Sunset didn’t even bother locking the door after making it back to her apartment. She was a drained battery with no more energy left to spare. Whatever pain that she had felt before had been magnified now that her body was no longer in survival mode. She slumped through the living room, past the kitchen, and into the bathroom. She was in desperate need of a shower, she could smell it.
As she began to undress, she caught her reflection in the bathroom mirror. She looked as if she had just crawled away from a plane crash. Scratches and large purple bruises marred her body from top to bottom. Most of the cuts on her body had scabbed over, although she noticed that some of her injuries were beginning to reopen in response to her moving around.
Her face had taken the most punishment by far. A torn piece from a napkin had been wedged in her nose from where she had been struck by one of the other students. Her lip was still busted a little, and she could tell by the swelling that she was going to have to carry around an ice-pack for her injured eye. Also worth noting were the profane messages and obscene drawings that had been scribbled onto her face with a marker.
***
The shower had done absolutely nothing to ease the pain, but it did grant her temporary respite from her troubles. After throwing on a new change of clothes, Sunset began planning out her next move.
Snips said that Rainbow Dash had told everyone where here apartment was located. If that was true then her current place of residence was no longer safe. Gilda had likely informed the other students about how she had escaped, which meant that she’d probably have a mob waiting for her outside the next morning.
Sunset, thankful that Snails had been kind enough to let her borrow his phone before driving off with Snips, pulled out the mobile device and dialed Vice Principal Luna's phone number. To her surprise, she was still awake, something that Sunset attributed with Luna being the Princess of the night back in Equestria.
Sunset told CHS’s second in command all about her current situation. The Vice Principal, upon hearing about the ambush and the students involved, was outraged by the news. She informed Sunset that she would arrive to pick her up within the hour and that she would be staying at her house for the night. With that problem out of the way, Sunset turned to her next order of business.
She opened her only dresser and dug around inside until she found her journal. She needed to talk to Twilight. There were some things that she needed to discuss with the Princess.
Sunset grabbed a pen and flopped down onto the couch in her living room. After flipping through to the most recently used page in her journal, she saw that she had some missed messages from Twilight.
“Hello.”
“Hi Sunset. It's Twilight, but you already know that. So, how did everything go today?”
“Hey, it’s just me again.”
“Are you there?”
“Sunset?”
“Hey, Sunset. It’s Twilight again. Just checking up on you to see how things went with the sirens. It’s getting late and I still haven’t heard anything back from you yet. I really hope you’re alright.”
“It’s almost eleven and I’m a little worried now. Please write me back soon.”
It dawned on Sunset after reading the last two messages that it had been a pretty lengthy amount of time since she had last written to Twilight. The last time that the two had communicated was yesterday, when Sunset told her about her plan to track down Adagio.
For Sunset, it felt like that conversation had taken place years ago. Not wanting to keep her friend waiting, she put her pen down to the paper and began to write.
“Hey, Twilight. It’s Sunset. Sorry for the late reply. Are you still up?”
Nothing happened at first, and Sunset began to ponder if Twilight had gone to sleep. Her concerns were quelled as words that weren’t hers began to appear.
“Oh thank goodness! I was just about to jump through the portal and come looking for you. What happened? You said that you would write me back as soon as you got back home!”
“Yeah, sorry about that. I ran into a little bit of trouble here and there. Nothing big though.”
“Are you alright? What happened? Was it Adagio?”
“Adagio and her sisters didn’t do anything. Adagio seems to think that Anon-a-Miss is actually Applebloom and Sweetie Belle. I think that she’s probably right. And if it turns out that it really is them, then Scootaloo might have had a role to play as well,” Sunset explained.
Back on the other side, in the magic laden realm of Equestria, Twilight smacked herself on the forehead. “Of course! I should have known!”
It was just like the Gabby Gums incident. The three fillies went around leaking information about other ponies through the local newspaper. Some of it was true, some of it wasn’t, but all of it was damaging and hurtful to those who had been targeted. There were still some things that didn’t sit right with the young alicorn however, specifically the part about Adagio giving Sunset information.
“How exactly did you get Adagio to help you? That sounds a little weird after what happened the last time we ran into them. And you still didn’t answer my other two questions. What happened? And are you okay?”
Sunset stared at the most recent message from Twilight and hesitated before writing back. This was it, the moment of truth. She still wasn’t expecting Twilight to cooperate but she still needed to try - she at least owed the sirens that much.
Sunset took a deep breath, deciding it best to gradually build up and break the news gently.
“From what I heard, there was a really embarrassing secret about Rainbow that went public. She went over the edge and helped a bunch of other Students lead me into a trap. I’m a little scratched up right now, but I’ll be fine.”
Twilight shook her head in disappointment. She had entrusted her friends’ human counterparts with the task of teaching Sunset the magic of Friendship. Rainbow Dash was supposed to help guide Sunset, not tear her down.
“Do you want me to have a talk with her and the rest of the girls?”
“No. There were some close calls, but I have everything under control now. As for how I got Adagio to help ...” Sunset took a deep breath. The moment that she had been dreading since that morning had arrived. “I made a deal with Adagio that if she helped me figure out who was behind all of this, and correctly guessed who the culprit was, then I’d help her get a new set of Amulets.”
There was no response for the next several seconds.
“I’m sorry, I think that I might need to start wearing glasses again because it looks like you just wrote down that you made a deal to help Adagio and her sisters get their magic back.”
Sunset didn’t respond.
“You’re just messing with me, right?”
Still nothing.
“Sunset?”
Sunset took a deep breath and then she began to write back to her friend from the other side.
“I’m serious. And I’m going to need your help too.”
There was a short three minute interlude before Twilight wrote back. During that gap, Sunset figured that the Princess of Friendship was either seething or on the verge of falling into one of those famous panic attacks that she had occasionally heard about during their cross dimensional chats. Given the message that came next, she figured that it was the latter.
“Do you have any idea what you’re asking me to help you do? I’d be putting the safety and well-being of an entire world at risk! And why would you ever agree to something that dangerous anyway?! Did you forget about what almost happened last time?!”
“You don’t understand. They’re going to die if I don’t do something. And because -”
“Hold on. What do you mean ‘they’ll die’ if you don’t do something?” Twilight interrupted.
“Do you remember how we stopped them during the Battle of the Bands?”
How could she forget? Adagio and her sisters had endured everything that Twilight and her friends could throw at them, only to fire back with at least two times the force.
The power of harmony had failed, which in turn had left the entire planet at Adagio’s mercy. Twilight honestly hadn’t felt that powerless since Queen Chrysalis and her army of Changelings had invaded during her brother’s wedding. In the end it was all thanks to Sunset’s timely intervention that the sirens were defeated and their amulets were shattered, permanently crippling the three sisters.
“What about it?” Twilight asked.
“Those amulets were how they were able survive here for so many years. Without them they can’t absorb energy. They’re starving to death. They can’t sustain themselves on human food like we can. They don’t have much time left.”
Back in her castle, Twilight had begun pacing back and forth, unsure of what to do. If the sirens were dying then she supposed that maybe she should at least try to help; she herself was partially to blame after all. On the other hand, if she did help them, they’d just go out and cause trouble again.
Out of all of her memories from how the students of CHS had behaved after being exposed to the sirens’ magic, there was one in particular that shined the brightest.
***
"Why are you acting like this? I thought we were friends ..." Twilight asked sadly as her heart began to crack.
"Yeah, and then you decided to come back here, just so you could beat me in the Battle of the Bands! I want this, Twilight, and you’re trying to take it from me! Some friend …" scoffed Flashed Sentry.
"But, that’s not why -"
"Come on Twilight. We’ve got things to do," Applejack interrupted in an attempt to help diffuse the tension between Flash and the Princess.
As Twilight and the rest of the Rainbooms walked away, Flash called out one final time.
"You really think you’re gonna help them?! I bet you have no idea what you’re even doing!"
***
Twilight frowned at the memory. It hurt every time that it crossed her mind. If the sirens could turn someone as sweet and noble as Flash into something so mean and selfish, then there was no telling what they would do to everyone else if they ever got the chance.
“I don’t mean to sound callous, Sunset, but why do you even want to help them? They survive by making other people argue and fight. If they live, they'll just go back to that. They won't have a choice but too. Don’t you think that maybe it’d be better for everyone if you let nature take its course?”
Sunset read and re-read the question over and over again. She couldn’t deny that Twilight did indeed raise a good point. Allowing the sirens to live would mean allowing an eternal cloud of conflict and strife to hang over the heads of anyone unfortunate enough to cross their path. She tried her best to think of a good counter argument, but nothing came to mind.
Sighing sadly, Sunset wrote one final message.
“Twilight, after you stopped me, everyone wanted me to disappear. They wanted me gone, and to be honest, I might have wanted it even more than they did. But despite all that I had done, and all that I had tried to do to you, and to your friends, you still gave me a chance.” Sunset reflected back on that fateful night, one year ago. Her transformation, the burn from getting hit by the Elements, the looks of contempt on the faces of the other students after she had lost … it all came back.
“You helped me, even though I didn’t deserve it. Is there really that much of a difference between me and them?”
Twilight once again found herself at a loss for words. She didn't want for anyone to have to die, but she didn't want a possible repeat of what happened at CHS either. She just wanted what was best for everyone. Unfortunately for her, the boundaries between black and white were starting to blur.
Something needed to be done, that much was for certain. Twilight just wasn't sure what that 'something' was anymore.
“I’m sorry Sunset, I really am, but I’m going to need some time to think this over.”
And with that, Twilight closed her book and the conversation came to an end.
Sunset, meanwhile, sat on her couch, thinking about all of the ways in which their talk could have gone better.
“Well, at least she didn’t say no,” Sunset said to herself.
Around 15 minutes later, the phone began to vibrate. She had a new message from Vice Principal Luna, saying that she had just pulled up in the driveway outside.
Her heart raced with new-found determination as she began rounding up her luggage.
She was innocent, and first thing tomorrow morning, she was going to make sure that the whole world knew it.