Since the defeat and humiliation at The Battle of the Bands where the sirens had lost their magic, the three had been as direction-less as a ship without a rudder.
The first night without their magic, Aria blamed the overbearing Adagio Dazzle and the ‘clueless’ Sonata Dusk for their plight.
Aria was slightly less belligerent to Sonata. And for good reason. Despite Sonata being the shortest and smallest build; her type of siren meant Sonata could take down both Aria and Adagio at the same time if really angered. Luckily she didn’t have the temper of Adagio!
It was several weeks later. They were struggling and failing to come to terms with their new situation, Adagio and Aria’s tempers came to full boil.
After an extended shouting match, Aria turned to walk away. She didn’t want to listen to Adagio tonight.
“Aria! Get your arse back here when I’m talking to you!” Yelled Adagio.
“Who the fuck died and made you Alpha of this siren pod?” Shouted Aria in response.
“I’ve been the brains of this pod for the last thousand years!”
“And look where it’s led us!” exclaimed Aria, “The Battle of the Bands was just the straw that broke the camel’s back!”
“What are you babbling about?” demanded Adagio. “What else are you blaming me for?
Give me one example.”
“That’s easy! How about that incident with the Spanish Inquisition.”
“Yes Dodgy,” said Sonata, speaking up, “they almost burned Aria at the stake for being a bitch.”
“WITCH!” Shouted Aria, “the tried to burn me for being a witch, not bitch. And stay out of this Nat.”
“Both were true,” said Adagio. “And leave Sonata alone. You know if you ever piss her off, she could reach down your throat and rip your heart out, if she could find one.”
“Don’t give me that. She’s as worthless as you!”
“Shut that up or your arse will be mine.”
“Why would you want my arse? Yours is big enough for the two of us!” said Aria.
Sonata let slip a small and quiet snicker, but the glare from Adagio shut her up quickly.
“Say that again!” warned Adagio getting in Aria’s face.
“I won’t say that again,” said Aria.
“You damn well better not,” snarled Adagio.
“I won’t say it,” said Aria.
Adagio was smug until Aria did something she’d never done before.
Aria was sick of Adagio, and she’d had enough of her. She felt she didn’t need her as much as she had before. At the time, Aria blamed Adagio for her plight, so she decided to leave.
She was almost ashamed that it had come to blows, almost. Not fisticuffs but hair pulling, plenty of slaps and a couple finger nail scratches. All while Sonata Dusk cowered crying, begging them to stop.
Sonata finally pulled them apart none too gently, they flew to the opposite sides of the room.
“Stop this!” Shouted Sonata with tears.
Adagio looked stunned, Aria looked mad.
“Fuck you both! You’ll never see me again!” Yelled Aria leaving.
Aria wasn’t sure she actually meant that last part.
After that, she quickly grabbed what little was hers from out in their van. Just a hoodie, a jacket, a couple changes of underwear and two changes of clothing. She was glad the other two didn’t see the tears streaming down her face.
She was going to take the van, it was in her name, but she didn’t have the bits to buy the petrol and insurance on her own.
That was all she owned with the exception of the shards of her siren gem, which she’d super-glued the pieces and was able to reattach it to the choker which she wore at all times. But it was pretty worthless to her now. It might’ve been able to be sold to a jeweler for some fast cash but otherwise it was nothing to her sentimentally, It served as a warning that if she ever could return to Equestria, it would be an instant death penalty.
Not for past misdeeds, which were many, but there were none alive that could bring charges against her or her fellow sirens, with the possible exceptions of Princesses Celestia and Luna.
It was because she was fed by the magic of the gem, it gave her the magic of her voice and it was the secret of her immortality. But it also was the magic of her existence, at least in Equestria.
Few knew that sirens didn’t ‘procreate’ like ponies or humans. When they’d been banished to this human world, they discovered that in spite of sex being something they couldn’t do in their siren form, they could ‘do it’ as humans do. It was still unclear if they could actually become pregnant. But after all this time, they never had. So sex had been both recreation and a tool to control men and women.
In Equestria, sirens were formed when a ‘Brood Mother’ had collected and concentrated enough negative energy, and if successful, the child would appear whole from the sea foam. A siren gem was the only physical thing the brood mother need to complete this. This rare gem naturally occurs on the ocean floor, or gems from past sirens which had died in battles, duels, accidents or the rare case of them taking their own life (by removing the gem) when they were too old and tired of the daily struggle.
The differences in sirens depended on the race of the brood mother. Usually there were up to three brood mothers in a pod, one of each race, but not always.
The races are as follows:
Common (Aria): This is the siren breed everyone is familiar with. The common siren is versatile in both magic and physique, making them a sort of “jack of all trades”. They make up the majority of all sirens in Equus, so they are simply known as “sirens” as a result.
Due to their equal balance in magic and power, they often make up the authority in their respective pods, and keep the hunters in line due to their natural bloodlust.
Aria’s mother had been the pod Alpha back in Equestria.
Hunter (Sonata): If there was ever a siren more terrifying than the common, it was the hunter. What they lack in magic, they make up for with incredible strength and brutality. While a single dragon, their natural predator, can take on up to three common sirens at most, a hunter is the only one to be able to handle a fully-grown dragon on her own.
Along with their physical superiority, a hunter also possesses venomous barbs at the end of their tail, which they use to paralyze both predator and prey before going in for the kill.
Courtesan (Adagio): Aptly named for their beauty, the courtesans possess fins similar to beta fish, giving them a very graceful appearance. The courtesans are the rarest of sirens to the point of being endangered as they are favored among dragons as the easiest prey, and their lack of physical strength makes it difficult for them to defend themselves.
But it’s thanks to their advantage in magic over the other breeds that they are most successful in causing anger from the citizens of Equus, making them very prominent harvesters.
So it was that after a year, and if the infant was deemed worthy of life, it was welcomed fully into the pod. But if the siren was judged to be weak or lacking in ferocity or magic, at the end of the first year, the pod would remove (as in, viciously tear out) the siren gem and the young one would dissolve back into the sea in agony.
The screams of the ‘unworthy’ yearling, Star Song, a friend of Aria’s while she was still a yearling, still haunted her dreams. It hurt most that she was calling out Aria’s name but she dare not show any weakness. After that she had to find someplace to cry.
Strangely enough, another yearling found her. Instead of berating her, or reporting this weakness, she helped comfort her.
That yearling who comforted Aria was named Sonata.
So it was another reminder what would happen if she and the others returned to Equestria.
That was the reason for the panic at the defeat at The Battle of the Bands. If a siren’s stone would be destroyed, the siren would starve to death within a week, then they would painfully dissolve into nothing. So Aria and her fellow sirens were afraid that they’d dissolve painfully into nothing.
But by the end of the first week, following their defeat at The Battle of the Bands, they were sure that they’d survive. However, they were sure if they’d ever return to Equestria, they would most certainly die most unpleasantly.
That was now just over two years ago.
Late one evening, Aria Blaze was walking home from work through the dimly lit portions of the ‘red light district’ of Canterlot. She’d gravitated here due to her unfortunate circumstances.
At first, without any substantial bits in her pocket, and on her own for perhaps the first time in her long life. Her desperation caused her to give her services to one of these shady establishments that catered to the base impulses of men and some women. It didn’t require any real skills and only cost her self-respect.
Truthfully, it wasn’t the first time she’d given herself for money, but at that time it was just another form of fun.
Though she could make more bits in a night than what she was getting now at her waitress job in a week, she’d had enough. Her pride finally gave her enough dignity not to turn fun into work. So she’d taken a waitress job at a greasy spoon. It was some bits, tips and a free meal every day.
The other worry was with her gem gone, so was her immortality. She’d cried for three days in her little ‘two bit room’ when she found a white hair.
She arrived at the seedy boardinghouse/bordello where her room was located. She tossed the lit butt she’d been smoking into the wet gutter, then entered the rundown building and climbed the three flight of stairs to the floor where her room was located.
Along the way she tried to entertain herself by checking out the new tags which were freshly painted in the stairwell and the hall.
The lower two levels were for ‘business’. Any drunken ‘John’ that mistakenly came to this floor and insisted on gaining access to her room, left with fewer teeth than when they arrived.
When she reached her room, she saw that there was a notice taped to the door. A warning that her rent was overdue and was needed by the end of the week or she’d be evicted.
Or she could work it off with a week’s service to the establishment.
‘Like that last part will ever happen again!’ Aria mused, but she was almost afraid it might have to happen. She tore the notice off the door, unlocked it and went in.
“I hate this fuckin’ world!” said Aria out loud and to no one.
She went to the fridge and took out a can of beer and guzzled down the entire thing in one breath. She then took out another. The empty was tossed into the recycle bin. The deposit was a way of saving some of her meager income.
She took out a microwave pizza and let it cook as she went out into the hall to go to the shared bathroom. The door was locked, so she had to wait until whoever was finished.
When finished she returned to her room, took out the pizza and sat down in her only comfortable chair. After she ate most of the pizza and had drank half of the can of beer, she lit another smoke and read the notice again.
She knew she had enough bits to pay the rent, but that’d mean she’d have to do without food, smokes and beer for two weeks at least.
The food wasn’t a problem. She could eat a big meal at work. And if she flirted, the manager would let her take a sandwich and chips and perhaps a slice of pie home with her. But by her priorities, the rest would be hard to do without, or so she thought.
Just too tired to care, she put down the half drank beer, undressed and walked to the bed. She did pass an open window, curtain-less but she could care less if anyone saw her naked. She always thought clothing, like most things in this world, was stupid, even after a thousand years. She climbed into the bed, put out the almost finished butt and lay back hoping to at least dream of a better life.
This night her dreams were different. There was the usual cheering and applause she so craved. But she wasn’t singing, and the applause wasn’t for her. She was sitting at a table covered with green and sitting next to some guy she didn’t know but looked familiar. He wasn’t much to look at but he was making her truly happy. A feeling she’d not felt in a while, if ever. But even asleep, she smiled as she kissed the guy an honest kiss.
The sun showed through the dirty curtain-less window. The dream had put her in a rare good mood. She sat up bare-chested and unashamed. There was no one here to see her, and again, she didn’t care.
But incase there were any interlopers from below. She threw on a robe, without fastening it, not caring if her ‘goodies’ weren’t completely covered. The boardinghouse was women only, so no big deal. She grabbed her towel, toothbrush, toothpaste, soap and shampoo then left her room to walk down the hall to the shared bathroom.
Thankfully it was unoccupied so she didn’t have to wait. After she went in and double locked the door, undressed, started the shower to warm up while she relieved her bladder. Then she got in the sadly too lukewarm water1 and commenced to clean herself and wash her flowing hair. On every wall of the shower was the warning to keep showers to a maximum of five minutes.
‘Who brings a fuckin’ timer to the WC?’ she chuckled to herself.
Back in her flat, she threw her robe on the unmade bed, sat naked in her chair, turned on the TV and ate the leftover cold pizza and drank the warm flat beer from last night, for her breakfast.
‘Human language is so confusing, even after all this time,’ thought Aria, ‘the beer is warm and the pizza is cold. But they are both room temperature.’
Later, she went to the closet and took out her waitress uniform, got dressed and left the flat for the day.