Anonymous
It’s dark in this alleyway, but you can make them out clearly: the three girls you have left to turn to. They look much more civilian without the fancy outfits. Like they could just be any three women, except for the eyes. The way they walk in perfect unison. The interruptions, repetitive conversations, smacks to the head.
It’s sublimated choreography.
One pointless slogging night the orange one, Dazzle, will grab your face and tell you the story of the world. Every war mongered, seduction cast, cult detonated. She’ll start to bubble with deep, operatic laughter at the whole thing, and then depart, and never mention it again. But here, now, you don’t even know that they’re from out of town.
They’re just the last place you have to go.
School was too painful for you, and if that makes you sound like a pussy, then so be it. You just weren’t able to deal with it the way other people did - you didn’t feel like you were going anywhere. No career plans, no friends, and only the constant ocean of worthless people. Your grades faltered, and you knew you were depressed, but... Well, how does knowing help, anyway?
Anyway. You don’t like to dwell on that. The world’s harsh to everyone in turn, but tonight’s the night things change for you.
”We noticed you dropped out of Canterlot High. Didn’t feel like a very stable situation?” Dazzle’s voice drips with humor only she seems to appreciate.
“Yeah. I got your note.” They’d slid it under the door of your house, so it’s not like you could’ve missed it. Just an address, and a job offer. “What are the terms?”
”Oh, nothing special. You arrange to investigate some things for us, accompany us, gather information. You’ll be our eyes and ears in places we can’t go easily.” You don’t know it now, but somehow this arrangement will involve letting them crash in your basement and raid your pantry. ”And in exchange, we’ll convince your family that you’re living a perfectly productive life. If you do a very good job, we’ll even work something out once we’ve regained our true power.”
They’ll end up true to their word, at least on the first point. Your family will feel proud of you, even if it’s all a lie. They won’t bother you like they used to, shouting to do this or that chore. You’ll realize almost perfect NEETdom.
But that’s not your only question.
”Next you’ll ask, ‘Why me?’” She pauses for your response like a showman.
“Well... yeah. Why me? I mean...” You look each of them in the eye. “What do I have to give you that any other student at CHS wouldn’t?”
Purple, Blaze, seems to be barely listening to anyone in this conversation. She’s just weighing you with her eyes, like she’s about to take your wallet. Dusk also stares at you, but differently; there’s no malice on her face. And her eyes, a different shade than the others. Even to your untrained senses, she feels like something different.
The other two aren’t a part of this world, but she adds to it. Hair like a flourishing blue penstroke, a kind of resting sweetness in her blue-raspberry complexion...
Dazzle speaks, and you’re drawn back to her. (Was her eyebrow always raised that high?) ”We need someone who isn’t a part of CHS. The Rainbooms rule the roost there, and anyone going there for hours every day is bound to wind up on their side. With you, we know that there’s no risk of being compromised.”
That makes sense, and she waits for you to accept. You debate it with yourself, and she keeps waiting, but eventually you latch onto the note of discord in her story.
“Why not get another dropout, then?”
She sighs, hands at her sides clutching at air. ”You’re the only one, okay?”
...You feel reassured by that truth. Their motivations are clear to you now, misfits seeking a misfit.
“Then I’ll do it.”
Dazzle smiles, though she still looks put-upon, and Blaze smirks to herself.
Dusk squees. ”I knew he’d want to help us out!”
And that, bookmarked forever in your life, is the first time you hear her voice.
Anonymous, later
The last couple of months haven’t been very productive. But they’ve been some of the best of your life. It’s like you took an off year before college, except to skulk around your hometown. You have the kind of face no one recognizes, and you’re naturally quiet, so you're not half bad at it, but unfortunately, none of the leads you turn up seem to go anywhere. It took you a while to even realize that they were looking for what was left of their pendants.
But now things are more complicated. The Friendship Games came and went, and there was a spike in local energy strong enough that they felt it. It was a crucial spark, turned into an ember now, not long afterwards.
People at Canterlot High have superpowers, en masse. There’s a whole “gridwork of intensely powerful Equestrian magic” within it. But... not anywhere else.
They held court over that in your basement, the three of them without you, and they decided they needed to make a move now or never.
Adagio’s standing next to you, singing and holding a note. Aria’s with her, singing a slightly different one. You’re stretched out on the couch, with Sonata over you. A test subject, making sure this isn’t lethal.
Sonata clasps your hands in hers and locks eyes with you. ”This might hurt, but don’t stop struggling.”
You swallow, and nod. Then she closes her eyes and starts singing too. The three notes converge, raise, fall. It’s not a song, more like an improvisation, just sounds. Are those dots of color in your eyes the ceiling light, or something else? You take shorter breaths.
And then, all of a sudden, your muscles stop working. The room opens up, and you see a swirling latticework of light hanging over you. Is it falling into you or rising out of you? The volume of their singing starts to increase, as if someone’s rhythmically punching a volume button.
With a snap, a beam of light stretches from some invisible horizon, to the structure, to you. It penetrates into your chest, and you spasm like you’re having a schoolbus bump dream. Sonata holds your hand tightly as something swims inside of you. And you gain the power of Stand.
Anonymous now, right now
You're hyperventilating. Your outpost’s been compromised. Three of ｢Nowhere Man｣’s ghosts were defeated, by the least likely burglars in history. You don’t even have valuable information about how their Stands work. Teleporting? Controlling electricity? Little panels that make things explode?
The thought of Adagio asking you these questions only makes you feel worse. Aria being angry at what you’d lost after all the work you did. And, and Nata. The look you’ll see in her eyes, when she finds out she’s back at square one. That you let her down. Your legs start to shake.
You raise your head and summon up your Stand. It swirls into existence between your palms - a large vase, almost like a canopic jar, with the swirl of a question mark for its head. Along the sides are spiraling lines of meaningless hieroglyphics.
You stare down at it. Why did it fail you? Why didn’t you have a Stand that could protect her?!
You hurl it across the room with both hands. It bounces into the floor, rebounds off it and smashes unsatisfyingly onto the couch.
After a while, the door opens. Arms wrap around your neck, and her head nuzzles next to yours. ”How’s things, Nonny?”
“...” When you don't say anything, she waits. She probably thinks you’re just being moody. Oh, Nata...
You keep your head bowed so she doesn’t see your expression, or the words you’re mouthing to yourself. After a minute, you take a wet breath, and tell her.
Trixie
This morning, when you wake up, you’re not alone in your room.
The hospital room's bland, but clean. You’ve been forced to stay here by your own sense of self-preservation, but now you’ve got a cast for your broken finger and you’ve healed up your sprain. It was time to leave a day or two ago, you could feel it. Magician’s intuition.
You really should’ve taken your own advice.
A familiar face is sitting at your bedside, reading a Harlequin Romance book. It doesn’t seem to be interesting her, and she shuts it as soon as you stir. Blue skin, white hair, Crystal Prep.
You sit up, stifling a yawn. “What do you want with Trixie?”
”Insurance. You’re not important any longer, but it would save time for us to get the information out of you.” She looks at you, anticipating another question. You stare back at her, not letting her see you scope the room from your periphery.
There are windows in this room, but they don’t lead anywhere because you’re not on the ground floor. There’s a small bathroom nearby, since you’re not completely bedridden, but of course it’s a dead end. The only exit’s the door, and she’s between it and you.
And there’s a chair between her and it. You create space between the chair and the floor.
”You’re not very smart if you think the same trick is going to work on me twice.” She leans to one side and gestures to the legs of the chair. They’re sticking into the floor, not even nailed in, like they were built in when the tile was laid! But that means Snails is here. And that means...
How deep does this betrayal go? The whole world could be out to get you, now.
”Where did you relocate the magical gem?”
No. No, you’re still in the clear. You’re just not safe here, in this building.
Thump! “Ow!”
She takes the book away from your head, eyes narrowing. ”I can see we’re going to have to do this the hard way.” She pulls out a cell-phone. Yours. On reflex, you try to use your power to separate it from her, but she’s holding it from too many sides.
”This is key for your plans, isn’t it?” She looks at you as she turns it over in her hands. ”You won’t be able to survive without this phone?”
Harumph. “No. I don’t need it to survive.”
”But you won’t be able to regain the gem without it.”
You don’t answer her. She inspects it carefully, switching it on and getting the password screen. Four numbers.
”Hm. Is the passcode ‘T-R-I-X’?” She checks your face, types it in, and it fails.
You snort. Like you’d be that narcissistic!
She puts an elbow on her knee and props her chin on her fist. ”...Is it ‘M-A-G-E’?”
What?! How could anyone know something like that?
On instinct, you deny it. “N-no!”
She smirks. ”Lying’s bad for you, you know. ｢Pavlov’s Daughter｣.”
A Stand appears in front of you, a small spinning disc with a giant mouth. It looks like a sand dollar, decorated with five small teeth. As soon as it appears, it dives through your skin, into your abdomen!
It’s painless, and you wonder if your organs are being shredded from the inside. Most of them don’t have nerves, after all. But you don’t start coughing up blood.
You wonder if her attack actually worked, or if she’s going to explain it, but she doesn’t need to. The feeling appears. The hunger, insatiable, for one thing in particular.
She holds it up. ”Tell me where the gem is, or my Stand will make you eat your cell-phone.”
The impossible craving tears into you. You pull against it. The metallic tang, the toughness against your teeth, the crunch of the final snap. Feeling it explode into a microcosm of circuitry before you swallow it, like technological spaghetti. You feel yourself salivating. And you realize what you need to do.
She sees the look in your eyes. ”It doesn’t really matter if you tell me. I won’t stop the effect until you tell me what I want to know, but even if you don’t, you’re eating this.”
There’s only one way out. This craving is driving you past sanity. You shiver with need, and understand it’s hopeless to resist this drive.
You’ll just have to go with it! You’ll just have to bust through!
You sit up further on the bed, poise, and throw yourself towards her. She flinches, and then balks at you as you go sailing over her.
“｢Abracadabra｣!” You create space between the edges and insides of her pockets. A wallet falls out of one, IDs scattering onto the floor. Another spits out lipstick. But there, there! You create distance between it and the floor.
It soars into your hand as you tumble to the floor behind her chair. Blue, compact, flip, but it still matches the description! A cell-phone! While she’s spinning to get out of the chair, looking around at the mess, you shove it into your mouth.
It is so intensely satisfying. From the bottom of your being, you feel refreshed.
And as soon as it appeared, your craving vanishes. Her mouth’s open.
You throw a punch at her jaw, and she recoils. By how she falls, you realize she’s probably never been in a fight before. Wordlessly, you pry your phone from her hand.
Then you pivot her, shoving her into the bathroom. Your Stand keeps a good distance between her and the doorway.
”You still aren’t going to get your hands on the stone, Trixie! You don’t have-” You drown her out. With your new reprieve, you scoop up the wallet and flip through it. Mostly gift cards, and no basic cash. Does this girl never use vending machines?
You find a driver’s license tucked behind a random gift card. ’Sugarcoat’, huh? She sounds familiar. Was she in the Battle of the Bands…?
You put it back and resolve to figure it out later. Now, where’s…? Ah, still in the far corner! You locate your primly folded belongings and change out of the hospital gown. In the bathroom, Sugarcoat’s gone silent. Let her sulk.
“I’ll tell you this, Sugarcoat.” You don’t know if she’s listening or not, but you speak to the door anyway. “Your whole gang of thugs hasn’t stopped the Awe-Inspiring Trixie yet.”
This time, the silence feels sullen. When you leave, you throw the door open and stride out confidently. It’s visiting hours, but early. The hallway’s lined with empty chairs and musty cushions instead of people, but like clockwork, there they are. The inseparable duo, Snips and Snails.
They look surprised to see you walking out, like everyone else who’s blocked your path. But they scramble quickly to their feet. Snips activates his Stand first, and you feel it in the sudden lurch in your step.
There’s a pounding in your head, like it’s been hand-dipped in static. Yes, ｢Run DMC｣ has definitely been activated. Snails, for his part, grabs something from a small end-table nearby and runs for you.
You helped him learn his power’s usefulness in close-range combat - the ability to ｢insert｣ things. The key, you know, is not to give him the opening.
You rush straight ahead. He tries to get closer to you, but you create distance between the two of you, widening the gap diagonally even as you strafe past him. Once you’re past him, you can punt Snips out of the way and get the hell out of Dodge!
Snails’ voice cuts through your determination. ”｢Busdriver｣!”
What? You turn your head to make sure he’s not close enough to strike you. But he’s not, he’s using his Stand to throw the object in his hand, a pen!
The space you’re already maintaining is starting to get to you, and it connects. Stabbing through the arm of your blouse, straight through, missing your skin but piercing the other side. The momentum staggers you, and then it jams itself into the wall behind you.
You lean awkwardly, scrambling to get your feet under you without hitting your ankle on a chair. Then he walks back the way you came, with a sense of purpose. You try reaching over to rip out the pen, but it hasn’t made a hole, it’s just lodged into your shirt and the wall. He learned to use his power at a distance?!
That shocks you, but you’ll still be alright. All you need to do is snap the pen-- Your head fills with more of the pounding as Snips draws closer. You can barely hear yourself think!
Trying not to panic, you work on snapping the pen. If you can snap the pen, you can still escape!
Then you see Snails grab something from outside of your room door. A full on crowbar, laid against the lip of the doorframe. He hefts it in one hand and carries it back toward you. He’s going to pin you to this wall even further!
Snips talks, grinning. ”Where’d ya hide it, Trix?”
You look at him, and realize you’re sweating.
”You’ll save us some trouble if you spill it.”
”That’s right.” The voice comes from down the hallway, where you came. Sugarcoat stands outside of your door, arms crossed.
You’ve almost got the pen, if only so much of it wasn’t already in! The Great and Powerful Trixie won’t be treated like part of a butterfly collection!
Snails raises the weapon and steps closer. You try to gather your power, but you need a few more seconds to let the space you’ve made dissipate. You throw a punch for him, and he grabs your fist, holding you in place.
”Sorry, Trixie. ｢Busdriver｣!” And like a shot, it goes into your leg, out the other side.
You kick your leg towards him, and the ghostly bar keeps going forward. The intangible surface passes through you, until your leg's too far forward to be pinned. He dodges your kick by stepping back, but the crowbar moves back with him. It settles into place on your leg, solidifying, without touching the wall!
With one mighty crack, you snap the end of the pen. An inky wound splutters onto the wall, and you take your opportunity. A blast of your power and Snails is back down the hallway, closer to Sugarcoat than you.
Next, the other threat. You spin to Snips, sweeping the leg. He sees it coming; you taught it to him, and how to get around it. Naturally, he jumps over your leg.
But he doesn’t land.
“｢Abracadabra｣!” You shout, increasing the distance between him and the floor at a constant rate. While he’s in freefall, you get in one solid punch to his face. He spins like a plane going down as you throw him out of the column of distance. Then he hits the floor on his back, and the ill feeling leaves you.
You run into the nearest elevator, down, and then walking casually into the nearest empty room. Opening the window a crack, and then making enough space to jump through. You close it behind you, land on sterile manicured grass, and get out of sight of the windows.
Then you take a deep breath and get as far away from the building as you can.
It’s many blocks before you finally stop, leaning back over the sidewalk, and think. You can’t go to the park, because someone’s bound to be watching it. Of course, there is a way to get the stone out without going there at all...
It’s funny, but your hope lies with the person you know the least. Wiz Kid. Or, you guess, Care Root.
It takes a minute for your phone to burst to life. A minute’s scrolling and you find some of the pictures you took in the Principal’s office. There was a file drawer that was positively lousy with copies of personal records. Lunch gave you a little more time than the mad dash you’d planned, so you’d found his.
It didn’t have any juicy information in it. In fact, he was as academically squeaky-clean as they come, no shocker. Probably one of those kids who frets over earning Bs. But sure enough, it had an address on it. You throw it into a GPS app and get to walking.
After a while, having a crowbar integrated into your leg starts to itch, and then to burn.You vomit up the phone after a while, and spit out some blood after that. Price of victory.
Only two things bother you now, after it all. Snips and Snails were the first recruits to your little brigade, and, by far, the easiest to convince. You knew they’d turned against you when they didn’t answer your messages, and started snooping for you after you retrieved the stone. You thought the Rainbooms had sunk their hands in.
But now, these other girls... Surely they’re not CHS students. How far do Twilight’s connections go?!
And, also… How did Sugarcoat know the right passcode to your phone? Was it a part of her Stand ability, or some other source of information? You used “MAGE” as your password everywhere you could get away with it, but you never wrote it down publicly, and you never told anyone about it. Could someone have stolen that information from you?
Care
Trixie finishes her story, and looks at you expectantly. You sat down halfway through, and now you’ve leaned forward, processing. It’s some story, alright - and a true one, you can tell.
You thought that the two kids at the mall were after Derpy, but they must have known that Trixie was coming to meet with you. And where you would be.
That’s concerning. Has someone bugged her phone, or yours?
You tuck that question away for a moment and finally start talking. “What made it so important to get to me?”
Trixie, whose face has run a gamut of emotions throughout her storytelling, switches to intent. ”Your partner.”
“Derpy?”
She nods, sharply. ”With her Stand, she can retrieve the stone. And given how dangerous it is to hold onto, surely she wouldn’t object to returning it to Trixie.”
“What are you going to do then?”
She pauses, abstract, and you give her time. ”I’m going to get to the heart of this. I’m going to stop all of these Stand users and take Twilight on myself.”
She’s still on Twilight. Why does she think that the new girl is so important? You sense there’s a rant there that’s best avoided, but even if she’s crazy in that area... She’s been through a lot in the last few days. She’s living on the run now, and she’s held her own against a mess of Stand users.
The good thing about your Stand is that you can accept bad things will happen to you. Accept, and prepare for them.
“I’ll make you an offer. Like you did with me,” you say. She leans in, back to intent, and you focus on choosing your words. “Bad things have been happening around me. For a while I thought it might just be my Stand, but I realized it couldn’t be. Not all of it, at least.”
You take a breath.
“Everyone wants me on their side in this battle, and they’re going to keep coming after me until I pick a side. And then they’re going to come after me for not being on their side.” You haven’t said this out loud yet, it’s your last chance to stop the intention from crystallizing - but you go on: “So… I’m not playing their game.”
You hold out an empty hand to her. “I’ll do my best to fix your wound, and help get the stone away from everyone else, but only if you agree to help me get to the bottom of all this after you have it.”
She stares at you. ”You want Trixie to… join your side?”
You shrug and nod. Then you notice the tears in her eyes.
Her hand thundercracks into yours, and she shakes it hard enough to pop a couple joints. ”Trixie accepts!”
You’ve made an important ally. Tomorrow, you’ll have to track down Twilight and talk to her. Maybe it’ll be as easy as that.
Except... You just realized, today’s Friday. You’ll have to do that after the weekend. In the short term, tomorrow, you’ll at least be able to help out her leg.
The night ends with her still on your couch, pain meds nearby. You wander into your room, past the empty sprawl of the rest of your house, and collapse.
Anonymous
You've finished talking, and now you're just on the sofa with her. You feel so undignified.
”Nonny, you couldn’t have expected that. And seeing it makes you ready for bigger surprises later on!”
“That’s not what Aria’s gonna say.”
”Is she being mean to you?”
A little, but neither of you can help it. “No, it’s just true.” In your mind, her expression of shock has been frozen still forever. The look she made when you told her that they’d taken one of her shards. The realization of a step backward, like a knife. A month’s work diminished...
”If you know who took it, you can find them. They’ll probably have more!”
That makes you raise your head. ...Huh. You meet her bright, violet eyes.
Gently but insistently, she pushes ｢Nowhere Man｣ into your hands. ”You haven’t lost yet, Nonny. I believe in you.”
She’s right. You concentrate, and three more ghosts spring from the jar. Like nothing!
You’ve suffered a loss, but Sonata’s right, you don’t feel dead over it. There’s a spark in your soul that refuses to go out, and it's the desire to hear her sing! And if a pair of CHS brats want to stand between that and you, you'll take them. Them, their Stands, and whoever else they want to bring to the party!
｢To Be Continued｣
Stand: ｢Pavlov's Daughter｣
User: Sugarcoat
Ability: Inflicts an incredibly strong variant of pica, with a non-food craving of the user’s choice, on any target who tells a lie within range.
Stand: ｢Run DMC｣
User: Snips
Ability: Broadcasts noise within range at any frequency outside of human hearing.
Stand: ｢Busdriver｣
User: Snails
Ability: “Inserts” objects into solid surfaces.