Sunset had never loved books more than she did right now.

It had taken her thirty moons to build the Enchanter and make it work properly because the lack of horn made it fifty levels of magnitude more difficult to remember the correct arrays. But since she had brought her books with her, it only took her a few hours to input the arrays for the mana pump spell into the Interpreter. After that, it was only four minutes for the circuitry to build around the ruby she’d placed in the glass box.

And just like that, she had an enchanted ruby in her hands. She could easily feel the pulsations against her fingers.

“I see,” Twilight said as she compared the arrays described in the book and the ones Sunset had inputted. “The ruby will only activate the mana pump upon feeling the electrical pulses going through the wires. It’ll consume some of the mana, though. Is that going to be alright?”

“The word of the day is ‘negligible’,” Sunset replied. “It’ll need a very small amount of mana to work. And considering the upgrade from quartz, you won’t even notice.”

They replaced the jaspers with the now conjoined jade-ruby battery, which Twilight had wrapped together with some thin wire she had lying around. Sunset thought the ruby was too big for such a simple task, but she could worry about perfecting things later. Next she replaced the pulsators —the twelve howlite stones encased in crudely made duralumin cages. For this she had Twilight cut two by six millimeter sapphires with the obsidian tools. Two in total. Sunset had tried doing that herself, but such fine work required straining her hands, making them hurt a lot.

She had chosen sapphire for two reasons. Just like rubies, they had very low mana thresholds, which was perfect for such precise work that was creating the pulsations in the Harmonic Veil. And just like rubies, again, they were corundum, which made them very difficult to break. Considering how small the pieces were, all precautions were too few. Sunset would have to replace the cages for something that could properly hold the new pulsators, but for now, tying them with thread was the way to go.

The final part to replace was something Twilight had dubbed ‘the hub’. It had originally been a machine that controlled electrical current, but Sunset had replaced many of its parts with quartz. By doing that, the hub read the electrical pulses Sunset’s laptop sent from the Interpreter, then tricked the battery into releasing mana to the system in the exact pulsations, reaching the pulsators and ultimately constructing the appropriate circuitry.

She replaced these with a single hexagon-shaped nephrite that was about a quarter the size of her thumb nail. Unlike its cousin jadeite, nephrite could hold less than half the mana and lost it over twice as fast. However, it had a much lower mana threshold, comparable to that of quartz, which meant that it would let the battery’s mana flow without issues. And unlike the quartz it was replacing, nephrite wouldn’t crack under such pressure.

Sunset threw away the cracked milky quartzes to the trash with a shake of her head.

Once Sunset loaded the illumination spell into the Interpreter and Twilight placed an apple in place, it was time to test the improvements.

Twilight cheerfully cleared her throat. “Enchanter version two point oh. Activation test number one.” Sunset smiled at her. “Jade-ruby battery at full capacity. Rectangle shaped two-ended sapphire pulsators, variation first, caged in duralumin at ninety-six percent aluminum purity. Nephrite hub, variation first. Common copper wires. Physical enclosing space, variation second, barrier made of glass. Target object, apple. Spellcraft circuitry for illumination enchantment verified. Ready to engage.”

Sunset thought about adding more parts to verify just to have Twilight talk more. She playfully rolled her eyes when Twilight shot her an expectant glare.

“Test number one. Activation in three, two, one.” With a single click, the Enchanter began to hum. The apple within the glass box began to give off a white light after a moment. Previously, the Enchanter needed three minutes to build the circuitry for the illumination spell. This time it took only one.

“Well, that’s a sixty-six percent improvement in speed,” Twilight said as she scribbled on her notebook. She then verified the battery. “It still feels practically full, whereas this same spell consumed about forty percent of one jasper battery. We need a better way to detect the amount of mana in gemstones. But this is definitely promising. The fact that the Enchanter worked on the first try is also really good.”

“Definitely,” Sunset said as she grabbed the apple. The light was white, but the red of the apple made it seem like it was slightly reddish. She giggled as she gave it a bite.

They ran the spell ten more times, at which point Twilight said that the battery felt about eighty percent full still. She did some rough calculations and decided that the illumination spell, combined with the mana pump one, took less than two percent from the battery each time. That was well over a ninety percent improvement, at least until they figured out a proper way to measure mana.

“The improvement of speed is most likely due to the new sapphire pulsators,” Twilight said, still writing in her notebook. “Considering we reduced the number from twelve to two, will having more increase the speed?”

“Doubtful,” Sunset said. “Sapphire’s mana threshold is already very low. My guess is that we need to change the wires. Copper is good for electricity, but for mana it’s not very good. Platinum wires would be the most ideal to reach normal unicorn casting speed. Gold would be second best.”

Twilight tapped her pencil to her lips a few times. Sunset decided she liked that habit of hers. “As a unicorn, how long does it take you to cast an illumination spell?”

Sunset thought about it. “With the same specifications? One or two seconds.”

“Huh… I guess we still have a long way to go.”

After finishing her notes, Twilight took the glowing apples back into the house. Shining Armor laughed so loud Sunset had no issues hearing him, and she herself snickered when Twilight returned with a small frown. With a light huff, Twilight sat down and opened the book about novice enchantments. Sunset decided to use this lull in their project to start working on her own.

She picked the last thing that was left in her backpack. A thin sheet of silvery metal.

Sunset had purchased it with the idea of making a sort of prosthesis for her horn. She had brought a few books on unicorn anatomy, specifically those that talked about their magical appendage. She’d use those as reference in her attempt to replace the bone with metal, the keratin with shape, and the synaptic tissue with gemstones. She didn’t know if it would work, but to Tartarus she’d try.

But before any of that, she had to make sure she’d even be able to start. All her books and gemstones would be useless if she couldn’t shape the iridosmium in her hands. She took a deep breath as she focused on her mana pool, feeling it swirling inside of her, waiting to be used to bend the world at her will. She willed it to flow from her chest and through her arms until it reached her fingertips. She was already used to this process, so it came naturally to her.

Then her mana encountered a barrier.

That was to be expected. Physical objects had a certain resistance to mana flow. She’d already explained that to Twilight. The threshold was a sort of gateway that had to be pushed open. Obsidian was the one material that offered next to no resistance at all, feeling like pushing a door made of soap bubbles. Gemstones had varying degrees of resistance, going from cardboard-like weight, like rubies, to steel, like jadeite.

Then there were metals. Platinum was the metal with the lowest mana threshold, lowered even further when magic treated, and its resistance was almost double that of sunstones, which were the most resistant of all gems. Sunset had told Twilight that gold had the second lowest threshold, though it hadn’t quite been a lie. Both gold and platinum were very ductile, which meant they could be turned into fine wire. Between the two, however, there were a few other metals that offered low thresholds.

Osmium and Iridium were two such metals, but they weren’t meant to become wires, and they were also relatively easy to break. That’s where their alloys came into the equation. Iridosmium, the one Sunset had ultimately chosen, offered a very low threshold while being malleable enough to be shaped with mana.

Easier said than done, of course. Sunset pushed her mana through, but the metal didn’t accept it. Her mana swirled back and forth, and some of it spilled through her body in the form of heat, making her chest and arms warm up rather quickly. She increased the flow, pushing with an exertion she hadn’t required in many years. Still, the metal refused to give in. Sunset huffed, noticing that her breathing was getting heavier, and a single droplet of sweat ran down her face. She was making too much mana flow through her body too fast, but without a proper release, it just kept coming back to her, increasing the force she needed to keep it moving.

“Sunset?”

Sunset grunted, ignoring the worry in Twilight’s voice. She kept her eyes focused on the metal. Her now red fingers were searing hot, and more sweat ran down her face and neck. Still, she kept pushing, increasing her flow one last time.

Finally, something in the metal gave in. The transition was so sudden that Sunset was knocked off balance, with her mana rushing into the sheet and back. She let out a dry gasp as the world suddenly spun around. She dropped the sheet and tried to hold onto the table, but her grasp failed and she fell from the chair onto the floor.

“Sunset!” Twilight cried, rushing to her side.

Sunset’s head spun nauseatingly. “Ugh…” She saw four Twilights enter her field of vision. She would’ve found it funny if she didn’t want to hurl.

“Sunset! What happened?”

Sunset cringed at the way Twilight’s voice rang in her ears. She shut her eyes and grit her teeth. Fortunately, Twilight seemed to get the memo, since she stopped talking and instead helped Sunset sit up carefully. After a few minutes, Sunset recovered from her dizzy spell, though that made her aware of how tired she felt all of a sudden.

Yet she still found the energy to laugh. “Sweet Celestia, that was horrible!” She laughed some more at Twilight’s confused expression. “I’m ok, Twilight. I just misjudged how much effort I’d need to overpower the iridosmium’s threshold. Whew! I haven’t struggled that much since the first time I tried to lift a boulder. Talk about being out of shape.” She allowed Twilight to help her sit back on the chair, then waved her off. “I’m fine, really.”

With a distrustful glare, Twilight sat right next to her. “What happened, exactly?”

Giving herself some more time to recover, Sunset grabbed the metal sheet and smiled at the very clear marks her fingers had left, like impressions on clay. “You see how charging the jade with mana was difficult for you?” Twilight nodded. “Well, this was about a hundred times harder.”

“A hundred?!”

“Give or take,” Sunset said with a shrug. “Pure platinum would’ve been much easier, but I wanted something more resistant. Ah, thank goodness I didn’t pick osmiridium. That would’ve been near impossible.”

Twilight blinked a couple of times. “Sunset, are you going to get that sick every time you try to work on that metal?”

Sunset let out a dragged out sigh. “Unfortunately. At least until I get used to it. I am not looking forward to that, I’ll tell you that much.”

“Then…” Twilight bit her lip for a moment. “Promise me you’ll try that only when there’s someone around to catch you. It’s dangerous if you keep falling to the floor like that.”

A warmth spread through Sunset’s chest. Not like the uncomfortable heat her mana overuse produced, but a nice, cozy warmth that was more like drinking hot cocoa on a cold day. She couldn’t avoid smiling at that.

“Sure. I promise.”

Two weeks later, Sunset was still not used to making her mana overpower the iridosmium’s threshold. She could feel the process getting slightly easier every time, but it always left her dizzy and dehydrated. She’d mostly kept her promise to Twilight, having people ready to catch her in case she fell, but when she was alone in Celestia and Luna’s apartment, she practiced in her room, where her bed would easily break her fall.

With all the attempts she made, the iridosmium sheet was getting warped, her fingers having left many marks during the short moments she’d been able to shape it like wet clay. That was the only reason that kept Sunset going back. There was physical proof that, given enough time, it would be entirely possible to shape the sheet in the exact way she’d need.

Eventually.

~~~~~~~~

“Hey, Sunset?”

Sunset looked up from her book. She’d been resting from her latest attempt with the iridosmium by reading and making notes on unicorn magical anatomy. “What is it?”

Twilight twirled a strand of hair with a finger. “So… I’m going to finish eighth grade next month, and my school is going to hold a graduation ceremony. Nothing too big. Just people talking for a while before they give us our certificates. And I thought… Well, I was wondering if you’d like to go?”

“Uh…” Sunset blinked a few times. “Sure?”

Twilight’s face lit up with a bright smile, and Sunset felt her heart skip a beat. “Great! It’s going to be on the twenty-eighth at five o’clock. Miss Celestia and Miss Luna might be busy, so if they can’t take you, I’ll ask Shining Armor or my dad. Oh! The dress code is formal-casual. Uhm, it’s not mandatory per se, so you don’t have to buy clothes just for that. You can show up in your regular everyday outfit!”

Sunset listened with only half an ear, focusing on her own chest. She already was very aware that she had a crush on Twilight, so it wasn’t a surprise that she liked seeing her happily ranting about something important to her. What confused Sunset was the intensity.

It wasn’t just that her heart beat faster and more strongly whenever she saw Twilight smile, or that she found herself blushing when Twilight did something cute. No, it was that even when she was alone in the apartment, eating or reading or doing whatever, she’d randomly think of Twilight, and all those sensations would attack her at once, and then she’d be unable to take her out of her mind for hours.

Never before had Sunset spared a thought to the concept of romance. Not like some foals who stupidly claim it to be gross. Instead, Sunset had simply not been interested at all. Even as she grew and started noticing other ponies, she simply shrugged those thoughts off and continued with her life. It wasn’t like she was burying her nose in books to force herself not to think about it. She simply had never felt attracted to anypony, and she’d been fine.

But then she’d met Twilight and started spending time with her. And before she’d realized, she had begun seeing her as a friend, an actual friend, with whom she could talk about her interests and receive smart responses. Then she’d seen Twilight as a pony and her heart had decided to squash her brain into mush, and even after they’d returned to the human world, Sunset still saw Twilight shine beautifully.

Sunset would be lying if she said she didn’t think of asking Twilight out. She did, on a daily basis. But she would also be lying if she said that the knowledge of Twilight’s pony counterpart stealing her life didn’t affect her. It was a stupid thought, she was aware of it, but it still held her back. It hurt to think of the reason she’d lost everything, and she didn’t want that feeling to negatively impact what she already had with Twilight.

So, at least for now, she decided to let time pass. Maybe, when she figured out what she wanted to do with her life, she’d be able to separate her feelings properly and make a decision.

Twilight moved on from talking about her graduation ceremony to her expectations for high school. Sunset leaned back, her book forgotten, and let herself enjoy the sound of Twilight’s voice.

Author's Note

Progress has been achieved! Soon, they'll conquer the world!

... Or not. We'll see.

If you liked it, please leave a comment! They're my fresh air in a scorching day.