, then after done coughing, spoke up. “Well, I’d quite forgotten about that. We came up with a fake name for Vinyl for the movie, right?”

Celestia nodded. “We needn’t worry about that, Luna. Her stage name was different from the name she’s enrolled under.”

Fluttershy hadn’t caught that the main vampire had been Vinyl. Granted, she spent a lot of time purposely avoiding the other vampire, so she wouldn’t ask...awkward questions.

“But...isn’t there anything you can do?” Fluttershy asked.

“We’ll be here for advice, if you need it,” Celestia responded. “Keep in mind, Vinyl gets by without a dampener just fine.”

“Vinyl isn’t a murderer,” Fluttershy countered.

“You killed plenty of people, yes, but I believe you to be far past the point of killing thirty people because of a missing brooch, and you’re never going to be like your mentor," Luna said firmly.

It had been her mother’s—the only item she’d been allowed to keep from her. She’d never found it.

Seeing that she touched upon a sore subject, Luna apologized. “I meant no disrespect, Fluttershy. I’m certain it was quite valuable to you. I simply meant that even if such a thing happened again, the current you would react quite differently to a slight of that sort.”

“If I had had my powers, Sunset Shimmer wouldn’t have made it far enough to be redeemed,” Fluttershy pointed out. “I would have killed her, Luna.”

“You could have have done so anyway. While she has some skills of her own, your skills certainly surpass hers,” Luna pointed out. "So, no, I don't believe you would have killed her because, simply put, you didn't."

Fluttershy still didn’t look convinced.

“I think we’ve said all there is to say, Fluttershy,” Celestia said. “If you need advice on something—like the best way to tell your friends, when you’re ready—then we will be here. For now, I’m certain you will be running late soon enough.”

“Thanks for the food,” Fluttershy said, sighing. She got up, but Celestia rose as well, grabbing a take out box from a cabinet. “You won’t exactly have time to stop at your house, and there aren’t a lot of vegetarian fast food options. Eat these on the ride into town.”

Fluttershy nodded her thanks, then strode out the door. By the time Celestia closed the door, she had disappeared.

Fluttershy climbed up the steps to school that day feeling dismal. The pancakes hadn’t filled her in the way she needed them to. They hadn’t satisfied a craving that was worse than any plain old sugar crash. There was something vicious inside her, and it had woken up last night.

She was so distracted that she walked face-first into Rainbow Dash and her other friends.

“Whoa!” Rainbow said, helping her catch her balance. “You alright there, Space Cadet?”

Fluttershy ignored the light-hearted jab. “Sorry, guess I just had some things on my mind.”

Applejack bit her lip, then said, “Well, I think I might know what’s on your mind Fluttershy.”

Fluttershy was absolutely certain that Applejack didn’t know, but said anyway, “You-you do?”

Applejack nodded gravely, then checked to make sure that the group of friends were properly alone enough, then said, “Have you gals noticed that Sunset’s been kind of down lately?”

A murmur of various agreements came through the group.

“Well, I’m worried that she might be...feeling overly bad about the Fall Formal,” Applejack said carefully, searching through her locker.

“I...was hoping she just had some blues,” Fluttershy said, actually taken aback. Truth be told, she’d somehow missed what Applejack was pointing out. “Goodness, do you think…”

“I hope not,” Applejack said slowly. “But...darn it! She’s my friend. I don’t want to lose her because even though we all forgave her, she couldn’t forgive herself.”

“That would be bad, especially as Princess Twilight specifically asked us to watch out for her,” Rainbow said. Her frown suddenly deepened. “Hey, she’s the Princess of Friendship, right? Do you think...other bad guys she’s reformed...well…offed themselves?”

“I think it might have been a possibility,” Applejack said darkly. “We should take turns keepin’ an eye on her. Just to be safe, you know? Someone should check up on her every day, and we should giver her plenty of support and encouragement.”

“Then I suppose we’re really lucky Vinyl decided to start hanging out with her,” Rarity said. “Vinyl asked her just a minute ago if it she was wanting to hang out.”

“Yeah, but, Sunset seemed kind of dodgy about the question,” Rainbow said. “Not today, not tomorrow, probably the day after?”

“Fluttershy and I were going to hang out with her once school was out,” Applejack said. “I can’t say for certain about tomorrow, but she already promised to hang out with the two of us today, so she can’t really go back on that.”

Fluttershy almost slapped her forehead. She’d forgotten about that. I really need to focus myself, she thought.

“Here, here,” Rarity said. “A promise is a promise, and it’s good to see that she has definitely made miles of improvement.”

“Still, no matter how much she improves, she could be worried about how she used to be,” Fluttershy said quietly. “You can never really know how much you’ve improved at something, you know?”

There was a moment of silence, broken finally by Pinkie Pie. “You know, I understand that, to an extent, but honestly? She wasn’t even the worst person I’ve ever met!”

“Maybe we could all get together and tell her that,” Rainbow Dash said. “Like, give her a card!”

“’You didn’t make my top five least favorite people’?” Rarity said pointedly. “I’m sure she’d love that, darling, but maybe we should consider something else?”

The bell rang in the distance. “Shoot!” Applejack muttered. “Well, we gotta run now, so I guess we’ll talk about this more after school.”

The girls rushed off to their classes. Fluttershy moved at a slower pace, feeling anxiety gnaw away at her sanity.

Or perhaps, if her past actions were any indicator, what was left of her sanity.

Meetups

Sunset had been hopeful, but still pleasantly surprised when Vinyl sat down next to her for a second day in a row. She looked up and noted Octavia sitting down on Vinyl’s other side. This wasn’t as surprising—if Vinyl was there, then sooner or later, Octavia would be as well. The two roommates were practically inseparable. Octavia’s attitude towards Sunset was also not a surprise.

Octavia was not normally considered the friendliest of individuals, and her clear dislike of Sunset wasn’t much of an abnormality from her normal demeanor.

Vinyl seemed to be deliberately ignoring Octavia’s behavior. Sunset’s friends were still in line picking up food, even though they all looked somewhat subdued--even Pinkie Pie, somehow.

She wanted to chat with Vinyl again. But with Octavia there, she decided to wait. Some of her old skills weren’t necessarily bad—she could tell that if she spoke up, it might make Octavia decide to say something bad. So she let Vinyl handle it.

Vinyl began packing away her lunch, without too much regard for table manners. Octavia made a disgusted sound. “Must you?” she asked, her posh accent lending the words their scorn.

Vinyl at least had the decency to swallow before talking. “Yes,” she said, then returned to consuming her light lunch as fast as possible.

Sunset snickered, trying very hard to hide it. Octavia glared at her, then sighed. “Okay, I believe she’s doing this just to get on my nerves because she’s mad at me, and…” She sighed again. “Fine, Scratch. You win.” She turned to fully look Sunset in the face. “I’m not sure how I feel about you yet, Sunset, I won’t lie. But I am willing to give you a chance, since you’re trying to turn over a new leaf.”

Vinyl swallowed again, then took a sip from a soda. With a loud belch, she set the can down.

Octavia turned her glare at her. “Must you?”

Even with the goggles, Vinyl made full eye contact with Octavia, saying, “Yes.”

Sunset burst out laughing, trying and failing to hide it. Even Octavia was forced to a light giggle, but eventually sighed and returned to her own food, shaking her head.

“Octavia, first, thank you,” Sunset said, recovering. Octavia looked up, seeming surprised. “It’s been...admittedly rough, both with everyone treating me...like I probably deserve, and even the whole ‘new leaf’ thing is difficult. I promise I’ll do my best with this chance. Second, I would like to wholeheartedly apologize for all the nasty things I did to you.”

“It’s all in the past,” Octavia said, waving it away.

Vinyl looked at her. “She never messed with us much, right? We stayed beneath her notice.”

Octavia didn’t answer directly. “I can handle myself, Vinyl.”

Sunset felt guilty immediately, figuring out what had happened without too much trouble. Truth be told, she didn’t remember ever messing with Vinyl, but she had bullied Octavia on several occasions.

Vinyl didn’t answer for a long time, then sighed, pushing her plate slightly away from herself. “You’re right,” she muttered. “Anyway, Sunset, I was wondering...even though you’ve gotten your schedule full for the next few days, maybe you have time for a coffee or something?”

“I was heading into town to get a few things tomorrow,” Sunset said, considering. “Alright, that would be great. We could meet up at Starbucks before I go do my shopping. Will you be fine if my driver joins us?”

“Your driver?” Vinyl asked, cocking her head in a confused manner.

“I, um, don’t have a car, and the possibility of getting one has always been...let's just say low. My friends volunteered to give me rides around town when I need them. Tomorrow was Rarity’s turn. I don’t see her as a Starbucks person, but I’m pretty sure it would be rude not to offer her, right?”

Vinyl considered. “I don’t mind,” she said. “Rarity’s a blast, though I admittedly find Rainbow Dash rough to talk to easily.”

Despite how quietly she said the last part, Rainbow Dash still shot a glare over at her direction. “I heard that,” she said.

“And you have to admit, you’re ‘best-of-the-best’ attitude can be quite infuriating at times,” Rarity countered, sitting down with her lunch.

“So, Rarity,” Sunset said slowly. “Do you think you could drop me off at Starbucks tomorrow, before I go shopping?”

“Of course, Sunset! Anything you need, I can give!” Turning slightly to Vinyl, she added, “Oh, were you wanting to hang out with your new friends?”

“Damn sure she was!” Vinyl answered, leaning over and throwing one arm around Sunset’s shoulders. “Talking about how much she liked cuddling and hugs aaaan-awaaah!”

Predictably, she fell off, dragging Sunset to the ground too.

“Oh, goodness, are you alright?” Fluttershy asked, somehow being the first to get over there.

“I’m fine,” Vinyl said with a shrug. She sat up slight, rubbing her elbows. “I landed on something soft.”

Sunset groaned. “Can I get up now?” she wined.

Fluttershy normally liked hanging out with her friends after school, but between Sunset’s discomfort and her vampire troubles, she was left with a lot of anxiety of her own.

Applejack seemed like the only one who had some level of calm.

“I brought snacks,” she said, nodding to the plastic bags in the backseat. “Chips and dip. A six pack of sodas.”

“Any apples?” Sunset asked with a wry smile. Her tension was still plainly visible, but she relaxed slightly when Applejack laughed.

“Yeah, how’d ya guess?” Applejack answered with a cheeky grin, turning down another street.

“It’s just one street over,” Sunset said, tensing back up slightly.

“I’m sure your house is lovely, Sunset,” Fluttershy said, trying to fix what she could. If Sunset’s house had really been that terrible, she wouldn’t have survived this long, right?

“There it is,” Sunset said, pointing.

Applejack eyed the small house, pulling into the driveway. A building scrunched between two other buildings, with minimal room for anything in the yard.

It was tiny, but it seemed to be in good condition. Couldn’t be that bad, right?

Sunset got out, but was unable to pick up the grocery bags before Applejack started carrying them. With a wry smile that showed she knew what she did, Applejack asked, “Get the door for me, sugar?”

Sunset nervously climbed the few steps up to her door, then began fiddling with the keys. Applejack said nothing as Sunset fumbled with them, suddenly snapping under her breath, “Tartarus.”

After a few more Equestrian swear words, Sunset popped the door open. “Well, make yourselves at home,” she said nervously, holding the door open.

Applejack had hardly stepped in when her jaw dropped in surprise. Fluttershy grew concerned, stepping in behind her, but the concern was short lived.

Sunset’s poker face was good, but not enough to completely hide her fear. “I know, it’s small, but I get by just fine,” she said quickly.

Applejack let out an appreciative whistle. “Sunset, this stuff all looks...uh, expensive as hell. How the...ahem, hay did you afford all this?”

“Um, I traded away some jewels I carried over from Equestria,” Sunset said slowly, hiding her surprise well. “Are...are you impressed by all this?”

“Sunset, I saw that fridge in a shopping catalogue a bit back, and I said it was too expensive for us to get at the farm. Wha—how in the--” She stopped, then slowly turned to look at a beautiful, exquisite portrait of a sunset over a woodland river, with a great stag raising its head to look right into the sun. “Fancy...shmancy…” Applejack wobbled a little, then set down the bags. She stumbled over to the sofa, sitting down.

“Well, it is small, but otherwise, it looks great, Sunset,” Fluttershy said. Over her years, she’d built up large amounts of money, and had a few mansions set up. The way Sunset’s place was furnished reminded her of those—small buildings, but loaded to the brim with the best luxuries to be afforded at the time.

“Sunset,” Applejack said, “you—you lived in a castle in Equestria, right?”

“Yessss?” Sunset dragged out slowly.

“So, this was your first...uh, low end house in...how long?”

Sunset considered. “Ever, really? My parents were on the lower end of nobility, but, uh, that was still pretty rich.”

Applejack’s head fell onto the back of the sofa. Fluttershy poked the sofa’s arm, feeling the soft, luxurious fabric.

She recognized it from some of her stints into sewing as very high quality. She giggled. “Well, Sunset, while I can’t speak for Applejack, I think your house is lovely. And her lack of speech is actually pretty vocal, too.”

“Sunset, this is—I can’t even--” She let out another whistle. “How many gems did you sell?”

“Er, a few? I just kind of filled my saddlebags and jumped through the portal."

Fluttershy giggled, bringing the grocery bags to the fridge. “So, a backpack full of priceless and rare gems?”

“I mean, they’re neither of those things in Equestria,” Sunset said slowly, running a hand through her hair. “Any determined pony with a shovel can get themselves a pail of small gems.”

Fluttershy opened the fridge, then stopped. The door had an ice maker installed, and the fridge itself had a few compartments more than she’d been expecting. She noticed multiple small boxes installed into the back of the fridge, but did note that the fridge was rather sparsely stocked otherwise. She made a note to ask Sunset about it, then paused before loading their snacks into the fridge. “Um, Sunset? What are any of these compartments? I don’t know where to put anything…”

“Uh, just wherever?” She shrugged unhelpfully, then turned to where the grocery bags had been sitting just a second ago. Two feet away from her, in between her and where Fluttershy had been standing. Sunset shook her head, obviously confused, but didn’t say anything about it. “Um, yeah. Aside from raw meat, I just shove things wherever.”

Fluttershy nodded, packing away the refrigerated snacks while making a mental note to stop using her vampire powers where people might notice—especially people who knew what magic was and might ask questions.

“Ah didn’t get any meat,” Applejack said, “’specially as ah’m pretty sure I’m the only one of the three of us who’d eat it.”

“I do eat meat,” Sunset said slowly, sitting down the sofa besides Applejack. “Just not pork or beef. Fish or fowl, but nothing I might have been related to.”

Applejack blinked, then turned to face Sunset. “Uh...sorry, sugar, I’ll try not to eat it around ya anymore. Okay?”

Sunset chuckled awkwardly as Fluttershy closed the door to the fridge. “Don’t worry about that, AJ, I just don’t eat it. Eat what you want around me, though I’m thankful you were considerate enough to do that.”

Applejack tipped her hat up slightly. “Well, alrighty, then. Whatcha wanna do? We could watch some movies, or play some games. Or...are you not into games? I don’t recall ever seein’ ya play ‘em before.”

“She’s from a world that I’m pretty sure doesn’t have electricity,” Fluttershy pointed out, sitting down besides Sunset.

Sunset jumped in her seat, looking from Fluttershy to the fridge.

“Somethin’ wrong, sugar?” Applejack asked.

“Uh...nothing, I guess. Just...got distracted…” She shook her head, and Applejack looked concerned. REALLY stop the teleporting now, Fluttershy admonished herself.

“Equestria has board games, but not video games. I have played video games before, mostly because I thought they were considered ‘cool’--” She grimaced. “—but I haven’t played in a bit.”

“Well, that’s fine. Do you have any favorites?”

“Well, um, this is kind of embarrassing…” Sunset ran a hand through her hair. “I’ve noticed that I’m something of a...’sore loser’. I get really angry when I’m not winning.”

Fluttershy cracked her knuckles.

Sunset looked at her in surprise as Applejack chuckled. “Well, I appreciate ya bein’ honest, Sunset. But Fluttershy knows how to handle a touchy temper.”

“So, what games do you play?” Fluttershy said, smiling confidently.

“Mostly stuff you probably wouldn’t be into anyway, so we could just--”

Fluttershy’s smile didn’t relent.

Sunset flicked on a wide-screen gaming console with a sigh. “This one is shorter, so when you inevitably don’t like playing—especially with me--” She hooked up two controllers, then sat down. “It’s a fighting game. Both players--”

“I know what a fighting game is,” Fluttershy said patiently. “They’re not normally my cup of tea, but I’ve played a few before.” She did raise an eyebrow at the characters. “But I didn’t think you played Thems Fighting Herds.”

“Because I thought it was funny,” Sunset said in a deadpan tone. “Fighting game, but all the characters are horses. Er, close enough, anyway,” she added, as Fluttershy locked in a cow.

“Do you...need a moment to figure out what your attacks are?” Sunset asked, selecting her own character.

“No, I play this one when Rainbow Dash makes me play with her,” Fluttershy said. “I used to play the lama, but this one suits me better, I think.”

Sunset’s eyes narrowed at the screen. “You know, I know enough about people to detect a trick coming. Just what are you planning on…” She blinked as Fluttershy pulled off an expert combo, then retreated just before Sunset could retaliate.

“Hrrm,” Sunset said, slowly. “Okay. I see. You plan on beating the crap out of me, then telling me how to be less angry about losing?”

“Hmm, more or less,” Fluttershy said with a shrug. “It’s what I did with Rainbow Dash, too.”

Sunset sighed. “Bring it.”

Some time later, Fluttershy decided to let the gaming stop. Applejack had been on the edge of her seat, watching them play. Truth be told, Fluttershy had actually had a lot of fun. Sunset was close to her own skill level, if rusty, and had made several victories quite narrow. However, as she’d warned, she’d gotten annoyed as the game stopped going in her favor, and her play had thus worsened. Which was how Fluttershy found herself sitting with a fuming Sunset Shimmer who was barely holding back, Fluttershy guessed, several mean comments.

“So,” Fluttershy said cheerily, “you want me to help you with that?”

Sunset took in a deep breath, then nodded.

“First, that right there was a good idea. Deep breaths whenever you get mad. Remember, it is just a game.”

Sunset considered, then took another deep breath, then released it.

“Second, rather than scream curses or about bugs or whatever--” She made a flippant gesture with one hand. “—think back to that very first combo I got off.”

“...Yeah. What about it?”

“How could you have stopped me from doing it?”

“Hmm...I guess I could have been paying a little more attention?” Sunset shrugged.

Fluttershy nodded. “It was a teensy bit mean of me, I admit, but it was more of a lesson than a play session, anyway. Now, when you lost this most recent match, what did you do wrong?”

Sunset stopped to think. “Hmm. I wasn’t paying attention to my health. I was going too aggressive when you had too much health. I was also letting my temper get the better of me.”

“Good. Now, any time something bad happens to you in a game, there’s a simple thing to do. Just ask what you could have done better. It both helps you improve, and keeps you from blaming the controller or something. Besides, taking a second to stop and think about it helps clear out all that anger.” One second of clear thought would have saved Celestia and Luna a loooooot of trouble back in the eighteen hundreds…

Sunset nodded. “That’s...good advice. Thanks, Fluttershy. And...sorry if I was--”

“Actually, I think you overexaggerated about how bad you were,” Fluttershy said. “You were definitely angry, but you held your tongue and didn’t even make any rude comments.”

“Even when she crouched up and down on you mid match,” Applejack said, elbowing Sunset Shimmer. “I’d have had some words with her o’er that one.”

“She stopped her combo for that,” Sunset hissed through her teeth.

Fluttershy giggled. “Again, that was kind of mean. But I hope it really got the point across, right?”

Sunset laughed. “Okay, okay, you got me there. How long did it take Rainbow Dash to get better about this all?”

“Better part of three months, while we were still living in Cloudsdale,” Fluttershy said. “You already have plenty of self control, so you’re not nearly as bad off as she was.”

Sunset laughed long and hard, leaning back on the sofa.

“Well, it is gettin' a mite late," Applejack said. "Should we pop open the snacks I brought?"

"Let's," Sunset said, rolling onto her feet. As she headed to the kitchen, she asked, "Fluttershy, do you...would you mind so much...if I asked you to keep helping me with my temper issues?"

"Oh, not at all," Fluttershy said. "In fact, that was actually fun. I can't wait to play again!" She even got me to stop thinking about all my other troubles...

It did strike her as odd, with her teaching Sunset how to manage her temper. Sunset's temper wasn't nearly as bad as what Fluttershy's used to be--the other vampires had tended to stay away from her, and she had earned the unofficial title of 'Flutterbitch'. Fluttershy had had to resort to using the dampener to keep herself from acting out, and it had worked. But without it, she was considerably concerned. After all, she now had to start feeding again. She used to not care so much whether or not she killed the person she drank from. She never really learned restraint in that area--no matter how much her teacher tried. Granted, his trying was only slightly less halfhearted than her own, given his own respect for human lives, but it was still what he saw as 'proper'.

Her thoughts were interrupted by a sudden sweet smell. Ever so slightly metallic, with a faint bitter trace, but it got more tempting the longer she smelled it.

"Tartarus," Sunset cursed.

"You okay, Sugar?"

"Yeah, just cut my finger like a dumbass. Stupid apples."

"Hey, now, it ain't the apple's fault."

Fluttershy opened her eyes, peering at he reflection in the now dormant gaming console. Red eyes stared back at her. "Fuck," she whispered to herself. This was not the time for this. She did not need to drink Sunset's blood. She was better than that. They were making food right now. She'd deal with that.

You know that won't be what you need, a dark voice whispered.

She closed her eyes. Breathe in, breathe out. She opened her eyes again.

The ominous red glow had vanished. She listened to the inane, inevitably pointless chatter from Sunset and Applejack--something normal. Something to ground herself. Force her mind to think that she was a human, just like them.

I will not hunt Sunset, Fluttershy said to herself. I'm not killing my friends. I'm not killing anyone.

Never again.

Funny Seeing You Here

"It's not that complicated, no matter what they'll say. I'll never meet another you."

Autoheart, "Stalker's Tango"

Good job, Fluttershy. You are a model of control, a paragon of restraint. People for thousands of years will praise you for how good you are at controlling the absolute basest of instincts.

A few tables down, Sunset Shimmer laughed at something Vinyl said. Rarity put in a comment that Fluttershy couldn't pick up with all the noise at the coffee shop, and Octavia replied.

Good for you, not stalking Sunset Shimmer, Fluttershy told herself with a sigh. What about Sunset's blood had triggered this? This obsession. She needed to stop this. She couldn't hurt Sunset. She wouldn't let herself.

Fluttershy sighed, sipping a coffee drink that she could hardly taste. Not that she particularly liked Starbucks at the best of times, but her hampered taste was more of a shadow of a larger problem.

The fact that she wanted to rip open Sunset's throat and drink her blood...

She forced her thoughts away from that. Sunset and her friends seemed to be getting ready to leave. Fluttershy took a long sip of her coffee. She would stay here and finish her drink. Sunset would go away, and Fluttershy wouldn't leave early. She would let Sunset go about her day while handling her own problems. That was absolutely what would happen.

Totally.

Sunset spared half a glance over her shoulder as they entered the mall. As should have been expected, Fluttershy had stayed in the Starbucks while Sunset and Rarity loaded into the latter's car. Obviously, Fluttershy wouldn't be able to follow them in a car. But, also obviously, Fluttershy was not following her.

You know that she was watching you, Sunset thought to herself. But why? What reason would Fluttershy have for--

"SUNSET!" a familiarly hyper-active voice shouted. Sunset barely braced herself in time for a supersonic hug from Pinkie Pie. "It's so crazy running into you here, right? What are the odds?"

"Uh, pretty high," Sunset said with a smile, "given that you new I was coming here."

Pinkie gasped loudly and theatrically. "Oh, my, gosh, how? AM I PSYCHIC?"

Sunset rolled her eyes, but in doing so saw Rarity give her friend a disapproving look. The other girls normally shrugged off Pinkie's antics, which Sunset had learned to do as well with but a single incident because of it.

But something was obviously making her friends act differently, between this and Fluttershy's odd behavior. What could it be...

"Anyway, here! I got you something!" She pulled out a card covered in glitter. Sunset took it slowly, and Pinkie jumped into her shopping cart, screaming, "ADVENTURE!"

The cart rolled away, crashing into Rainbow Dash's, causing both girls to end up in a heap.

Sunset opened the pink, glittery card. Inside was a picture of a cake and, written in something white and gooey stuck onto the card, "I LOVE YOU". Beneath it, clearly added with a pen afterwards, "In a purely platonic way".

"Well then," Rarity said with an awkward chuckle. "Pinkamena certainly keeps us on our toes, hmm?"

Sunset eyed Rarity with suspicion. "She sure does," she said slowly, closing the card and stowing it in her purse. As she turned around, she caught sight of Fluttershy, perusing a clothing store advertising punk outfits that Fluttershy certainly wasn't actually interested in.

Sunset suppressed a groan. Do you girls have me on a fucking SUICIDE WATCH? She should have expected something like that sooner, probably. Especially with how down she'd been in recent times.

It was endearing that they'd go through all this trouble because they were worried about her, but she had to admit, it was annoying, and thoroughly misguided. "Um, Rarity, you know I'm okay, right?"

"No, you're amazing, darling!" Rarity said, seemingly completely ignoring what Sunset really meant. "Just think about what you've done!"

"...Interdimensional treason?" Sunset said. "I mean, I get that it is impressive that I almost pulled it off, but--"

"No, no, no, no!" Rarity said hurriedly, shaking her head with wild eyes. "What I mean is that after all of that, you changed yourself so completely! How many other people have managed to do that?"

"I mean, quite a few," Sunset pointed out. "Considering it's a major part of how Princess Twilight was crowned."

"But, uh, it-it doesn't make it any less impressive," Rarity stuttering, clearly floundering.

Sunset laughed, then decided to stop messing with her friend. "Yeah, I suppose that's right." She would tease them about this later, but for now, she did still have shopping to do.

Fluttershy sat down that night in her room with a sigh, then opened the shopping bag. It was full of punk-style outfits, several of which were horribly revealing. Some of the vampires chose to go the full 'super sexy undead' theme, but she had never liked it.

Neither had her mentor, and had had several foul words to say about such people.

Fluttershy would have never taken them, except she had to look like she was actually shopping. She threw the bag onto her bed, letting out a growl. She was certain her eyes were quite red right now, but she didn't really care.

Well, there's probably something in that bag I could wear without looking like a whore, she thought.

A minute later, she left out into the town, dressed in a black leather jacket and a tight blue jeans.

She paused to examine her reflection in a shop window. It...didn't look too bad, all things considered.

She shook her head. Whatever. Whatever he'd say is irrelevant, as he's long dead. Permanently dead, and not...whatever vampires were.

Fluttershy sniffed, then wrinkled her nose. She took a few steps to the side, looking up at the nearby wall. Someone had graffiti-ed...expertly done...art...?

She blinked in surprise. It was an exquisite masterpiece, spray painted with tender care onto the wall, right next to the shop advertising a charity event. It smelled fresh, so she knew that it wasn't commissioned at the dead of night, yet she almost felt like even if they'd been caught, the artist wouldn't have had charges pressed. And thinking about it...

Beyond the chemical smell of spray paints, Fluttershy caught Sunset Shimmer's scent. What was Sunset doing out here at night, anyway? And if she was right, then Sunset was heading...

Into the woods?

"You want to hunt her, don't you?" a voice whispered.

Fluttershy jumped. Her reflection had been joined by a man with gray skin and night black hair. A red cloak fluttered to the ground, trimmed with white fur, and he wore armor that looked more aesthetic than practical. And to finish it all, two red eyes stared at her from pools of green.

"And now I'm hallucinating my dead mentor," she groaned aloud. "Just what I need."

"Yes, quite right. I am exactly what you need," the figment said. It was eerie--he spoke just like she remembered him. "Just as you need to food, Fluttershy."

Fluttershy extended her wings, two massive, leathery bat wings, eyes flaring bright red as she stared down Sombra. "You listen here," she snarled. "I will not attack her. You will not bait me into going after her."

The hallucination laughed. "You'll do it yourself. Control for one night is good. Any vampire should be able to do that. But what about five? Or more? How long will a starving vampire last?"

Sunset ignored the piercing jab, then flew up into the air. She followed Sunset's trail, going deep into the woods.

Please be alright... Fluttershy descended as she neared where Sunset Shimmer was, then crept through the trees. Worst come to worst, she knew how high the cliff Sunset was at was. She could catch her before she hit the ground.

Fluttershy pulled to an abrupt stop. Sunset was setting up a picnic blanket, pulling some of the food she'd bought just earlier today at the store. Fluttershy blinked, seeing her set up a candle before sitting down. Sunset pulled out a small photo frame, and thanks to her vampire sight, Fluttershy caught the photo of two unicorns, both yellow. The clearly younger one had a yellow and red mane that was much like Sunset's current hairstyle, and the older one had a red mane in a different style. Both were...smiling? Horses in her world couldn't do facial expressions like that.

"Hey, Mom," Sunset said quietly. "The years go by quickly, huh?"

Fluttershy stilled, feeling a pang in her heart. You poor thing...

"It's just great that this time, I can say I really got what I wanted. Well, not what I wanted last year, but...what I didn't know I wanted. It's...slow going, I know. But I'm making friends. You'd be happy with that, right? You always said I should focus on making friends as well as studies, and...I was kinda dumb back then, huh? For someone so smart, especially. I wonder if Princess Celestia ever thought of me like you probably did. Someone with great potential inside her, but...so unwilling to ever try and tap into it. Dismissing what you both saw as great as unimportant. Not worth my time." She gave a sad chuckle. "I have so may friends now. Or, rather, a lot compared to the big fat 'zero' I used to. Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash, Rarity, Applejack...Fluttershy." A slight pause, then a smile over her shoulder. She slid her sandwich behind her, discreetly out of her sight.

She...saw me? When? Did she see me flying? Probably not, right?

"They've all been a little worried about me the past day or so. I suppose...I was feeling blue because of us talking tonight, but I think they got the wrong idea in their heads." She laughed quietly.

Fluttershy accepted the sandwich, then snuck back into the woods. She flew through the air, leaving Sunset what privacy she had left.

Fluttershy found a nice spot by a river, sitting down on a fallen tree. She looked down at the sandwich.

"You must feel so proud of yourself," Sombra hissed from her side.

She shoved her hand through the hunger-induced hallucination, watching as it dissipated. Then she took a bite of the sandwich.

I guess I'll tell them that Sunset's okay tomorrow, she thought. Doing so tonight would be impractical. Instead, she stared out over the river, listening to the sounds of the water running past, and thought of her parents.

Sunset strode up the steps into the school, feeling a certain lightness in her heart. Perhaps it was the weather.

Perhaps it was being done with her yearly conversation with her mother. All these years and there was still that dull ache in her heart whenever that date rolled around. She wondered if it would go on like that forever. Maybe she could ask someone? No, none of her friends were that old, anyway.

Her friends were all chatting quietly, and only Fluttershy noticed her coming closer. This called for fun.

"Hey, guys," she said, having stepped really close.

A series of shrieks and cries echoed that hurt her head and almost made her regret her choice. But not quite.

"Hey, sugarcube," Applejack said, recovering first. "Um, ah'd like to apologize. We might have--well, I might have jumped to a conclusion and the rest of 'em followed me."

"Don't worry about it. Once I got over the slight annoyance of it, I found it rather endearing," Sunset said. "Besides, it was almost funny to see you all in the mall trying to be sneaky. Everyone but Applejack, anyway."

"For the last time, I was just doing shopping!' Rainbow Dash said. "Rarity said she was going to keep an eye on you, so I just went to shop. I forgot when and where you guys were gonna be."

"I wasn't mad at you, darling," Rarity said, "But Pinkamena's antics were entirely out of place."

"Actually, I didn't even question Pinkie," Sunset commented. "But I saw you get mad at her for it, then she ran into Rainbow Dash, and I saw that Fluttershy had followed us from the Starbucks..."

There was a stunned silence. "Fluttershy? Starbucks?" Rainbow Dash guffawed. "I don't get it."

"She wasn't in the Starbucks..." Rarity said, pausing slowly. "I would have seen her."

"She's gotten pretty sneaky as of late," Applejack said with a chuckle. "Made Sunset jump twice the other day. Woulda made me jump if I hadn't known Pinkie Pie as long as I have."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Pinkie demanded.

"It means you're as jumpy as a junebug, and often just suddenly appear next to someone," Applejack said, still smiling at her friend who hadn't been next to her a second ago.

Fluttershy herself said nothing, simply watching her friends with a deadpan poker face staring out at them. Or rather, all of them but Sunset.

You're just being paranoid, Sunset told herself. Fluttershy's not watching me or anything, she was just concerned. Like the rest of them were.

You couldn't survive suddenly moving to the human world if you couldn't pick up on little details. A large part of her brain was screaming at her like it had been almost the entirety of yesterday. Something was wrong.

She needed to find out what. I need to talk to someone who knows her really well, to see if she's not acting normally.

Luckily, I have the perfect idea already.

Obsession

Sunset knocked a few times on the door to Rainbow Dash's house, hoping her friend was up already. Thankfully, she was, and with a sigh of relief on Sunset's part, the door was soon opened.

Rainbow Dash was wearing a light jacket over her pajamas, but didn't otherwise look like she'd just gotten out of bed. Of course, there was the strong possibility that she had simply chosen to not get out of her pajamas since she got up an hour or so ago, made more likely by the lazy Saturday morning.

"Sunset?" she asked. Seeing the relief on her friend's face, she immediately burst out with, "Is something wrong?"

"No, no, well...nothing major, anyway. I just wanted to talk. If...if you have the--"

"Please, I get enough shyness from Fluttershy," Rainbow Dash said, elbowing her. "Come on in, it's cold out and we don't use the AC much to save money."

Sunset followed her friend into the house, and listening to the sound of grease popping. "Mom's making some breakfast, if you want some," Rainbow Dash said loudly--presumably so her mother could hear.

"Bacon and eggs!" the voice called from where Sunset assumed the kitchen was.

"Uh--I don't eat bacon, but I'd take the eggs, if it's not too much trouble," Sunset answered.

The loud popping sound made Sunset wince, but she ignored it. Rainbow Dash plopped down on the living room sofa, turning the TV down. She gestured to a spare seat, saying, "Come on in! Mi casa es su casa!" She paused. "At least, I think that's how it's said."

Sunset nodded. "Yeah, I picked up that much Spanish at least, though, admittedly, the other human world languages I picked up are French, German, and Japanese."

Rainbow Dash's jaw dropped. "I have enough trouble with what little Spanish I know, and you're saying you learned three languages?"

"Plus a few in Equestria--Old Ponish, Draconic, and Templar," she said with a shrug. "Though, it's been so long, I've forgotten most of the last two, though I still sometimes write in Old Ponish."

Rainbow Dash let out a whistle. "You are awesome. In a nerdy, egg-headed way, but still awesome."

"Speaking of e-eggs," Rainbow Dash's mother said, stepping into the room. She put Rainbow's plate in front of her, and then a plate with two fried eggs on it in front of Sunset. "I learned how to cook for vegetarians during Fluttershy's visits. Fried in coconut oil!"

"Thank you," Sunset said, ignoring how viciously Rainbow Dash was tearing into her meal. Sunset bit her lip, trying to figure out how to word the next part. "So, um, Rainbow, I...uh...was actually wanting to talk...about Fluttershy."

Rainbow Dash devolved into a sudden coughing fit. She took a moment to recover, then said, "Finally. I've been waiting for you to ask me about her for, like, a week."

"You...you have?"

"Duh! I'm not stupid! Several of the other girls have also noticed the way Fluttershy's been looking at you."

"So I'm not crazy," Sunset muttered.

"That makes one of you," Rainbow Dash snorted.

Sunset blinked in confusion. "I'm sorry?"

Rainbow sighed. "Okay, this is gonna sound out of the blue, but work with me, here. I know the old you did not do friends, but what about romance?"

"Well, no, not really, except for Flash, which was mostly me mooching off his popularity..." She trailed off abruptly. "I do not like where you're going with this."

Rainbow Dash laughed. "Well, look at it this way. She goes even more silent than usual whenever you're near. She's been following you around a bunch. She's--"

"Oh, no, no, no, no," Sunset interrupted. "I--Rainbow, I--I picked on her almost more than anyone else! And now--sweet Celestia, you're trying to--she's--" She let out a frustrated, unintelligible cry. "She's not into me!"

"Well, what else could it be? She's stalking you because she's a vampire wanting to drink your blood?" Rainbow Dash snorted.

Sunset blinked. "Vampire...how...how could I not see it? It makes so much sense!"

Rainbow Dash sighed. "Sunset, you should really consider moving to the real world, y'know."

"Rainbow Dash, I'm a mother-bucking unicorn from another dimension," Sunset snapped. "Do not lecture me about the 'real world'!"

"Uh--fair point," Rainbow said. "Let's look at it this way. Are there vampires in Equestria?"

"Well, yeah, I get that," Sunset said slowly. "Let's look at this for real for a second. I'm sure there's an explanation, but Fluttershy being in love with me is not it."

Rainbow Dash let out an exasperated groan. "Okay, you're in denial. Here's an idea: how about you, me, and her all hang out at your place? We can see about it then, hmm?"

"Well, she has been helping me with my, uh, gamer temper."

"Did she crouch?"

"Yeah..."

Rainbow winced. "You poor thing."

Sunset nodded. "A-anyway, I can ask her if she wants to hang out tomorrow, or the day after, and if she'd mind if I invited you along with!"

"She's usually free on Sunday," Rainbow said. "Come on! It'll be great! Call her now!"

Sunset had her phone out before she really had a chance to think about it. Her doubts appeared to late to save her, as Fluttershy picked up the phone quickly. "Heeeelloooo?" she drawled out slowly. There was an odd staticky sound from the phone, almost sounding like the wind.

"Hey, um, I was just wanting to know--well, I was talking with Rainbow and I--um--"

Rainbow Dash slapped her forehead loudly.

"Sorry, hold on," Fluttershy said. Sunset heard something, almost like the sound of a lightweight box being dropped, and the wind abruptly stopped. "Um, sorry, but could you--repeat that? I, uh, didn't really hear..."

"No worries," Sunset said, calming her nerves. "I was just wanting to know if you'd like to hang out with Rainbow and I soon. Like, tomorrow? Or--the next day?"

"We could do it today," Fluttershy said eagerly. She cleared her throat. "Uh, I mean, if--if you didn't have any other plans."

"No, today is fine," Sunset said. My heart's not racing, it is not racing, she just wants to hang out...

"I'll bring some snacks! Would five be good? Whose house?" She paused. "Oh, um, sorry, I, uh, got a little excited there."

"M-my place," Sunset stammered. Rainbow Dash, close enough to hear every word, covered her mouth so Fluttershy couldn't hear her laughing. "Does...five sound good?"

"S-sure," Fluttershy stammered. "Rainbow Dash was showing up? That's great! We could all sit and talk together..."

"Yeah, uh, great," Sunset cleared her throat. "See you then?"

The wind interference suddenly picked up again. "Sure thing." Fluttershy hung up.

Rainbow Dash finally cut loose, developing into a full-on burst of hysterical laughter. Sunset just sighed. "Shut up."

Fluttershy put up her phone, then turned to the sky and sighed. Her immediate thought had been how Sunset had helped take her mind off her troubles, and she remembered too late why spending time near her was a bad idea.

She sighed again. Sunset needed help from Fluttershy. Fluttershy just had to muscle through it and help her.

She looked out over the city, from her vantage point on top of a large building. At least with Rainbow Dash there, nothing too bad was likely to happen. Right?

Sunset felt like she was being watched. She'd seen Fluttershy every other time, so it made no sense that she wouldn't catch her this time, right? Besides, Fluttershy would probably be getting ready. There was no reason why she'd be here following her.

She probably wasn't. Sunset was certainly being paranoid.

"Hello, space cadet!" a voice shouted right beside her ear.

She let out a shriek, jumping back to see a sheepish, yet still grinning broadly, Vinyl Scratch. Octavia, right behind her, rolled her eyes. "Really, Vinyl, must you?"

"Yes," Vinyl said without missing a beat.

Sunset let out a quiet chuckle, the edge of her fear dimming. "Hey, guys," she said awkwardly. "Funny seeing you here, eh?"

"Are you alright?" Vinyl asked, lowering her glasses. Her red eyes looked Sunset up and down, clearly concerned. "You seem rattled."

"Just a little," Sunset admitted.

"Here, come on!" Vinyl took her hand, dragging her along with more strength than Sunset would have assumed. "We can hang out at my place and you can tell me all about it!"

"I've got places to be," Sunset stammered. "Getting ready for hanging out--"

"You can do that at my place!" Vinyl said.

"Octavia, help," Sunset begged.

Octavia considered. "You know, I'm not sure. My own schedule is just so full..."

"Yeah! She was gonna hang out with us!" Vinyl said. "Allons-ee!"

Sunset quickly found herself sitting in the most weirdly decorated house she'd ever seen. Split perfectly along the center, one half was decorated in lighter, day-like colors, and the other half was deep blues. She somehow felt certain that Principal Celestia and Vice Principal Luna had a house decorated in the same style, but ignored that thought.

The building had almost no rooms to speak of, instead just having appliances strewn about wherever amidst the household clutter. On what she assumed was Octavia's house was a massive stand for her classical violin(which was probably a lot more expensive than she assumed) and on Vinyl's side, a massive DJ set up.

Vinyl had dropped her on the sofa, which was in the center of the house. Even the sofa couldn't ignore the sharp dividing line, dyed half blue and half yellow. It was like someone had decided upon a theme before checking to see if it looked good, but then stubbornly refused to change their mind.

"'Tavi's setting up tea, so we can talk while you have a nice hot drink in your hands," Vinyl said. "What time were you hanging out with your other friends?"

"Five."

"Oh, you've got plenty of time," Vinyl said reassuringly. "It's only three-thirty."

Sunset nodded. "I guess."

"So do I. I guess that you mostly just didn't want to talk about what was bothering you?" Vinyl asked, grinning.

Sunset grimaced. "That obvious?"

"Kinda."

"You did seem to be immensely troubled," 'Tavi' said from the stove. Sunset wouldn't have dared call it a kitchen--it was simply situated on Octavia's half of the house. She noted that the microwave was on Vinyl's side, right next to a small pile of frozen pizza boxes. Hopefully, they were empty boxes. "I thought you might need a minute to talk it out."

Sunset sighed. "It's...really weird."

Vinyl grinned. "Oh, me and weird have been friends for a long time, Sunset."

Sunset smiled. "Alright." She began to explain the situation. She watched carefully as Vinyl's smile slowly faded, and the DJ adopted a poker face. By the end, Vinyl had taken off her signature glasses, and, having wiped them off, set them on the small table in between the sofa and the TV.

Vinyl put her hands together, leaning slightly forward in thought.

"Is everything alright?" Sunset asked, taking a sip of her tea.

"Just thinkin'," Vinyl said slowly. "There are...some things I was told in confidence, so...trying to work that out."

Sunset felt her heart hammering against her chest.

"So, you should probably tell her the truth, right?" Vinyl said finally.

"That...I just want to be friends?" Sunset said slowly. "What if she gets her feelings hurt?"

"I mean, that sounds like it would happen one way or another, that would happen eventually anyway," Vinyl muttered.

"The truth never hurt anyone," Octavia said slowly. "Rainbow Dash is going to be there too, right?"

Sunset nodded.

"Then she can help in case things get too...awkward to progress properly," Octavia said.

"I'm still half of the mind that Rainbow and I are both overreacting," Sunset said slowly.

Vinyl said nothing, just sitting there leaning forward, hands over her mouth.

"You're tea is going to get cold," Octavia said.

Vinyl sighed. "Well, I think you should just be honest with Fluttershy," she put in. "That seems to be the only good advice for situations like this, right?"

Sunset nodded slowly.

"I'll give it some thought, see if I can't come up with better advice," Vinyl said. "But for now, I think you should get ready. I also have a music piece I've been prepping for the CHS Musical Showcase here soon. Maybe clean up a bit before your guests arrive?"

"Yeah..." Sunset said slowly. She couldn't help but feel like she was being brushed off, but...something was wrong with the whole conversation. Something just slightly off.

"Do you need a ride?" Octavia asked, breaking her train of thought.

"No, I wouldn't ask you--"

Octavia waved off her concern with an indignant sound. "My mother taught me better than to invite guests over and not properly see them home!" She rose, striding to the door confidently. "It was pleasant having you, Sunset."

"Uh--thanks," Sunset said. "A pleasure to see you two, too." She gave Vinyl one last look before heading out the door with Octavia.

Vinyl waited until she heard the car drive off before pulling out her phone. She quickly put in Celestia's contact information, waiting impatiently for the old immortal to pick up the phone.

"What is it, Vinyl?" Celestia asked in that slightly distracted tone that told Vinyl she was working on something.

"Hey, I was just talking to Sunset Shimmer, and I wanted to ask...is everything alright with Fluttershy?"

Sunset had just finished cleaning up her house to make things more comfortable looking when the doorbell rang. She straightened her jacket--she'd made the dubious choice of taking one of the fashionable jackets given to her by Rarity. It was too late at this point, though she had to admit, Rarity had perfectly figured out her fashion sense. The smooth fitting, shiny black leather was wonderfully designed, and considerably comfortable. The rest of her wardrobe was her standard, though she had touched up her hair just slightly.

Perhaps that was going to give the wrong impression.

Sunset threw open the door, giving her too friends a wide grin. "Hey, guys, come on in," she said.

She only saw Fluttershy's car out front, but Rainbow Dash seemed to be carrying the reusable shopping bags Fluttershy owned.

"I brought some snacks," Fluttershy said.

"And I carried them!" Rainbow Dash said triumphantly. "Now all we need is a place to put 'em, Sunset. Think you can manage?"

"Sure," Sunset said, beckoning them inside.

Rainbow Dash hesitated a little, coming inside. "Somehow, I got the impression your place would be a lot more sparse," she said slowly.

"Applejack and I were of a similar mind," Fluttershy said, leading the way to the fridge. "But Sunset's got a really nice place here, right, Rainbow?"

"Darn straight," Rainbow said, setting the sacks just beside the fridge. "Let's see what you got--" Her mouth split into a wide grin. "Hey, Sunset, you ever had garlic bread before?"

Fluttershy looked confused at the angry look on Sunset's face. "That was a joke, Rainbow Dash," she snapped. She hesitated, trying to get the better of her temper, but Rainbow only laughed.

"Sure, sure," she said, packing several of the foods onto the countertop.

"Do you--not like garlic bread?" Fluttershy asked, confused.

"No, um, I like it fine," Sunset said. "Just...inside joke."

"Oh. Sounds funny. I think." Fluttershy looked very much like she was trying to figure it out.

"Well, I'm not sure. Rainbow's the only one whom I bet is going to find it funny," Sunset said dryly.

Rainbow set the reusable bags on the counter, laughing. "Well, duh. It's hilarious!"

"Your face is hilarious," Sunset muttered.

Fluttershy giggled, then seemingly paused. She eyed Sunset carefully, looking her up and down. "You...look nice?"

DAMMIT! "Thanks..." Sunset said slowly, awkwardly. What better way to shoot a friend down then by dressing to the nines?

"Okay, before this gets really awkward," Rainbow said with a sigh, "you two both have something to say to each other."

Fluttershy blinked. "We do?"

"Fluttershy, we've all seen how you've been staring at Sunset the last few days," Rainbow said. "I'm gonna step out for a minute, give me a shout when you two are done working it out."

Before Sunset could quite process it, Rainbow Dash was headed out the door. "DASH!" she shouted, charging after her friend. She caught up to her in the doorway, saying, "What are you doing?"

"The truth will set you free! Or something," Rainbow shrugged. "Anyway, have fun!"

Sunset's own door was slammed in her face. Stunned, she turned, to see Fluttershy sitting on the edge of her sofa, a thinking expression on her face.

"Uh, Sunset?" she asked slowly.

Sunset panicked. "BREAD!" she shouted, rushing over to her makeshift kitchen--it was no more a kitchen than Octavia's, when she thought about it. She fumbled through the drawers, dining ware clattering against each other loudly. She shoved a frying pan aside, looking for a cutting board she could use.

"Sunset, um, I think there's been..." Fluttershy hesitated. "...something of a misunderstanding."

Blindly reaching into the drawer, Sunset felt a sharp pain on her fingertip. "Not again," she muttered, pulling her freshly bleeding finger from the drawer. "Ah...dammit. Where'd I put..." She grabbed a paper towel from the nearby roll, holding it to her cut. "Well, this is turning to shit," she said. "I--I'm sorry, Fluttershy, I--I've got to admit, um--" She paused. Fluttershy was standing stock still eyes closed. Sunset sighed. "I'm sorry, okay, but could we just be--"

Fluttershy's eyes snapped open. They were red--a bright, crimson red, shining actual light onto Sunset. Her two front teeth had elongated dangerously, and there was a certain...odd look about the rest of her face that Sunset couldn't quite get a pinpoint on.

"You should have been more careful," Fluttershy whispered.

Satiation

"Heed the call the time has come, For all you children of the night!"

Aurelio Voltaire, "The Night"

Sunset stood stock still, looking into the bright red eyes of Fluttershy. They weren't casting enough light to read by, but it was a clear enough indication of something very wrong, if the teeth weren't enough.

"Fluttershy?" Sunset said, concerned. "Are you okay?"

"No, I'm...hungry," Fluttershy said quietly.

"Fluttershy, we need to--"

Fluttershy lunged. She seized the wrist attached to the bleeding finger, knocking Sunset down to the ground. Sunset's head hit the counter, causing stars to dance in her vision as Fluttershy pinned her to the ground.

Fluttershy pulled back the sleeve slightly, then bit down hard on Sunset's wrist. Sunset let out a cry of pain, hearing the door slam open only in the background. Blood dripped down the length of her arm, and some onto the floor, as Fluttershy's eyes closed in contentment.

Up until Rainbow Dash tackled her. The sudden movement dislodged her jaw from Sunset's wrist, and she hissed, casually throwing Rainbow Dash away. The athlete slammed into Sunset's TV, smashing partly into it as it fell over backwards. Rainbow Dash groaned, but didn't rise.

Fluttershy grabbed the front of Sunset's jacket, ripping the fabric, fully revealing Sunset's throat. A fierce hunger shone in her eyes, and her stomach rumbled quietly.

Sunset reached up with her other hand, to the counter. Fluttershy hesitated, turning to where Sunset's hand reached. Sunset grabbed the handle of a frying pan, swinging it down hard into Fluttershy's face. The angling as awkward, but the frying pan was heavy enough so that it didn't matter. Sunset let gravity do the brunt of the work, sending Fluttershy falling back in an unceremonious heap. Sunset leapt to her feet, gripping her injured hand close to her chest, and rushed over to Rainbow Dash. "Rainbow! Are you--you're--"

"'M fine," Rainbow said, shaking her head. "What happened?"

"I don't know," Sunset said. "She--I was panicking, trying to figure out what to say, a-and--"

"Calm down," Rainbow said, struggling up. "And give me hand, will you?"

Sunset extended her good arm, helping Rainbow Dash stand. Rainbow stretched, wincing. "Okay, so, I'm assuming some sort of evil Equestrian magic?"

"I don't know," Sunset said. "There are things that could possess somepony--or person--but her eyes were glowing, and she had fangs and-and--"

Rainbow grabbed her shoulders roughly. "Listen to me, Sunset. There's trouble right now. We can't waste time on silly things like doubts, got it? Fluttershy needs our help."

Sunset nodded, wiping tears away with her sleeve. "So, we need to call the rest of the girls, right?"

Rainbow nodded, then turned and looked to Fluttershy. "What did you do to her to make her stop?"

"F-frying pan to the face," Sunset admitted, suddenly realizing. "What if I killed--"

"I'm fine," Fluttershy said, keeping a calm but disoriented tone. "Just--a little dazed."

Rainbow let out a deep breath. "Well, that makes that easier. Don't worry, Fluttershy. We're calling the gang in, and we're gonna fix you up, right?"

Sunset nodded enthusiastically.

Fluttershy sighed. "It's not Equestrian magic," she admitted. "It's...complicated. Call Luna."

"Vice Principal Luna?" Sunset questioned. The adrenaline rush over, her hand was beginning to throb.

"Yeah. You can use my phone."

"I'll do that, you call the rest," Sunset said. She rushed over to the small, butterfly-patterned bag that she thought Sunset kept her phone in. Rifling through the pockets one handed took an awkward length of time, and several pain-induced swear words. Finally, she pulled out Fluttershy's phone, listening to Rainbow Dash cover the events for a second time over her phone.

Sunset moved further away so that her phone call wouldn't disrupt Rainbow Dash's calls, while dialing her school's vice principal. Her heart's pounding beats almost seemed to coincide with the painful throbs from her wrist, but she let out a sigh of relief as the phone beeped in answer.

"Fluttershy, is something amiss?" Luna's voice came, getting straight to the point.

"It's--Sunset here, and uh--" Sunset looked to her fridge, where Fluttershy was sitting, arms covering her face, knees drawn up to her chest. "--Something's wrong with Fluttershy. I--"

"I'm on my way," Luna interrupted. "Is she still attacking people?"

"Wha--no!" Sunset shook her head. "She--bit me, but she said--she was hungry."

"The fucking--" The next few words were drowned out by a car door slamming, and an engine revving. "Give her space until I get there. Doctor your wound, try to stop the bleeding. Where are you?"

"My place. I--"

"I know where that is," Luna interrupted. "I'll be there as soon as I can. Let Fluttershy know that, but do try and keep a distance. If she's calmed down, she should stay calm until I get there, but best not test that too much."

"Alright. Got it," Sunset said. Luna hung up without further ado, leaving Sunset gulping, trying to bring moisture back to her now dry throat.

"Luna's on her way," Sunset called out.

"The girl's are en route, too," Rainbow Dash said, stepping over. "I don't know what Luna is gonna do, but the rest of us need to be here for her." Rainbow nodded over to Fluttershy.

Fluttershy let out a loud sigh.

"Don't worry, Fluttershy! We'll have this fixed up in no time!"

Fluttershy didn't seem comforted by it.

Rainbow turned back to Sunset. "Do you have a first aid kit anywhere?"

"Bathroom," Sunset said, nodding to the door built into the staircase. "I spent quite some time studying anatomy, in case I needed to doctor myself up."

Rainbow rushed off, letting the door slam behind her as she came back out. "Got it!" she said, sliding to a stop. She opened it up, then blinked. "Uhh...what even is any of this stuff?"

"It's...probably a lot more expensive than I initially assumed," Sunset chuckled. "We'll need disinfectant and bandages, I think..."

Rainbow Dash nodded. "Now, let's get a look at--" She took Sunset's left hand, then her eyes bulged. "Fucking hell!" she cursed. "What--how--I thought you said she bit you."

"After growing three inch fangs, Dash," Sunset growled, looking towards Fluttershy. "Besides, I'm sure it's not her fault, anyway."

"I know that," Rainbow huffed. "We need water to rinse this--" She grimaced, looking to the sink. "Okay, bathroom it is. Can you walk?"

Sunset considered, then nodded. "Help me up?"

Rainbow Dash obliged, leading her to the bathroom. Once the water began cleaning off the injury, Sunset took a deep breath, then looked at it herself.

The flesh had been gauged deeply, almost striking the major blood vessels. The rest of the wrist was a light purple bruise from Fluttershy's grip.

Rainbow wrapped a wet towel around the wrist after cleaning the blood off, saying, "Let's stop the bleeding, okay?"

The sound of a car pulling up distracted Sunset. "None of the girls live that close, right?"

Rainbow Dash paused. She stepped out of the bathroom, picking up an umbrella from its stand.

"You shouldn't leave the door open," Luna said, closing it behind her. "It could let in far worse things than a draft."

"Uh, we've been busy," Rainbow said, dropping the umbrella. "Do you know what's wrong with Fluttershy?"

"In the sense that you mean, nothing is wrong with the girl," Luna said stiffly. "She was simply very stupid."

"You don't need to lecture me," Fluttershy said quietly.

"Indeed? So thou knowest exactly why thou should feed regularly? So that thou can maintain thine control?" Luna said, her voice raising. "That the people thou loveth, and who loveth thee back, do not wish to see thee in such a sorry state?" She put a hand to her forehead, sighing. "Fluttershy. Are you alright?"

"I'm not really hurt."

"I--hit her with a frying pan," Sunset put in. She shrank beneath Luna's gaze, not meeting her eyes.

"That would seem to have knocked some sense into her, but I doubt it would do much more," Luna said. "Come, let's finish getting that wound dressed."

She stayed silent, and refused to answer Rainbow's repeated questioning. Time seemed to pass slowly for Sunset, who used her good hand to cover her mouth and avoid the curses. Eventually, though, she had the wound washed and bandaged.

"Once some time has passed, you'll want to get that jacket off," Luna mentioned, gesturing to the bloody sleeve.

Sunset grimaced. "It won't stain too bad, right?"

Luna shrugged. "Fabrics were never an expertise of mine." She looked up as the sound of another car alerted her. Unlike the two that had driven past while she was dressing the wound, this one came to a full stop. "It would seem the rest of your friends are here," she said.

Applejack, Rarity, and Pinkie Pie all burst through the door at around the same time, all shouting and asking questions.

"Quiet," Luna commanded, stepping back into the main room. She seated herself on the arm of the sofa, arms folded in front of her. "I can explain everything, but no that Sunset and Fluttershy are both alright."

Sighs of relief came from the three. "But whatever happened?" Rarity asked. "I mean, Rainbow just said that some sort of Equestrian magic possessed Fluttershy, and--"

"Anything she said of the sort was pure conjecture," Luna said, glaring at the athlete. "And assume it to be wrong, as that statement was. There is little to no Equestrian magic involved here."

"WHAT?!" Pinkie Pie exclaimed. "But--how--why--"

"Let me finish," Luna snapped.

Pinkie Pie shut up.

"The truth is quite simple. Fluttershy is a vampire. Until recently, she was using a relic built for vampiric fasting to suppress her need to feed regularly. But, something happened with 'the magic of friendship'--"

"That moment in the car," Sunset said.

Luna raised an eyebrow.

"S-sorry," Sunset stammered, shrinking back again.

"No, I wish to hear this," Luna said. "Fluttershy herself never fully explained it."

"W-well, Fluttershy and I were hitching a ride in Applejack's truck..." Sunset squirmed uncomfortably. "And, Applejack and I were talking, and then...magic of friendship..."

"I was worried that Sunset was livin' in some abandoned warehouse or something like that, and told her I wanted to check out her house," Applejack put in. "I was tellin' her that friends stand by each other."

"It broke the dampener," Fluttershy said. She still hadn't moved. "That's what happened there."

"Hmm." Luna considered it for a moment. "In any case, we told her that she needed to feed regularly from people again. Apparently, she didn't." Luna grimaced.

"Can you really blame me?" Fluttershy said, voice cracking. "You know what I was like, Luna. You fought me before, remember? Eighteen-forty-six, Las Pegasus."

"You've changed since then, Fluttershy," Luna said. "Much like Sunset Shimmer changed. You've become a new woman."

"Sunset? She wasn't even evil compared to what I was!" Fluttershy looked up, tears streaming from shining red eyes that made Rarity, Applejack, and Pinkie step back. "I was a monster, Luna! The other vampires didn't want anything to do with me! They all ran the other way when I looked at them! I was vile! I was horrible! Can you blame me for being terrified of that creature? For not trusting myself not to kill anyone I tried feeding from?"

"And you think that an almost completely starved vampire is the safer option?" Luna said, shocked. "I fail to see how you could have thought this was a good idea!"

"I warned you already! I can't trust myself!" Fluttershy screamed.

"Oh, for crying out loud," Rainbow Dash said, stepping forward. "Yes, you used to be bad, We get it. But, like, I'm pretty sure the magic of friendship wouldn't activate for an irredeemable monster, sooo...who cares?" She shrugged. "Any, Luna, I assume the fix at this point is for her to drink a lot of blood, right?"

Luna nodded.

"Well, given that a good portion of this mess is probably my fault anyway, then I volunteer," Rainbow said, sitting down in front of Fluttershy.

"What? No, I--"

Rainbow Dash flicked her forehead. "Hey. She's right, you know. We don't want to see you hurt."

"But what if I--"

"You're not going to kill me," Rainbow snapped. "I don't believe that would ever happen, Fluttershy. Especially because we have a secret weapon."

Fluttershy sighed. "Friendship?"

Rainbow nodded. "There's Rarity, Applejack, Pinkie, Luna, and Sunset! And you think they'd let it happen? No! So come on, get your fill!" She hesitated, then shrugged off her jacket. "So, uh, do I just--"

"Rainbow, I--" She sighed. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be! We all gotta eat, and I know you won't kill me."

"That makes one of us," Fluttershy muttered.

"Hey, you trust me?"

Fluttershy sighed. "Yes, and you trust me, yeah, yeah." She sighed. "Thanks."

"What are friends for?" Rainbow said.

"Normally, not playing bloodbag to their starving vampire friends," Fluttershy said.

"Well, I imagine most really good friends would," Rainbow said. "So, do I just sit here--"

"Yeah. Maybe, um, I reeeeally suggest sitting still." Fluttershy moved closer, towards Rainbow's throat.

"Yeah, um, I figured," Rainbow said, keeping her eyes on the ceiling. "Sitting still feels like the--ow." Fluttershy's fangs slipped into Rainbow's throat. "Okay, it's actually not that bad. Except for how it feels. It feels weird as hell, you know?"

Fluttershy reached up, pitting a finger to Rainbow's lips. Rainbow took the hint, closing her eyes as Fluttershy fed.

Applejack shuddered, turning away. "That's...this is...she's really a vampire, huh?"

"Yes," Luna said. "And like most vampires, she has really good hearing, so no matter how quietly you talk, she probably heard you."

Applejack blushed. "Gosh, I'm sorry, I--"

"Let's save the talking for when it's over. Their will be plenty of time for questions then." She stepped over to the fridge, then opened it. She grimaced, then closed it without drawing anything out. "Rainbow Dash will need someone to drive her home. Do her parents know where she is?"

"Yeah, I think so," Sunset said. "Do you think she can sleep over with someone? I-I have a couch I can sleep on so--"

"I'm not making you sleep on the couch," Rainbow said. "Ow! Okay, okay, shutting up!"

Luna cracked a smile as they lapsed into silence. It was realistically less than thirty seconds, but it still felt like forever before Fluttershy pulled her head back. She licked her lips, then let out a satisfied sigh. Rainbow sat back, blinking. "So, you done?"

Fluttershy nodded. "I'm sorry, this...was my fault. I should have told you guys sooner, or...or just fed normally."

"What does 'feeding normally' entail, exactly?" Rarity asked.

"Mostly, finding someone who's alone at night, and using vampire hypnosis so they don't remember it," Luna said. "But this can lead to issues."

"Especially as I don't really like doing that, because it's...not really nice," Fluttershy said.

"Well, you have all of us, right?" Sunset said. "So we can all take turns! I can do it next time!"

"NO!" Fluttershy shouted, at the same time Luna said much calmer, "Not happening, Miss Shimmer."

There was a stunned silence. "Let me explain," Luna said. "A lot of vampires like magically charged blood. Some of them are even addicted to it--like the blood from immortals such as myself."

"Like yourself?" Rarity exclaimed.

"Please let me finish, Miss Rarity," Luna said impatiently. "Sunset, you are not a human. I would have expected Fluttershy to go longer without needing to feed, except for the fact that, I'm assuming, she caught scent of your blood."

Sunset winced. "I cut my finger trying to slice up some apples the other day."

"As I said, you should really be more careful," Fluttershy mentioned. She ran a hand through hair that was a little more unkempt than it had previously been. "I hadn't connected it to Equestria, though. I forgot she's...a unicorn, right?"

Sunset nodded. "So, you drinking my blood would be unhealthy?"

Fluttershy nodded. "Yeah, and I--well, after this clusterfuck--" She gestured to the room at large, ignoring the gasp from several of her friends. "--I don't really want to drink your blood."

"I will let Fluttershy explain any specific questions you have about vampires," Luna said. Fluttershy glared at her, and Luna shrugged. "Celestia and I don't really know the details ourselves, Fluttershy. You were never in a hurry to explain anything that wasn't immediately important."

Fluttershy sighed. "Yeah, that's right. I'm really stupid, aren't I?"

"Don't say that!" Sunset said, moving closer.

Fluttershy bared her fangs and snarled, "Stay back."

Sunset stumbled away quickly. "Okay! Um, look, Fluttershy, everyone makes mistakes!" She gestured to herself with a wry smile. "Point A, am I right?"

"Point B, over here," Rainbow said, raising a hand. The hand immediately fell down to her side with a thump, and she glared at the offending limb. "Most of this is because I was trying to set Sunset up with Fluttershy, believe it or not."

"Um--" Fluttershy hesitated. "Right."

"Does this mean--you weren't really interested in me?" Sunset asked.

"Yes, I'm sorry, I--"

"Don't be," Sunset said. "I like you and all, but let's just be friends, okay?"

Fluttershy stared at her. "You...still want to be friends? Even after..."

"Of course I do!" Sunset said. "Hunger makes people do crazy things, right? So don't worry about it!" She made an exaggerated waving motion.

"I--I have a question," Applejack asked hesitantly.

Fluttershy turned to her. All the red had disappeared from her eyes at this point, leaving her looking slightly bedraggled, but nothing more. "Okay," she said slowly. "Feel free."

"In a lot of vampire mythos, they...can't stand on holy ground, because...well, dammit, I don't know! But...I mean…"

"It strongly depends on the vampire," Luna interrupted. "I can see why you might be concerned by that, Miss Applejack, but there are vampires who can walk on holy ground just fine."

"Ones who never asked to be changed," Fluttershy said. "God punishes sinners, not victims."

"But there haven't been any other vampires like you, who've made such drastic turnarounds to becoming good people," Luna pointed out. "Your case is unprecedented."

"In any case, yes, that's why I've turned down your previous offers of heading to church with you," Fluttershy said, turning back to Applejack. Luna rolled her eyes, giving a put upon sigh, before leaning back and letting the friends finish their conversation. "If I find out that I can step on holy ground, I'll consider it, okay?"

Applejack let out a sigh of relief. "Thanks for the honesty, sugarcube."

"Luna mentioned hypnosis. Can you mind control people?" Pinkie asked excitedly.

"Um, yes, but--"

"OOH! OOH! DO ME, DO ME!" Pinkie shouted, jumping up in Fluttershy's face.

The vampire's eyes lit up bright red, and Pinkie went absolutely stock still. "Sit down," she commanded.

A pink blur shot across the room, sending the sofa creaking as she sat down, eyes wide and unfocused. After a second, they returned to normal, and she blinked. Then she gasped loudly and theatrically. "THAT WAS AMAZING!"

Dealing With It

"Okay, so the impromptu sleepover has officially begun," Rainbow said, closing her phone. She was seemingly feeling better at this point, and had actually gotten up and moved--though not much, and normally rubbing her back as she did so. Still, she had fared better than Sunset's TV, at least.

Fluttershy was doing her best to ignore the attention she was getting as the rest of the girls began winding down. Sunset closed her door behind her as they listened to Luna drive off.

"So, darling, what did she want to talk about?" Rarity asked.

"Uh, just a cover story for--" She waved her cast. "I don't think it's really gonna be necessary. Everyone who'd ask questions is in this room, right?"

"Darling, just because they haven't opened up to you yet doesn't mean they won't care that you got hurt," Rarity said. "Besides, what about Vinyl?"

"I'm pretty sure Vinyl is the reason Vice Principal Luna came here so quickly," Sunset said slowly. "I...well, nevermind, let me worry about her, alright?"

"If you say so," Rainbow said. "Um, the lightheadedness will fade, right?"

Fluttershy nodded. "Yes, but I did drink about a quart of blood, Rainbow Dash. I know certain foods can be helpful for that, but I'm not a hundred percent certain. In the past, I...didn't care so much about the health of my, uh, donors."

"Do vampires have a term for them? Er, me?" Rainbow asked.

"Normally, 'bloodbags' or 'sheep'," Fluttershy said. "'Donor' was the nicest thing I could come up with."

"I'm not sure you could find a nicer term, darling," Rarity said, flipping her hair. "It does lend a certain generous air to it, hmm? Giving freely to someone in need?"

Fluttershy sank in on herself.

"What? Did I say something? A vampire faux pas?"

"Not that I know of," Fluttershy said. "The rest thought I was so crazy and out of control that they didn't associate with me."

Sunset sat down on her sleeping bag--per Fluttershy's request, a good distance away from the vampire's. "Did that ever get lonely?"

"Well, with the state I was in, I never really cared," Fluttershy said slowly. "I never really understood what I was missing."

"Well, might as well make for lost time, right?" Sunset said. "It's been working pretty well for me."

Fluttershy smiled. "Yeah, I guess it has, hasn't it? For both of us."

Sunset smiled back.

"WAAAAAIT!" Pinkie jumped up in Fluttershy's face. "Can you only drink blood? I've seen you eating before! YOU CAN EAT CAKE, RIGHT?!?!?"

Fluttershy giggled. "Yes, I can, but I don't really need to. But I don't have that good a sense of taste, anyway."

"WHAT?" Pinkie shouted in Fluttershy's ear.

"I can't really taste most things like you do, but I can certainly enjoy the effort you put into making something nice for me," Fluttershy said with a smile. "Thank you for all the work you do."

Pinkie stared at her, then grinned. "Your welcome!" she said, flying back to her own sleeping bag.

"What's that you got there?" Rainbow asked.

"It's...a book," Sunset said slowly, rubbing her good hand across the old, worn cover.

"I see that, but you're giving it a really weird look," Rainbow said, raising an eyebrow. "So, is it, like, a special book?"

"Kind of. It's from Equestria."

"Ooh! Is it a spell book of some kind?" Rarity asked.

"Even if advanced theory of unicorn magic was in any way something you'd be able to understand--" Sunset raised an eyebrow at the sheepish Rarity. "--no. It's a magic book linked with another one that...my mentor has so we can write to each other. Or at least, had. I don't even know if she kept her copy."

"It's...Princess Celestia?" Applejack asked slowly. "You thinkin' of writing to her?"

"I don't think she wants anything to do with me, at this point," Sunset said quietly. She looked up, seeing everyone staring at her. She sighed. "Remember, I lied to her, broke her trust, stole a large helping of gems, then go back only to try and steal her new student's crown, which I plan on using to depose her as ruler of Equestria. Considering all of that, I'm amazed Princess Twilight didn't drag me back to be executed."

"Because you were willin' to change, sugarcube," Applejack said. "Besides, somethin' tells me ya don't get to be Princess of Friendship without being willing to forgive an' forget."

"Some things you never forget," Sunset intoned.

"Who says you're supposed to?" Fluttershy said. All eyes looked to her. "I mean, I tried to kill Luna. She and Celestia certainly aren't forgetting that any time soon, but both of them gave me the help I needed to make it this far."

"I've...gotta be honest, sugar. I forgive ya everything, y'know? But the image of that fireball headin' towards me is never leaving." She shook her head, then reached over, wrapping an arm around Sunset's shoulders. "Quit fussin' so much over things you did before." She turned and shot a look at Fluttershy. "Both of ya. Focus on the now."

"And on the later!" Pinkie said. "There's always a party coming up sometime!" She somehow caught them both in a wide grin, despite their being at opposite sides of the room.

"Both of those have me as dead tired, so--" She hesitated. "'Dead tired' isn't, like, considered offensive to vamps, right?"

"Not really, no," Fluttershy answered. She almost looked like she wanted to object to 'vamps', but said nothing further.

Rainbow Dash lay down in her bag, yawning. "Well, that's a relief. I keep worrying I'm gonna...say a slur or something..." She trailed off into a light sleep.

"Well, let's follow her example, shall we, girls?" Rarity said, laying down. "We can talk more in the morning."

Most of the lights were turned off, one after another. The last one left was Sunset's light, mostly hidden by her pulling her blanket mostly over her head. "Applejack?" she said, looking to the girl closest to her.

"Yeah?"

"You got a pen I could borrow?"

After a second of silence, Applejack passed a pen over.

"Thanks."

Applejack left her friends sleeping, stepping out into...night? Probably? Very early morning. The autumn chill sank into her bones, but she almost welcomed it. She sat on the edge of the steps to Sunset's house, trying to get a handle on her emotions.

After all that had happened, waking up early was probably expected. She was surprised that all the other girls were still asleep at this point.

Well, Rainbow Dash wasn't surprising, actually. Even factoring in her usual carefree attitude, she had lost a quart of blood, so being tired was--

One of the shadows nearest Applejack moved. She straightened, looking over to her right. "Hello?" she asked.

It was just her own shadow. Sitting down, and with the pale moonlight slipping through the clouds, it just looked strange.

And...winged.

The shadow readjusted itself, and from its head, two glowing red pinpricks of light appeared.

"Uh...is that you, Fluttershy?"

Fluttershy landed lithely on her feet, looking just like she always did. "Oh, sorry, I didn't mean to startle you," she said. "I was just up there thinking..."

Applejack looked up. Sunset's roof was flat, so Fluttershy must have been sitting on the edge of it, right? But why did the shadow have glowing eyes?

Fluttershy squirmed uncomfortably. "High places help me think," she said.

Applejack laughed. "Well, suit yourself, I guess." She turned back to look out into the city, and of random cars driving down the road. "Has...anyone really seen ya doin' that?"

Fluttershy sat next to her. "Not really. City life is busy enough so that they're either working already, or asleep."

"Do you sleep?"

Fluttershy didn't answer for a long moment. "Vampires don't go to sleep."

"I..."Applejack hesitated. "Sorry."

"You didn't make this choice for me," Fluttershy said, the red glint returning to her eyes. "Don't apologize. I should say sorry to you."

"Well, all's forgiven," Applejack said. "We're willin' to give you any help ya need, Fluttershy, and I'm certain Rainbow and Sunset aren't too shaken. Heck, it sounds like even Principal Celestia and Vice Principal Luna forgave ya."

Fluttershy let out a 'hmm' sound. "Years ago. I assume they thought I'd died for a bit, when I stopped causing trouble, so they must have been surprised to see me here, playing nice."

"How old are they?" Applejack asked. "I caught you sayin' something about the eighteen hundreds..."

Fluttershy shrugged. "I'm old, same as them. I didn't hear anything about them when I was young, so, I can't really say when they were born.'

"How does that work with your body aging?" Applejack asked. "I mean, I remember you bein' a kid."

Fluttershy looked Applejack in the eyes, and her face began to change. The chin narrowed, lines of age began to appear, and her eyes flash bright red. Her two front teeth elongated, but it didn't stop. Her face looked almost like a traditional nosferatu, old, wrinkled, with glowing red eyes and long, sharp fangs. "Most vampires can't do that," she said, voice sounding...dry, almost. She closed her eyes, and quick as it had come, her face returned to normal. "I had a good teacher, I suppose."

Applejack let out an appreciative whistle. "It would make one heck of a Halloween costume."

Fluttershy paused, then turned and looked at Applejack.

"Sorry, with Halloween coming up, it just--uh--"

Fluttershy giggled. "I suppose it would," she said. Her ears twitched, and Applejack listened to the sound of a phone buzzing. "Let's head in," she suggested, standing up.

Applejack shivered in the early morning chill, then followed Fluttershy inside.

Sunset was starting to wake up, though most of the others had sat up blinking. "Somebody turn that off," Sunset muttered.

"Alright, I got--" Applejack blinked. "Sunset? Um, I think it's for you."

"For me? Where'd I put my phone..." Her hand fumbled around her sleeping bag for a minute, eventually touching the glowing pink, vibrating book.

Sunset sat bolt upright, eyes going wide. "BOOK!" she shouted.

"I'm up!" Rainbow Dash burst out, sitting up.

There was a brief flurry of activity as Sunset held up the old-looking tome, which had stopped glowing and vibrating, before all the girls lapsed into silence. "Oh, she actually answered," Sunset moaned. "What do I do? She's...she's...okay, deep breaths. Deep...breaths..." She quickly began hyperventilating.

"Uh, who answered? She knows that's a book, right?" Rainbow asked Rarity, with a concerned expression.

"No, silly! Obviously she put her phone in the book!" Pinkie nodded vigorously.

"Really?" Rarity asked, glaring a the two of them.

Rainbow Dash slammed her palm into her face. "Oh, right, magic book."

"How could you forget--"

"I was tired, still am tired, and also, missing a quart of blood," Rainbow snapped. "Suffice it to say, I'm cranky."

"Now, now, sugar," Applejack said, sitting besides Sunset. "Let's not get too worked up, a'right? Slow, deep breath, in...and out."

Sunset complied, breathing slowing down.

"Now, Princess Twilight told Princess...Celestia..." When Sunset nodded, Applejack continued. "She told Princess Celestia that you were reformed. You just went and apologized to her, right?"

Sunset nodded.

"Now, if she's as nice as you've lead me to believe, then she'll forgive you," Applejack said.

"If she's anything like the one in our world, she's forgiven worse," Fluttershy said, giving an encouraging smile. "Come on, just open it and read her response."

Sunset gulped, then opened the book. She took her time flipping to the space where Celestia's reply had come.

Sunset took in a deep breath, looking up at her friends. Then she grinned. "Well, here goes nothing." She looked down and read what Celestia had wrote.

Dear Sunset Shimmer,

It's so wonderful to hear that you're doing alright. But let me ease your worries--all is forgiven, Sunset. I would have told you sooner, but my thought had been that the journal wouldn't work. The fault is mine, Sunset, for this, and for your descent.

I failed you as a teacher, Sunset. It was my job to watch over you, and I failed. It was my job to teach you about the things that you should stay away from, and I failed. It was my job to keep you from making the mistakes you did, and I failed. It is I who should be asking for your forgiveness, Sunset, and I hope that you can give it to this foolish old mare.

Sunset blinked back tears, rereading just those passages again.

"Sunset?" Rarity asked slowly.

"She...forgives me," Sunset said. "Pen. Where's a pen..."

"Here!" Fluttershy said, suddenly appearing on her other side holding a pen.

Sunset took it quickly, then gripped it in her bad hand with a wince.

Don't say things like that! You were in no way at fault for any of that, Princess. I messed up, you shouldn't blame yourself for that.

She paused as text from Celestia started to appear.

Part of living as long as I have is that you learn to accept where blame lies. I'm not perfect at it, but I can at least recognize when I've failed my job as a teacher. But do understand I'm not taking ALL the guilt off your shoulders. I was simply doing my best to apologize for my own mistakes, Sunset, not say that you made none.

Sunset let out a small sigh, then wrote back.

Well, as far as I'm concerned, everything is forgiven, Princess. You always felt like...well, a second mother, to me, up to and including trying to get me to make friends. Between the two of you, I should have listened at some point. Heck, it's the student's job to listen to their teacher, and I failed that one pretty hard, too.

It happens to the best of us, Celestia replied. There are plenty of people whom I ignored at one time or another, nearly costing me everything.

"Is everything alright, darling?" Rarity asked.

Sunset wiped the tears off her face, looking up and smiling at her friends. "Yeah," she said. "It really is."

You Look Like Hell

"Thanks for the ride!" Sunset said, waving goodbye to Rarity, who had driven her over even though it technically wasn't her turn to give Sunset a ride.

"No problem at all, darling, I'll try and swing back around to give you a ride home when you're ready," Rarity said, waving. "Have fun with your friends!"

Rarity drove off, seemingly convinced that 'fun' was what Sunset planned for. Sunset, with a great feeling of trepidation, turned and walked to the door of Vinyl's and Octavia's house. She hesitated, then knocked three times, firmly, on the door.

After a second of hearing Octavia shout something--probably asking Vinyl to get the door--she heard Vinyl's voice whine, and then the door opened. Vinyl wasn't wearing her glasses this morning, and was dressed in shorts and short-sleeved T-shirt that was almost two sizes two big for her. Vinyl stared at her for a solid ten seconds before bursting out with, "Holy shit, Sunset, you look like hell."

Sunset had ignored Rarity's attempts at using makeup to cover the bruise. The entire right half of her face was a light purple instead of her typical yellow, there was another bruise on the base of her neck, and her right hand was still wrapped like an Egyptian mummy.

Octavia turned away from her stove, then her eyes widened and she let out a gasp."My word, Sunset, is everything alright?"

"Yes and no," Sunset said slowly. "Can I come in? There's...something we need to talk about."

Vinyl stepped aside. "Oh, boy," was all she said.

Sunset smiled at her as she stepped inside the cluttered room. "You have a guess at what happened, don't you?"

"Lu-lu told me everything," Vinyl said, waving it off. "The whole of everything."

"Lu...lu...?" Sunset blinked, sitting down on the sofa in front of the TV.

Vinyl jumped over the back of the sofa, landing in a seated position. "So...yeah," she said.

There was an awkward moment of silence. "Just so we have the air cleared between us, and no confusion...you are a vampire, right?"

Vinyl opened her mouth, making an exaggerated 'ah' sound while she exposed fangs to match Fluttershy's. "Yah, tha shums i' up," she said with her mouth open.

"Vinyl," Octavia scolded.

Vinyl closed her mouth, but the fangs stayed. "So, you had something more to ask about, I'm guessing?" Her confident grin remained ever-present.

"Yeah. She...kind of lost control of herself, and...I don't know how to help her. Do you know any tips and tricks that I could pass on?"

Vinyl stared at her, smile wavering. "Um, how old do you think I am, like, compared to Fluttershy?"

Sunset blinked. "I mean, I think they mentioned something about her age, but, I was a little distracted..."

"Riiiight," Vinyl said slowly. "Sunny, I'm forty-eight years old. Very young, as far as vampires are concerned, right?"

Sunset nodded. "Okay."

"Fluttershy is...ah, old. Like, really fucking old." Vinyl ran a hand through her hair. "I think a little over a thousand years, at this point, but I wasn't raised by vampires. The only things I know are what I found out myself, and what Celestia and Lu-lu told me."

Something about that statement confused her. "You weren't raised by vampires? I mean, what about whoever turned you into one? Is...is that not how it works?"

Vinyl leaned back on the sofa. "That is how it works, but....it's a bit of a long story. Basically, around fifty years ago, Celestia and Luna were taking out this really bad vampire together. I think he was calling himself...'Discord' or something like that? But in any case, the fight was going well, but as he died, the place caught fire. They were rushing to get out, but, they hear this baby crying. They rush into one of Discord's rooms, and they see, sitting in a crib, a naturally born baby vampire. Me." She gave a smile and a wave.

"From what they said, everything about that should have been impossible," Octavia said, handing a plate of food to Sunset.

"You didn't have too--"

"I wanted to," Octavia interrupted. "Eat up."

"'Tavi does what she wants," Vinyl said, waving it off. "Anyhoo, they bring me out of there, and struggle figuring out how to raise me. I don't remember much of back then, but--" She shrugged. "As far as I know, no one turned me into a vampire."

"Wow," Sunset said. "Is...that why you call her 'Lu-lu'?"

"Eh." She shrugged. "Probably. Auntie never objected to it, so it kind of stuck."

"Hmm." Sunset sighed. "So, anything you know about vampires, Fluttershy also knows, right?"

"Certainly. In fact, I've kinda wanted her to teach me several times, but...she was never open to the idea. Maybe...you could ask her if she'd be willing to?" Vinyl gave a hopeful smile.

Sunset chuckled. "Alright, I'll let her know you asked."

Vinyl laughed, throwing her arms around Sunset in a bear hug that left her gasping for breath. "Thank you thank you thank you!" Vinyl shouted.

"Okay--um--I need--air," Sunset croaked.

Vinyl let go, cheeks turning pink as she sheepishly ran a hand through her hair. "Sorry."

"One more question," Sunset gasped, rubbing her side.

"Shoot."

"I can't help but notice that I am completely lacking of any memories of bullying you," Sunset said slowly. "And Luna said that vampires have hypnosis..."

"Yeah, you were a real bitch back then," Vinyl said. "I figured, 'why put up with it?'" She shrugged.

Sunset glared at her.

"What?" Vinyl said. "I mean, Celestia and Luna always told me not to use it unless I have to, so but, in my defense..." She gestured at Sunset, like that was justification.

"I...probably can't blame you, anyway," Sunset said slowly. "I really was awful, wasn't I?"

"Hey, don't beat yourself up too hard! Everyone does things they're not proud of!"

"The simple fact of the matter is that it is the past, and the past cannot be changed," Octavia said, slicing a bite off her own plate of pancakes. "You can only really change your future, for better or worse."

"Whoa, deep philosophy," Vinyl said. "You been reading that Plateau dude again, 'Tavi?"

"Plato," Octavia said sternly.

"Regardless," Sunset interrupted. "Have you...ever had trouble with..." Sunset gestured to her bandaged wrist.

Vinyl shook her head. "My adoptive parents made sure that never happened," she said. "They still check up on me to make sure I'm feeding regularly."

"But I was under the impression that vampire bites heal quickly," Octavia said slowly, examining Sunset's injury.

"Uh, yeah, if I just poke my fangs into you," Vinyl said. "If I'm being careful, nothing bad happens. If, however, a starving vampire bites someone, they'll probably not be careful."

"Is...Octavia your...uh, donor?"

"I thought the term was bloodbag," Vinyl said. "And, irregularly, because doing it on the same person every week can be bad."

"That's good to know, for scheduling purposes," Sunset said slowly.

"Any other help you need, feel free to drop by," Vinyl said. "Though I feel like here lately, we haven't gotten to hang out except when you needed something important."

"Hmm. We could hang out now? I'm not needed anywhere, so..."

"You play any video games?" Vinyl asked.

"Uh--yeeees," Sunset said tentatively. "But I have something of a 'gamer temper', so maybe we could stick to co-op?"

"Ha, no thanks. In my house, trash talk is expected, you frikkin' poser," Vinyl said, red eyes flashing as she grinned.

"It is on," Sunset growled back.

Octavia sucked in a deep breath. "Oh, boy."

As she walked to school on Monday, Sunset's phone let out one of the annoying pings that were oh-so-popular amongst human devices. She pulled it out, seeing a message in the group chat with her friends.

Fluttershy: So, uh, I'm gonna need food again tonight.

RaiDash: rly? i thought u fed like just last night

Fluttershy: It's just a temporary thing until I get some blood back in my system.

P!nk!eP!e: We could hang out at my place! SLEEPOVER TIME!!1

Rarity: Pinkamena, darling, why the '1'?

P!nk!eP!e: My finger slipped.

AJ: How the hay does that explain anythin?

Sunset chuckled to herself, then decided to pocket her phone as she headed up to the school's front doors.

Something about how the past few days had been going made her pause, however. She had learned very well how to tell if she was being watched, and as she looked about her, she noted all the students staring at her.

Well, they always did. Sunset had always ignored the whispers, the looks, all of it. Except, with having recently been stalked, even if it was just by one of her friends, Sunset was feeling rather jumpy.

Well, acting like this only seems to be making the stares worse, she thought to herself. In fact, constantly looking over her shoulders seemed to be attracting a lot more looks. Why--

She reached up and felt at her face. It was still sore, and when she'd looked in the mirror that morning, a dark purplish-yellow. They had, in fact, noticed. What was the cover story Luna had thought up again...?

She bumped into a pair of students. "Oh, I'm so sorry!" she said quickly. She'd bumped into students a couple of times, since the Fall Formal, and none of those had ended well.

"Oh, don't mention--" Lyra stopped mid-sentence as she realized who she was talking to. "Holy crap, what happened to your face?"

Bon Bon looked visibly disgusted. "Are you telling me," she said slowly, as more students gathered nearby, "that after Twilight's whole big speech about forgiveness and repentance, after she let you off the hook for all of that--"

Wait! It isn't like that!

Sunset flinched back, not looking up at any of them.

Bon Bon hesitated. "--someone beat the crap out of you?" she said, still clearly disgusted. "I mean, you're not my favorite person, but...come on!"

Several murmurs rang up from the nearby students. Sunset caught a few statements, namely, "Uncool", and, "They should be expelled."

"Whuh?" Sunset blinked, jaw dropping in surprise.

"For crying out loud," Bon Bon continued. "I--I can't even. Who? Who did this to you?"

"Um--I--"

"Trixie knows whose at fault for this!"

Sunset was ninety percent certain Trixie didn't, actually, but the massive smoke cloud that suddenly appeared in the midst of them left her coughing too much to say anything. Trixie took a moment to relish being the center of attention a moment, before continuing her spiel. "Clearly, a student has taken their opportunity to enact some petty vengeance upon Sunset Shimmer."

"Yeah, we got that," Bon Bon said, raising an eyebrow.

"But we all know that Sunset would be perfectly capable of defending herself!"

You could have just, y'know, not brought that up? Sunset thought to herself.

"But she couldn't, or it would simply look like she attacked the other student!" Trixie continued. "And she must have thought that none of us would believe her, because all of us ignored Twilight's decision to forgive her! None of us ever made any attempt to approach her!" She took off her ridiculous magician hat, holding it over her chest. Her voice wavered slightly, as she finished with, "We are all at fault for this."

That got the entire student body to pause. Most of them thought about it a moment. Several people sheepishly ran a hand through their hair or rubbed their elbows in an ashamed manner.

"But! Trixie will make amends! She will be the first to sign your--" She patted her pockets, then paused. "Give me one moment," she continued, patting her sleeves. She even checked behind her ears, then noticeably deflated. "Okay, can I borrow someone's pen so I can sign her cast?"

"I hadn't even noticed the cast!" Lyra burst out, leaning closer. "That--that's just brutal! Who the hell did this to you?"

"It--she didn't mean too--it's not like--" Sunset paused. "You--you guys actually care?" she whispered. "Rainbow Dash...or...one of the others, they didn't put you up to this?"

"Of course not!" Bon Bon said firmly. "I--I'm sorry that I made you ever think that we wouldn't care if someone did this to you. Maybe we could start over?"

Sunset blinked, feeling wet, moisture running down her face. She looked into Bon Bon's earnest face, then at the rest of the students. All of them...they cared...

The dam finally burst. Sunset broke down, throwing her arms around Bon Bon and sobbing uncontrollably.

"What's going on here?" Rainbow's angry voice demanded, the owner coming around the corner. She paused, seeing Sunset hugging an incredibly awkward looking Bon Bon while openly crying in front of the assembled students.

"Um," Bon Bon said, cheeks turning a light crimson.

"Everything's fine," Sunset said, letting go of Bon Bon. She wiped the tears from her face with her sleeve. "S-sorry, I just...got so emotional. I..."

"Don't worry about it," Bon Bon said, putting a hand on her shoulder. "Any one of us could have put in the effort to, you know, talk about things at any point. Trixie's right--we're all to blame for you getting attacked."

Rainbow Dash blinked in a confused manner. "Er..."

"Ahem."

Rainbow Dash jumped aside, revealing Vice Principal Luna behind her. "As pleased as I am to see all of you so concerned for Sunset, I do need to see her in my office real quick."

"Please, Vice Principal Luna," Lyra said slowly. "Who did this to her?"

"No one," Luna said. "It was an accident, but I will let Sunset fill you in on the details later. The rest of you, off to class."

Sunset breathed out a sigh of relief as the students began shuffling off to class. "See you at lunch," Bon Bon said, giving her a wave.

"So will Trixie, as soon as she finds her pen," Trixie said, putting her hat back on. "Trixie, awa--"

"What have I said about smoke bombs in the halls, Trixie?" Luna demanded

Trixie stopped, hand raised to the sky with a smoke bomb held in it. She cleared her throat, stowing the offending item away, and, with a nervous chuckle, sprinted off.

Rainbow Dash ran a hand through her hair. "I heard you sobbing, and I thought--geez, I don't know what I thought."

"Regardless, you should avoid answering questions about Sunset's accident," Luna said. "Let the others know. Meanwhile, I'm going to tell Sunset a proper cover story in my office, as I don't believe she listened or cared that much the other night."

"See you later," Sunset said, following Luna. After Rainbow Dash went off, pulling out her phone to call the others, Sunset said, "Thanks for the save. I don't think I could have thought something up there."

"Don't mention it. Regardless of it simply being common courtesy, the fewer people knew about vampires, the better."

"So...my friends and I..."

"'Tis fine. I was of the mind that she should have told you sooner. Would have saved us all some difficulty."

"Ah."

Luna stepped into the office, and Sunset hesitated in the darkness. As usual, Luna had the blinds pulled tightly over the window, and the lights turned off, leaving minimal light.

"Is something wrong, Miss Shimmer?"

Sunset closed the door behind her. "Are...are you a vampire, too? You mentioned that you were immortal..."

"No, I simply do not mind the dark. It certainly helps when dealing with misbehaving students," Luna said casually.

"If...you don't mind my asking, what are you? Are you an Equestrian?"

"Just so we're clear, I do mind," Luna said slowly. "That is a long tale that is better off forgotten."

"O-oh. Sorry, I--"

"Do not apologize. Regardless, we should move on with the task at hand." Luna folded her hands together, fingertips resting against each other. "I thought it might be prudent to make up some sort of attacker, but Celestia said that making a story without a villain would be better. She came up with saying the injury was caused by a playful prank, gone horribly awry, and we do not wish to disclose the name of the miscreant as no harm was ever intended."

Sunset chuckled to herself. "Verily," she answered.

Luna narrowed her eyes.

"Sorry, I--"

"Apology accepted," Luna interrupted coldly. "Do you find the cover story acceptable?"

"Yeah. I don't really have anything to add. Is...that all we were doing here?"

"I was planning in case you wanted to discuss it at length, and besides--no matter how quickly we got it over with, it would be best to discuss it all in relative privacy."

Sunset pointed over her shoulder at the camera in the corner of the room.

"The security guard knows enough to edit out certain odd comments we make regarding mythical creatures from fantasy stories," Luna said casually.

"Oh..."

"Since that was all, I recommend you head off to class now," Luna said, opening one of her drawers.

"O-okay." Sunset got up, thinking back to the cover story. It sounds believable. "What kind of prank would bruise up my face and throat, and leave my arm swaddled in bandages?"

"One we do not wish to explain the nature of for the protection of certain semi-guilty parties, as absolutely no harm was intended on their part," Luna said simply.

"Convenient."

Luna smiled coldly. "Verily."

Sunset wasted no further time rushing off to her class. She slipped into the room, pausing as Cranky Doodle did to look at her, but he said nothing. Sunset tried to ignore the whispers, and the looks from her fellow students as she set up her desk. Most of them hadn't even been there five minutes ago, how could the story of everything of already passed? Those were clearly looks of pity she was seeing.

Her pencil rolled off the table, bouncing on the ground. "Shoot," she muttered.

"I GOT IT!" Lyra and Bon Bon shouted. Both lunged for the fallen pencil, slammed their heads together, and fell away, leaving Derpy as the one to pick it up and hand it to Sunset. The cross-eyed girl seemed to not notice her friends.

"Here you go!" she said in a chipper tone.

"Thanks?" Sunset said hesitantly.

"Don't worry, I drop stuff all the time," Derpy said with a grin.

"Everyone alright over there?" Cranky asked.

"Yeah," Bon Bon and Lyra muttered, returning to their seats while blushing furiously.

That settled, Cranky returned to the lesson, which Sunset found herself some difficulty paying attention to. Granted, math was math, in Equestria or Canterlot High, so she could do it easily anyway. Barring distractions.

As she went about her classes, she put up with everyone stopping to give her well wishes or, even worse, apologize for never giving her a chance. Sunset did make sure that Luna's cover story spread around, so hopefully, people would stop thinking that someone had beat the crap out of her.

The irony that Trixie was actually mostly right and that Sunset was doing her best to make sure everyone didn't know it was not lost on her.

Sunset paused, stopping right before she ran right into another student. "Oh, sorry," Sunset said, flinching back slightly out of reflex. Where'd your spine go? part of her mind demanded. Even now, when no one really even seemed angry at her, she was still flinching back from people.

The green-haired woman glared ferociously at Sunset. Okay, so, some people don't seem to care to much about my injuries. It should have been a relief, but, Sunset reflected, she seemed to be in a lose-lose situation.

"Would you shut up with the fake apologies?" the woman growled.

"They're not fake; I really didn't see you there," Sunset said slowly.

"Oh, I bet you really did--"

"Oh, Wallflower!"

The woman stopped abruptly, face paling as Fluttershy stepped over, smiling sweetly. But her back was to the room, to any other students who might see her eyes. Vivid, glowing red eyes that were full of fury. "It's good to see you again! How's it going?"

Wallflower backed away, but Fluttershy took a step to intercept her. Wallflower froze, looking around to see that the rest of the hallway was strangely empty of students.

"Fluttershy? It's okay," Sunset said. "I--"

Fluttershy held up a hand to silence her. "She apologized, Wallflower. What do you say when someone apologizes to you?"

Wallflower muttered something that Sunset couldn't hear.

Fluttershy punched the wall by Wallflower's head, denting in the locker. Wallflower jumped, then slid down to the ground. "I-I forgive you," she stammered hastily.

"Fluttershy," Sunset snapped. Fluttershy paused, then stepped back from Wallflower.

Sunset extended her good arm to help Wallflower up. Wallflower looked at her, then accepted the hand without a word. "You alright?" Sunset asked.

"'mfine," Wallflower mumbled, looking away.

Sunset glared at Fluttershy. "What was that about?"

Fluttershy turned and walked away slowly. Sunset glared at her back, then sighed. "She's had...a rough few days, okay? Give her a little bit of a break."

Wallflower said nothing.

"I'm--I'm Sunset Shimmer, though you probably already knew that," Sunset said. "It was Wallflower, right?"

"Wallflower Blush," she said. "Not that you'll remember it..."

Sunset suppressed a sigh. "Look, I really am trying to do better, okay? You may think that I'm faking, but, I really am sorry. For everything."

"I...guess I am, too," she replied. "I...the reason why she was so mad at me was that..." She hesitated.

"You don't have to--"

"I found a magic rock and was using it to wipe people's memories of me," Wallflower said quickly. "Every single awkward moment, every single conversation that started wrong. Just wanted to make a good impression, y'know?" She shrugged. "Except when I tried doing it on her, it...didn't work. I still don't know why."

"I'm willing to bet you found an Equestrian artifact of some sort," Sunset breathed slowly.

"Equestrian--the horse place that the Princess-person came from?" Wallflower asked. "Messing with it was probably stupid, yeah..."

"This is amazing!" Sunset said. "I mean, I always knew they just dumped random artifacts here so they wouldn't have to deal with them, but...the fact that it kept its power after all these years...oh! Do you still have it? I want to see it! Which one is it? Should I send it to Princess Twilight? Portal's closed anyway. Ahhh! This is so exciting!" She paused, blushing. "Um, ahem. Sorry."

Wallflower stared at her. "Uh...Principal Celestia took it."

"Aw."

"You're...not even a little mad?"

"Do you even realize who you're talking to?" Sunset said, raising an eyebrow.

Wallflower chuckled, then covered her mouth, suddenly remembering she wasn't supposed to like Sunset.

"I'm gonna head off to lunch now," Sunset said. "I enjoyed talking, Wallflower. And I'm sorry for everything I--"

"TRIXIE--" A smoke cloud rose up between the two of them, sending them both into a horrible coughing fit. "--HAS FOUND HER PEN!"

All Is Forgiven

"Is that her now?"

"I hear Trixie, so yeah..."

"Trixie is so glad to be nearing the cafeteria!" Trixie's voice shouted out. "She's just so hungry..."

"She's overselling it..."

"Shh! Here they come!"

Sunset Shimmer stepped into the cafeteria, entirely focused on giving an odd yet amused look to Trixie when the assembled students all shouted out, "SURPRISE!"

Sunset let out a shout, falling back onto her butt, looking up around in her surprise.

The students had hastily cobbled together a massive card reading simply, "GET WELL SOON!" Seeing it, Sunset's jaw dropped, and she looked around at all of the students, speechless.

"Too much?" Bon Bon asked Lyra.

Sunset began crying again.

"Absolutely," Lyra replied.

"I--when did you even have the time for this?" Sunset asked, wiping her face. "Sweet Celestia, I'm such a mess today..."

Principal Celestia chuckled from her nearby position. "Well, I'm glad that you think I'm sweet," she said slowly.

Sunset somehow both paled and blushed, looking up at the Principal. "Um, wait, uh, I can--I can explain!"

Celestia laughed. Vice Principal Luna rolled her eyes.

"Come on, Sunset!" Pinkie shouted, jumping up besides Sunset and pulling her to her feet. "Setting this up this quickly was hard, even for me! Get up and enjoy it before the Principal remembers that we have classes later!"

"R-Right," Sunset said. She hesitated, looking back at Wallflower. "See you later?"

"Uh--" Wallflower froze, as most of the students suddenly turned to look at her. "S-s-sure," Wallflower stammered.

Sunset let herself be dragged over to where Pinkie Pie had made a large cake, styled like Sunset's cutie mark. "Come on, first slice is yours!" she said.

"When did you even have time?" Sunset demanded.

"I got it made before school this morning," Pinkie said with a shrug.

Sunset blinked. "Wait, but--"

"Yup. I had most of the party prep done before school.

"But--how did you know? That--"

"They'd forgive you? That they'd be concerned someone might have hurt you?" Pinkie smiled. "Well, if you know them like I do, it's kind of obvious, Sunsets."

Sunset wiped her eyes with a sleeve. "Dammit, now I'm crying again," she muttered.

Octavia stepped forward, handing her a handkerchief. "Don't worry, I packed extras," she said.

Pinkie gave her a smile, handing her a slice of cake.

Sunset took the cake in her good hand, then turned to face the other students. "Thank you," she said. "Thank you so much for giving me a second chance. I--I promise to make it count."

"Aren't you going to sit with Sunset?"

"Well, she's got plenty of friends to keep her company right now," Fluttershy said. "I'll be fine over here."

"Are you upset about what happened the other night?"

"Of course I am. Sunset forgave me, though."

"Hey, Fluttershy!" Rainbow Dash sat down besides her, putting down a plate with a slice of cake and several actually healthy foods. "Who are you talking to?"

"Myself," Fluttershy said.

Sombra's smile twisted. "Indeed."

"You know, every once in a while, when I go to Carousel Boutique, Rarity doesn't notice me immediately, but I don't know that she didn't notice me, because she's talking full volume about her dresses," Rainbow said, breaking into laughter. "And she always screams when I get right behind her and answer her..."

"That...sounds deliberate, Rainbow Dash."

"Well, if she hasn't caught on yet--" Rainbow grinned mischievously. "Hey, aren't you gonna grab some of the cake? Or, muffins?"

"I wasn't really planning on it," Fluttershy said. "I can't really taste them, anyway, and I should let other people have them, in case there's not enough."

"Can't taste--oh, right." She rubbed her throat, a little awkwardly. "You holding up okay? You said you, uh, were still hungry, so..."

"I'm doing fine, Rainbow, thank you for asking," Fluttershy asked.

"Oh, yes, fine," Sombra chuckled. "So cute that they think they should be concerned for you rather than about you."

Shut up, Fluttershy thought.

"Oh. So, there was something I wanted to ask."

"Okay. Ask."

"If you are a vampire, what was up with the garlic bread?" Rainbow Dash asked slowly. "I mean, does garlic not actually do anything?"

"It is extremely off-putting, and tends to put us off eating," Fluttershy said, checking to make sure no one was close enough to hear. "As I was starving, I don't think it would have worked but I was desperate."

"Ah. That's actually clever." Rainbow said. "Actually, that sounds important. We should tell the rest of the girls that tonight, right?"

"Ah, yes, so obliging," Sombra laughed. "So easy to take advantage of."

Rainbow took the wrapper off her muffin, then popped the entire thing in her mouth.

I am fine. I am under control. Breathe in, breathe out. Control was one of the only things vampires considered to be 'virtuous'. Breathe in, breathe out. She represented kindness. She had to keep from hurting her friends. Breathe in, breathe--

"HEY!" Rainbow Dash shouted in her ear.

Fluttershy let out a shocked squeak, falling out of her chair and hitting the ground with a crash. "Ah, there you are," Rainbow said with a cheeky grin. "I was wondering where you'd gone off to."

Fluttershy stood up, dusting off her arms.

"Um, are you mad at me?" Rainbow asked apologetically. "Sorry, I--"

Fluttershy grabbed the back of her chair and pulled it over. Rainbow Dash tumbled backwards in an unceremonious heap with a not-so-awesome squawking sound, eventually ending up upside down with her feet straight up in the air.

Fluttershy sat down with a smile, taking a bite of her salad. "Not anymore, Rainbow Crash," she said, ignoring the other students staring at her.

"Duly noted," Rainbow said with a groan.

They chose Pinkie Pie's house for their next sleep over. The choice often fell between hers and Rarity's, the only two that could reasonably fit all of them properly, but Pinkie Pie said that she had a surprise for Fluttershy waiting at their house.

Sunset rode over in Pinkie Pie's car, with Rainbow Dash and Rarity, to get everything ready. No sooner had they stepped inside when Pinkie said, "Okay, I'm off to make the thing for Fluttershy, you guys just get ready."

Rainbow Dash tucked her sleeping roll under one arm, then lifted up Sunset's as well.

"No, I can carry that," Sunset began.

"You're arm is still in a cast, I've got this," Rainbow said firmly.

"What happened to Sunset?" Maude asked blankly, looking up from her computer with actual emotion on her face.

"Uh--nothing. Just...a prank gone awry," Sunset said, giving the same smile she'd been doing anytime someone asked.

Maude stared at her blankly, and Sunset had the distinct impression that Maude didn't believe it.

"Don't worry, Maude--no harm was intended to Sunset Shimmer, and if any had been, such aggression would have been dealt with accordingly," Rarity said, giving a confident smile. She took Sunset's good arm, leading her after Rainbow Dash.

"Hmm. Does it have something to do with the sleepover you guys had the other night?"

"Well," Rarity began, but Maude interrupted her.

"You guys aren't doing...anything dangerous, right?" she asked slowly.

"Don't worry, Maude! Everything's okie-dokie!" Pinkie said, breezing into the room to throw an arm over Maude's shoulders. "But there is a buuuunch of stuff we kinda sorta promised the Principal we wouldn't tell, okay?"

"Hmm. As long as everyone's alright, and if the Principal knows..." Maude considered it, then shrugged. "Alright. Stay safe."

Crisis seemingly averted, Rarity finished bringing Sunset into Pinkie's bedroom. "I suppose we should have anticipated a few people not buying it," Rarity muttered. "Especially from our sisters. Sweetie Belle didn't notice me leaving, but we shall have to talk to Applejack about her sister."

"We probably need to talk to Applejack, anyway," Rainbow said. "She's...well, honest to a fault, really."

"You're probably right about that," Sunset said, pulling her journal from her bag. "She might have trouble just regurgitating the cover story over and over again." She paused, listening to the sound of a truck pulling up. "That sounds like her now."

"Yeah, that's her," Rainbow said, without looking up from setting up her sleeping bag. "I'd recognize the sound of that beat-up old truck anywhere."

"You can tell just by the sound of the engine?" Rarity asked.

Rainbow nodded. "Well, yeah. I'm awesome."

Rarity raised an eyebrow.

"...And I make it a habit of being broke, so I do most of the repairs on my motorbike," Rainbow Dash admitted, running a hand through her hair.

"You're a motorcyclist?" Sunset asked, looking up. "You know what? That shouldn't be surprising."

"Hey, I do a lot of awesome things that you guys never hear about," Rainbow Dash said indignantly.

"I didn't mean anything by it. I was just a little surprised. I managed to get my hands on a pretty good motorcycle myself."

Rainbow looked at her in surprise. "Really? We could ride together sometime. Motocross, maybe?"

"I'm not sure we can just 'spur of the moment' motocross, Rainbow Dash," Sunset said slowly.

"Somehow, I shoulda pegged you for a motorcyclist," Applejack said as she stepped into the room.

"Now there you two--" Rarity let out one of her patented, startled cries. "Fluttershy! What are you wearing?"

Fluttershy wore a black leather jacket, blue jeans, and low cut white top that hang down just above her midriff. "I bought some clothes like this the other day, thought I'd actually give them a try," she said. "It...looks bad, doesn't it?"

"Actually? You kind of rock that style," Sunset said, giving her an appraising glance. "I bet Rarity was just surprised."

Rarity gave an awkward chuckle. "Quite."

Fluttershy looked down at herself, then smiled. "Imagine if I went to school like this."

Sunset grinned. "Oh, I want to see that," she said. "You really do look good."

Fluttershy smiled. "Thanks. It's not normally my style, but...well, I bought it anyway, might as well use it."

"Well, I'm glad you did buy it, because you look great," Rainbow said. "I'm willing to bet there are a lot of people who don't manage to pull of the 'super-sexy vampire' look."

Fluttershy wrinkled her nose in disgust. "Please don't say that again," she said slowly.

"What? You do."

"I was trying my best to avoid that look," Fluttershy muttered. "Maybe I should have just gone with my normal tank top?"

"I think you look fine like you are," Sunset said.

Fluttershy dropped her bedroll a bit away from Sunset, thinking. "My...mentor...really disliked the..." She paused. "...'super-sexy' vampire look," she said, substituting what she'd been about to say. "I guess he imparted that to me, too."

"With Halloween coming up, what if we all do some kind of themed costuming?" Sunset said suddenly. When everyone looked at her, she blushed. "Sorry, a little off topic. But still! It could be fun."

"Speaking of 'fun'!" Pinkie exclaimed, sliding into the room. In her arms was a very, very tiny cake on a plate, topped with a red icing. She handed it to Fluttershy, saying, "So, when you said you couldn't really taste things, I decided to try making something you really could taste!"

Fluttershy frowned at the cake in her hands. "Um, Pinkie, why does it smell like--"

"Don't question it, just eat it!"

Fluttershy sliced off a bite, then tentatively put it in her mouth. She chewed, then her eyes widened. She swallowed it, then cut off another bite and ate it as well.

"SHE LIKES IT!" Pinkie shouted, jumping into the air. "YES!"

Fluttershy paused. "So, how exactly did you bake blood into a cake, and do I want to know where you got it?"

"Well, it was a test of my baking skills, but I think I managed it after a few attempts. I'm just glad Principal Celestia was so helpful!"

"Right," Fluttershy said slowly.

"Does it, uh, taste good?" Sunset asked slowly.

"Very. But...it's not really filling. In...the vampire sense."

"There's not a lot of blood in it," Pinkie said, rolling her eyes. "That would be weird."

"Pinkie, you made me a cake out of someone's blood," Fluttershy said, giving her a look.

Pinkie just kept on smiling.

"So, I s'ppose it's about time we address the elephant in the room," Applejack said. "Rainbow handled the, uh, donation last time, and Vice Principal Luna said that Sunset can't. That just leaves me, Pinkie, and Rarity."

"Assuming none of you had any garlic today," Rainbow Dash asked. "I asked Fluttershy about that earlier, it's apparently off putting for vampires."

"Well, I don't think any of us did," Rarity said, pausing to give her friends a chance to speak up. "Anyway, should we...flip a coin?"

Sunset pulled out a set of straws from her bag. She hid them behind her hand, so that only the tops were visible, and on level with each other, then grinned. "Draw straws," she said. "Each of you pick on, then come and get your straw. Short straw donates a quart of blood."

"Well, it's as good a way as any, I suppose," Rarity said. "I'll take the middle straw."

"LEFT!" Pinkie shouted.

"Guess I'm right," Applejack said, reaching over and taking the right hand straw.

Sunset, for her part, made no change to her facial expression as Pinkie took the left one. "Hey! Mine is the same size as Applejack's!"

Rarity took the remaining straw, seeing it noticeably smaller than the other two. "I can't help but feel...I don't know, actually."

"I'm sorry," Fluttershy said.

"None of that, now, darling! It is what it is." She shrugged. "I don't remember there being a fountain of blood or anything, but--"

"You don't really need to worry about getting blood on your shirt," Fluttershy said.

"Ah. I see." Rarity stepped over, sitting down besides Fluttershy. "So, do I just--"

"It helps if you sit still and stay quiet," Fluttershy said.

"O-of course," Rarity said, tilting her head back.

"Okay. I'm gonna start now." Fluttershy moved in...and Rarity screamed.

Fluttershy moved back, raising an eyebrow. "I hadn't bit you yet."

Rarity blushed. "Oh, um, so sorry, I just--"

"Is everything alright in there?" Maude's voice came from outside the closed door.

"Uh, nothing much just...a fat spider."

"Oh. Alright." There was a moment's silence as they listened to Maude's footsteps receding.

"Who are you calling fat?" Fluttershy demanded.

"Um--sorry, it was--"

Fluttershy giggled. "It's fine," she said. She turned back to Rarity. "Now, please...sit still, okay? I don't want to hurt you."

"Of course." Fluttershy moved in again, and Rarity let out a panicked scream the moment the fangs touched her throat. Rarity stumbled back, falling on her butt.

Fluttershy's eyes faded to red as the loud footsteps of Maude sounded outside.

"Wow, Sunset, that sure is a big spider!" Rainbow Dash said, purposefully loudly.

"Yeah," Sunset said. "She looks cool, though I don't think Rarity appreciates it."

Silence passed outside, then they heard Maude walking off.

"Rarity, would you cut that out?" Applejack hissed. "Maude's sharp as flint. I don't think she's buying that as it is."

"I'm so sorry, I'm just...pointy things, touching my throat." She shuddered.

"It's not even that bad," Rainbow said. "Besides, don't you sew?"

"Believe me, getting sewing needles beneath my thumbnails has only made me more concerned of pointy objects," Rarity said stiffly.

"Well, get over it," Rainbow said. "Her teeth are so sharp, ya can't even feel--ow!" Applejack interrupted Rainbow by elbowing her in the ribs.

Rainbow glared at the cowgirl.

"Ah get it if yer a mite nervous, sugarcube, but you should really just toughen up a bit," Applejack said.

"Well, I'm trying, but--" Fluttershy lunged forward, clamping her jaws around Rarity's throat and wrapping one hand around her back to keep her from pulling away. "Gaaaaa-aha hahaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!" Rarity screamed, eyes closing. "FLUTTERSHY! WHAT WAS THAT?" She opened one eye hesitantly. "Wait, it...doesn't feel so bad, except--ow, ow, ow ow ow..."

"You might just wanna shut up," Rainbow Dash said.

The door slammed open, concern visible on Maude's face. "What is going on in here?" she demanded, her deadpan tone cracking just slightly.

There was a very long silence as she stared at Fluttershy and Rarity.

"Fluttershy's a vampire and Rarity's donating blood," Sunset said simply.

"You could have just...said that in the first place," Maude said. Her eyes passed over Pinkie. "You'd have saved me a lot of worrying."

"Sorry, we just...were asked not to tell anyone," Pinkie said.

"What if I'd had the gun in my hands?" Maude asked. "Pinkie, this..." She paused. "Vampire?"

Fluttershy gave a thumbs up.

"Okay." Maude stared for a minute longer. "So, everything is fine?"

"Yes?" Sunset said hesitantly.

"Okay. I'll let you...do your thing." Maude left, closing the door behind her.

"That coulda gone worse," Applejack said.

Fluttershy pulled away from Rarity, then let out a sigh. "That's done," she said. "Rarity..."

"Well, I'm sorry! I just--was nervous, and I-I--"

"No, I'm sorry. Sorry that you girls have to do this for me, and...for not respecting your feelings enough," Fluttershy interrupted. "I've just been...a little cranky here lately, because..." She sighed, sitting back and folding her legs up against her chest. "Well, hunger, and...because I'm scared. Of...of myself."

"Darling," Rarity said, putting a hand on Fluttershy's shoulder. "It's okay. I don't know much about who you were, but...I know who you are. You're the kindest person I know, Fluttershy."

"Some people might have had problems with it, but we sure as heck don't, ain't that right, girls?" Applejack asked.

The rest of them gave affirmations. Fluttershy smiled. "I don't know what I did to deserve you girls...thank you so much."

"Hey, don't sweat it," Rainbow said, waving it off. "No one's done anything to deserve me."

"Yeah, best we can tell, we just hafta deal with 'er," Applejack said with a grin.

"Hey!"

Rarity hesitated. "Um, just one thing. Girls, could I...have a hand getting to my sleeping bag?" Fluttershy picked up Rarity, easily lifting her. "Whoaaaaoh..." Rarity clamped her mouth shut as Fluttershy paused. "Thanks, darling."

"Don't worry--I'm the reason you're so light-headed, anyway." Fluttershy gently put her down on her sleeping bag. "So, if we're having a full sleep over anyway, what next?"

"So, I actually had a great idea," Rainbow said proudly.

"Oh! We make cakes and have a cake fight?" Pinkie shouted. "Or we all dress up in capes and sleep upside down from the ceiling? We write crossover fanfiction between our favorite shows?"

"Um...no," Rainbow said, raising an eyebrow. "I was gonna say...look, the CHS Musical Showcase is coming up, and I was already planning on showing off my awesome guitar skills..."

"Because of course you were," Sunset said with a smile.

"...but then I realized all of you guys play instruments, too!" Rainbow Dash said. "What if we started a band?"

"That's--" Rarity paused. "Maybe it's the blood loss, but that actually sounds like a good idea."

"I think it sounds good," Fluttershy said. "It's been a while since I sang anything for someone else to hear, it'd be nice doing it for fun this time around."

There was a moment's silence as they thought about that. "I sang as entertainment for my mentor's guests," Fluttershy explained.

There was a long, "Oh," amongst the friends.

"Being in a band would be fun!" Pinkie said.

"I sing every once in a while, but it would sure as heck be fun to do it with you gals," Applejack agreed.

"Great! Maybe we can--" Rainbow paused, then looked to Sunset. "You know, I've never seen you with in an instrument, but one of us could teach you!"

Sunset looked up in surprise. "Oh! Um, you--I'd hate to impose--"

"Aren't you girls always telling me to be more confident?" Fluttershy stated. "Come on, Sunset! We'd love to have you! I just know it wouldn't be the same!"

"I play guitar," Sunset said slowly.

"Rad! Working with two guitarists...I'm not sure it'll cause any problems, actually, especially 'cuz what everyone else is gonna be playing," Rainbow said with a shrug.

Sunset smiled. "Then, I'd be glad to play with you guys."

Time Flies

"Let's just live! Day by day, and not be conquered by our sorrows!"

"Let's Just Live" by Jeff Williams

Sunset snuck into the main room of Pinkie's house, heading straight for the fridge. There was little in there in the form of food, unless you counted whipped cream--which Sunset did not, but she worked with what she had. She sprayed--poured?--some on one finger, licking it off.

"Most people put that on actual food," Maude said from behind her.

Sunset let out a startled cry, jumping up. She banged her shoulder on the fridge, wincing, but managed to avoid completely falling over.

"Sorry, did I startle you?" Maude said. Like Sunset, she was wearing sleep clothes--a pair of blue shorts and a white T-shirt.

"No worries. What's one more bruise?" Sunset winced, rubbing her shoulder. "My own fault for not paying enough attention."

"Oh. Okay." Maude stepped away, back over to the counter, where she had a computer set up.

"Whatcha working on, this late?" Sunset asked. The rest of her friends had fallen asleep some time ago.

"Um..." Maude actually hesitated, looking awkward. "Can I ask you a question?"

"Sure, go ahead."

"Is Fluttershy a good vampire?"

Sunset blinked. "Of course."

"So how'd you get hurt like that?" Maude asked, her staring boring holes into Sunset.

Sunset paused. Maude's gaze remained unchanging.

"Well, Fluttershy, but she didn't mean to," Sunset said. "She...ended up spending a lot of time without feeding, so she lost control."

"Why?"

"Uh, hunger makes people do crazy things sometimes, so..."

"No, why would she not feed for that long?" Maude asked. "How long have you guys known she was a vampire?"

"Well, just the other day, really, but--the thing is--she wasn't feeding because--"

"I was scared."

Maude pivoted on one foot, her other swinging around, missing Fluttershy as she moved aside casually. Maude caught herself before she slammed her leg into the counter, expertly righting herself while sliding backwards from Fluttershy.

"Sorry," Fluttershy said. "I didn't mean to scare you, I was just--I forget how quiet I am."

Sunset didn't point out that Fluttershy certainly hadn't been there a second ago, no matter how quiet she was. Probably, Fluttershy herself hadn't even noticed.

"Don't worry about it," Maude said. "You heard..."

"Most of the conversation, yes," Fluttershy said. "I wasn't meaning to eavesdrop, really. But, anyway, I was scared because I used to be a bad vampire. One of the worse ones, actually." She shrugged. "But I'm thankful that everyone gave me the opportunity to change for the better."

"That's great," Maude said. "For both of us, really."

"Of course. Especially as there are still the really bad vampires out there, though...most of them don't come anywhere near me." She smiled shyly. "They didn't like me."

"Sounds like their loss," Sunset said.

"Well, at the time, it really wasn't," Fluttershy said. "If any of them got on my lands, I just killed them."

"Was there anyone you talked with?" Maude asked.

Fluttershy considered for a long moment. "Before those times, when I was still with my mentor, he made me meet with some of his associates. Some of them tried to gain favor with me after he died, but...well, after I killed the first few, the rest stopped coming." She paused, then looked past Maude at the computer screen. "Oh. Um, most of that isn't true."

"I had a feeling," Maude said, "though I don't know where to actually look for information on vampires."

"Try Principal Celestia; she can tell you a lot of what she knows," Fluttershy said. "Or you can ask me; I don't mind."

Sunset stole a glance at the Whinnipedia page on vampires--specifically, vampire weaknesses.

"Do vampires have to be invited in?"

Fluttershy shook her head. "No, but it was a tradition, amongst those who cared."

"What about holy symbols?" Maude asked.

"Evil vampires can't get to close, nor can they get on holy ground," Fluttershy said. "The good ones--" She hesitated, then pulled a cross pendant out of her sleep shirt, smiling. "I guess He's very forgiving."

The pendant was plain, and a small thing, to be sure; but Sunset could tell that it meant a lot to Fluttershy.

"That's good to know," Maude said. "Thanks."

Fluttershy strode past, saying, "No problem. Always happy to be a help."

"Goodnight, Maude," Sunset said, following Fluttershy. She listened to the sounds of Maude typing, then tapped Fluttershy on the shoulder.

Fluttershy jumped up in surprise, then chuckled. "Uh, sorry," Sunset said, chuckling as well. "I was just wanting to let you know...Vinyl was asking if you could help teach her about vampire stuff."

"Hmm...I suppose I should," Fluttershy said hesitantly. "Tell her it won't be easy, though. The only way I know how is the way my mentor did, which was..." She winced. "Unkind."

"Hey, um, if you don't mind my asking...what happened to him?"

"My mentor?" Fluttershy asked. When Sunset nodded, she said, "I killed him."

"Oh, I'm sorry, I--"

"I do not feel guilty in the least, Sunset," Fluttershy said in a very un-Fluttershy tone.

Sunset blinked, surprised.

"Sunset, one thing you must remember, that you and I wanted change. We wanted, at the end of the day, to be good people," Fluttershy said. "Sombra was vile. He was black hearted, and you wouldn't sleep tonight if I told you some of the things he did. I did not kill him for that, yes--I killed him because I was mad at him. But I do not regret it. He could never change like we did."

"Ohhhhh...um...I'll take your word for it. If the current 'you' is saying that, then...he must have been really bad."

Fluttershy looked to one side, almost like she was listening to something. "Yeah," she said, sounding distracted. "He was."

Sunset hugged her. Fluttershy went rigid, then said, "Thanks."

"Hey, I can deal with some rough teaching," Vinyl said, clicking buttons on her controller. They'd decided to play co-op today, as they were doing important talking while doing so. "Auntie Lu-Lu was rough as hell, y'know?"

"I can imagine," Sunset said. "But Fluttershy said her mentor was so bad that she killed him and doesn't regret it. Sombra, I think she said his name was?"

Vinyl paused the game. "Sombra...I know I've heard that name before," she said. "Celestia mentioned it a few times..." She snapped her fingers. "Fourteen-sixty-eight, the Black Crystal King."

"Does that name mean anything?" Sunset asked, letting her controller drop.

"I think. From what I remember, that guy was bad news, Sunset." Vinyl paused. "That was her mentor?"

"Yeah...? I'm suddenly worried she might not have wanted me to mention it."

"Don't worry about that, I'm sure she would have said something," Vinyl said. "Besides, she did kill him, so..." Vinyl shrugged. "Anyway, let's keep going."

The game unpaused, Sunset picked up her controller again. "So Fluttershy wanted to spar with you tonight?"

"Yup." Vinyl stuck out her tongue as she executed a difficult move, but then continued. "Said she wants to see where I am before what I need to know. Hey, you should bring your friends along! Watch me win!"

"Maybe? I dunno. Most of them seem to have adapted to the vampire thing really well, but..." She thought back to Rarity. "Rarity and AJ are having some trouble, I think."

"Maybe it'll do them some good to see the two of us going at it," Vinyl said. "I think she has hand-to-hand in mind, as I've never really touched a sword."

Sunset winced as she met her end to a carelessly thrown grenade. "Whoops," Vinyl said. She chuckled nervously. "That right there is why I've had trouble training with swords, by the way. With vampire speed and strength, it can be really hard to make sure no one accidentally gets hurt."

"I just assumed the Principal and Vice Principal healed past injuries," Sunset said, "as they're supposed to be really old and yet don't have any facial scars."

"They do, but missing limbs take decades to heal," Vinyl said. "Vampires recover quicker, supposedly, but..."

"Did Fluttershy ask you to bring anything?" Sunset asked.

"Just my bloodbag," Vinyl said in a chipper tone.

"I do believe that 'donor' was the word she used," Octavia said stiffly.

"I do believe that you are right," Vinyl said, mimicking Octavia's accent.

Sunset laughed. "Why do you need to bring Tavi with you?"

Vinyl shrugged, making a 'I-dunno' noise. A loud sound effect signaled her death, before the GAME OVER screen lit up. Vinyl winced, glaring at the screen.

"Should have revived me quicker," Sunset muttered.

"Yeah, well, you shouldn't have died so quickly," Vinyl said.

"Oh, yeah, like the vampire has grounds to complain about that," Sunset snapped.

"Wait, am I an undead?" Vinyl asked.

Sunset blinked. "Well, you're a vampire--"

"But I was naturally born," Vinyl said slowly. "I was never human in the first place."

"By the strictest definition, that would mean no, you're not an undead," Octavia pointed out, turning the page in her book.

Sunset looked at the name on the cover, then shared a look with Vinyl. Both grinned. "Enjoying your Socrayts?" Vinyl asked.

"I assumed it was Doo-jenise," Sunset said.

"You two are incorrigible," Octavia muttered.

It was late at night when they pulled up in Rarity's and Applejack's cars, to a gate that Fluttershy seemed to have left open for them. It led down an old, worn woods path, with rotted old trees along the sides that left Sunset wondering whether or not they were intentionally dead.

The house at the end of the path wasn't too large, but it didn't look cheap. Applejack's truck pulled to a stop behind Rarity's car, and Applejack said, "Was she goin' fer creepy, or would I hurt her feelings by sayin' that?"

"Don't worry about it, I plan on telling her it looks creepy as--" Vinyl Scratch cut herself short at one look from Applejack. "--buck?"

"Good enough," Applejack muttered. She opened her door, and Sunset left on the passenger side. Octavia and Vinyl left the backseats as they saw Rarity and Rainbow Dash get out ahead of the fashionista's car.

"Wow, Fluttershy, going all out with the 'creepy-as-fuck' theme, huh?" Rainbow Dash blurted out.

"So, she's allowed to say it, but--"

Fluttershy jumped off the roof, bending her knees as she landed. Dust rose up as she stood up straight, dusting herself off. "I mean, not intentionally, but--oh, wait." She cleared her throat, pulling her cape up to cover her mouth. "Welcome, friends, to my humble abode," she said in a voice that might have sounded sinister from anyone else.

"Aesthetics are all well and good, darling, but why is your entire theme 'being a vampire'?" Rarity asked.

Fluttershy shrugged. "I've never actually done this before," she admitted.

"Well, next time, I can help you with some drama tips," Rarity suggested, patting her on the shoulder.

"Really? I don't know, you seem busy--"

"Pfft! Darling, this whole place looks like it could use a touch-up," Rarity said. "I'll come over Saturday to give you a hand. I think we could definitely do something wonderful with this place, but at the moment, it doesn't look like anyone's been in here for years."

"Not since the forties, anyway," Fluttershy said, looking back at the building.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa--you've had this place sitting here for seventy years?" Rainbow Dash demanded.

"I have a few places like it, too," Fluttershy said. "Just for storing things, really."

"Princess Celestia had some rooms of her castle devoted to storing mementos," Sunset said, eyeing the place. "You get lots of miscellaneous items that mean something to you over a thousand years, huh?"

"Uh...not necessarily ones that mean something to me, as I've only had friends the past...twenty years or so?" Fluttershy shrugged, stepping over to the porch. "Mostly, it's stuff like--" She hefted a naginata with an exceptionally thick blade. "--yeah, this," she muttered.

"Um, I don't own a sword," Vinyl admitted.

"Oh, don't worry! We weren't going to be doing that. Vampires and swords don't normally mix anyway--our strength tends to destroy them, so..." Fluttershy shrugged. "I have a few that are really durable, but otherwise, I just punch things."

"Yeah! Karate action!" Rainbow Dash launched into an impressive looking kick that Sunset knew was not proper form.

Fluttershy, not even moving very fast, caught her around the upper leg, then pinned it to her hip under her arm. "Anyway, I was mostly just hoping to get a feel for where you're at," Fluttershy said as Rainbow tugged uselessly on her leg. "What powers do you have?"

"Well, um, I'm halfway decent at the hypnosis," Vinyl said.

"DO ME! DO ME!" Pinkie demanded.

"Um--okay." Light flashed from Vinyl's eyes. "Steal Applejack's hat."

"Yeah, no thanks," Pinkie said, stepping away.

Vinyl grimaced. "It works on Sunset," she muttered.

"Do you have wings?" Fluttershy asked.

"I can get wings?"

"Are you stronger and faster than Celestia and Luna?"

"Stronger than both, but slower."

"That would be reflexes," Fluttershy said. "You're as physically fit as you'll ever be, but your reflexes still need to be trained."

"Well, um...I can...uh..."

"Can you teleport?" Fluttershy asked.

"No," Vinyl said, lowering her head a little. "I...haven't managed that one on my own."

"Don't apologize for it, it's more my fault than yours," Fluttershy said. "I'm sorry, I should have gotten over myself years ago to help you. Instead, I...I just brushed you off."

"Don't worry about it," Vinyl said. "You're helping me now, so, that's all that matters, right?"

"I suppose." Fluttershy shrugged. "Have you manifested any unique powers yet?" She let go of Rainbow Dash, letting the other girl stumble backwards.

"Ummmmmmm..." Vinyl thought about that. "No?"

"It'll come, you're only fifty," she said. "Girls, you might want to go sit on the porch. I'll try to keep it away from you." She slipped off the cloak, bundling it up and tossing it onto the porch. Underneath, she was dressed in shorts and a plain gray tank top, and nothing else.

Vinyl herself was wearing a tank top, but her shorts came down lower than Fluttershy's. Fluttershy began stretching, pulling one arm past her face, then the other. "We'll limit it to nothing but technique, strength, and speed," Fluttershy said. "First person to get dunked in the river loses. Don't hold back like you do against Celestia and Luna--I can take it."

"Um..." Vinyl stared at the river for a second. "But, like, running water? That'll hurt like hell."

"Yeah, I know," Fluttershy said. She stretched her arms over her head. "You should stretch first."

"Why? I mean, it won't really do me any physical good, right?"

"Vampires can be weird about what works with us or not," Fluttershy said. "For this one, though, it's a mental thing."

"You've got this, Vinyl!" Octavia cheered.

"Yeah, get her one for me, eh?" Rainbow called out, rubbing her thigh where Fluttershy grabbed her.

Vinyl squared off her feet, entering a boxing stance.

Fluttershy kept her own stance loose, but utterly relaxed and eyes closed. She cracked her neck to one side, then the other, then her eyes snapped open, two glowing orbs of red. "Begin," she said.

Vinyl wearily took a step forward, keeping a fighting stance. Fluttershy leapt forward so fast that pieces of the ground flew into the air where she leapt from, and where she landed.

Behind Vinyl.

Vinyl let out a yelp, ducking aside as the other vampire swung a kick. Fluttershy hopped forward, dodging while unleashing a flurry of kicks at Vinyl. Vinyl stumbled, frantically blocking the onslaught on the backs of her arms. Then, she swung in a kick of her own. She caught Fluttershy's stomach, sending the girl sliding backwards. Fluttershy's feet gouged the earth as she slid to a stop. Fluttershy rubbed her side, then rolled one shoulder. And she grinned. "Good job," she said.

"Tha--" Vinyl rolled to the side as Fluttershy attacked again. Vinyl dodged and blocked, losing ground from Fluttershy's assault.

"I'm beginning to think I got lucky with that frying pan," Sunset murmured.

"Lucky? Nah, she didn't want to hurt you," Rainbow said. "She just needed to be reminded of that."

Vinyl struck a few blows of her own, several catching Fluttershy off guard. What was clear to Sunset was that Fluttershy, while more experienced, was out of practice. Unfortunately, she seemed to be remembering her old skills too fast for Vinyl, and if she was intending to hold back, Sunset couldn't tell.

Fluttershy grabbed Vinyl's arms, then began forcing her back towards the river. Vinyl's feet gouged a path in the dirt, as Fluttershy forced her back. Vinyl forced her to a stop, leaving the two of them standing there for a moment. Then, Vinyl pivoted, spinning on one heel, and threw Fluttershy behind her.

Fluttershy landed in the river with a splash and a yelp. Vinyl panted for a moment, then stood up straight. "Holy shit, I actually won," she said.

"Go Vinyl!" Octavia shouted, clapping.

"Whoohoo!" Rainbow Dash cried.

"Uh..." Applejack looked to the still water. "Should we be worried?"

The girls all rushed over to Vinyl's side, looking into the water, but before even Rainbow Dash could do anything, the water churned. Fluttershy burst from the surface, flying ten feet into the air with massive, leathery wings stretched out on either side of her. The water contorted, rising with her in a double helix, which it impossibly maintained, spinning and whirling beneath her as she stared with fiercely glowing eyes.

And she smiled.

"THAT WAS AWESOME!" she shouted, thrusting her hands to the side. "VINYL, YOU WERE AMAZING!" She landed on the ground of in front of them as the water stopped disobeying the laws of physics, falling back into the river.

Fluttershy was clearly soaked to the bone, but was still grinning. Seeing their looks, she blushed. "Okay, I got a little excited there," she admitted.

"Darling, you're soaked," Rarity said. "Someone get a towel."

"I'll get her cloak," Rainbow said, rushing.

"Girls, don't worry, I'm fine," Fluttershy said, shaking water out of her hair. "It did really good into getting me back into my old skills, anyway, and it...felt nice to cut loose like that." She stretched her arms over her head. "After worrying about accidentally hurting people, letting it all out like that..." She smiled. "Thanks, Vinyl, I think this time was more good for me than you."

"Don't sweat it--doing this by myself has taken fifty years with no signs of progress, so, however you're willing to do it--"

Rainbow Dash tossed the cloak over Fluttershy, who caught it and fastened it around her neck, pulling it over herself. "I think we'll work on the teleporting next," she said. "Training hypnosis is normally the next one, but...well, we won't be doing that. I wouldn't feel comfortable using my friends as...ah, training dummies."

"I'm cool with that," Vinyl said, waving her off. "Did you mean we'll work on the teleporting tonight or..."

"Sure, tonight," Fluttershy said. "The rest of you might want to go home soon, as I plan on keeping her out here for a few hours yet."

"But first--" Pinkie Pie leapt over, holding a small cake dish. "Victory cake! I improved upon the recipe."

"Oh, um, Pinkie, uhhhh, I appreciate the thought, but vampires...can't really taste much," Vinyl said, holding up her hands. "So I--"

"Don't worry, Fluttershy loved it," Pinkie said. "Try a bite!"

Vinyl raised an eyebrow, then took a bite. Her eyes widened. "Thish ish amavin," she said, mouth full.

"Must you?" Octavia demanded, disgusted.

Vinyl swallowed. "Pinkie, how did you make this? This is--this is great!"

Octavia took the fork and stabbed a bite. "Wait, you shouldn't--" Pinkie Pie's warning came too late, as Octavia's eyes widened as well. She spat out the bite to the side, gagging. "The fuck?" she gasped, gagging. "That is vile."

"Well, duh, I baked blood into a cake," Pinkie Pie said. "It was meant for vampires."

"Well, at least I know what finally got 'Tavi to swear," Vinyl said.

"Fuck you," Octavia gagged. "Water...I need...ugh...I think...I'm gonna..." She rushed over to the trash bin, hand over her mouth.

"Um," Fluttershy looked over at her, wings fluttering anxiously. "Are you okay?" She winced at the sound of Octavia retching. "Probably not. Who's driving her home?"

"I will," Applejack said. "See ya at school tomorrow, right, Fluttershy?"

"Yeah! We've got band practice!" Rainbow said.

"I'll see you girls there," Fluttershy said. "I won't let the Rainbooms down!" She paused. "That is the name we decided upon, right?"

"It's the only one no one shot down," Sunset said, shrugging.

The rest of them began saying their farewells as Octavia rinsed out her mouth with bottled water. Fluttershy smiled. "Hey, Vinyl?"

"Yesh?" Vinyl said, before swallowing another bite of cake.

"We're really lucky we got such good friends, aren't we?" Fluttershy asked.

"Yeah, I guess so."

"You guess?"

"I mean, if we weren't the kind of people who'd they want to be friends with, then...'lucky' wouldn't help us, would it? We were good people, so when we got lucky with who we met, we made use of it." Vinyl shrugged. "Or maybe 'Tavi's been reading too much philosophy again."

"No. I think...you're right." Fluttershy smiled. "Thanks. Now, let's get started."

Our Past Is Not Today

"My past does not define me, cause my past is not today!"

Sunset Shimmer in "My Past Is Not Today"

Dear Princess Celestia,

It seems everything's going good over here. Admittedly, I think a lot of us were a little 'up-in-the-air' about it for a bit, but things seem to have worked out. Fluttershy especially has settled into being much more comfortable, and has even written a vampire song for our band that we plan on singing for Halloween (this world's version of Nightmare Night).

Our band itself is a little...strange, I should say? We all play wildly different instruments, but thanks to Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy, the music still sounds good. We've also had a few minor arguments, but it was just over silly little things and we worked those out, even if Rainbow Dash still refers to it as 'her' band occasionally.

What I think is the most strange is that I'm a part of it, actually. Only a couple of months ago, they wouldn't have wanted me anywhere near it, but now, they sought me out so they could have fun with me, too. And it's not just them, the entirety of the student body seems more comfortable with me! I was half-worried that they might go back to treating me like they did once the bruise faded, and the bandages came off, but no. There are still a few holdouts--people like Wallflower, though she, at least, isn't mean about it. We just acknowledge that she doesn't particularly like me.

Things are really looking up for me, Princess Celestia. I'm of the mind that I should have listened to you much sooner, but also, if I had, I wouldn't have met all these amazing friends. But what about the friends I could have met in Equestria that I never did? Ugh...

I suppose I shouldn't really be concerned about it, regardless. The past is the past, right? Either way, it is not today, and I'm free to make my own future.

Your faithful student, Sunset Shimmer

P.S. Give my thanks to Princess Twilight, next time you see her! I owe her big time for all this!

Sunset closed the journal, smiling to herself.

"I'm just saying that wearing something a little more decent than our standard school wear might be appreciated, Applejack," Rarity said.

"And Ah'm just sayin' that no one's gonna care what we're wearing, Rarity," Applejack said pointedly. The two were busy glaring daggers at each other, there instruments still strapped on around their shoulders.

"Girls--" Fluttershy said, too quietly for neither the fashionista nor the cowgirl to hear.

"We're going to be representing the school, Applejack. I, for one, think we should at least care about proper decorum."

"Girls--"

"And Ah, for one, think that only students are gonna be there, and ain't none of 'em gonna care if we're wearing your frilly fru-fru dresses!"

"Girls--"

"For the last time, Applejack! 'Ain't' is a contraction for 'I am not'! It is not a word you can just shove into any sentence and have it remain grammatically correct!"

"Girls--"

"Consarn it, Rarity! We both know that that ain't the concern right now!"

"That AIN'T the concern, Applejack?"

"GIRLS!" Fluttershy shouted, eyes turning bright red. When both turned to look at her, they immediately faded to their normal color. "Oh, um, sorry, nevermindyoucangobacktoarguingnowso--"

"Rarity, can you take a moment to appreciate that maybe some people...uh, really don't care that much about the clothing?" Rainbow Dash said. "I don't mind, really, but...fashion isn't everyone's cup of tea."

"And Applejack, would it kill you if wear something that was...like, slightly fashionable?" Sunset paused after saying that. "Uh, no offense to your current outfit. But I'm just saying it would make Rarity happy, and it wouldn't hurt you?"

Rarity and Applejack shared a look, then both giggled.

"Well, I suppose those are fair points," Rarity said. "I am not above admitting to being at fault. Or, 'ain't' above it."

"Ah'm pretty sure yer wrong about that," Applejack muttered. "And, fine, if you wanna stick me in somethin' that's not...well, not makin' me look like a dandy, I'd be fine with that."

Sunset checked the time, smiling. "Well, as much as I enjoyed band practice today, I gotta go. I volunteered to show some new students around the school."

"That's awful kind of you, sugar," Applejack said, tipping her hat. "See ya Thursday?"

"Wouldn't miss it for the world. Any world," Sunset assured her. She grinned at Rarity. "Ain't that the truth?' she said with an over-exaggerated cowgirl accent.

She left the room to the chorus of laughs. Sunset moved through the school, and as she passed students on their way to various activities most called out to her.

"Hey, Sunset!" Lyra said. "See you Friday?"

"You bet!" Sunset called out. "Hey, Firecracker. You exploded any time recently?"

"Har de har, Sunset," Firecracker said, smiling and rolling her eyes. "The grill was busted."

"It was also still on while you were messing with the propane tank," Sunset said as she passed her. "Don't expect people to stop making fun of you until the hair regrows on your arm."

Firecracker raised the remains of one of her eyebrows. "Trip and hit any interesting staircases recently?" she asked dryly.

Sunset rubbed the last remnants of the bruise on her face. "Okay, fair enough."

She passed other students, giving similar greetings, before ending up in the main foyer, where three girls awaited. "You must be the new girls," she said. "I'm Sunset Shimmer. Welcome to CHS!"

"Yes, we've been pretty excited to come here," one of the girls said. She wore a violet punk outfit, which should have clashed with her head full of orange curls, but somehow, it worked for her. Sunset found her attention drawn to the one person who could give Pinkie's hair a run for its money--she had a great mane of bouncy orange curls, sticking out on every side of her face. "You can call me Adagio. These are my sisters, Aria Blaze and Sonata Dusk."

"A pleasure to meet you three," Sunset said, shaking Adagio's hand. Aria didn't seem the least bit interested in shaking hands, so Sunset shook Sonata's next.

"Pleasure to meet you, too," Sonata said. "What happened to your face?"

Aria shot her a look, but Sunset only laughed. "A bit of an embarrassing mishap," she admitted. "If you think it looks bad now, then you should have seen it the day after I got it."

"I can only imagine," Adagio said sympathetically. "It doesn't look great with your complexion."

Sunset chuckled. "Yeah, I noticed," she said. "Anyway, let me show you around." She began leading them to different school rooms, making small talk on the way. The three girls were fairly tight-lipped about themselves, she noted. They seemed intent on brushing off any question that sounded like, "Have you done that before", and despite the fact that they were transfer students, they didn't seem to know too much about how schools worked. Sunset dismissed it as her being paranoid.

"Oh! We're having a musical showcase very soon," Sunset said, gesturing to one of the posters that a fellow student had hung up. "Everyone's getting together to show off their own musical style. You could sign up!"

"That could be fun," Adagio said. "We are musically gifted, after all." She completed this with a smile to her sisters.

"Well, duh," Sonata said. "It's how we get people to do what we wan--oof." Aria elbowed her hard in the ribs as Sunset's "I-am-currently-in-danger" warning gave off a few chimes.

Overreacting, or under-reacting?

"Um..." Conversation change, stat. "Those are pretty," she said, pointing to Adagio's necklace. Both the others wore one curiously like it. "Where'd you--"

Her hand hadn't even been particularly close to them, but Adagio's hand snapped forward, caging Sunset's wrist in a grip that was strong enough to have her gasping in pain. Adagio let go quickly, but Sunset just stepped back, rubbing the fresh scarring on her wrist.

Adagio's eyes flickered in surprise, seeing the scarring. "Oh, um, sorry," Adagio said. "These are very important to us, so--" Her hair bounced in a sudden breeze as her hand shot towards her own, suddenly empty, throat.

"Yeah, I reeeeeally bet they are, Adagio," Fluttershy said pointedly. With the punk outfit that she had started wearing to school--Sunset had a picture of Bon-Bon's reaction as her phone background--she looked like she fit right in with the three new girls.

All of whom went completely colorless upon seeing Fluttershy. "I thought you'd died," Adagio said simply. "Everyone lost sight of you back in the twenties."

"I wanted a change of pace, and scenery," Fluttershy said. "Made my first ever friends in '98." She shrugged, then smiled. She tossed the gem back to Adagio. "I'll take over from here, Sunset."

"Um, you sure? They friends of yours?"

"Well, not yet," Fluttershy said, "but they were the closest I got."

"Right. I'll leave you to it, then," Sunset said slowly, backing out of the situation, more than a little relieved.

"'Not yet'?" Adagio asked, fastening her gem back around her throat.

"Of course. While I'm afraid I can't let you...uh, do whatever it is you normally do, you're free to stay here." She gave her a smile. "Maybe you could meet the people who made me give friendship a chance."

"It certainly sounds like a proposition, Fluttershy," Adagio said. "But we were here because we felt magic from our home. Real magic that we can actually use, that's not the...more vile magics of this world." She shuddered at the thought.

"But--" Fluttershy paused. "Are you Equestrian?"

"The fuck's an Equestrian?" Sonata asked.

"It was their lame-ass country," Aria said with an eye-roll.

Adagio slammed her hand into her face. "As a matter of fact, we are not Equestrian. Not only were we from the opposite side of the world, we predate the country." She paused. "I think we did, anyway. I never cared too much about what the silly ponies were doing."

"So what were you going to do with it?" Fluttershy asked. "The magic."

"What we've always been trying to do. Get everything we've deserved." She closed her eyes, seemingly savoring the thought. "Fame. Adoration."

"Obtained with mind control?" Fluttershy asked. "You know, that won't be adoration."

"Of course it will be," Adagio snapped.

"You can make them jump when you say, you can make their hands clap, but there is literally nothing that can force someone to legitimately love you, Adagio," Fluttershy said. She reached over, putting a hand on Adagio's shoulder. "While it's a bit more work, letting them choose to love you is much more rewarding."

"You've changed."

"Isn't that a good thing?" Fluttershy said, smiling. "After all, you remember the old me, hmm?"

Adagio stared her in the face. "I suppose it's pointless arguing either way, hmm? You won't let us take the magic."

"Weeeeell, no, not really," Fluttershy admitted. "But I'd rather convince you not to then force you."

"We'll...have to see," Adagio said slowly. "By the way, that other girl. She knows what you are? I saw the bite."

Fluttershy winced. "I, um, had a tiny bit of an accident," she admitted. "Turns out, old me was so scary that even I was scared of her."

"They didn't call you 'Flutterbitch' for nothing," Adagio smirked.

"Didn't we start them doing that?" Sonata asked.

Aria hit her hard with her elbow. "She doesn't know that," Aria hissed.

"It wasn't that hard to figure out," Fluttershy said, eyes briefly turning red. "But it was pretty fitting, and kind of funny." She giggled. "Yes, my closest friends know, but it's not exactly common knowledge around the school." She paused. "Did you have a gameplan for Celestia, actually?"

"We had a song rehearsed," Adagio said. "It should work on her, right? Your Stare did."

Fluttershy nodded. "Well, that's true, I suppose. Why not you come along? I'll introduce you to my friends."

"People you call friends," Adagio murmured. "Humans?"

"Yes. Every--well, every one of them but Sunset, anyway. She's a unicorn from Equestria."

Adagio seemed surprised at that. "Well. I suppose can't be completely worthless if you're vouching for them, hmm?"

"I don't think anyone is completely worthless," Fluttershy said.

"Is that why you got our help to kill Sombra? Because he wasn't one of the worst people to ever live?"

Fluttershy hesitated. "Well, I mean..." She thought it over. "Sombra was horrible. He was vile, he murdered my parents, tortured me and many others. But once upon a time, he had something good inside him, right? And I am remiss that I never saw it."

"Perhaps," Adagio said. "Well, then, let's go meet your friends."

Dear Sunset Shimmer,

I'm glad to hear that you are doing alright. Your new friends sound lovely, and I'm glad that they, too, have forgiven you. Twilight says that it was no problem at all, by the way, and that she was glad for the opportunity to make some friends. Next time the portal opens, I'll give you another journal so you can talk to her, as well.

In fact, next time the portal opens, we might pay you a visit. It would be wonderful to talk to you face-to-face again, and to hear the music you and your friends play. Though it would probably be best if you informed my doppelganger of any such plans--and apologize on my behalf for the incident that occurred during my last visit (See? We all make mistakes, Sunset.)

As far as Fluttershy's plight is concerned? I'm glad that she managed to make amends for her past. My sister was, for a time, in a similar situation, and if you require any further help, I can share some of her experiences with forgiveness. I'm certain she would be glad to help.

I'm almost embarrassed to admit that nothing of note has happened here since I last wrote to you. It's been simply more of the same as it's always been--stuffy politicians arguing with each other. When you mentioned that your country in the human world is run without a single person able to make a decision and say, 'that is final', I must confess, I don't know how they can possibly accomplish anything.

Of course, who am I to complain about that? Equestria has done very little these past thousand years, so perhaps it wouldn't be much different. But even if nothing will be accomplished, I still must go and manage my country.

With love, Princess Celestia

Sunset smiled, closing the book again.

"So, everything's alright?" Fluttershy asked.

"Absolutely," Sunset said, setting the journal on her bag.

"Then what are we waiting for? Let's play!" Rainbow said, doing a fake strum on her guitar.

Sunset jumped over besides her friends, strapping on her own guitar. "Ready!" she said.

She grinned as Pinkie counted to four, banging her drumsticks together, and when finished, Sunset struck the chords on her guitar, and began to play.

Author's Note

Well, this one's done! I'm glad you guys came to the end with me, here. The pacing of this one definitely feels a little weird to me, but I hope it was enjoyable anyway.
I will say that well-intentioned constructive criticism is welcome, but hatred for the sake of hatred will be ignored.
Anyway, I do have plans for the remainder of the other 'Alternative' stories for this plan. I'm currently writing the one for Rainbow Dash, as well as occasionally writing original work I intend to publish and an EQ/RWBY crossover. The Rainbow Dash one is coming well under way, you can probably expect it within the next two months.
All that said, I thank you for giving my fic a chance, and I hope it was at least worth the time spent on it. Well wishes to all, and I'll see you next time around!