“Who wrote these things?” Sunset grumbled angrily. Surprisingly, the art store still delivered her stuff since deliveries actually came from their warehouse in town. At least it was a nice distraction after what happened, the poorly written manual was keeping the image of the fireball hurtling towards Susan at bay. “What do you mean run the wire through the hole before securing the base of the lamp into the clamp? What hole? What lamp?! It’s just a simple freaking drafting desk!”
“Problems?” A somewhat familiar voice asked from behind her. A startled Sunset spun around to see Twilight Sparkle standing there with a nervous grin, right arm hanging limply and her left reaching behind her back to hold it. She was swaying a little bit as her eyes roamed over the room giving Sunset time to spot the differences from Princess Twilight, such as the messy bun, white lab coat, and glasses.
“A few. This stupid manual doesn’t even make sense. It’s saying to install a lamp that didn’t even come with it.” Sunset huffed out in frustration.
“They hardly ever make sense, you must be Sunset Shimmer. I’m Twilight Sparkle, but I guess you already knew that.” Twilight said, her eyes becoming a little downcast. “So you like music and art?”
“I love music and art.” Sunset grinned, throwing the manual in the trash can by the desk as she went over to Twilight. “What about you?”
“I’m not a huge fan.” Twilight said, “Most of the artist I’ve met didn’t exactly come off as very friendly to me.”
“Why wouldn’t they be friendly?” Sunset asked, curious to the girl’s expression shifting back and forth from annoyed to sad.
“Even here I’m seen as the biggest nerd in school, next to my boyfriend. At least they don’t harass me here as much as they did in Crystal Prep. Anyways, come on, you are going to need a wrench and possibly a ratchet to put that thing together. I have them in my lab.” Twilight said, turning from Sunset to leave the room, the fire haired teen quickly following after a moments hesitation.
“Well, so far to me you seem pretty adorkable.” Sunset said, a teasing grin spreading across her lips.
“See, even you think I’m a dork.” Twilight said, stopping at the door Sunset knew to be the girl’s lab. Twilight leaned her head on the door while taking a few deep breaths.
“I said adorkable, as in an incredibly cute dork. I meant that as a compliment.” Sunset said, reaching up she squeezed the girl’s shoulder who seemed to be feeling down. It was quickly knocked off as Twilight spun around to stare into Sunset’s eyes.
“Wait, you aren’t mocking me?” Twilight asked with a hint of hope.
“Should I?” Sunset asked, a bit confused.
“Most the kids at school do.” Twilight said, her feet becoming very interesting all of a sudden.
“Pfft, I’ve learned kids at school are often idiots.” Sunset grinned, a twinge of pain shooting through her. True, she thought that after the pain of Anon-A-Miss, but most were actually good people. They were just way too easily manipulated.
“Yeah, they are.” Twilight said, a renewed smile blossoming as she turned around and pushed the door open allowing them entrance. There were desks lining the entire length of two walls with a computer at each end. An assortment of white boards, plastic totes, shelves, and dressers covering the rest.
“You know, I kind of expected more books.” Sunset said, sounding a little disappointed.
“I keep those in my room.” Twilight said, showing off her nervousness again as Sunset looked around. Sunset had to rub her temples, a headache forming as she looked over the contraptions cobbled together along with diagrams and charts laying beneath the machines. The closer she got to what looked like a crystal sitting in the middle of circuit boards with wires, tubing and various other materials surrounding it that filling up most of the table, the more intense her headache got. Several more wires were plugged into a control panel with one large cord going to an outlet while others ran over to the desktop computer that was on and seemed to be collecting data.
“What is this?” Sunset asked, her heart beating faster as she took a step back and collapsed into one of the office chairs.
“That? It’s the first thing Martin and I worked on together when we learned those energy readings I was picking up in Canterlot was magic. We tried taking what we knew, which wasn’t a lot mind you since we didn’t have an actual source to run tests on, and combined it with stuff from literature and games. We were trying to make a type of shield that would protect us from…”
“Protect from what?” Sunset asked, her vision starting to spin as she stared at the device.
“From racist bullies. I was really scared when my parents moved us here because of their jobs. When I found out that only a couple people treated me differently and nobody was doing anything other than spouting nonsense, we abandoned the project. It isn’t working, but it is still collecting unusual data so I leave it on.” Twilight explained.
“Turn it off!” Sunset groaned out, reaching for it before her arm fell back to her side.
“Excuse me?” Twilight growled, turning to face Sunset fully, only then realizing the rough condition the girl.
“Please, shut it off.” Sunset groaned. With a gasp of realization, Twilight hurried and pulled the power cord from the wall outlet, the USB cables from the computer, and yanked the gem from the center of the mess.
“Are you okay?” Twilight asked, kneeling in front of Sunset and looking up at the other girl.
“Just peachy, Twi.” Sunset groaned, looking around at the walls and realizing the paint looked off. It didn’t look like normal paint as it seemed to give off a soft glow of shifting colors. Almost like a rainbow LED fan light from her new desktop computer. “What is the room painted with?”
“Some special paint I got from Elyon, she says it’s lined with something that blocks stray magic that most mages use in practice rooms. She said that since I’m going to be experimenting with magic, I better use it to keep from causing damage to the apartment.” Twilight explained, the name Elyon ringing some bells though Sunset just couldn’t remember who it was at the moment. "Are you sure you're feeling ok?"
“I’m feeling a bit better.” Sunset sighed as she leaned forward and rubbed her face. She was wondering what was causing her reaction, but the better she felt the more she was sure it was the contraption before her. The paint must have been dulling the effects though still let some through which may have explained the hard time she had using magic here.
“It shouldn’t have done anything to you, I’m so sorry.” Twilight whined, obviously distraught over the situation as she shot to her feet. Sunset grabbed her hands before the girl could retreat and made Twilight look at her.
“It isn’t your fault, Sparky. In fact, I’m really impressed that even though you don’t know much about magic, you still managed to piece together some kind of nullification field.” Sunset grinned, “Or something to that effect. I can’t wait to get started teaching you about magic!”
“Wait, what?” Twilight gasped, a hopeful yet excited look overcoming her.
“Oh Sparky, if you can come up with something like this with so little knowledge, think what you can do if you have an actual education in it.” Sunset giggled, the action growing infectious as Twilight soon joined in.
“You sure you’re okay, Susie?” Velvet asked, the two sitting at the table having a cup of coffee.
“I’m ok, Vel, thank you though. I hate to admit it, but the whole thing has me shook up.” Susan said, visibly shaking a little for effect. “The silver lining is that I got to see how badass my daughter is.”
“Badass, huh?” Velvet chuckled, sipping her coffee. “Never thought I’d hear that come out of your mouth.”
“No other way to describe it. She was hit with a huge fireball and absorbed it. She then created new fire over her hands that were much smaller, yet the heat was so much more intense. And it didn’t even seem to phase Sunset one bit. I’m scared for her, Vel, but at least now I know for sure she can handle herself.”
Just then two girls could be heard giggling, which soon turned into a laugh that had shivers going down both women’s spines.
“Why do I have a bad feeling about that?” Velvet asked.
“Somehow I get the feeling you should.” Susan groaned.
“Should we go see what they are up to?” Velvet asked.
“Vel, I love our daughters, but my sanity has been tested enough today. There is no way you are getting me to go in there right now.” Susan said with a deadpan look.
“Yeah, probably best we don’t.” Velvet chuckled.
“So you think it’s possible?” Sunset asked, truthfully a little shocked by the girl’s confidence.
“Well, we would have to rework this little beauty here.” Twilight said, she was making an effort to ignore the raised eyebrow at that claim when she pointed to the contraption before them. “If you can help us with the magic angle, Martin and I can most likely put together something in the form of a bracelet. It depends on what materials we have on hand and how bulky it will be. We might even be able to pull out my designs for the energy collection device I was working on before I left Crystal Prep.”
“I hope we can get it done by Saturday night, I really want to give it to mom for Christmas. Don’t worry, it will be from all three of us.” Sunset assured the girl.
“You should give it to her yourself.” Twilight protested.
“You both are going to put in a lot of effort on this, you both deserve to have your names on it.” Sunset countered.
“The only problem we have is where do we get the crystals from. We need gems that can not only channel magic, but store it as well.” Twilight explained, “This will be a prototype, but maybe we can build a better one later? With more time we might be able to build something like Iruma’s ring in that anime.”
“Sorry, I have no idea what you are talking about.” Sunset admitted.
“Basically, the ring absorbs magic and lets it’s wearer actually use the magic it stores to cast different spells. It won’t be like a couple of set spells, but it would be like the wearer has real magic.” Twilight said.
“That sounds promising.” Sunset mused, “Don’t worry about the gems, I know somebody who might just hook us up with some.”
“Really? Who?” Twilight asked.
“Princess Twilight Sparkle.” Sunset said with a grin, getting the exact reaction from the other girl that she was expecting.
“…What?” Twilight asked, her mouth hanging open as her brain tried to reboot.