RIIING!
She had expected to wake up to her alarm, but the tune currently jolting Sunny awake was one she’d come to dread recently. Groaning as she woke up to the sunlight filtering through her window, she rubbed her tired eyes as she let out an extended yawn. Once she managed to open her eyes fully, she scanned herbed room to see if Midnight had tampered with anything after taking her back home.
It didn’t take her long. Despite her family’s wealth, they weren’t the sort to flaunt it and Sunny’s bedroom wasn’t a large one. A desk of incomplete homework and one rather expensive computer in one corner, overlooking the garden and pool through the open windows, and a shelf of games beside it. Another shelf, this one for books - mostly nonfiction, gifts from her dreaded grandmother, all unsorted - dominated another wall. The third held her bed, a single, and a smattering of posters above it. Fourth had her wardrobe; the door a jar and clothes cascading out of it. Everything seemed to be in order.
RIIING!
Oh, yes! Her phone was ringing. Wait, it was ringing? This early in the morning? For the love of Midnight, don't let it be who Sunny thought it was-
Principal Cinch
The teenager said something the editor later removed before collapsing back into the comfort of her sheets with a heavy sigh. The phone rang itself out, and chimed with a text tone precisely three seconds later.
Sunny groaned again, taking a quick glance at the message before hammering out an ever quicker reply. Strange that, how she’d noted the contact as “Principal” and not “Grandmother”, but the way Cinch had messaged her had made it more than clear she felt the same way. It was professional - robotic.
What worried Sunny far more than her unlikable relative was the time though - 07:43. School began at eight, sharp. The school might've changed dramatically since Dean Cadence became Principal Cadence, but there were some things that remained the same, and one of them was a heavy intolerance for lateness.
Putting aside any further complaints, Sunny staggered over to her wardrobe, tore a uniform and underclothes out from it and put them on. Then she grabbed her bag, sweeping an arm across her desk and funneling what was hopefully the right pile of homework and textbook into it. That done, she flew downstairs - her parents already gone, there was nothing more for her to do than to swig down the lukewarm cup of coffee they’d left for her and grab the piece of toast left beside it.
Wait a minute! Was she seriously planning to go to school with a piece of toast on her mouth?! That was so anime! And besides, every time a girl went to school with a toast on her mouth, she'd inevitably, without fail, end up bumping into her supposed love interest.
Sure, Midnight was incorporeal during the day, but cliches surpassed any and all logic, and Sunny couldn't handle the risk. After all, she hadn’t even told her friends yet… well, apart from Rarity. But the fashionista seemed to be in a case of her own these days.
So screw it! She was eating her toast before leaving.
Sunny's gut growled like a lawnmower and rumbled like a semi truck. Maybe she should've eaten a full breakfast rather than just a slice of bread? She shoved the concern aside; she was fairly certain she had done this routine enough to grow used to it, to manage until lunchtime at least, so why couldn't her stomach be the same?
Ugh, she needed to forget about the food. Come on, think of something else to think about! Surely there must be something worth pondering about while she walked, or in today’s case ran, the few miles separating her house from the school campus.
Another text. Sunny checked it as she hurried, rolling her eyes - it was Cinch and yes, Sunny had remembered to eat a full and nutritious breakfast this time.
But that whole affair only took a minute. Now, what to think about? Boys? Not her in a million years and then some. School? No point in doing that before she even arrived there. Friends? Well Indigo had been talking about that cruise...
Wait. Cinch's relationship with Midnight!
Yeah, now that she thought about it, Cinch was at least partially, if not fully, responsible for bringing Midnight into the world. Sure, it was Twilight getting overcharged with unstable magic that caused Midnight to bloom into existence, but it was Cinch's idea to have Twilight gather up the magic in the first place.
All just so Crystal Prep could keep their winning streak against Canterlot High.
Damn.
Her train of thought hit a blockade half a second after she did. Sunny’s world went upside down, and she hit the sidewalk a second later. Rubbing her head, she looked up - spotting a rather preppy looking girl dressed in workout gear, her face obscured by the shadows of her cap.
How and why? She ate the piece of toast at home and not on the road so this wouldn't happen!
"Are you okay, Sunny?" the girl asked in a posh Tidewater accent that more or less totally failed to match her get-up yet still worked on an oddly instinctual level.
Sunny blinked. “Rarity?”
"You aren’t hurt, are you?" the fashionista asked as she helped Sunny stand up. "My sincerest apologies, I wasn't looking where I was going."
"It's okay, I'm guilty of that too," Sunny replied, rubbing her head. "I was thinking about-"
She stopped herself. Was the potential family ties between Midnight, Twilight, and Cinch something Rarity needed to know? In fact, was it something anybody needed to know?
The answer was felt like a no, so she shut her mouth.
"Sorry for how I acted yesterday," Rarity continued, after looking around and spotting nobody else. "Darling Nightmarity woke up in the middle of my beauty sleep, so you can guess how I was feeling a little cranky because of it. Felt lonely, the poor thing."
Nightmarity? Was she talking about Nightmare Rarity? Midnight did call her that, but she said it was only said by those who felt suicidal. Then again, Rarity was her girlfriend, however that worked, so maybe she was the exception?
“Now I really must rush off. I cannot finish my morning exercise and arrive for class only fashionably late if we stay talking too long,” the girl said, clasping her hands, “But I suppose I might as well just check since you’re here. You see, a mannequin at the Carousel Boutique was stolen last night. I asked Nightmarity about it, but she said she had no idea what happened! Seriously, I do wonder why we pay her.”
"Pay her?!" Sunny exclaimed. She shushed herself and switched to whispering as she continued, "You mean your Nightmare self actually works at the boutique? I thought she was a pretty freeloader! Or just a ghost."
"Not in my house, she isn't,” Rarity replied, “Even a malicious shadow fiend should be able to earn her keep. I gave her the job of security guard during the night, making sure that no burglars could get in and steal the merchandise. She also helps set everything up in the morning and close the shop at night," Rarity sighed. "But as you can guess, she didn't do the her duty well last night."
"Well, this is the first time I've heard about it," Sunny scratched her chin. "You say they stole a mannequin? Did the mannequin even wear anything?"
"Nope, it was as naked as they come," Rarity rolled her eyes. "If you ask me, whoever stole it must've been a pretty dumb burglar. It was my favourite mannequin though… as much as one can keep favourites among storefront dolls."
"ACHOO!"
The girls turned to face the place where the sneezing came from, and Sunny raised an eyebrow. "Well, I wish you luck looking for the culprit, but I have to get going to Crystal Prep now. I don’t really want to be late, fashionably or otherwise."
"And I need to head off too," Rarity said, finally returning to her normal tone of voice. "Have a good day, Sunny."
"Same to you, Rarity."
The girls separated and waved goodbye. Rarity ran off back home, and Sunny was just preparing to do the same but to the school when another sneeze blared. She turned to the spot she heard it echo from, at a tree a few yards down the street. And she sighed.
"Gee, that better not be Midnight," she said with an expression halfway between a fond smile and a tired glare.
"ACHOO!"
Sunny ran to the blossoming tree, having confirmed it really was the source of the sneezing, and once she saw what was hiding behind it, her jaw nearly dropped: Leant beside the trunk was a girl about her own age; porcelain skin and a shock of hair split evenly between night-dark purple and dusk-bright pink.
"Stupid nose!" the girl whined, rubbing her nose. "I don't even have internal organs, why am I sneezing?"
To her surprise, Sunny recognized the voice. "Midnight?"
The girl flinched and turned to face the baffled teenager. She freaked out and tried to back away, only to hit the back of the tree and cause an apple to fall right on her head.
"Ouch! That hurts!" she whined, rubbing her skull. "I mean, I'll take anything over being blasted by Sunset's energy beam, but still!"
"So it really is you, Midnight!" Sunny narrowed her eyes. "Now, let me guess: the actual body you're using right now is a mannequin?"
Midnight twiddled her fingers. "Y-Yes..."
"And the uniform?"
"I grabbed it from your closet when you were sleeping. It was pretty messy. Didn’t think that you’d exactly notice."
Well, that mystery was solved pretty quickly. Still, Sunny did not appreciate somebody rifling through her wardrobe - she had things in there… probably, under all the junk. And there was the problem of the missing mannequin. Frowning, she went out on a limb and caught Midnight by the collar of her stolen blouse.
"W-W-Wait, I-I can explain!" Midnight flailed her arms. "I-I thought about last night, and how this can't keep going the way it is, so I asked Nightmare Rarity to help me out and she suggested me to use this mannequin as an alternative!"
So that's why Nightmare Rarity didn't tell Rarity who the burglar was, she was in the know about this the whole time! Oh, Rarity would be so furious when she told her!
"I only did it so this relationship of ours could actually go somewhere!" Midnight smiled like a caught dog. "I don't want this relationship to end, but I don't want it to become a burden for you for you either. So, this was the best thing I could think of!"
Sunny released the animate mannequin and rubbed her eyes. Why didn't she see something like this coming? Midnight was such an unpredictable individual that she could've literally done anything after their disastrous date last night. Come to think of it, this was actually pretty benign.
Midnight winced. "And that's not the worst part."
Or maybe it was pretty bad after all.
“Dearie, what now?"
The spirit coughed with shame, angling her doll-head away and at the ground. "Well, I don't know what to call myself!"
... Seriously? She just committed theft on two private properties, and the thing that bothered her the most was that she couldn't figure out how to name her alter ego!? But then again, if she wanted this to work, Sunny realized that the ghost couldn't go as "Midnight Sparkle" anymore. Even a night-themed name could make people suspicious and, besides, there weren’t even that many of those to go around any more - Sunset, Starlight, Midnight herself, Luna, Moondancer, Twilight, the other Twilight...
Although, if she really wanted this to work, she really should've picked a mannequin with a different color scheme. At this rate, people would just end up mistaking her for Rarity.
Sunny pinched the bridge of her nose and hissed in a breath - at least her girlfriend wasn’t terrifying during the day. "Alright, what have you thought up for a name so far?"
Midnight remained silent. After several minutes of that - a school bell buzzed in the distance as the two waited - Sunny assumed she hadn't thought of anything and spoke, "Fine, let me give you an idea: how about Star Gazer? I don’t think that’s taken yet."
Despite haunting an inflexible mannequin, Midnight beamed. "It's perfect! I love it!"
She didn't even hesitate! Sunny took a deep breath. "Fine, take it if you want, but don't come crying to me when it turns out some other character got to it first. I have to get going to Crystal Prep right now. I’m already late and I don’t think I’m ready to tell Cadance you’re my excuse. I mean, no offence."
But Midnight - sorry, Star Gazer - was not offended at all. Instead, she stood up straight and after a few seconds of rapid hand waving and finger curling, a purplish aura blossomed around her and, slowly, her feet left the ground. She was flying.
"Wait, you can use magic in this form?!" Sunny exclaimed.
"Why not? Sunset and her friends can use it in their people forms no problem," Midnight - sorry, Star - folded her arms. "And since I'm basically made of magic, it'd be kind of ridiculous if I couldn't control what I essentially am, right? Besides, this looks really cool!"
Sunny rolled her eyes. "I feel like I could refute that comment, but I don't want to. Could you give me a ride?"
The living mannequin beamed a wide smile, and without saying anything else, she grabbed Sunny's hand and hugged before she took off to the skies. Sunny hugged back once the mannequin began flying towards Crystal Prep, and she made the mistake of looking down.
"Don't worry, Sunny, I'm not going to drop you!" Star assured her.
Sunny was too terrified to listen.
After flying for a minutes, but it felt like hours to Sunny and bad hours too, both girls overlooked Crystal Prep, and after a few brief theatrics, Midnight began flying down as their classmates noticed them, scrambling and shouting and slipping out phones for the inevitable YouTube clips.
"Hey, look!" Sour Sweet exclaimed. "It's a bird!"
"It's a plane!" Lemon Zest shouted.
"It's something really weird, but not really that surprising," Indigo Zap added.
Sunny and the mannequin touched the ground. With a snap of plastic fingers, Star shut off the aura, kicking up a small tornado of dust and conveniently shorting out all the phones nearby.
"The third thing is the correct answer!" she declared, hands on her hips and girl at her side like she was a comic book hero.
“No shit,” muttered Sugarcoat.
"Say hello to your newest transfer student," the spirit flashed a smirk, waving an arm and conjuring a small flash of fireworks, "Star Gazer!"