“Attention, guests,” the voice said over the intercom after a trio of electronic chimes. “The library will be closing in fifteen minutes. Please make sure you get your books checked out before then. Thank you.”
Starlight Glimmer sighed. Closing time always came way too quickly for her liking, and on weekends doubly so. Especially since she didn't have a library card, and couldn't just check out whatever books she hadn't finished and leave with them. There was also the fact that she depended on libraries for internet access, as she didn't exactly have the money for a laptop or a good smartphone. Not with her lifestyle.
So she made a note of where she'd left off in the books she'd been reading in the thick and battered journal she always carried with her, then turned her attention to the browser she had opened to double-check her online affairs. Most of it was maintaining her blog and arguing with people; it never failed to irritate her that despite the supposed vastness of the online world, so few parts of it actually agreed with her in any meaningful sense. Why was it that nobody seemed to realize that happiness and world peace would only come from complete and utter conformity, where nobody was different and therefore nobody was better than anyone else? It had just seemed so obvious to Starlight for so long now, but apparently she was the only truly intelligent person in a world that had been blinded by its own selfish ambitions. But what else was new?
With nothing left to do in the library, Starlight filed out with the rest of the patrons onto the city streets. It was still light out, and a quick check of her watch confirmed that it was still a few minutes before six – time to rustle up a meal for herself before heading back to the motel. She checked her wallet and saw that she had just enough cash to grab something from one of the local fast food joints, if she didn't mind being flat broke afterward.
Her stomach growled, and she let out an irritated sigh. “Food it is,” she muttered to herself, stowing her wallet and grabbing the helmet off her motorcycle. It wasn't exactly the sort of vehicle she would have preferred, too loud and flashy and noticeable, but her current lifestyle didn't exactly give her many other options. Bicycles were too slow, cars too expensive, and most of all her – for lack of a better term – 'riding partner' insisted on using one. And Starlight, in pursuit of her desire to blend in with her herd no matter how small it was, would have to use one too if she wanted to conform.
'Riding partner'. That's all that woman ever would be, could be to Starlight. She was exactly the type of person that Starlight hated most, self-absorbed and convinced of her own superiority – the lone wolf in a world of sheep. And Starlight knew for a fact that the hate was mutual, even if neither had ever quite said so out loud. All the snide comments and put-downs whenever they met up for the night or split up for the day made the nature of their relationship quite evident. And Starlight honestly, genuinely preferred it that way – she already knew that her 'partner' would be one of the first ones to be imprisoned when her revolution inevitably came about, and if Starlight lost and her 'partner' won? Well, Starlight knew that would be her own end.
But for now, she and Starlight had an unspoken recognition of each other's usefulness on the road. Both were smart and skilled, and when you never know when the cops are going to finally catch up to you it helps to have someone to trip close at hand.
As she rode down the city streets towards the restaurant she'd singled out as her go-to place for meals on their first day in town, Starlight thought. Not about her 'partner', or about all the things in her life that had led up to this point, but simply about what she was going to do tomorrow. She had very little money to her name at the moment, not in her wallet and certainly not in any paper-trail bank account. And while it would be her partner's turn to pay for the next motel they stayed at, Starlight wasn't about to ask her for any cash. She would have to get more money herself.
If she was lucky, extraordinarily so, she would finally find someone rich who she could convince of her cause and thus to redistribute some of their money to fund it. But that had never actually happened to her before, and while it wouldn't stop her from trying if the opportunity arose, Starlight knew she'd be forced once more into less... desirable means. Dumpster diving, mostly, for any returnables or things that could be sold. Raiding any fountains for the loose change tossed into them. Panhandling, if she felt safe and that her 'partner' wouldn't find out. Even stealing if she was desperate enough and saw a good chance to, though with the number of crimes she'd committed since running away from her family all those years ago she was wary of risking the kind of attention it could bring again.
But, as she reminded herself, all of that was necessary for her to survive in the cold, corrupt world she lived in. It was hardly her fault there weren't any systems or supports in place to truly help those who weren't able to hold down a job to survive.
Her meal passed in quiet solitude, eating her sandwich inside the joint out of convenience. Nobody was around to bother her or even spare her a second glance, but even so Starlight was tense. Tonight was the night they'd agreed to head out, but the next stop on their covert tour of the country hadn't been decided yet. Normally they'd have done it in the morning before going their separate ways for the day, but her partner had been particularly irritable and had rushed out with barely a word. Starlight wasn't worried, of course, she'd never be afraid of her, but she was concerned that if they left their usual argument too late it would affect their ability to get to the next city or even attract some unwanted attention if there were other guests at the thin-walled motel they were staying at.
Especially because Starlight already knew where they basically had to go; there wasn't any other good choice left in the area. Everywhere else was either too small for them to operate in, or had already been visited in the last couple months and thus too risky to return to just yet. But even though Starlight had been suggesting the city for some time now, her partner had just kept vetoing the idea for increasingly ridiculous reasons. It was obvious that she was trying to avoid the place, and Starlight suspected she knew why. But unless her partner suddenly decided she wanted to spend all night driving to a place further away, she was going to have to bite the proverbial bullet and stop avoiding Canterlot.
It was well past seven when she finally pulled up into the parking lot of what was probably the seediest motel in town, though thankfully not the worst she'd had the misfortune of staying in. To her surprise the lights were on in the room she and her partner shared, which could only mean one thing – her partner had already returned from whatever illicit deeds she'd been up to that day.
Starlight parked her bike next to her partner's, and took a deep breath to prepare herself for the coming argument. She didn't even bother reaching for her copy of the key, just walking straight up to the door and giving it three short knocks in a specific rhythm. She paused, listening for the sound of footsteps. “It's me,” she said once she'd heard a figure approach the door. “Starlight. I'm alone.”
“Uggh, finally,” came the voice of her riding partner, as irritable as Starlight expected. She took half a step back, and moments later a lock slid back and the door was cracked open. She saw her ever-paranoid partner peer out to confirm that Starlight really was alone, and once satisfied she opened the door fully. “It took you long enough to get back here,” she snapped as Starlight walked in, closing and locking the door behind her.
“Well sor-ry for getting something to eat,” Starlight shot back, her pretense of composure failing immediately as she walked straight towards her bed and grabbed the bag under it that contained the rest of her scant few belongings.
“You should have gotten it earlier,” her partner replied, arms crossed. A quick look-over showed Starlight no obvious bulges in either her leather jacket or her tattered blue jeans, a sign she either hadn't stolen anything or more likely had already stashed it away or sold it, but she was holding what looked like a rolled-up magazine in her amber-skinned hand. “Or do I have to remind you again that we don't have time to mess around right now? Because in case that little pea-brain of yours has forgotten, we have to leave tonight and we still haven't decided where we're going.”
Starlight sighed. “Gee, I wonder who's fault that is?” she asked her partner with a smile dripping with sarcasm. “Oh wait!” she pressed her hands to her cheeks in mock surprise. “Maybe it's the girl who ran out before we could make that decision!”
Her partner scowled dangerously, the scar across her left eye enhancing the effect as it had since she'd gotten it. “I don't appreciate that tone of yours,” she told Starlight, tossing the magazine on her bed and walking across the room towards her. “Maybe it's time for me to finally ditch you.”
“Hah!” Starlight laughed. “Please, you need me just as much as I need you right now! So why don't you just back off so we can finally figure out our next stop.”
“You really like walking on thin ice with me, don't you Glimmer?” her partner said, shifting her weight into a more threatening stance, one that Starlight had seen her adopt just before lashing out.
Starlight called her bluff. “The same can be said of you,” she answered with a hand on her hip and more than a trace of haughtiness in her voice.
The two young women stared each other down for several moments before Starlight's partner finally spoke. “Fine,” she spat, not looking away. “But you owe me for this.”
“Fine with me,” Starlight replied, some tense part in the back of her mind unwinding a little. “Now, I know you aren't gonna like this, and I am kinda sorry for bringing this up to you again, but I really think it's time we headed to Canterlot. I have-”
“Agreed,” her partner replied, moving past Starlight in a beeline for the room's bath.
“-several good reasons as to why and what we'd get out of it,” Starlight continued, turning to follow her partner but remaining oblivious to her answer. “If you'll just hear me out this time, I can-” she paused and blinked in confusion- “wait, what?”
“I said I agree, Glimmer,” her partner replied testily, standing in the bathroom doorway with the harsh incandescent light making her extra-short red-and-yellow hair look almost fiery. “Or did you somehow become deaf when you were alone for ten hours?”
Starlight ignored the slight, too stupefied by her partner's answer. “Really? Why? We've been circling Canterlot for weeks because you've been so wishy-washy about going there!”
Her partner snorted and looked back at her. “What can I say? I finally found a good enough reason to go back to that dump.”
“Go 'back'? 'Reason'? What are you talking about?” Starlight asked, her voice raising as she grew more and more confused. “Why were you even avoiding Canterlot in the first place?”
Her partner's smirk fell, and she turned her back on Starlight yet again. “Don't bother asking. You wouldn't understand,” she said, slamming the bathroom door closed.
Starlight's gape of shock soon curled up into a frustrated scowl, and she stomped her foot and stormed away. “Fine, be that way,” she muttered under her breath, opening her bag and stuffing into it the back with her journal in it, as well as all the bits of sleazy motel 'finery', toiletries, and anything else in the room she felt she could get away with stealing.
When she zipped it up again, the magazine on her partner's bed caught her eye. She looked toward the bathroom just in time to hear the shower turn on, then hastily crept over to the bed and picked up the discarded thing. To her surprise it was the latest edition of the Manehattan Evening Gazette, the sort of tabloid trash she had always thought her partner looked down on. But even though she felt the same about the publication, she couldn't help but have her eyes drawn to the front page headline: 'NEW SUPERHEROES IN CANTERLOT?'
It was accompanied by a black-and-white photograph, or rather a pair of photographs cropped and put side-by-side. To Starlight's surprise they both looked completely realistic despite the subject matter; the left depicted a woman in what looked like a full spandex bodysuit, cape billowing as she leaped through the air between skyscrapers. The shadow of her ridiculously wide fedora made her eyes hard to make out, but there was definitely some kind of light-colored broach or clasp at her neck.
The photo on the right also showed a scowling young woman, this one about the same age as Starlight and her partner. But she had pointed ears sticking out of her multicolored hair at the top of her head, and more incredibly she seemed to be 'flying' over a busy street on some kind of sharp, crystalline wings (and with one arm outstretched in a classic superhero pose). She had a pin shaped like a storm cloud in her hair and lightning bolts on her dress, and with the crystal shoulder pads and the little wings on her boots she had something of an ancient goddess aesthetic about her. To top it off, she had what Starlight could only assume was a rainbow trailing about behind her.
Obviously both photos were fake, and reading the captions and article only cemented that fact in Starlight's mind. But her partner wouldn't have held on to it without a reason, and so Starlight's eyes narrowed as she continued to read and read trying to find something she'd missed. And as she did, she whispered to herself under her breath. “What are you planning, Sunset?”