A green skinned girl with a simple medium-length haircut stands hunched over behind a desk, supporting herself with both arms and holding her head with the palm of one of her hands, and doing nothing other than being bored out of her skull. A necklace with a red gem adorns her neck.
One can see by the large label on the front of the desk that this is both where one checks-out and an information desk. One would also be able to deduce from the shelves all over the store that are filled with almost nothing other than books that this is a bookstore of some sort.
Not that many people would actually walk in here without already knowing that.
One of the few patrons of the establishment, a high school aged young man who up until now had been browsing the store at random, walks up to the desk.
"Excuse me. Could you help me find a book?" he says.
"We don't have it."
"What?" asks the young man in confusion. "I haven't even told you what book it is yet."
"You've been in here for nearly an hour. Either we don't have it, or you're too stupid to find it, and either way, trying to help you would be pointless."
"What? I'm not stupid!"
"Well, then I trust you are smart enough to make this next deduction: we don't have it!"
The young man sputters, and then says, "I'm going to report you to your boss!"
"Go ahead, see what happens."
He doesn't answer, choosing to instead just give the girl a death glare, and then turns and walks toward the entrance.
After he has turned away, the girl allows herself a grin.
After a little while longer, a woman in a dress and carrying a purse walks through the entrance, ringing the bell that such places often have in their door.
She walks straight up to the girl's desk.
"Hello dear. I was hoping that you could help me find a book, please."
"I was hoping that I wouldn't be approached by another helpless moron. I guess we're both disappointed."
The woman blinks in surprise, and then quickly adopts a snarl.
"Excuse me?"
"I'm not your mom. Go find it yourself."
"I am taking my business elsewhere. You best shape up, young lady, or someone less nice than me is going to put you in the hospital."
The woman sharply turns back around and goes out the door from whence she came.
The girl smiles sinisterly and lightly touches her pendant.
A large muscular man walks in next, and approaches the desk, which he leans down on, earning him a glare.
"Can you tell me where the self-help books are?" he says lazily.
"Maybe. What loser character flaw are you trying to overcome?"
The man suddenly pounds his fists on the desk.
"I'm not a loser!"
"I think you're looking for a book called 'Seeing Yourself the Way Others See You'. It's over there."
The man takes his arms off the desk and makes an obscene gesture before walking out of the door.
Almost right after the man is gone, three more girls (the only customers left in the entire store) approach the desk.
"Oh, great, don't tell me that you three have a question for me too."
"Wow," one of them states, and the help desk girl lifts her head up to properly look at the girl speaking, and can't help but stare at her enormous orange hair that somehow doesn't collapse from it's own weight. "How are you still employed, talking to people like that?"
The help desk girl smiles. "Let's just say that my boss just can't resist the sound of my voice."
To her surprise, the other girl smiles back at her.
"I thought so. My name is Adagio Dazzle."
"I don't care."
Adagio takes a quick look around, ensuring that they are completely alone. Once she verifies that they are, she continues.
"You should care. We're sirens. And so are you. The pendant is a giveaway."
The help desk girl stands straight up for the first time in hours and looks Adagio in the eye.
"Let me guess, this is your territory and you want me to hit the road?"
"Not quite. Tell me, how long have you been here, in this world? Did you come from Equestria, or are there other worlds out there that connect to this dump?"
"Yes, I came from Equestria. And I've been here for about a month. And I know who you three are."
"Oh?" says Adagio, pleasantly surprise. "What exactly do you claim to know about us?"
"You're the three who went rampaging across the Equestrian mainland and got banished by some wizard."
Adagio's face of amusement changes to one of annoyance.
"Well, it's not like you did any better, clearly! Here you are!"
"I didn't go and draw attention to myself like you dummies did. I was a queen of my own island for centuries!"
"Ooooh! A whole island!" spits Adagio sarcastically.
"So what happened to you to land you in this world then if you were a queen?" asks one of the other girls in deadpan.
"That's Aria, by the way." says Adagio. "And this moron is Sonata. And I am curious about that myself, how did you get yourself banished? Couldn't have been the same guy as the one who banished us, we've been here since the dark ages, he has got to be dead by now."
"Oh, it sooo stupid," answers the girl. "Some all-powerful freak named Discord just suddenly showed up and ruined everything!"
All three of the other sirens winced.
"Ouch," says Adagio. "Okay, never mind, I don't blame you at all. But you're stuck here now, same as us, and I think we can help each other."
"I don't need your help. I don't like you."
Adagio lets out a laugh. "Oh, Aria, Sonata and I hate each other. But I'm sure you've noticed how hard it is to use our powers in this magically void hole."
The girl doesn't say anything, so Adagio continues.
"But we found out that if we put our voices together, we can create a negative atmosphere far easier than if we were just singing all by ourselves. You didn't even try to sing to those customers back there. It's because you knew it wouldn't work, wasn't it? I bet you just got lucky with your boss."
"You're asking me to join you just because I can make your song more powerful?"
"That is literally the only reason we keep this one around," says Aria, pointing a thumb at Sonata.
"I thought you kept me around because I make really yummy chocolate chip cookies," says Sonata in confusion.
After a moment, Adagio nods and says, "That too."
"And what are you all trying to do?" asks the girl.
"What do you mean?" asks Adagio, raising a brow.
"I mean that you must have a goal. What is it?"
"Well, if you're talking about fantasies here, I'd like to subjugate this whole world and have them bow before us, but we all know that that is unrealistic."
"Oh my gosh," says Aria. "There you go about dominating this world when it would be so much better to go back to a world where we actually have our magic back!"
"We tried looking for a way back for years, Aria. It's not going to happen."
"Well, I just want our lives to not suck."
"I don't really know what I want," says Sonata. "I just go along with whatever Adagio and Aria want. I guess I could use a new teddy bear."
"You ripped the head off of your last one, Sonata," Aria points out.
"Which is why I need a new one," Sonata points out, speaking as though it was obvious.
"I just want revenge," says the desk girl. "Revenge against the ones who put me here in the first place."
"We all wanted that for the first few years," Adagio says. "We got over it. But, if you do come with us and we ever figure out how to actually go back, we will help you get revenge, if that's still what you want."
"Alright. I'll do it."
"Perfect. What is your name?"
"Lady Lento Luxurious."
"Ugh" says Aria, facepalming. "That is sooo going to clash with our vibe."
"Don't words that end with an 'O' connotate masculinity in many languages?" asks Sonata. "Yours makes you sound like a dude."
"Sonata," says Adagio in annoyance, "My name is Adagio!"
"Yeah, but for some reason you make it work."
"That's right!" Adagio turns back to Lento. "We can worry about that later. First, we're going to do something about your hair. When we're done with you, you'll look almost as fabulous as I do."
"I don't have to quit the bookstore, do I? It's boring, but at least it's easy."
"Of course you should keep working here. This isn't a social club, Sonata would drive us all insane if we were forced to hang out all the time. You can do whatever you want most of the time, but you will have to carry your own weight. Oh, and just so you know, Sonata swiped some stupid children's' books, and Aria grabbed another blood and gore movie. We were going to sing to you if you happened to notice, but you don't care, so it really doesn't matter."