A little while later, Twilight and Spike were across campus, walking outside in the sunshine and trying to figure out their next move. Suddenly Twilight was pulled into a shaded area of the school and found herself face-to-face with Susan.

“Can’t believe I didn’t recognize you earlier,” Susan smirked. “I got to commend you for having the balls to come here after I stole the crown.”

“How did you figure it out?” Twilight asked.

“I saw your piss-poor handwriting on the ballots,” Susan said. “I recognized it from my quote-unquote ‘twin sister’ the first day she came to this world. So, I put two and two together and realized that you’re pissing me off here.”

“Either way,” Twilight said. “The crown belongs to me!”

“You and your ‘dog’ being here is just a minor setback,” Susan said in a smart-alecky manner. “This school is my neck of the woods. You don’t know the first thing about this world. I was born and raised in this world while that Sally you heard about has been here for the better part of three damn years. With her being a pathetic little sad sack, she was so easy to manipulate. You? You haven’t even been here a full day.”

“If you already rule this school,” Twilight asked. “Why do you need my crown?”

“Answer me this,” Susan said. “What happens when you bring a magical element into an alternate world?” She gave Twilight a chance to answer, but, the purple girl couldn’t respond. “Seriously? Even you don’t know? Heh, and I thought you were supposed to be hot sh*t!”

“How do you even know it’s a magical element?” Spike asked.

“Well,” Susan answered. “That sad sack told me about your world while I taught her about this world so she’d be less likely to f*ck up. One thing she told me about were these things called the Elements of Harmony. Figured the one you had would look better on me.”

“What?” Twilight asked. “How did she know about the Elements of Harmony?”

Susan shrugged. “I don’t know, some bullsh*t about reading a fairytale, taking it at face value, and trying to make new elements.”

“Huh,” Spike whispered to Twilight. “Guess Sunset is a lot like you.”

“Except I haven’t tried to make new elements,” Twilight whispered back. “I wouldn’t know where to start.”

“I’ve seen this Sunset work,” Susan said. “She’s managed to make magical potions that aren’t snake oil bullsh*t.” She then lifted part of her skirt up to show more of her right leg. “I once got a snake bite right on my thigh. A topical potion fixed that and removed the venom along with any evidence the damn thing bit me in the first place.”

“I see,” Twilight said. “Anyway, do you know where Sunset is now?”

Susan dropped her skirt and laughed. “Don’t think I don’t see what you’re trying to do. You find Sunset and she f*cks up my plans by bringing her five bitches back together.”

Spike growled at Susan. However, the bad girl wasn’t intimidated.

“That the best you can do, pipsqueak?” she taunted. “My stomach growls better than you. And besides that, you should stay out of trouble. You don’t want to be taken away, do you?”

At the thought of such a thing, Spike subsided.

“Twilight, let me give you some advice,” Susan said as she was about to walk away. “If you want to be a princess here, you’re going to have to work your ass off. But, it wouldn’t matter anyway. I’ll always be better than you in this world. Just look at you. You can barely walk and you’re sh*t at handwriting. So, I suggest you go back home and leave me to run things the way things are supposed to be.” With that, she confidently strutted away, leaving Twilight and Spike under a dimmed fluorescent light. Susan then made it to her two lackeys once out of Twilight’s earshot. “Follow that bitch Twilight. Otherwise, your brother’s grades’ll drop like flies.”

“You got it, Susan,” Skip saluted.

“We won’t let you down, ma’am,” Sheldon saluted.

“Make sure to bring me sh*t I can use against her,” Susan ordered. “Just like the last bitch who tried to run against me during the Spring Fling.”

“I still find it weird that you roped us into that,” Skip said. “We weren’t even freshmen at this school back then.”

Susan was beginning to lose her patience. “Do what I tell you or I’ll tear off your d*cks and shove them up your a**holes!”

The two boys yelped. “We’re going, we’re going!” And they scrambled off to find Twilight and Spike. In their haste, they kept tripping over each other.

A short time later, Twilight walked up to a vending machine. It had been some time since she had eaten lunch, so when Twilight saw there was food inside, she tried to figure out how to get some out. Considering she wasn't familiar with this machinery, she found difficulties maneuvering it. She pressed her hand against the plexiglass, she tried pushing it, and she even had the idea to try bucking the plexiglass to break it. But, as she was about to kick it, someone walked up to Twilight. This was an oddly familiar girl with blue skin, silvery hair, a dark blue jacket, a purple mini skirt with a magic wand on the side, and blue, purple, and golden yellow shoes. Twilight could tell this was this world’s version of Trixie Lulamoon.

“Excuse me,” she said. “I just need to get in there for some peanut butter crackers.”

Twilight, embarrassed, moved out of Trixie’s way. Trixie then inserted some money into the vending machine and got her snack from the bottom.

“Thank you,” she said politely. She then walked off.

Twilight realized she didn’t bring any money with her. She didn’t notice the bird from earlier scooping up some coins from atop the lockers with her talons and quickly dropping them near her while flying over to the other side with nobody noticing.

“Huh?” Twilight asked in confusion, hearing the metal clinking. She looked down and saw the coins on the floor. She then cautiously picked them up. “Um… whomever left these, thank you.” She then inserted the coins into the machine and pressed the same combination of buttons she saw the human Trixie use. A package of peanut butter crackers was pushed off and landed on the bottom of the vending machine. Twilight then pulled it out. She then took Spike somewhere nobody else could hear them. “Well, Susan was right about one thing, Spike.”

“What’s that?” Spike asked.

“I don’t know this world very well,” Twilight said. “If I’m going to have any chance of beating her, I need to learn more about this world’s society. But, there’s a problem right there. Sunset’s been here longer than the both of us and we don’t know where she is. Meanwhile, Susan’s been here her whole life and asking her is out of the question.”

“Well, you had,” Spike said. “And she certainly didn’t tell you then.”

“True,” Twilight said. “Hmm, so I’ll have to find out other ways to learn about this school and this world. With this being a school, I have no doubts that there would also be a library.”

“Maybe that map Fauna gave can help,” Spike suggested.

Twilight looked at the map after wiping off some excess salt from the cracker. Sure enough, she was able to find it.

“Going straight to the library will draw much less attention than standing around and just observing these humans,” Twilight said.*

So, she walked inside. Unbeknownst to her, just inside, hiding behind some potted plants, Skip and Sheldon were hiding. They had mischievous smiles on their faces.

“Got your phone?” Skip asked in a whisper.

“Never go anywhere without it,” Sheldon answered.

Neither knew that the bird was listening. The bird wanted to intervene, but, knew that doing so could give her away.

Twilight’s breath was taken away by what she saw. A tall, domed ceiling arched over the circular room. Hundreds of books were stacked on shelves that stretched up two floors high. A golden bust of a Wondercolt shone in the center of a workstation that was surrounded by black square things. They had flat boards full of buttons in front of them. Twilight had no idea what they were even for. Some sort of musical instrument, perhaps? She then talked to a passing librarian, bearing a remarkable resemblance to Cheerilee from Equestria.

“Excuse me,” Twilight said. “But, what does this thing do?”

The librarian looked visibly confused. “You’ve never seen a computer before?”

“No,” Twilight admitted.

“Well,” the librarian said. “Computers are one of the most helpful tools known to mankind. You can search the internet, play games, or even send information across great distances in the blink of an eye.”

“That sounds incredible,” Twilight said. “Thank you.” She took a seat. “So, how does it work?”

“Well,” the librarian said patiently while pointing things out. “You start by taking the mouse and gently moving it across the mouse pad. On the screen, you’ll see a little arrow. It’s called a cursor. And if you press your finger here, that will give the cursor a selection.”

“Thank you,” Twilight said. She slowly moved the mouse to see the cursor. “So, how can I make it select something for research?”

“Typically,” the librarian said while pointing to the internet icon. “I would go to the web browser, which you can do by going here and then clicking on that. This opens a window on-screen including a search engine. Then, you type in what you want to search for, then press enter, and it will take you to the search results page.”

“Is the typing what this thing next to the mouse is for?” Twilight asked.

“Yes, that’s right,” the librarian smiled. “It’s called the keyboard.”

“So, it works kind of like a type-writer?” Twilight asked.

“Something along those lines, yes,” the librarian answered. “I’m surprised someone as young as you knows about them. They’ve been obsolete for decades.”

“We use them a lot back home,” Twilight said. “I think I can figure things out from here, but, you’ve been so helpful and I appreciate it.” She then proceeded to try typing on the computer keyboard… with her fingers curled up like hooves, resulting in a big jumble of letters appearing in the search bar. Skip and Sheldon, watching and recording from afar, chuckled quietly to themselves. Suddenly, there was loud music playing. This caught the librarian’s attention as she saw three freshman girls dancing to the music. The first girl was a yellow skinned girl with red hair adorned in a pink bow, wore a green blouse, blue jeans, and yellow galoshes. The second girl was an alabaster skinned girl with long pink and purple curly hair adorned with a magenta headband, a magenta short sleeved sweater over a light pink striped shirt, a long yellow skirt, and magenta boots. The third had orange skin, short mulberry hair, a black short sleeved hoodie, dark green shorts, and black boots. The librarian cleared her throat, catching the trio’s attention as they paused the video.

“Blossom Alice Apple, Susie Belle Germaine, and Scottie Louise Peters,” the librarian scolded each of them in the order listed in the descriptive paragraph. “I’ve told you three that school computers are not for YouTube videos unless they have educational value.”

“But, this does have educational value,” Susie Belle protested. “We’re just seeing how many hits our new music video has gotten and isn’t gathering research on views important?”

“If you want that kind of information,” the librarian said. “You’ll have to get it back home.”

“It’s just as well,” Blossom said in a noticeable southern accent. “The comments we’ve been gettin’ ‘bout our song have been pretty dang awful. ‘Epic fail.’ ‘Funniest thing ah’ve ever seen’?!”

“We weren’t even trying to be funny,” Scottie said.

“I know what you mean,” Susie Belle said. “We still don’t know what we’re going to do after high school, career wise.”

“I suggest you try being more patient getting your Cutie Marks,” Twilight said.

The three freshmen heard Twilight’s suggestion. “Cutie Marks?” they asked.

“You know, a mark on your flank that symbolizes your special talent?” Twilight quizzically explained.

“That sounds more like a butt tattoo,” Scottie said. “Why get them to represent your talent if you’re not supposed to show your butt in public? Seems kind of pointless.”

“Although,” Blossom said. “Ah am startin’ ta think maybe we can get jobs as tattoo artists after we graduate!”

“Well, we have like four years until we graduate at 18,” Susie Belle said. “Though, we can sharpen our art skills now.”

“Quick!” Scottie said. “To the art room!”

Giggling excitedly, the three headed out of the library.

“I wouldn’t advise such discussions in a public place,” the librarian said to Twilight. “Discussing one’s rear end is considered rude.”

“I’m sorry,” Twilight apologized. “I didn’t know. I won’t do it again.”

That evening, after making sure to stay hidden as the library closed, Twilight and Spike organized some books into a makeshift bed.

“Sorry it’s not the most ideal sleeping place, Mom,” Spike said gently. “But, it doesn’t seem like anybody comes up here.”

“I appreciate the effort all the same, Spike,” Twilight said. “I had a lot of research to do.”

“Speaking of which,” Spike said. “Anything in particular you found out?”

Twilight pulled out a book with CHS WONDERCOLTS written on the front cover. “I found this,” Twilight said. “It’s called a ‘yearbook.’ It holds a record of all of the students and the events during a particular school year.” She then opens the yearbook to a page called, “Freshman Fair.” On the page is a picture of six particular students. “Look, Spike. There’s Ashleigh, Roxy, Fauna, Pinkie, and I’m going to be the girl on the far right is this world’s Rarity, though her name seems to be Rachael here.”

Spike looked at the picture to see the human Rarity. He then noticed the sixth girl in the middle, holding a small red bird in her hands. She looked like Susan, but, friendlier.

“I’m guessing that the sixth girl there is the Sunset Shimmer from Equestria,” Spike figured. “If so, that little bird must be Phoebe, who got changed coming here, too.”

“I believe you’re right,” Twilight said. “I can only wonder where Sunset is now. And what’s really surprising is that, in this picture, the other girls look like they’re friends.”

“Some of them said that they were friends before ‘Sally,’ disappeared,” Spike said. “Maybe Susan had something to do with it.”

“I wouldn’t put it past Susan,” Twilight said. “But, we can’t prove it.”

“That’s true,” Spike said. “But, if you want to win votes, you'll have to focus on making friends here. Let’s face it, neither of us know much about this world, so, we need help from some natives.” He gave a slight yawn.

“You’re right, Spike,” Twilight said. “First things first, we should get some sleep. We had a very long and eventful day today.” She then kissed Spike on the forehead. “Goodnight, Spike.”

“Goodnight, Mom,” Spike said, curling next to Twilight.

Later that night, the bird from earlier was guiding a figure clad in clothes as dark as the night to the domed roof of the CHS library. They saw Twilight and Spike asleep on a pile of books.

“Is that them, Phoebe?” the figure asked the bird. The bird nodded. “Good girl.” The figure then carefully opened a glass panel and lowered a rope to climb down on. Once her feet were firmly on the ground, she quietly crept up to the slumbering Twilight and Spike. She gently woke them up.

Twilight and Spike both stirred. When they opened their eyes, they saw their new guest. She looked like Susan, only she had a much gentler demeanor.

“Are you Susan or ‘Sally?’” Twilight inquired.

“‘Sally,’” she replied. “But, you may call me Sunset. Everyone does.” She presented a card with a picture of her and her name on it.

“Oh!” Twilight gasped softly. “It’s so nice to finally meet you. Princess Celestia has told my friends and myself such wonderful things about you.”

Sunset’s face showed visible confusion. “She had positive things to say about a failure like me?”

“What do you mean?” Twilight asked. “Princess Celestia never said anything about you being a failure.”

“She must have if you know about me at all,” Sunset responded. “How she’d send another pony to punish my failures on her behalf.”

“What are you talking about?” Spike asked, just as confused. “We’re here because Susan stole Twilight’s crown.”

“And what’s this about sending a pony to punish another pony?” Twilight asked.

“Didn’t you have a fellow protege to beat you up each time you failed?” Sunset asked.

“No,” Twilight answered honestly. “I didn’t have any fellow protege. At my entrance exam, I was the only one who qualified.”

“So, the princess did the beating herself?” Sunset asked.

“Again,” Spike asked. “What are you talking about?!”

“Why would you think there are beatings?” Twilight asked.

“Because I experienced them before I came here,” Sunset answered.

“What?!” Twilight and Spike gasped.

“Why would anypony beat you?” Twilight asked, absolutely mortified.

“To punish me for my failings,” Sunset responded. “That’s probably the real reason you’re here. Because Princess Celestia wants me punished for trying to get away.”

“Spike and I are telling you the truth,” Twilight said. “Susan stole my crown and we came here to get it back from her. Nopony is going to beat you, I promise.”

“Princess Celestia didn’t even know you were here,” Spike added.

“She didn’t, huh?” Sunset responded with noticeable skepticism. “She knows literally everything. She sees you when you’re sleeping, she knows when you’re on the can, she knows what’s going on all across the land.”**

“Before we came here,” Twilight said. “She didn’t even know that your friend Wallflower was getting picked on.”

“Wallflower must’ve been tortured into telling you that information,” Sunset reasoned.

“No, she wasn’t,” Twilight said. “When Wallflower explained what had happened, Princess Celestia was disgusted with what she heard about the bullies. She even asked Wallflower why she didn’t tell her sooner.”

“What would be the point in telling her if she already knew?” Sunset asked.

“Because she didn’t!” Spike said, beginning to grow exasperated.

“Easy, Spike,” Twilight said gently. She calmly rubbed his left face cheek. “It’s clear that Sunset has been through a lot during her time as Princess Celestia’s protege. This must have been the work of that bully that Wallflower mentioned.”

“Moonrise was sent to punish my failures on the Princess’ behalf,” Sunset said. “I kept failing and the princess kept sending Moonrise to punish me on her behalf.”

“Moonrise?” Twilight asked.

“And Princess Celestia would never do such a horrible thing,” Spike said.

“I appreciate what you’re trying to say,” Sunset sighed. “But, unless I hear from the princess herself that she didn’t, I just can’t bring myself to believe that what you’re saying is true.”***

Twilight sighed in defeat. “Very well. So, why are you up here?”

“I heard that you’re trying to run against Susan for the Fall Formal Princess,” Sunset explained. “You have no idea what you’re getting involved in. She doesn’t play nice.”

“Ashleigh told me something along those lines earlier, too,” Twilight explained. “But, if it’s to get my crown and Element of Harmony back, I’ll take the risk.”

“The Elements of Harmony were found?!” Sunset asked in surprise.

“Yeah,” Spike said. “Almost two and a half years ago, Mom met five other ponies and found them in the Everfree Forest in the Castle of the Two Sisters.”

“You helped, too, Spike,” Twilight said.

“Was that on the very day Nightmare Moon returned?” Sunset asked.

“It was,” Twilight explained.

“I left at the midnight hour of that day,” Sunset said. “It’s been three full years for me since that day.”

“You miss your brother and Wallflower, don’t you?” Spike asked sympathetically.

“I do,” Sunset admitted. “But, I can’t go back to Equestria and face Celestia’s wrath.”

“We promise you there won’t be any wrath,” Twilight said. “She, Sunburst, and Wallflower all miss you and they want you to be safe and sound back in Equestria. Sunburst has been searching Equestria for you since you’ve been gone.”

“Back to the point,” Sunset said. “I’m afraid your plan has a fatal flaw.”

“What’s that?” Twilight asked.

“In order to officially run for Princess of the Fall Formal,” Sunset explained. “You have to be a registered student.”****

“Oh, dear,” Twilight said in a worried tone. “That is a flaw.”

“But,” Sunset said, pulling something out of her pants pocket. “I think there is a way that I can help.”

“How?” Twilight asked.

Sunset presented Twilight with a Canterlot High Transfer Student ID card. It had Twilight’s name on it. “This will let you pass as a registered student so you’ll at least qualify to be a candidate.”

“Thank you,” Twilight said gratefully.

“At least this way,” Sunset said. “Celestia knows I succeeded at something.”

“Wait,” Spike said. “How did you know about us?”

“You can thank Phoebe,” Sunset answered as she gestured to the red bird. Phoebe chirped politely. “She’s been keeping an eye on the school for me for the past year.”

“I see,” Twilight said. “Well, thank you, Phoebe. I have just one more question for you, Sunset. Why haven’t you been coming to school? Your friends really miss seeing you here.”

“Susan’s been putting Essence of Lavender in my morning tea every morning for this past year,” Sunset explained. “She doesn’t know I’ve built up an immunity by now. If I tried contacting my friends, she could find out.”

“That does make sense,” Twilight nodded. “But, you should really find some other way to see them without Susan finding out. Things have really faltered between them.”

“I wish I could help,” Sunset admitted. “But, Susan would know if I tried.”

Twilight sighed again. “I’ll see what I can do then.” Twilight yawned. “I’m going to try to get some sleep. I have a lot of things I need to do tomorrow. Thank you for talking with me and I want to help you, too.”

Before leaving, Sunset gave Spike a gentle scratch behind his ears. Spike was surprised by this gesture, but, allowed it to happen all the same.*****

“Rest well, little guy,” she said kindly.

After Sunset climbed back up the rope and hid evidence she entered, Spike spoke up.

“I get the feeling Wallflower didn’t tell us the whole story,” he said.

“Well, Wallflower did promise to keep it a secret,” Twilight explained. “And with Pinkie in the room, she wouldn’t let Wallflower fully tell. You know how Pinkie is at keeping secrets.”

“Well,” Spike continued. “Whoever this Moonrise is and whatever she did to Sunset, she really did a number on her. I haven’t even met Moonrise and I hate her. I can’t explain it, but, when Sunset touched me, I could tell at once that she’d never hurt me.”

“I understand what you mean, Spike,” Twilight said. “But, it’s clear that Sunset doesn’t want to believe us on this. There has to be some other way to convince her to not only get back to school and reconcile with her friends, but, also a way to get her to come back to Equestria so she can properly talk with Princess Celestia about this.”

“Let’s worry about that later,” Spike suggested.

“Yeah, you’re right,” Twilight said. “We should get some rest while it’s still night.”

And so, the two went back to sleep, with Twilight holding Spike in her arms.

Author's Note

Here's the next chapter.

*Take that, canon!

**A two-fold reference!

***Emotional depth is emotional.

****Yeah, that's not addressed in canon.

*****WHOLESOME!!!

At last, the real Sunset has made her appearance.

Comments? Questions? Thoughts? You know where to leave them.