//------------------------------//
// Sky Factory 05: No Bed, No Problem 
// Story: The Many Destinies of Sunset Shimmer 
// by ratedoni 
//------------------------------//

Usually, sleeping was never a big deal to Sunset, she just went back to bed every night and felt asleep, with only a handful of those times having a dream, or at least one that she could remember next morning. Yes, there was a time when Sunset had some troubles getting to sleep, but that was due to how lumpy and hard her bed was when she arrived at the human world. Since the fight against Twilight Sparkle for the crown things became a little better for the teenager since she was in a better mental state and even had time to work a little while. That mixed with a stipend she had from Equestria -apparently she was still listed as a countess back home- mean that now Sunset never had to go hungry nor she will have problems with thing like beds again. Sadly this time she didn’t even have a bed and her jacket was a poor substitute for a pillow.

Sighing once more, Sunset tried to adjust her body, but it was naught because the hard wood floor underneath her was not exactly the best thing when it came to comfort. Knowing that it was in vein, the redhead turned to her side and looked at the only other person that accompanied her in this weird little island in the middle of a void.

Twilight Sparkle, the human version at least, had taken her glasses off and was trying to use her hands as a pillow with them tucked beneath her head, but Sunset knew that she was not sleeping by all the twitching and shuffling the young girl did.

It was weird experience to spend so much time with a girl that was at the same time familiar and not, but it was a fun experience except for the whole ‘surviving’ thing. The got to know each other little by little and, really, the experience of being in an alternate dimension wasn’t so bad considering the two were experimenting with things no one before had seen. It was like a strange dream come true situation.

“Can’t sleep?” the other teen trapped alongside Sunset left any pretense of sleeping once she heard her companion speak. Her eyes seemed tired, but more than, it was the look of someone that had too many things in their head. Sunset had seen that look many times in the mirror, back in Equestria or in the human world whenever she found some new technology or theorem that she could get her hands on. It was probably the reason she felt so close to Twilight after the day they had spent in the floating island.

At the beginning it was the way she looked that made Sunset and the rest of the students in Canterlot High think of her as only the human version of Princess Twilight Sparkle, but inside she was her own person with similarities sure, but they were so different. Sure, one used glasses, but it went beyond that. It was clear that Twilight was more reckless in her studies, but she had a true desire to learn and not only know, but to use that knowledge, to become acquainted with it until it was completely understood and mastered.

The day they spend turning saplings into trees and making the island more habitable by creating enough space for them to walk around without fear of falling into the void was not exactly the most fruitful one they had ever had, but it helped Twilight and Sunset bond a little bit. Most of their life still remained a mystery for each other, but at least they had grown used to the presence of the other. They still had to learn everything about this new environment, but it was a start.

“Not really, there is so many things to do, so many things to learn in this world, how can I get my brain to relax when there is still so many things that we have to do to make this place livable, let alone to go back home?”

“Yeah, I know how you feel… is like when you get a new topic in school that you haven’t checked before and you spend all weekend reading about it and experiment,” Sunset smiled a bit at the memory of doing that when she got her first computer. Well, get is a little stretch since the rather outdated IBM she found one day stored in Canterlot High. The motherboard was toast, but with some work, Sunset Shimmer had found herself the proud owner of a piece of human history. Later on, once she had been brought back into light… or rainbow… she had learned all about the little abandoned IBM AT. It was a relic at the human world already, but just starting from it allowed her to learn everything she knew about computers.

“Exactly,” Twilight said with her eyes completely open, surprised that Sunset understood her like that, even talking about something Twilight herself had done multiple times “no wonder you went toe to toe with me in the first event.”

“Nah, it wasn’t even close, I was too worried about the random flashes of magic to put attention to the question, you had it in the bag from the beginning,” looking at the downcast look in Twilight she quickly realized what was happening “no, none of that, we already talked about this, it was in no way your fault, magic tends to have those effects in people that are not accustomed with it.”

“It is still my fault we are in this place.”

“Don’t think like that; just think of it like… a learning experience.”

“Yeah, and I just learned that it is basically impossible to fall asleep on top of wood,” the Crystal prep student continued their chat already getting out of her funk. Both teenagers finally gave up on sleeping and simply looked up into the alien sky.

“Yeah, not sure how Japanese people can sleep like this.”

“Well, technically it is not the same; it is made out of rice straw, I think so, never really put much attention into sociology.”

“Well, whatever the case, I hope we can get something else in this world, like beds. Guess that’s going to be the priority next morning. What do you think of the plan?”

“I suppose it could work, but I still have no idea how to go on this, never been much of a fan of camping or anything that had to do with it, no matter how much my brother loved camping.”

 “What about doing research on site? Biology and botany?”

“I could learn all of that in my own laboratory.”

“But that’s boring, I mean, where’s the fun in reading about something like that in a book when you can learn all about it by doing and observing?” And the conversation went on and on as both teenagers spent a full night just talking science. Let’s leave those two eggheads alone for now, shall we?