A knock on his door and he knows who it was before the voice filters threw the door.

“Curtain Call? You are needed on stage in 2 minutes!” His assistant called, knowing the Pegasus was more than likely adding the final touches to his costume before he emerges.

“Thank you Matineigh, I’ll be out in a moment!” Replied the pegasus from within, leaning towards the mirror for the last time to make sure nothing was out of place before he hurried out of his room, only to see his assistant’s tail whip around behind the corner. She obviously was running back to make sure the lights were in place and the ponies at the curtain were ready to pull it up when it was time.

Trotting quickly enough to make it in time but not fast enough to mess up his costume, Curtain Call allowed a smile as he felt his heart race. There was supposed to be a big time movie director in the audience tonight, scoping out ponies for his next movie.

“He’s looking at small town ponies with no name in any big works!” Matineigh had told him cheerfully this morning as she bounced in with the paper floating before her. She kept babbling as it was placed before him and he began reading it. “It says he’s only coming here because this is where he got his first big break as an actor and wanted to see if it could do the same for another pony!” It was indeed exciting. If tonight went well, somepony would be moving up in the world of acting, from theatre production to starring in movies!

It would be a dream come true for most ponies in the business but he wonders that if it was him chosen....would he forget his small beginnings in the big world? It had only been ten years out of school for him, a short while for an actor but it was his talent.

He shook his head. There were more experienced ponies on stage beside him tonight. One of them would surely be chosen, not him. Not a greenhorn.

Prancing onto the stage with only moments to spare, the pegasus took up his position-perfectly balancing on his hooves, the front ones that were crossed one in front of the other, his knees bent and his wings ready to spring into action- and closed his eyes, taking in a deep breath as he did so. Soon, he hears the crowd beyond the curtain go all quiet and he smiles, counting down from 5....4....3....2....

“Welcome, everypony, to the opening night of The Blood Brothers!”

~*~

“Mama, can you believe it?” The little filly bounced around her mother’s hooves as they walk along the street, the shops in the streets beginning to close for the day. They had gone shopping for some new clothes for the filly, as all her exams had just finished and the winter holidays were about to start soon enough. “I got top marks in my flight test!” Her test had been at the start of the week and the test results had come this morning in the mail. The light grey pegasus smiled softly at her daughter, knowing how exciting it was for her daughter to see the marks on the paper, saying that she had ranked third highest in her age group of flyers. “Third! Can you believe it? I guess Ashton got first, seeing as his parents are both wonderbolts! But still! third? I honestly thought I’d be dead last, especially since I just know I messed up on the last turn....!” Lucille chuckled softly, bumping her daughter gently with her wing to nudge her away from bouncing straight into a pole.

“I know, sweetie, you’ve mentioned only a hundred times.” She laughed with a hint of pride. Take that you rich pansy, I bet your son didn’t even place. The thought was directed to an hated enemy of hers, the parent of a child that always liked to show off his cutie mark, one of the first in her daughter’s class and never did anything to curb her son’s vanity, despite his young age.

“What’s your daughters’ Cutie Mark Lucille?” she’d always ask if they passed in the street, her nasally voice always making her nearly flinch but she'd school her face before it would happen. “Oh? What do you mean she hasn’t got it yet? How terrible! My son found out what his was the first week!”

Did she forget to mention the child’s mother was as vain and boastful as the son? Where the father was in all this, she didn’t know. Lucille never saw the stallion at parent days or any other event for that matter and only knew that ‘his work is very important.’

“Can we get ice cream Mama?”

“Dear, it’s winter. It is cold. Why in Equestria do you want ice cream?” The mother in her instantly rose to the surface, not wanting her daughter to have something that could upset her stomach. She knew that when she herself ate ice cream on a cold day, her teeth froze and so would the rest of her, even wrapped up in a blanket indoors. The filly pulled a face at her.

“I know it’s cold. But Donut Joe's’ is just around the corner and they do hot chocolates too, for only three bits! Pleeease?” Sighing heavily, Lucille gives in, knowing she couldn’t win when a hot drink was offered.

“Fine, but don’t come complaining to me about brain freezes alright?”

“YAY!”

~*~
Looking at the card in front of him, the unicorn wondered if he was in the right place. The building in front of him called to his rational side that the pegasus was rich but his irrational side argued that even if she was rich, why give a random pony she bumped into her card and offer to buy him lunch? It just didn’t make sense.

Shaking off any doubts, he used his magic to knock on the door using the knocker and waited patiently.

And waited.

And waited.

Until, finally, after what seemed like an hour, the door opened to reveal the pegasus from yesterday standing there with a disheveled mane and bloodshot eyes looking as if she had just woken up.

“Oh, um....” He stumbled over what to say, thinking that perhaps he was early and she wasn’t expecting him yet. But instead, she just smiled at him and all thoughts flew of apologising flew out of his mind.

“I’m sorry, I’m not quite ready.” She gestured him into her house, using her back leg to slam the door closed once he was in. “My friends and I stayed up later then I thought we would but then Trick Shot brought a new game with him and we spent most of the night playing it, along with drinking apple cider, so I should have expected it.” They trotted along the hallway until they came upon a room he could only explain as a cave.

The door was open when they arrived and the curtains were drawn tightly in front of the windows, with pillows and blankets scattered every which way and he thought he spotted something slide under a particular pile of pillows and blankets before a tussled white mane streaked with red and blue poked out from underneath the pile. Purple eyes squinted at them, a beige hoof rubbing one eye.

“‘Song, whos’ tha’?” The pony asked with a dry mouth, his tongue somehow sticking to the roof of his mouth despite its dryness. The pegasus next to him, apparently named ‘Song’, chuckled fondly.

“This is....what did you say your name was again?” As she peered at him, another pile of pillows simply exploded outwards and a white unicorn emerged from it with flailing legs. ‘Song’ and the other pony just laughed at him, the beige pony pulling himself to his feet, pillows and blankets tumbling to his feet, and showing himself to be a pegasus like his friend. His cutie mark was a red velvet curtain, opened, with a spotlight showing in the middle.

“I didn’t,” he said quietly, lowering his head and ears as he watched the beige pegasus rear back onto his hind legs and pull at his friend’s front hooves, righting him onto his belly. Though it was at his balance’s expense and he fell backwards. “Yours’ is Song? It says on the card.....” Song smiled at him and he went quiet again.

“Song is a nickname. I have a good voice, according to these two.” She waved over to her now laughing friends. “Known eachother since early Flight School, me and Caller over there. And Trick Shot was friends with Caller when he joined the local drama group of ponyville a few months later.”

“Hey, Song, who’s that?” questioned who he assumed to be Trick Shot since the pegasus had to be ‘Caller’, from what Song had said.

“I....I’m called Rhythmic.” The blue unicorn stammered quietly, having a feeling that these three friends, who had obviously knew each other for years, were very good friends and he suddenly felt like he was intruding on their space.

“Rhythmic?” Song rolled her eyes, nudging passed him as she went to pick up a glass of water on a table. Downing the drink in an unladylike fashion-gripping the lip between her teeth before flicking her chin up so she could drain the water left in it-she tossed the glass expertly onto a pillow where it stayed. “Well, ‘Rhythmic’, I’m just going to go clean up while you, Caller and Tricks all have fun. And don’t break him, either of you.” She warned the two males still sitting over by the window where Caller had pulled Trick Shot up. “I’d like a working date, if you please.”

“Of course ma’am,” Caller stood up to bow deeply, only to nearly topple back over on to Trick Shot, who pushed him the other way and watched him fall onto his back where he flailed comically and made his friends snort with laughter.

“Let me rephrase-Rhythm, make sure they don’t break each other.” Song giggled as she walked passed him and further down the hall. He opened his mouth to correct him of his name before he realised what had happened.

Song had left, the only one he felt remotely familiar with, in a strange home.

Not only that but leaving him alone with two-presumably hungover- strange stallions.

He groaned in dismay.

Author's Note

PFFT, I'm tired and it took me just over two hours of writing to do this x.x 1751 words....just over two hours and I managed to get nearly two thousand words....(Btw, I still need a name for the filly. at the moment, it's okay to just refer to her a cute things like Sweetie and such but I really need a name. I nearly had a few, but they slipped my mind before I could write them down.)