Starlight
My teammates were idiots.
If I’m being perfectly honest, Twilight was actually a certifiable genius. She knew the answer to just about any question you could ask, and sometimes she could answer questions that you only meant to ask. And Sunset was pretty clever in her own right. I didn’t especially like the Faunus members of my Team, but they had some redeeming qualities.
Trixie is an idiot. That’s what I was getting at.
Every few days, she found herself getting into fights with other students, normally because she couldn’t keep that big mouth of her’s shut. She lost almost all of them. The worst part? She always bragged. Even after she lost. Especially after she lost. I hated it. She never shut up about how amazing she was, which irritated me to no end. She completely flew in the face of what it means to be a Huntress. Huntsmen and Huntresses should be calm, level-headed, and humble. Trixie failed at all of these, most of all the “humble” part.
Midway through our first semester, I decided to do something about it.
Our dorm was mostly empty, with only me and Sunset there. Trixie was off, probably losing to a third-year, and Twilight was most definitely in the library. She seemed obsessed with some Huntsmen that went missing a few years ago named Night Light, and she spent every spare second learning about him. Sunset was, as usual, sitting on her bed and rocking out with her orange headphones. I waved my hands in front of her to get her attention. When this failed, I pulled my staff, Sameness, from my back and fired a bolt of my Aura, sending her headphones flying.
“Hey! No weapons or Semblances in the dorm!” warned Sunset.
“Whatever you say, Boss,” I scoffed. “Did my package arrive?” Without an answer, she reached under her bed and chucked me a small box, emblazoned with a large gear and a torch inset. The symbol of Atlas.
“You owe me a pair of headphones,” grumbled Sunset. “Those weren’t cheap, Glim. Cost me 300 Lien.”
“I will pay you back when I get money from my parents,” I promised. “And when I pay back everyone else I owe. That probably won’t be for a while, though. These were expensive.”
“Alright, I’ll bite. What are those?”
I popped open the box, letting two square patches tumble out, both decorated with the Atlas crest. I loved Atlas, and I’d happily live there over Vale if I could afford it, but they were obsessed with their symbol. I found it nauseating.
“These are the solution to my problem,” I said.
“Problem being that you’re an obsessive-compulsive psychopath?” asked Shimmer.
I am not obsessive-compulsive. I just hate when things are uneven. Everyone and everything should be level and equal, and it gets under my skin when they aren’t. It’s as simple as that.
“No,” I said dryly. “I was referring to Beacon’s problem.”
“They enroll obsessive-compulsive psychopaths in their school?”
“You know how people say you’re funny?” I asked. “You’re not. These are Inhibitors. These patches send a small amount of specially charged Dust into your nervous system, which all but shuts down your Aura for 24 hours. It’s used in prisoner transport, and they cost me an arm and a leg.”
“Question. What problem is this solving exactly?” asked Shimmer.
“Lulamoon! This is going to knock her off her high horse!”
“Is that supposed to be some sort of race thing?” Shimmer wiggled her pony ears. “Come on, that's offensive.”
“I'm going to put the Inhibitor on her so she can't use her Semblance,” I continued, ignoring my leader.
“Another question. How is that gonna solve your problem?” asked Sunset, this time with a little less of her sarcastic, jokey nature. I shook my head, then slapped one of the inactive Inhibitors on my neck.
“I am going to lock her Aura, and my own, and neither of us will be able to use our weapons or Semblances until tomorrow,” I said. “When we are on an even playing field, she will learn humility and she will stop bragging about nothing.”
Sunset laughed. For several minutes. I did not appreciate that laughter at all. She didn’t stop until I drew Sameness and shot a small bolt of fire at her, igniting her hair. Sunset glared at me, and I extinguished the flames with a wave of the staff.
“What’s so funny?” I asked. She snickered slightly, shaking her head in disappointment.
“Alright, where to start? First off, that’s gotta be against the rules,” said Sunset. “Luna will give you detention until graduation if she ever found out that you messed with another student’s Aura. And if you get us banned from Vytal, I will literally murder you.”
“She won’t find out, and I promise that we will be perfectly able to compete in the Tournament,” I promised.
“Secondly, how is blocking her Aura gonna stop her from using her weapons?”
Trixie Lulamoon was an absurd, overconfident, flamboyant, extravagant little girl who thought she was a Huntress. Her weapons matched her personality quite well. Were you to ask her what they were, she’d say “The Great Trixie has no need for weapons!”. In actuality, she has a bag of party tricks. Razor-edged and Dust-lined playing cards, smoke bombs, tiny fireworks, “magic” coins and God only knows what else, all hidden within the sleeves of her cloak. Her weapons weren’t like mine or Sunset’s; She could ostensibly wield them without any use of her Aura.
“I’ve done some research, and her Aura is directly linked to all of her little tricks except the smoke bombs,” I explained. “It’s just like how you could use your guitar without using your Aura, just not how you would like to.”
“And the smoke bombs?”
I marched over to my bed, lifted the mattress, and raised a small burlap sack, which I threw to Sunset. She opened it and retrieved one of the small blue orbs it contained.
“Seriously?” she asked.
“I’ve been planning this for weeks,” I said, failing to withhold the pride I felt. Sunset shook her head again, then leaned over to retrieve her headphones.
“Jesus, these are busted to hell and back,” she grumbled. “Okay, Starlight Glimmer, master strategist, I got one more question for you.” She put the broken headphones on again for some reason. “What makes you think that Trixie will learn any lesson from this?”
“Any reasonable person would be humbled by this sort of experience,” I said.
Sunset started laughing again, so I angrily left the room. What she thought was irrelevant. All I had to do was find Lulamoon so I could activate the Inhibitors and shape that show-off into the perfect person, just the way I want her.
Alright, perhaps I was a bit of an obsessive-compulsive psycho.
Trixie is an idiot.
I had several plans in mind to get the Inhibitor on her neck. I spent a lot of time and money on various measures I would use in case she ended up being difficult. One particular plan involved a handful of Dust, 30 Lien, and one of Shimmer’s spare guitar strings. However… Trixie made all that planning and shopping unnecessary.
I saw her in the hallways, on the way to class, when I saw an opportunity I couldn’t resist. We were all alone, and she had her back to me. I crept up behind her, the other Inhibitor in my left hand.
“Hey!” I shouted. “Lulamoon!” She turned, which gave me a prime opportunity to slap the Inhibitor directly onto her forehead.
“What in the world are you doing?” asked Trixie. She went to pull off the patch but wasn’t quite fast enough. I pulled out my Scroll and tapped the Inhibitor’s activation app.
A shocking pain ran through my body, dropping me to my knees. It ended as swiftly as it started, and I wasn’t the only one affected. As I struggled back to my feet, I could tell that my partner was doing the same. She gripped her head in pain, leering at me suspiciously.
“What did you do to Trixie? Was this some sort of attempt to assassinate her?!”
“You have to be important for it to be an assassination,” I said with a sinister grin. “But you’re not. You’re just like the rest of us, Lulamoon. Hopefully, this will teach you that.”
“Hm. Whatever you did to Trixie, she suggests you apologize,” said Trixie. She flicked her wrist, letting a card slide into her hand. “Now.”
“And if I refuse?” I asked. She glared at me and threw her card as hard as she could.
It flew half a foot and dropped to the ground.
“What?!” demanded Trixie. She slid out another card and threw it at me. This time, a small gust of wind blew it to the right. She was getting frustrated, drew three more cards, and threw them. This time, she got lucky, and one of the cards managed to hit me.
It bounced off against my nose like a paper ball.
“Oh, what’s the matter, Trixie?” I asked evilly. “You seem to be lacking some of that Great and Powerful flair I’ve come to expect.”
“Trixie… Trixie doesn’t understand… Her Aura is supposed to push the cards… So… You! You turned off Trixie’s Aura!”
“Which seems to have the side effect of heightened brain function, because you came to that conclusion rather easily.” I pulled Sameness from my back and aimed it at my adversary. “Now see if you can run your mouth when we’re on even footing.”
“Have you bumped your head?! Even without Trixie’s Aura, she could sweep the floor with a Huntress as weak and talentless as you!”
“You don’t get it, do you? I’ve made it so that we’re the exact same! We’re perfectly equal!”
“So what if you’ve made yourself Trixie’s equal?” She flipped her hair, then adopted her favorite pose; her left hand on her hip with her right pointing forward accusingly. “Trixie is still superior to you in every way!”
I’ve said it before, but I think it bears repeating; Trixie is an idiot.
“Then prove it, Lulamoon,” I said. Trixie flipped out one of her cards and primed to attack, but a voice interrupted her.
“There will be no fighting in these halls, especially today!” I quickly reattached Sameness to my back, hiding my weapon just before Professor Luna turned the corner. All it took was one look at her to tell that she meant business.
Her long sapphire hair, which she normally let loose down to her neck, was tied up in a tight ponytail. She had donned dark black gloves with her navy blue war jacket and pants, and her normal black heels were now knee-high boots. Most startling was the presence of her weapon, Nightmare. It was a large, smooth mirror with a razor edge and a strap on the back so that she could hold it like a shield. I had never seen it used, but I’d been told that it lives up to its name.
“Gods be damned, it’s you two,” she grumbled. “Very well, you’ll have to do, follow me!” She took off and, after glancing at each other for a second, Trixie and I followed her.
“What’s going on?” I asked. I pulled my staff from my back, preparing for a fight.
“What’s ‘going on’ is a small Grimm invasion,” said Luna. “We have an inordinate amount of Grimm in the Emerald Forest, and they are moving closer and closer to the school. We need your help to battle them back.”
I had never really considered that my plan might blow up in my face, which may have been arrogant of me. I glanced at Trixie, who was trying her best to conceal just how afraid she was. I didn’t have the courage to tell Luna what I had done to Trixie.
“Trixie hopes you have a plan,” whispered my partner.
“Working on it,” I hissed.
“Now is not the time for chit-chat,” snapped Luna. “The Grimm are marching ever-closer, and my sister can only hold them back for so long.”
This was all Trixie’s fault.
“Glad you could make it, sister dearest,” said Celestia not taking her eyes off of the Forest’s perimeter. I could almost feel the Grimm marching. “And I see you picked up the cavalry.”
“They were not my first choice, but they’ll have to do until the reinforcements arrive from Vacuo,” said Luna. “Ms. Glimmer, Ms. Lulamoon, you will be remaining here and dealing with any Grimm that manage to get past.”
“Luna and I will try to thin the herd, so to speak,” said Celestia. She waved her scepter and three golden spheres floated from the surrounding bushes, hovering around her. “Just like old times, eh?”
“Yes, quite,” said Luna. In a flash, her and her sister were gone into the Forest. Trixie waited until they were gone, then flicked me on the forehead. Hard.
“Ow!” I rubbed my head gingerly. “What was that for?!”
“Are you insane?!” demanded Trixie. “We are going to die because of you! What did I ever do to you to deserve this?!”
I shouldn’t have smiled. This was a serious matter, and one or both of us could easily die there. This was my first real Huntress situation, and I shouldn’t have had time to be amused by my partner.
But I did.
“I’m sorry, what did who do to deserve this?” I asked venomously. Trixie didn’t seem to notice, instead just pacing nervously.
“I just wanted people to respect me, is that too much to ask?” she lamented. “Just a little bit of respect, that’s all I ever asked for! Now, I’m going to die because you couldn’t let go of your ego!”
“My ego?! You’re the one who waltzes around the place, talking as if you’re God’s gift to Huntsmen!” I snapped. “You realize that I wouldn’t have done any of this if you were just a normal, humble Huntress instead of a stupid…” I struggled to find the right word. “Peacock!”
“Peacock?”
What we had forgotten while arguing is that our negativity was being picked up by Grimm. We didn’t notice their advance until they were marching just a few meters away. The only reason we looked up from shouting at each other was the loud roar of an Alpha Beowolf. It was massive, twice my height, baring its fangs and snapping angrily. It led a large pack of other Beowolves and various Grimm, all of which were advancing slowly.
“Give me your Scroll,” said Trixie. I looked at her curiously. “Give Trixie your Scroll!” I flinched in surprise but tossed her the Scroll nonetheless. Trixie flipped through it for a second, looking for what I could only assume was an off-button.
“There’s no way to turn it off, okay?” I said. “These are meant to not be able to be turned off!”
“Trixie isn’t trying to turn it off, she knows that’s impossible,” said Trixie, apparently more than comfortable with her former way of speaking now. “But, if Trixie was to work some of her magic…”
The patches activated again, this time only making me stumble from the pain. Trixie caught me before I tripped, a superior grin on her face.
“What did you do?” I asked.
“You know, Trixie’s father programmed Scrolls for a living,” she said. “And, over 17 years, Trixie was bound to pick up a few tricks.” Her grin widened. “Trixie managed to tweak the Inhibitor’s application just a tad. We should be able to use about half of our typical power.”
“That’s not going to be enough,” I pointed out. She raised a card, the Ace of Spades, flipping it between her fingers.
“Light this card for Trixie,” she ordered. I didn’t bother asking questions, I just waved Sameness to ignite the card. To my surprise, the flames that erupted were black.
“What in the world…”
“Trixie has a few tricks up her sleeve. Now she needs you to get them bunched up and keep them still. Do you think you can do that?”
“My Semblance, but… Five seconds may not be enough to get in and out,” I said. “If I had my full ten, then maybe, but…”
“Do you know what your problem is, Starlight Glimmer?” Trixie asked. “You are too content with mediocrity.”
“What are you even talking about?”
“You hate Trixie for bragging when you should be bragging yourself.” She flicked her other wrist, a black wand sliding from her sleeve into her left hand. “Instead of shooting for the stars, you try to drag everyone down to Earth.”
“I just want everyone to be equal,” I grumbled.
“And we will be. On our own time. We just won’t be equal on the ground. We will soar together,” said Trixie. “Trixie suggests you don’t get left behind.”
I wasn’t happy with how much food for thought this stupid magician was giving me, but I stowed her advice away for later use. For now, I grit my teeth and tightened my grasp on my weapon.
“Alright, I’ll do it,” I said. Trixie placed her hand on my shoulder.
“Here. Trixie will lend you some of her power.” I felt a wave of warmth flow through me as Trixie flooded me with her Aura. It was like mixing two different flavors of pop, both familiar yet completely new at the same time.
I ran forward, firing bolt after bolt of fire at the line of Grimm, igniting chests and pissing them off. They seemed to forget that Trixie was just a few dozen feet behind me because they all jumped me. I dodged a Beowolf’s slash, forcing its claw into the belly of its friend.
One.
An Ursa made a swing for my head, which I avoided with a duck. I slapped its knee with my hard wood staff, though, that only seemed to annoy it.
Two.
What was Trixie planning to do? I couldn’t possibly hold these Grimm of for a whole three more seconds! I was outclassed, outgunned, and outnumbered.
Three.
I felt the sting of claw against my cheek, the sharp bone managing to pierce my Aura and draw blood.
Four.
I avoided the next swipe and slammed my staff into the ground, igniting the air around me.
Five.
I felt myself lurch forwards, then backward as I repeated my actions, but in reverse order. My rewind normally had a maximum of ten seconds, which was normally more than enough. But with only half my Aura, I could only go back five, which may not put me in a safe place.
I managed to go back eight.
“Starlight, get out of there!” Trixie called. From outside of the mob of Grimm, I took a second to admire my work. The Grimm swiped and clawed at nothing, and they were really surprised when they spontaneously combusted.
“Whatever you’re going to do, do it now!” I called, sprinting back to her. “That won’t kill any of them!” Trixie just smiled, then stepped forward. I stopped beside her, feeling her Aura leave my body and return to her.
“Watch in awe, Starlight Glimmer,” she said. She threw her flaming black card as hard as she could, sending it rocketing like a bullet. The card dropped just in front of the group of Grimm, which looked like a miss to me. Trixie just grinned and waved her wand. I can only guess that she was activating some sort of Dust mechanism, because the card rose, leaving a ring of fire that was growing in height. Trixie moved her wand like a conductor at an orchestra, each movement manipulating the fire in some way. With a downward flourish, the fire collapsed in on itself, scorching every Grimm that it contained.
She flicked her wrist, and the card emerged from the flames. It flew back to her hand, completely unscorched. She twirled, bowed, and offered it to me.
“Is this your card?” she asked.
Trixie is an idiot. But, I suppose, she was my idiot to deal with.
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Trixie is kind of a badass.
I'm so happy I hit those buttons up top.
6918107 Same!
6917788 Trixie thanks you for calling her a badass. Trixie also would like to say that you are a badass for reading.
6917631 The Great and Powerful Trixie appreciates your love.
Hoping that the 'bad guy team' (if there is one) turns out to be Sonata, Aria, and Adagio,
6919101 They won't show up for a while. I was referring to FRRP.
So why did you skip into the middle of their first Semester? I feel it would have been better to show us Trixie and Starlight not getting along as their time together progresses. This tends to be more impactful than just saying it happened. It let's the reader see their history, see why the characters don't get along and makes their eventual friendship that much more meaningful. It's gonna be the same for Sunset and Twilight. It's good writing as it is, but this could be a great story if you follow the show-don't-tell rule.
6919227 It was a matter of how much each issue mattered to me. On one hand, I could pick up almost immediately from where Sunny left off. From there, I could show off Starlight and Trixie bickering and hating each other. On the other hand, I could go right to when the problem has escalated enough to where Starlight decides to do something and hope that the two characters' basic natures are enough to make it believable. The reason I went with the latter rather than the former is that all of the beginning of the chapter would be padding. I don't believe Starlight would do anything this drastic until weeks of working with Trixie, so I would have to do something to fill that time. None of it would be substantial, and I didn't want to turn it into a filler episode, so to speak. Ultimately, I'd rather have it be slightly less impactful than have it filled with complete nonsense.
Totally unrelated, but this is the second chapter you've commented on, and I didn't get a notification either time. Is this some sort of fimfiction magic that I'm not familiar with?
6923400 Yang would be proud.
Thanks for reading
6919278 Not sure why you're not getting notified. That's strange.
As for the story, I'd advise the development of the characters and their relationships with each other, be the subplot to some conspiracy or some large scale Grimm problem. At least a big enough problem that they see the sense in putting their differences aside and working together. It'll keep things from seeming padded and allow for more natural and impactful character development.
Hm. I'm a touch surprised that in that particular group there isn't somebody who's turned insisting Starlight is a "sociopath, not a psychopath" into an in-group conversational reflex. Though psychology is hardly a static science, terminology's constantly debated anyway, and just because they're all bright and presumably all read doesn't happen to mean any of them cover that subject. Feh.
And EQG Trixie gets a sudden inexplicable urge to look in a mirror and slap herself for not practicing until it's automatic. (Basic form should let anybody throw a card ten to fifteen feet without any real practice, or visibly "boomerang" an uncrimped card two feet or so. Practicing magicians are on record as "dealing" cards to specific audience members at eighty-foot ranges, or scaling a crimped card out to twenty feet and catching it again in the deck. I might think she uses metal cards, but not if she's still doing card tricks with them.)
...Really, though, if I wasn't impressed with the story I wouldn't be commenting at all.
9438503
Trixie never practiced her card throwing because she never needed to; She's used to sending the cards flying with a burst of her Aura, which doesn't require much in the way of physically throwing it. When she had her Aura shut down, she wasn't prepared to actually have to throw it.