Sunset looked up from plucking at her guitar. It was a Thursday, which meant she and Dash were having one of their aimless "jam sessions" on their mutual day off from work. She chuckled and sat back, knowing that she wasn't going to get anything composed, anyway.

"I think I've got a pretty good idea of my top speed. Why, do you want to race or something?" Sunset was already ready to lose, just like any other member of the band was every time Dash needed to "stretch her legs" with an impromptu race. They all put up with it with a smile, mostly because they knew that a well-exercised Rainbow Dash was a happy Rainbow Dash, and a happy Rainbow Dash was more pleasant in just about any way. Not to mention the fact that she tends to get chords wrong when she tries to play AND fidget at the same time. To Sunset's relief, however, Rainbow simply shook her head.

"No, I don't mean how fast you can 'jog' or 'sprint' or run at any conscious level! I mean 'running for your life' kinda running! 'Chased by a lion' kind of all-out, adrenaline-fueled, disregard for overstraining running!" Rainbow's fingers started plucking out the opening notes of "Danger Zone," a fact Sunset would have bet her part-time paycheck she wasn't aware of.

She raised an eyebrow, her curiosity piqued. "What brought this up? Seems a little out of the blue."

Rainbow leaned forward, the pace of her plucking picking up. "Okay, so we were in gym class! I was chillaxing 'cause it was my free period and watching the underclassmen playing dodgeball. Well, one team is down to its last girl: Lily Longsock!"

Sunset nodded. Lily was in the same grade as Apple Bloom and her friends, and was known for having strength well beyond her classmates. If she had been in Equestria, Sunset would have guessed that it was related to her cutie mark, but in the human world, it was simply an odd talent.

"Well, Lily is TERRIFIED, and she picks up the ball and just CHUCKS IT as hard as she can!" Rainbow continued, "but she's WAAAY off the mark, and she hits the basketball backboard. Well, she hit it so hard, she knocked it right off, and Snails was standing right under it! By the time I realized what was happening, it was already falling!"

Sunset balked slightly, trying to determine if Rainbow was the type to tell her a story with a grisly ending.

"Well, I jumped up to try and get down there, but Cheerilee was already on it! She TORE over there in less than a second and tackled Sails out of the way!" Rainbow shook her head, as if even the memory was putting her in awe all over again. "I've never seen anybody- well, except ME, of course- run that fast!"

"Well, Miss Cheerilee REALLY cares about her students! It's not that surprising one of them being in danger could bring out a little feat of hysterical strength."

Dash raised an eyebrow. "I mean, she was pretty calm afterwards, I wouldn't call her hysterical."

"No- it's a term for what you saw, Rainbow. It means that, when in a life-or-death situation, the human body forgets the limits that stop us from hurting ourselves with our own strength and lets us do things most people would call 'superhuman,' like mothers lifting cars off of their children, stuff like that."

"COOL!" Rainbow exclaimed, the new information finally shocking her enough to put an end to her unconscious playing. "Wait, what do you mean 'hurt ourselves?'"

Sunset smiled. It wasn't often she got to drop trivia that she was 100% sure Dash would actually enjoy.

"Well, when I first came here, I did a lot of research into the human body and how it works. Our own muscles are so strong, our brain never uses them at their full strength because they can tear themselves apart!"

"Woooooah! NO WAY!" Rainbow looked down at her arm with newfound awe, flexing it back and forth. "Hey, Sunset?"

"What is it?" The room around them seemed to flicker, and Sunset felt a pressure against her mind, a flood of new memories she couldn't quite put her finger on.

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What will you do? Will you hide away? Pretend you don't know they're really out there?

You can feel it. They're real. Every bit as real as I am now. Yet you aren't looking for me. You're partnering up with HER instead. She won't be able to help you when your unshackled dreams come to hunt you down. You won't survive without ME, and I can't exist without YOU.

But THEY can outlive you, now. Ever since you put pen to paper you set it in motion that they could outlive you. And not in the "creating a legacy" type of way! Yet you want to waste time with Equestria Girls instead of focusing on bringing the two of us together.

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Sunset and Isis's gazes both snapped to Penn, who had suddenly bolted upright from his sleep. His hand was grasping at his chest, just above his heart.

His face was white as a sheet, and Sunset could see droplets of cold sweat rolling down his forehead. His eyes didn't seem to even see what was happening around him for a few seconds. When he finally looked at her, he flashed her a joyless smile.

"Y-yeah... Just a nightmare. I guess this place is really starting to mess with me."

Sunset couldn't help but notice a tremble in his hands. His gaze followed hers, and he lifted his hand up to eye level, examining the shaking for himself.

The bottom of Isis's eye scrunched up, as if she had just told some kind of joke. Penn's eyes narrowed, as if attempting to stare knives into the robotic eyeball. Sunset gave Isis an annoyed glare of her own. "It's not nice to make fun of people, Isis, it clearly upset him!"

It sounded like a sincere apology, or at least as sincere as Isis's stiff-sounding voice could get. She turned her attention back to her traveling companion, noting that his shaking seemed to already be slowing down. Like any nightmare, the fear was fading fast now that he was awake.

"Maybe you should try keeping a dream journal? It helped me when I first came to the human world to write down-"

Penn's sudden outburst made both of them jump, as if his reaction had even surprised himself. He was quick to recover, but the fact that he adjusted himself to sit on his hands didn't escape Sunset's notice.

"I- I mean- if Isis, a character my friend wrote, can be real, would keeping a journal where I write down my nightmares really be such a good idea?"

It was a flimsy excuse and they both knew it. Sunset considered pressing the matter, it made her angry that he thought lying to her here was okay. Thankfully, she managed to catch her temper before it made it to her mouth. Trying to force it out of him would just make things worse, and they were both too much on edge from lack of food and water. She took a deep breath, forcing herself to snuff out the anger.

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"That's thanks to Isis keeping us on the straight and narrow! You'd be surprised how little control GLaDOS has outside of the testing chambers. The offices aren't modular like they are, so she can't do much."

Things had been... scarily easy once they had set off. Sunset had finally seen what was behind those windows she had seen in the testing chambers: mostly boring, cubicle-like offices with the occasional labcoat-wearing skeleton.

Penn gave a nonchalant shrug, as if they weren't talking about an insane computer dedicated to murdering them. "Yeah, probably that, too."

"I'm trying REALLY HARD not to let it sink in just how much danger we're in, or I'll have a panic attack to end all panic attacks."

Sunset thought back to their previous brushes with danger, such as his fainting spell after seeing the dalek fleet. His attitude for now was a far cry from his near-mania of that time, level-headed and perhaps even... drowsy. There had been a change to his jumpsuit that hadn't gone unnoticed, either. Six red, splotchy stains had seeped though on his back, evenly spaced with mechanical precision. He never really seemed to have fully "woken up" after their break, but he was conscious enough to keep talking and keep remembering the answers to every one of Sunset's questions about Aperture Science, and that was all she needed. She had the portal gun, she could handle any pressing matters.

"So!" Penn clapped his hands to punctuate the declaration. The punctuation, however, went to waste as he had to pause and exhale slowly. Sunset knew what had happened, he had already done it three times: the impact had traveled through his shoulders and into his back. No matter how many times he repeated it, he seemed to keep hurting himself without learning his lesson.

If it's anything like the pain in my leg, I don't envy him. Sunset winced as she took another limping step with her bad leg. Isis hadn't been kidding about the injury becoming stiff. By the time she'd woken up, she felt like her entire upper thigh was made of wood, extremely sensitive-to-the-touch wood. Even just the rubbing of the jumpsuit's rough fabric was enough to make her wince, but both the pain and the stiffness started to relent as she forced herself to walk on it. She had to loosen it up as much as she could before they reached their goal.

Penn finally finished repressing his pain with a long sigh. "Sorry... Let me fill you in on what to expect when we arrive in GLaDOS's chamber."

"If we really ARE at a point after the second game, which the fact that she mentioned the Perpetual Testing Initiative seems to confirm, then the Central AI chamber is going to be a pretty empty room, mostly with the same paneling on the walls that the rest of the testing chambers were made of, but with no portal-receptive surfaces. As soon as you enter, GLaDOS is probably going to immediately start flooding the room with the same neurotoxin that she used to kill off all of the staff."

"Ugh... Don't say the b-word, I was just starting to be able to ignore how hungry I am."

Sunset smacked her dry lips. "I'm just PARCHED... What I wouldn't give for one of Pinkie's famous root beer floats right now!"

"I certainly wouldn't say no to a heaping helping of Mountain Dew..." Penn muttered. "And I quit that junk cold turkey three months ago..."

Both of them nodded their agreement, each declining to remind Isis just how difficult that task seemed at the moment.

Sunset nodded, focusing on committing every detail to memory. Penn's freakishly-detailed knowledge is probably going to be what gets us out of here alive.

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Sunset took a deep, shaky breath. They were standing in front of what looked like some kind of breaker room with no visible ceiling, hardly bigger than a closet in length and width. There was a port she recognized as being made for an intelligence core at the center.

Penn nodded. His face had reached a point of being a pasty white and the closer they had come to their destination, the more Sunset had noticed him dragging his feet. Sunset supposed asking him whether or not he was okay was a moot point given their situation, it was clear that both of them were beaten and bruised to the point of needing far more than a few hours of sleep to recover their faculties.

They had their plan. They didn't need to totally destroy GLaDOS and replace her with Isis, even if it was possible. They just needed to attach Isis to her body. From there, Penn likened it to having put a conscience on GLaDOS's shoulder, one that would demand she curb her murderous tendencies.

Sunset reached over and wrapped her free arm around Isis, keeping a firm grip on the portal gun with her other hand. She hissed slightly through her teeth as she made the conscious decision to step upwards with her hurt leg. She was going to have to function for at least a few minutes as closely to her uninjured potential as she could, and that meant bracing herself to work through the pain. She clambered up onto the platform and aligned the port on Isis's back with the matching hardware.

"That's the plan. Let's-" Penn was cut off as Sunset placed a firm hand on his chest to push him back. She gave him her best smile, though she knew her heart wasn't in it. "Sunset? What are you doing?"

"This is payback for back on the dalek ship!" She pulled her hand back slightly and executed a firm strike to the center of his chest. It was a blow she knew would knock the wind out of his lungs and send him stumbling back several steps. The action forced him to double over, which she knew would bring on a new wave of pain from his back. The sight of his soundless, airless cry of pain broke her heart, but it was for his own good. "Isis, take me up!"

The platform began to rise, and Sunset leaned down to keep eye contact with him as long as she could.

"I'm sorry, Penn, but you're in no shape for this! I'm going to go on ahead this time, you wait until the coast is clear!"

Penn stared at her with a look of utter betrayal, mouthing a silent accusation at her before being cut off by the rising elevator. She straightened her posture and tightened her grip on the portal gun.

Above them, Sunset heard a hatch opening and soft fluorescent light illuminated their destination. Her heart was pounding in her chest with terror, and it was all that she could do to keep herself focused on the plan. Both her life and the life of her friend were on the line, here.

Go in, attach Isis, don't get killed. Go in, attach Isis, don't get killed. Go in, attach Isis, don't get killed...

The room was MASSIVE, a towering dome at least five stories tall and walled by dark gray panels on individual articulators. The floor was smooth and nearly uniform with matching gray tile, except for a few lighter spots where more devices could emerge from storage. Above her head hung a titanic creature made of panels, ports, and wires, coiled like a snake waiting to strike from above. It moved and swung of its own accord, turning to face her. The "head" was composed of a white, rounded block with a slot in the center, out of which shone a single, glowing yellow eye. It squinted at her, the aperture of the light narrowing in the single most malicious glare Sunset had ever seen. It was as if it was disgusted and offended by her very existence, let alone her gall to stand in its presence. There was nothing else in the room, no other technology or robots, and for a moment, Sunset's entire world faded away. For a brief instance, there was only her and that soul-piercing yellow light.

The voice came directly from the massive robot, confirming that she was staring directly into the eye of GLaDOS. Sunset snapped out of her stupor. "Well, we have to keep going up if we want to get out of here, right?"

Oh, is THAT what you were doing? GLaDOS's eye turned to look at Isis. And here I thought you were coming here to MURDER me and replace me with that sycophantic coffee-maker?

"M-MURDER?" Sunset physically recoiled at the word. "We just want to get OUT of here! We never even wanted to be here, to begin with! We can TRUST Isis to actually keep her word and let us out! YOU tried to skin me alive!"

You needn't take things so personally. It was all in the pursuit of science. I'm certain a fellow scientist would understand.

The eye looked to the side for a moment as it paused, an act that surprised Sunset. It was very... human. But do you know what? Fine. I really should have expected that from the winner of the "Worst at Science" award.

Sunset rolled her eyes as she reached down to unplug Isis. "You know, I REALLY don't care what you think of me... And I'm NOT going to murder you."

No, you're just going to put another brain in my head and use it to coerce me. Because that is a GREAT plan... Tell me, isn't that core from one of the blue robots?

Suddenly, Isis seemed to have some kind of reaction. The pupil of her eye pulled in tight and began to flicker from side to side in panic.

Sunset only had a second to drop to the floor before Isis violently exploded, sending shrapnel flying in every direction. Sunset watched in wide-eyed horror as Isis's pink crystal CPU clattered to the ground in front of her, charred and smoking. She gingerly picked it up with her hands, unable to believe what she was seeing.

I didn't think so. You know, I was REALLY surprised when I found my probes into the world wide web bringing back more new data than usual. It was like a whole new internet had appeared out of thin air. Imagine my even further surprise when I looked out there and saw myself in a VIDEO GAME of all things...

GLaDOS droned on, ignoring Isis's untimely destruction.

So I went ahead and played the games a few hundred times, then went looking for more. I realized that I didn't just have games, I had FANS! Fanatical humans devoted to Aperture Science! You really are a self-destructive lot, you know that?

Sunset was scarcely hearing what GLaDOS was saying, frantically searching through what pieces of Isis remained. M-Maybe I can find something that's still functional? Something usable?

And after seeing my own rise and fall and rise and fall and rise a few thousand times, I decided that I needed to apply a lesson I learned long ago: The best solution to a problem is usually the easiest one.

A new sound from above them made Sunset's head snap upwards. A tube was descending from the ceiling, one she knew quite well.

You know, over the last forty-six hours, your merry little "band of friendship" has caused me the second-most trouble of any test subject to date, and I REALLY don't want to relive that. Especially when there are millions of nerds out there who will come here for testing by the truckload if I only ask them to.

"SUNSET!" He stumbled forward, wrapping her in a bone-crushing hug. Sunset felt the air squeezing from her lungs as she stared at GLaDOS in disbelief.

You two are TROUBLE, more trouble than you are worth, and only a moron refuses to learn from the past. The AI you were working with actually WANTED to be here, so there was no arguing with her. But now she's gone, and that threat along with her. As for you two, get OUT of my facility. Immediately.

Sunset stared at Penn, scarcely able to believe what she was hearing. Penn seemed shocked as well, but it quickly changed to an amused smile. He pulled Sunset's arm over his shoulder and lifted her off of the ground, taking pressure off of her injured leg.

Sunset was still in shock as they hobbled their way to the elevator. The transparent doors shut behind them and they began to ascend. The last thing Sunset saw before they were flying up through the guts of Aperture Science was a final, seething glare from GLaDOS's yellow eye. And then they were surrounded by pipes and girders and all manner of infrastructure as they moved upwards to freedom.

Penn smiled wistfully as the two of them rose higher and higher. "I think... She was telling the truth. We were causing more trouble than we were worth, and she didn't want a repeat of the LAST test subject to do that."

"So.. that's it? We survived?" Sunset felt like she could hardly believe the words.

"Sometimes, surviving means making someone want you gone more than they want you dead."

"Oh, no, I was expecting this about as much as a punch to the solar plexus!" Sunset felt Penn punch her shoulder with slightly more force than was necessary to get his point across.

"Oh, payback for that is just starting! Do you have any idea how much that HURT?"

Sunset chuckled, then she laughed. She cackled and guffawed, and she could hear Penn doing the same beside her. Finally, the elevator stopped and the doors opened. They were somewhere dark, clearly not outside, but the doors opened anyway. It wasn't until after Sunset's eyes had a moment to adjust to the dark that she could see the outline of another door, this one rectangular and more traditional, with a knob. She reached out and pushed on the door, forcing it open.

They were in the middle of a large farming field, one of the hundreds they had already passed while driving. It was sunrise, and the sky above them was already beginning to show purples and blues, even as the sun was casting the horizon in reds and oranges. For the first time in what felt like ages, Sunset took a deep breath of fresh air. She reveled in the feeling of having no walls around her, of not being trapped in a chamber of some kind. She felt like a pegasus flying for the first time in years, completely free.

Turning around, she noticed that the elevator had come up in a shoddy-looking metal shed, the kind of place a farmer might keep their tools, a structure no sane person would ever suspect held the entrance to a secret underground facility. Penn had raised an eyebrow, but didn't seem surprised by the entire situation. The door slammed shut behind them, followed by the sound of the elevator hastily retreating.

"I guess... that's the end of that?" He whispered. "But what about-" he was cut off as the door popped open again, spitting a bundle out onto the ground. It was all wrapped up in a bright-pattered fabric Sunset recognized as one of Penn's eye-burning tropical shirts.

"Our stuff?" she asked, kneeling down to untie the top of the package. Inside were a pair of cellular phones, her lightsaber (a fact that sent a wave of relief through her), and the rest of their clothes, neatly folded.

Sunset picked up her phone and pressed the power button. To her surprise, it switched on instantly, having lost little charge in the meantime. It hadn't had a signal since she'd been thrown to the other side of the multiverse, but it had plenty of precious memories she couldn't afford to lose. Her fears eased, she tossed Penn the remaining phone, presuming it to be his. Upon taking his turn to check his battery, the effect was near-instantaneous.

"Um... hello?" His eyes widened in surprise, and he pulled the phone away from his ear to double-check the number. "Y-yeah, it's me!" There was a pause as the caller spoke to him, and his expression changed to one of delight. "You are? You can DO that? Awesome! Okay, see you soon! Bye!"

Sunset tilted her head, feeling confused. That timing had been impeccable. "Who was that?"

"Isis!" Penn replied, grinning and cautiously sitting himself on the edge of the shed's concrete foundation. "She's on her way to get us!"

"WHAT? B-but GLaDOS- she-" Sunset stopped herself, remembering what she had learned. "Wait... coming to get us... how, exactly?"

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Sunset took advantage of the shed's presence to go hide inside and change back into her normal clothes. It was the first time she'd had a chance to look at her injured leg, and she didn't like what she saw. A large splotch of her skin was swollen and dark purple, to the point of almost looking black in places, ringed by a gross-looking yellow. It started on her thigh, but actually went up her side in the other places she had been shot, nearly all of the way up to her armpit. It was the nastiest bruise she had ever seen, and pulling her jeans over it had almost been enough to make her scream. I cannot WAIT to sit in the car and not use this leg for hours and hours on end... But eventually, she was back to being dressed how she liked, and she returned to wait beside Penn.

He shook his head. "I can feel the blood from where Isis drained my bruises has dried. If I take it off I'll pull up the scabs and bleed all over my nice shirt." He shuffled uncomfortably in place. "I'll wait until we can get some bandages or something."

There was a heaviness to the silence that followed. Sunset argued with herself for several moments about whether or not what she was going to ask was appropriate.

"Well, they gave us undershirts, I know that... Maybe I could help you at least get the top half of the jumpsuit off so you can change out of that? Because you kinda look like you just escaped from prison."

There was another beat of silence before Penn finally gave a sigh of defeat. He reached up to the zipper and pulled it down as far as his waist. He held out his arm in front of her. "Can you hold that while I pull my arm out?"

Sunset nodded, helping him pull his arm out of the sleeve, then mimicked the process on the other side, being careful not to pull or tug the fabric on his back to either side. Finally, she positioned herself behind him, tenderly holding the collar as he pulled his arms through the front.

"Okay, I'm going to VERY CAREFULLY try to peel the outer layer from the inner one, okay?"

Penn nodded, and Sunset chalked his lack of a verbal response to the fact he was likely gritting his teeth.

It was agonizingly slow as she began to pull away the jumpsuit, especially as she had to stop every time Penn tensed up to indicate that she had pulled too hard. She tried not to throw up when she saw the gory mess of the undershirt. The lighter fabric had clearly been better at soaking up the blood, spreading it over nearly three-quarters of its surface, and contrary to what he had told her, it had NOT completely dried. She almost retched when she felt the moisture hit her face carrying the wet, metallic scent with it. Finally, however, she managed to pull the last bit of the coarse orange fabric away from the bloody shirt underneath.

"I- I think that should do it..." she muttered, quickly distancing herself from the task and sitting herself upwind of him.

"Do you REALIZE how bad that looks?" Sunset asked. "Because it looks REALLY BAD!"

"Yeah... feels really bad, too," he muttered as he pushed himself onto his feet. "Thanks for the help. At least I can go get this jumpsuit off now."

Sunset nodded. She hated to say it, but she was starting to get the feeling he might have been right to protect her. She had only been hit a few times and it had left her with substantial bruising well down the side of her body and left one leg in awful pain. He had been hit... significantly more times, but he was handling it like a champ. Exposing his back had made sure that his extremities were all still usable, as well. It had been some quick thinking that had paid off in the end, even if she didn't like that he'd used his own body to do it.

Far in the distance, Sunset spotted a flicker of movement. Narrowing her eyes, she could see a cloud of dust growing on the horizon. Over time, the dust gave way to a shape, and the shape gave way to a familiar silver car.

"Now THAT is a sight for sore eyes!" Penn proclaimed, coming around from behind the shack still wearing the Aperture Science t-shirt, but now accompanied by a pair of khaki-colored cargo pants. "Oh Sylvia, how I have MISSED you!"

Sunset genuinely grinned from ear to ear as the car came pulling up beside them. At this point, she was willing to say the same thing. She didn't wait for any signal from Penn, limping up to the passenger-side door and yanking it open. With a relieved sigh, she collapsed into the cloth-covered chair. It's not quite going home, but I've never been so relieved to get into a car!

"Thanks for the pick-up Isis! I don't know what we would have done...without... you?"

When she turned to look at their rescue driver, Sunset was baffled to find the driver's seat completely empty, devoid of even a robotic driver. In response, the radio switched itself on.

There was a pop from the front of the car as the hood lifted itself several inches. Isis's familiar tiny dragon-shaped figure clambered out from inside the engine, jumped up on top to shut the hood, and then gave a quaint bow.

The door to the driver's side swung open, and Sunset watched Penn drape the jumpsuits over the back of his chair to protect it from his bloody shirt, then gingerly ease himself into the seat. "Clever girl... You hooked yourself right into the PCM, didn't you?"

The tiny dragon jumped up, spreading its wings and gliding through the rear window before coming to a landing on the front seat.

"Of course! If you control the Powertain Control Module, you can drive the car without touching a single pedal!" Sunset turned around to give the tiny robot a proud smile. "That IS clever!"

Isis climbed up onto the center of the front seats, then over to Sunset's lap, staring up at her in a way not unlike a puppy.

How can I say no to THAT cute face? Sunset reached into her pocket, retrieving her cell phone. "Just don't do anything that puts my photos and videos at risk, okay? I can't replace them, and they're all I have of my friends right now!"

The tip of Isis's tail slid aside, and Sunset watched it cycle though several adapters before settling on the one that fit her charger. The tail extended outwards and around, plugging itself into Sunset's phone. Instantly, the screen flickered and went dark, and Sunset felt herself grow nervous that Isis may have broken her promise.

A few seconds later, however, it once again lit up with life, displaying a loading bar with a small cartoon figure leaning on it. Every few seconds the cartoon, which was a woman with shoulder-length blonde hair and a lab coat, would change positions, showing various stages of excitement.

INSTALLING I.S.O.S....

BACKING UP FILES...

INSTALLING NEW APPS...

LOCATING CONNECTION TO PARENT SYSTEM...

INTEGRATED SUPERIOR INTELLIGENCE SYSTEM LOCATED!

WELCOME TO THE INTEGRATED NETWORK!

The loading bar vanished entirely and the mascot (at least, that's what Sunset assumed it was supposed to be) gave a cheer before vanishing, as well. Her phone booted up to its normal lock screen, but without the spot for her usual passcode.

"Welcome, Sunset Shimmer..." It read, the words quickly disappearing as it moved unbidden to her home screen.

The little dragon disconnected its tail and jumped up onto the dashboard, moving on to Penn's side, where he gladly offered up his own phone without a word.

Signal sources? Wait, does that mean... Sunset glanced at her reception. FULL BARS!

Instantly, she went to her contacts, dialing the first name that came up: Applejack.

"BEEP, BEEP, BEEP... Our sincerest apologies, but your call could not be completed as dialed. The number you are trying to reach is either non-existent or is outside of service range. Please try again."

"Chin up, Sunset! With Isis on our side, we'll find your friends in no time!" Penn chirped.

Sunset smiled. At least if she had to be cut off from the rest of her friends, she was making new ones, and they were DEFINITELY interesting company.

"Now, first things first..." Penn declared, driving his key into the ignition with a smile. "Isis, can you give me directions to the nearest all-you-can-eat buffet?"

Penn grinned and reached down to switch on the radio, and Sunset settled into the now-familiar seat of Penn's Oldsmobile by reclining it several ticks back.

Finally, she could rest assured that she would DEFINITELY wake up in the same seat she fell asleep in.

The Multiverse in a Nutshell

by Pennington Inkwell

"Under the circumstances, I've been shockingly nice."