Twilight Velvet hummed a happy tune to herself, bacon and eggs sizzling on a skillet in front of her in an otherwise silent kitchen. For the first time in a long time, all was right with the world. Her husband discovered a new galaxy, she finished editing Yearling's latest novel, her granddaughter took her first steps, and her daughter has friends. That last part brought a bubbly giggle out of her as she turned on the coffee maker.
Ever since her daughter enrolled at Crystal Prep, she worried that she wasn't connecting with any of her fellow students. While she wasn't a social butterfly, she did at least attempt to interact with people at her old school. Until recently, it looked as if she had closed herself off even more than before, treating the notion of forming any kind of lasting relationship with her peers like a kind of punishment. If things didn't change, she was considering transferring Twilight to another school, academic opportunities be damned! Fortunately, Twilight's first friend managed to divert things away from such a drastic option.
Not only had this mysterious Petal Wasp managed to bring Twilight back to where she was before her enrollment, she pushed her beyond that! She wasn't staying cooped up in her room or her lab at school anymore and acted more like a teenager again. She was laughing and smiling again and seemed so much more at ease with the world. Of course, she did backslide a bit after their fight, but it looked like Petal was not the only friend Twilight could depend on when things got rough.
It all made her want to meet this mysterious girl even more.
The familiar sound of her daughter's footsteps snapped her out of her happy musings. She pulled out a clean plate from a kitchen cabinet, loaded it up with a generous helping of eggs and bacon, and turned just as Twilight sheepishly entered the kitchen. Her daughter's demeanor earned a raised brow out of her as she placed the plate down at the lavender teen's usual spot at the table. Instead of immediately taking her seat, Twilight fidgeted in place for a moment, then nervously asked a question.
"Um....mom....would it be too much trouble to set up.... another plate?"
"Why?" Velvet blinked.
Twilight chuckled nervously then said, "Well...a friend may have stopped by last night and....um...heh..."
As if on cue, another set of footsteps echoed down the hall towards the kitchen and a girl Twilight's age came into view. Her skin was a light shade of yellow while her hair was a short wavy two-toned dark green curtain that came down to her shoulders. Her teal eyes shined with confidence and an impish sort of mischief as they took in the kitchen and the two other people present. She wore a gray T-shirt with black skull prints decorating it under a black leather jacket with the right sleeve seemingly torn off at the shoulder. A patch shaped like a blue wasp with petal shaped lavender wings was displayed proudly on its left breast pocket. This went well with her black jeans and spider print belt, both showing signs of wear. The only part of her attire that didn't look roughened beside her shirt were her boots, the articles in question being heavy, white-laced, and made of black leather. She had a lithe runner's build, but even a casual glance could see that the girl had a bit of muscle to her as well.
"Good morning? Velvet frowned. "And who might you be?"
"Right, sorry for dropping in out of nowhere like this," she nervously chuckled, putting out a hand towards the older woman. "I'm Petal Wasp. Nice to finally meet you, ma'am."
Velvet's demeanor instantly lit up at that, taking the offered hand and giving it an enthusiastic shake.
"Like wise," she beamed. "And call me Velvet. All of that "Ma'am" stuff makes me feel old."
"Gotcha',"Petal smirked. "And yeah, sorry again for popping up on you like this."
"While I am not exactly thrilled by that, it is nice to finally meet the girl that helped my daughter step out of her shell," Velvet smirked, giving Twilight a passing glance as she let go of Petal's hand.
"Yeah, Sparkles was a real mess before she found me," she sighed, putting both of her hands in her pockets and giving her friend a tired frown.
""Sparkles", eh?" Velvet giggled. "Only been friends for a couple of weeks and you already have nicknames. Does Twilight have one for you, too?"
"Not yet," Petal snorted playfully, taking a seat at the table. "We'll probably make that her next homework assignment later."
"I will grade her fairly," Velvet nodded.
"Mom!" Twilight whined, plopping into her seat at the table.
Petal and Velvet laughed good-naturedly at the mortified teen, the matron of the house already preparing a plate for the unexpected guest. At the same time, Twilight's eyes kept drifting towards her friend's new form. Apparently, all Wraiths had seldom used human forms that they could access when the need arose. The reason for this was two fold, as while this form made them harder to track by those Petal called "Gifted" it also took away their ability to do more than feed or change back to their normal forms. The fact that Petal refused to elaborate of what Gifted were put her on edge, but the way her human form looked nearly pushed her over completely.
She looked so much like the woman from Twilight's dream. So much so, in fact, that if she didn't know better, she would've thought that the two were mother and daughter. It took everything Twilight had not to break down when she saw Petal's human form. Even now, she would have brief flashes every time she looked at her friend and swore Petal looked painfully frail before reality set back in a second later.
Stop it Twilight, she thought with a sigh as she brought a forkful of scrambled egg to her mouth. It was just a dream. Petal's fine. She's fine! You have nothing to worry about!
"So Petal, tell me about yourself," Velvet smiled, setting a mug of coffee in front of the girl in question.
"Not much to tell," she shrugged, casually picking up the mug with both hands and taking a sip. "What do you want to know?"
"Well, how did you manage to sneak into the house?" Velvet frowned. "I'm a bit of a night owl and I know for a fact that no one other than my husband came through the front door last night."
That simple question made Twilight's heart stop.
Petal gave Velvet a mischievous smile and said, "By being a bad influence."
"Excuse me?" Velvet blinked, then sported a matching smile as she slid a loaded plate down before the girl.
"I gave Twilight a call and asked her to leave her widow open for me. After that, all I had to do was climb up to it and let myself in."
"I see," Velvet said, aiming a raised brow at her daughter. "How else have you corrupted my little girl?"
"Aside from getting her to have a social life, not much," Petal shrugged, taking a casual bite of bacon.
"Speaking of, do the two of you have any plans for the day?" Velvet asked.
"Well...the girls invited me to hang out with them at the mall later," Twilight demurred, fidgeting in her seat. "I'll have to let them know that Petal will be coming along as well.
"Damn straight you are," Petal chuckled aiming a wide grin her friend's way. "You've got a bet to pay up for."
"A bet?" Velvet asked, her cheshire grin a little less pointed than the disguised Wraith's. "Oh, do tell."'
Petal chuckled wickedly while Twilight groaned out her misery. This was already looking like it was gong to be a very long day.
***
Lemon, Indigo, and Sugar waited with varying degrees of excitement radiating off of them from their seats in the middle of The Crystal Emporium's food court. While Sugar was as hard to read as ever, boredly skimming through some random sight on her phone, Lemon sported a broad grin as she excitedly vibrated in her seat. Indigo was more composed, but the way her fingers rapidly tapped out her nervous energy onto the table was hard to miss. Roughly half an hour ago, the three of them received a text from Twilight that told them that she was going to be a little late and that she was going to be brining a friend along with her.
While they were happy to spend some more time with Twilight, they would be lying if they said they weren't looking forward to finally meeting the mysterious "Petal" their friend mentioned yesterday.
"How much you want to bet she's as big a nerd as Twilight is?" Indigo smirked.
"Says the girl that read all six volumes of Daring Do over fifty times," Sugar monotoned.
"Hey! They're good books!" Indigo barked, glaring at Sugar.
"Meh, I'm more of a Dark Towers kind of girl," Lemon shrugged.
Both girls gave her raised brows at that.
"You read?" Indigo asked gobsmacked.
"You like King?" Sugar intoned, a tiny hint of shock entering her voice.
"Is it really that surprising?" Lemon asked, rolling her eyes.
"Yes," both girls said in unison, Indigo's incredulous tone overpowering Sugar's flat one.
"Especially King's books," Sugar added. "HIs works tend to lean on the obscure side."
"What can I say, I like cosmic horror," Lemon shrugged. "Like, have you dudes seen what H. P. Lovecraft came up with? It's really tripy stuff."
"Didn't he create tentacle porn?" Indigo asked, raising a brow.
"No," Lemon huffed. "But they did use his stories as inspiration for Bloodborn."
"Do you have any recommendations?" Indigo asked, suddenly a lot more interested.
"You two have fun with that," Sugar frowned, going back to scrolling through her phone. "I like historical fiction and mysteries anyway."
Boooooorrrrrrrring," both of her friends groaned.
"I'm not making you read them," she stated, then let a small smirk form on her lips as she looked up from her phone and added, "Unless you bet against me again."
Both girls shivered at that.
"Never again," Indigo muttered.
"Ditto," Lemon nodded.
"Then you have nothing to worry about," Sugar monotoned, her face going back to being unreadable as she shifted her focus back to her phone.
Before the conversation could progress any further, a familiar nearby call caught their attention. Looking more sheepish than usual, Twilight made her way towards them with a much rougher looking girl sporting a mischievous smile trailing about a foot behind her.
"Sorry we're late," Twilight mumbled, taking a seat.
"No problem," Sugar stated, eyeing the new addition to their group as she took a seat next to Twilight. "This is Petal, right?"
"Yep!" Petal smirked, leaning back in her chair. "NIce to finally meet you all."
"Same," Sugar replied, a faint cautious edge entering her tone. "I'm Sugar Coat and this is Lemon Zest and Indigo Zap."
As she said that, she pointed to each girl in question, not once taking her eyes off of Petal. The Wraith took it in stride, letting the suspicion she sensed roll off her back. The feeling greatly improved the Wraith's already high opinion of the girl as she leaned forward and met her gaze. She could feel how nervous Twilight felt, but managed to push that to the back of her mind for now. She needed to make a good first impression with these girls or things were going to be more complicated than they needed to be in the future.
"You're not the kind of person I thought would be Twilight's friend," Sugar said flatly.
"Why's that?" Petal asked, frowning.
"You look like a punk," she replied.
Twilight gulped, while the rest of the table gasped at that.
Petal narrowed her eyes and said, "So?"
A faint glare graced Sugar's normally blank face as she added, "I thought Twilight would be friends with someone with more of an academic presentation."
"Maybe," she shrugged, leaning back in her seat. "But you've got to admit, I look pretty badass."
"She's got you there Sugar," Indigo snickered.
"Are you in a band?" Lemon asked, just as eager as Indigo and Twilight to break the tension.
"Nah," Petal laughed, waving off the question. "Never sang a day in my life, but I'd love to give it a shot sometime."
"No prob!" Lemon beamed. "I've got all kinds of gear at the school! It'll be a little tricky to sneak you in, but we could totally do a jam session together sometime!"
"Sounds fun," Petal chuckled. "I'll think about it and get back to ya later."
Lemon smiled brightly at that.
"If you want, you could help me train Slugger too," Indigo smirked, giving Twilight a side-glance.
"That should be fun too," Petal smirked, doing the same. "What do ya say,"Slugger"?"
Twilight groaned, hiding her face with her hands.
"If it isn't too much trouble, can we move on to our plans for the day?" Sugar Coat intoned, a thin frustrated frown forming on her face.
Petal flinched, sensing the girl's anger as she gave her her full attention. The rest of the group did the same, but were oblivious to the degree of Sugar's ire. Not wanting to make a scene, the Wraith ignored it and let things play out.
"Right, I'm just itching to get to the arcade," Lemon smiled. "Can't lose my DDR record, y'know?"
"House of the Dead, here I come!" Indigo cheered. "I'm gonna take that final boss down for sure this time!"
"What about you?" Sugar asked, pointedly ignoring Petal in favor of Twilight.
"Um...Touhou," she mumbled, nervously tapping her fingers together. "And you?"
"There are a few racing games I like to play," Sugar shrugged. "I'll see if anyone beat my high scores and correct that."
"What about you, Petal?" Indigo asked.
"Don't know," she shrugged. "Never played a game before."
The group, sans Twilight, gave her strange looks at that.
"Like, never?" Lemon frowned, confused.
"Yep," Petal replayed.
A determined frown formed on Indigo's face as she declared, "Okay, time to fix that!"
"How much money do you have on you?" Sugar asked.
"None," Petal sighed.
"Then no. We're not."
"Fine by me," Petal sighed, cutting off any protest the rest of the group had in mind. "I like to people watch anyway."
Sugar nodded, then said, "Now that that's all sorted out, let's get moving."
"Actually, can we stop someplace first?" Petal asked, leveling a cheshire's grin at her lavender friend. "Twilight lost a bet and it's time for her to pay up."
"Pay up how?" Sugar asked, eyes narrowing.
"You'll see," she chuckled, earning a blushing groan out of her friend.
***
With summer right around the corner it was only natural that people would start looking into getting new clothes for the coming season. As such, The Summer Sun was flooded with customers eager to do just that. The store was full of the kinds of clothes one would wear on the boardwalk ranging from straw sun hats and sunglasses to tank tops and shorts. This also included the one article of clothing Twilight dreaded above all else; swimsuits.
"Alright Sparkles, try these on," Petal beamed, practically shoving four bikinis into the lavender girl's arms as she took her towards one of the store's changing rooms.
"Why these?" Twilight whined, staggering into the room.
"Cuz you'll look great and you lost," Petal smirked.
"Can't I try on a one-piece?" she begged.
"Nope," Petal snorted and closed the door. "Be back in a few minutes if I find anything else."
"Take your time, please," she sighed weakly behind the door.
Chuckling to herself, she left her friend to her own devices and went off to find more suits. Meanwhile, the other Shadow Bolts watched the whole exchange with varying degrees of interest. As soon as she disappeared into the sea of clothing wracks, Sugar let herself relax and approached the changing room door.
"You know, you don't have to do this," she said, just loud enough to be heard past the door.
"A deals a deal," Twilight grumbled. "And I've been needing to get a new swimsuit for a while now anyways."
"If you say so," Sugar frowned. "Can you promise me something?"
"I guess," she grunted, struggling with the straps of the suit she was trying on. "What is it?"
A bit of worry crossed Sugar's face, some of it entering her tone as she said, "If you need help, let me or the girls know, okay?"
The door squeaked open, the teen within now wearing a dark blue bikini and a concerned frown as she stepped out to meet her friend.
"Of course," she nodded.
Sugar let a small smile spread across her face, only for it to vanish a moment later when a familiar condescending female voice reached them.
"Well, look what we have here," the voice gushed, only to bitterly add, "The two bottom feeders and the librarian's bottom bitch."
Twilight's heart sank to her stomach as she slowly turned towards the voice's source. Sure enough, standing about eight feet away from her was Sour Sweet. The girl wore a simple pair of blue jeans and gray converse that went well with her red T-shirt. Her arms were crossed and a venomous sneer graced her lips as her indigo eyes trailed across the group. It took on an even more cruel edge when they landed on Twilight.
Indigo and Lemon glared at the girl as they put themselves between her and their friends.
"What do you want Sour?" Sugar spat, joining her friends.
"Just looking for some new swimwear," she said sweetly, then bitterly snapped, "But I found you rejects instead."
"Buzz off Sour," Indigo growled, clenching her fists.
"That's real cute Indigo," Sour smiled, then frowned as she coldly stated, "Maybe I should beat your ass harder this time. Might help you learn not to fuck with me."
Indigo let out a frustrated growl, but didn't make a move beyond that. Lemon gulped, torn between her fear of the unstable girl in front of her and her loyalty to her friends. Sugar was as unreadable as ever, her mind running through a dozen ways to get out of here that didn't involve a fight. Not just because it would mean getting kicked out of the store, but because, as much as she hated to admit it, Sour would mop the floor with them.
Sour leveled a sweet smile at Twilight and in a matching tone said, "Love the new look Number one. It totally suits you!"
Twilight froze, then tightened her jaw as she waited for the barbs she knew were coming.
With a cruel sneer, Sour added, "Should make it easier for you to make a few bucks on the corner."
Before Twilight or her friends could respond, a cold chill shot down both their's and Sour's spines. A second later, Petal stepped out from behind a nearby display behind Sour. Twilight and her friends watched the girl with chilled fascination, the group feeling like they were watching some great predator in the wild as she closed in on her prey. The Wraith sported her usual roughish smile, now held with a sharp edge to it as she gently placed a hand on Sour's shoulder.
Sour froze, a cold dread that she had never felt before running through her down to her very core.
"You caught me in a good mood, so I'm going to let you off with a warning this time, " Petal sweetly stated, a deep rage sitting just on the edge of her tongue. "Stay the fuck away from Twilight and her friends or I'll turn you into my own personal hand-puppet. You got it?"
Stiffly, Sour forced herself to turn her head to face her, a retort ready to be fired, but it died a miserable death the second she locked eyes with Petal.
At the same time, an image flashed before Petal's eyes. In it, she saw two Sours standing on a narrow platform over a deep dark pit. Each of them were covered in wounds, some old and some new as they frantically tried to push the other off of the platform. A dark shapeless mass could be seen moving through the shadows of the pit, a glowing red eye or jagged claw becoming visible before it literally melted back into the darkness.
When she came back to reality, it was just in time to see Sour nod before she bolted out of the store. Forcing her thoughts away from what just happened, Petal locked her aura away and gave her group a more genuine smile.
"You okay Twilight?" she asked, joining the group.
"Y-Yeah," Twilight sighed, then smiled weakly as she added, "Thank you Petal."
"Anytime Sparkles," she smiled.
I'm gonna have to ask Lily about this later, but in the mean time.
"Now, let's get you dressed back up and buy that suit. That bitch was right about one thing, you look fucking hot!
Twilight's face heated up at that.
"She's got a point," Indigo smirked, thankful for the lighter shift things had taken.
"Yeah," Lemon nodded, studying her new friend. "You should totally get that!"
Her blush spreading down to her neck, Twilight looked to Sugar for help.
The bespectacled girl just gave her a faint smile and said, "It's true. You look really good in that."
Twilight let out a mortified whine as she quickly ducked back into the changing room, her friends laughing good-naturedly at her misery.