//------------------------------// // The Girl From Another World // Story: Two in Exile // by River Road //------------------------------// “Not Magic Kindergarten!” Sunset paused and looked up, twitching a bit at the still somewhat unfamiliar feeling of her ears not perking up. She sighed and closed her laptop, standing up to walk over to the bedroom of her small, three-room apartment. Several thumps and crashes came from the other side of the door, followed by several seconds of silence and then a high-pitched scream and even more thumps. She quietly opened the door, sending a sliver of light into the darkened room. On the far corner of the room she could see a shivering bundle of blankets, wide eyes barely visible as they stared at her. Sunset rolled her eyes and fully opened the door, standing with her arms crossed and half silhouetted against the light coming from the living room. “Well, you’re certainly taking this a lot better than I expected.” The bundle of blankets kept staring at her, voice cracking. “W-what are you?” Sunset casually raised a hand to inspect her fingernails. “I’m a magical talking unicorn from a land beyond the veil. Also, I’m a female human adolescent.” “A… hyoo-men?” The blankets stopped shivering, though they didn’t show any other intention of moving. “So that’s what you’re getting hung up on?” Sunset smirked. “Well, if I needed any more proof I suppose that would be it. You’ve been pretty lucky, kiddo, walking into the only other Equestrian in this world. At least I don’t think there are any others.” The bundle of blankets finally opened up enough to reveal the girl’s head, leaning forward. “You’re from Equestria?! Please, can you show me the way back? I don’t even know exactly how I got here and my parents are probably worried and…” she gasped. “Oh no, the exam!” “Whoa, whoa, calm down filly.” Sunset leaned against the doorframe, faking disinterest. “You got all the time in this world to figure yourself out. Or as long as it takes me to kick you out, at least. The only reason I even carried you all the way here in the first place was because I was curious and you wouldn’t wake up.” “You would kick me out?” Twilight tried to fold her ears back, cringing and shuddering when it didn’t work. “W-what did you mean when you said I have all the time in this world?” “Well, the way I figure it’s gonna be a good two years before the portal opens again. And even when it does I don’t see why you would try to go back if the old nag made so much effort just to banish you in the first place.” She frowned. “How did Celestia manage to open it anyway?” “Princess Celestia?” Twilight gave her an incomprehensive look. “I was running away after I failed the entrance exam and got lost. Then there was a loud boom and… wait, did you just say two years? I’m stuck here for two years?!” She threw off the blankets, staring in shock. “Yup.” Sunset turned around, walking away again. “Sounds like you got here by some freak accident. And that means you’ve just gone from interesting to useless. You have five minutes to pack your bags and get out.” Twilight jumped up and stumbled after her, almost tripping over her strange new legs as she tried to keep up. “I… what?! B-but I don’t even have bags!” “Great, then you won’t need five minutes.” “Where am I supposed to go? I don’t even know where I am!” Sunset sat down at her laptop again, absentmindedly gesturing towards the door. “You’re in my apartment. There’s the door. Everything after that is not my problem. Congratulations, you’re a man now. Woman. Whatever.” Twilight stared up at her, tearing up. “Y-you’re just sending me out there? All alone? Into a world of hairless minotaurs that I don’t know anything about?” “Cause that’s what happens when you jump through a weird magic mirror without thinking…” Sunset grumbled under her breath. She groaned and rubbed her eyes. “Alright twerp, you can stay here for tonight. On the couch. You’re going to be quiet, you’re going to stay away from my stuff and if you start to annoy me I’m kicking you out faster than you can say ‘ow, ow, I’m sorry, please stop hitting me with a broom’. You got all that?” She glowered down at the little girl. Twilight gulped and nodded quietly, staring up at her. She quickly scampered away to the off-green couch. Sunset watched her, meeting her gaze for a few moments as the girl peered over the couch’s backrest at her. Then she turned back to her laptop and started browsing the internet again, grumbling under her breath. For several minutes the only sound in the apartment was that of Sunset typing and occasionally clicking on her laptop. She didn’t react to the thump and the series of small, shuffling steps moving around her table, nor the top of a head slowly coming into view over the table’s edge, staring at her. “What are you doing?” Sunset’s eye twitched. ~~~~~ Sunset quietly ate her pop tarts, trying to ignore the obnoxious cereal crunch that only little colts and fillies – or little girls and boys, as it were in this world – could produce at this volume despite drowning it in milk. Twilight had barely said a dozen words all morning, acting subdued and stealing glances at her. Finally Sunset put down her coffee mug and sighed. “Alright, what’s wrong? Don’t like frosted cereal?” Twilight flinched and looked up, biting her lip. “I’m, uhm…” She muttered something into her bowl. Sunset leaned in. “What was that? Speak up, filly.” “Pleasedon’tkickmeout!” Twilight blurted out, blushing and quickly making herself small again after her outburst. Sunset blinked, having leaned away from the girl in surprise more than she would like to admit. She opened her mouth, then closed it again and frowned. “Well, I’m not letting you stay alone in my apartment for hours. You could burn the whole place down by accident before I’m even three blocks away.” She stood up and took her plate as well as the girl’s bowl, dropping them in the sink in a gesture of finality. “I have to leave for school and you have to leave, period.” Twilight perked up for a second at the mention of school, then wilted again at the memory of just how she had gotten into this situation in the first place. “I-I understand… I think.” Sunset nodded. “Great.” She started to clean their dishes, trying to ignore the awkward silence as she finished cleaning up, grabbed her bag and put on her boots. She held open the door, waiting impatiently as the girl shuffled out of the apartment and down the stairs. They finally made their way outside, Sunset deliberately locking the front door with an air of finality. She gave Twilight one last look, then turned around and started walking off. “Well then, good luck. Don’t follow me around.” Twilight bit her lip, fidgeting nervously before blurting out. “Twilight Sparkle!” Sunset paused, looking over her shoulder. “What?” Twilight blushed, mumbling. “M-my name… it’s Twilight Sparkle.” Sunset stared at her for a few seconds, then shrugged and turned her head back to keep walking. “Good for you. If I find out you’ve gotten rich somehow I’ll send you a bill.” Twilight shivered, nervous and with no idea where to go as she watched Sunset disappear down the road. ~~~~~ “Well well well, if it isn’t Fluttercry.” Sunset walked up to the pale yellow-skinned girl by the school’s front entrance, reveling in the way the girl flinched just from hearing her voice. “Begging money for your animal friends again? I didn’t know they let beggars loiter on school grounds.” Fluttershy shrunk a bit, trying to hold the stack of flyers protectively in front of her. “I-I-I’m not b-begging for money. I’m trying to find volunteers… for the animal shelter...” She looked away, voice breaking towards the end. Sunset smirked and leaned in. “Piece of advice. You might even find some poor idiot willing to volunteer if anyone could actually hear you.” She pulled back and walked past into the school building without waiting for an answer. An easy target like Fluttershy was just what she had needed. She felt back in her game again, ready to play her fellow students like a fiddle and extend her influence over the school some more. Maybe today would turn out to be a good day after all. ~~~~~ “Sunset Shimmer, please come to Principal Celestia’s office at once. Sunset Shimmer to Principal Celestia’s office.” Sunset flinched at the name that still sounded way too much like ‘Princess Celestia’ for her liking, growling as everyone in the classroom turned to look at her. Without a word she stood up and grabbed her bag, walking out with her head held high. She wouldn’t let these teenagers see any weakness, certainly not because of something as meaningless as a visit to the principal’s office. One of her victims of this morning must have snitched on her. Maybe Fluttershy had finally been pushed so far as to run there, though she really didn’t strike her as one who would do that. She really was a far too easy victim. Either way, a few empty apologies and half-truths, maybe another detention and she would be out of that office before the lunch break. Sunset walked into the front room to the teacher’s lounge, ignoring the look from the school’s secretary Miss Raven as she made her way to the unassuming door that led to the Principal’s office. Knocking and taking a second to put on an appropriately innocent and mildly surprised expression, she opened the door as soon as she heard the “Enter” from inside. “You wanted to see me, Principal…” She trailed off, staring at the young lavender girl sitting in front of the principal’s desk, looking down nervously with her back to the door. Celestia looked up from the girl to meet Sunset’s eyes, raising an eyebrow. “A hall monitor found this young lady, and I quote, sneaking around the school. She doesn’t go to Canterlot High, she doesn’t carry any ID and when we tried to ask where she was from she just asked for you. Maybe you can shed some light on all this, Miss Shimmer?”