Rogue Sun

by Jninja15

Chapter 3: Uninvited Guests

It was morning, and Sunset Shimmer had gotten up early to make sure that the brats she locked up yesterday couldn’t get into any sort of shenanigans that she wasn’t ready for. She unlocked and opened the door to find the Crusaders sleeping peacefully on the floor, Apple Bloom curled up in a ball, Sweetie Belle lying on her back, and Scootaloo was lying down on her stomach. Sunset slightly cringed when she saw the Crusaders, she had forgotten how ridiculous their outfits looked. Shortly after recovering from her cringing, the Crusaders had already woken up and acknowledged Sunset Shimmer.

“Good Mornin’.” said Apple Bloom, rubbing her eyes.

Sweetie Belle sat up, stretched and yawned loudly, “Good morning everyone.”

Scootaloo lifted up her head from the floor. “Mleh.”

Sunset leaned against the frame of the door, looking at them as if she was supposed to be impressed and clearly wasn’t. “Squirt, you’re coming with me. Red; Marshmallow, you two are going to stay here for now.”

Still drowsy from just barely waking up, Apple Bloom said, “Now wait just a darned minute.” pointing lazily at Sunset Shimmer. “Who’s ‘Squirt,’ who’s ‘Red,’ and who’s ‘Marshmallow?’” she said as she circled her finger around, pointing at the three of them that Sunset may be referring to.

“You, with the wings, you’re ‘Squirt.’ Come with me. You two can figure out your names for yourself.”

“We have actual names you know.” said Scootaloo, picking herself up from the ground; dragging her feet as she walked over to Sunset.

“Don’t care. Now, let’s get to work on figuring out if the piece of the map that we have has any clues on how to find the other pieces.” Sunset said as Scootaloo slowly made her way past the door and Sunset closed and locked it behind them.

Halfway down the hall, Scootaloo finally said, “You know, we may be working together on this for a while, so we should probably get familiar with each others’ names. My name is Scootaloo. What’s yours?”

Sunset just ignored Scootaloo until they reached the computer that Scootaloo was working on yesterday and plugged in the flash drive again. As Scootaloo was sifting through the data on the drive, Sunset asked, “How do you want your coffee? With cream or sugar?”

“Ooh, sugar, please.”

“Too bad. You’re getting black coffee.”

Scootaloo pouted and got back to work. Sunset was at her coffee machine, that produced stuff more like bitter black sludge that was sure to wake anyone who dared to ingest it. She was pouring out a second cup of this sludge when she noticed the sound of a great rumbling coming from outside, she could also hear the slight clanking of small pieces of metal coming from throughout the house. The trembling and the clanking of metal grew louder and louder, then suddenly stopped. Sunset dropped everything she was doing at the moment and started running to Scootaloo at the computer, then the front door exploded with a loud ‘KA-BOOM!’

---

“Are you sure we should cooperate with her? We don’t even know her name.” said Sweetie Belle, “She could kill us at any time.”

“Yes, but she’s had many chances in which she could’ve killed us,” said Apple Bloom, “but she hasn’t, which means she needs us, and we need her.”

“For what?”

“Scootaloo has the skills to decrypt the map and there be more like that out there. If this woman could to do that herself, she would have, and then would not have a reason to keep us. And if Ah’ know Scootaloo, she will refuse to do anythin’ unless we- her best friends- are by her side, which will help keep the two of us alive.”

“We aren’t by her side right now.”

“We’re close enough. Plus, she has a fully functional car that can get us to places we need without having to stock up for weeks in order to even reach the closest town. She is also super scary, which should hopefully keep some people off of us as we travel through towns, and she is the only one who can drive the car by herself.”

Sweetie Belle nodded in agreement. “I do like her car.”

“Yeah, it looks nice, how does it look on the inside?”

Sweetie Belle was about to speak but was immediately interrupted with a loud ‘KA-BOOM!’ coming from outside of their room.

“What’s going on out there?” said Sweetie Belle with wide eyes, filled with fear. “Did she kill Scootaloo?”

“Ah’ don’t know.”

A little bit of time passed before they got their answer and the door then opened, revealing Scootaloo with a set of keys in one hand. She was breathing a little heavily. “Come on, we gotta get out of here. I know another way out.”

---

“KA-BOOM!’ The front door exploded into many burning splinters. Scootaloo was startled by this. Sunset Shimmer ran into the room and came up to Scootaloo.

“What’s going on?” asked Scootaloo.

“Hold on.” Sunset then peered into the other room and saw a figure walk in through the massive amount of smoke with bulky armor that made it look like it had no neck, a mask that had four tubes coming out from behind it and into the armor’s back just below the base of the neck, and looked like it had a gas mask built inside of it, overall making it look less pony-like. The armor was steel gray, with indigo highlights, a blue stripe down the middle of its head, and the symbol on its left shoulder was a blue shield with a yellow lightning bolt on it; the figure also had an exposed pair of yellow-orange wings, indicating that he was a pegasus. Six more figures came in with similar looking armor, but did not have a coat of arms like the first figure and was almost stark white. All of them were holding a sort of rifle in their hands. Sunset’s eyes widened and she inhaled sharply, she turned back to Scootaloo and said, “Shut everything down, take the drive and get the hell out of here. There’s a secret exit in the back of the vault. You should be able to open it when you find it.”

“Who is it?” asked Scootaloo.

“It’s the gorram Empire. That’s who. Now take the map with you and get out of here.”

“What about my friends?”

“There’s no time. Just go.” Sunset turned around and lifted up her hand, summoning a magic circle of red and yellow around her hand, she reached through the circle, and whipped her arm slightly backwards, summoning a combat shotgun into her hands, fully loaded and ready to kill anyone that stands in her way. The summoning of her weapon gave Scootaloo enough time to quickly and successfully pickpocket Sunset for her keys, after which Scootaloo ran off to where her friends were being kept.

“Find the drive!” said the winged, decorated figure, its voice distorted into a deep, mechanical one, “And leave no stone unturned until you’ve found it.”

The others began to spread out as Sunset jumps into the room and fires a round at the head of an unlucky invader that happened to be in front of her. He fell over backwards, dead from the concussive force.

The winged figure then lifted up his hands, halting all other movement, and took off his helmet, revealing his face. He had the same skin color as his wings, and his hair was of the same blue his armor bore, his hair was spiked up and was slightly blown back.

“Sunset Shimmer, how nice to see you again.” he said, trying to give off a warming smile.

Sunset smiled, “Flash, Flash Hundred Yard Dash.” She dropped her smile into a stoic expression, “Can’t say the same for you.” and kept her gun aimed directly at Flash Sentry’s face.

Flash’s smile didn’t fade, “Aw, come on now, I’m sorry I couldn’t come visit more often, being the Captain of the Royal Guard for Empress Twilight takes a lot of time out of my day, I thought you would have missed me some.”

Sunset maintained her stoic face, “Well, you were dead wrong.”

“Oh well. Now that we have the pleasantries out of the way, why don’t you hand over the map and we’ll be out of your hair in no time.”

“I don’t know what you are talking about.”

He sighed and dropped his smile, “If that’s how you want to play this, so be it.” he put his helmet back on. “Kill her.” The other armored guards lifted their weapons and trained them on Sunset.

Sunset flicked a hand forward and cast a spell that flashed a bright light, blinding Flash Sentry and everyone else in front of her for a brief moment. When Flash recovered his sight, he saw that Sunset had disappeared and left a grenade at his feet. He jumped back, using his wings to give him give him a bit of a boost, but could not go very far due to how heavy his armor was, and avoided the subsequent explosion. Unfortunately, it killed two of the guards he came with. When the dust settled, the other guards were still standing around. “Well, what are you waiting for?” Flash said impatiently, “Find the map and kill that witch.”

One of the guards spoke up, “Are you sure you want to kill her? She’s kind of hot.”

Flash stared at this guard, came up to him and gave him a heavy handed, armored backhand smack to the face making a loud ‘Clang!’ once the armored hand made contact with the armored head.

“Right, kill her, got it.” the guard responded, and with that him and two other guards marched off deeper into the building.

Flash took a deep breath. “I really need to talk to Empress Twilight about getting a new donor for these clones.”

Sunset Shimmer was hiding around a corner with a sledge hammer, waiting for the next fool to cross her path. A guard walks in front of her and she immediately nails him in the crotch with her hammer, causing him to recoil in the sudden change momentum, then she reeled back and delivers and uppercut with her hammer to his head, knocking him over backwards. Sunset lifted the hammer over her head and brought it down hard on the fallen guards head, crushing it. Her hammer then dematerialized in a glow of red and yellow, leaving only a massive dent in the guard’s helmet where his head should be.

Another guard rounds the corner, spots her and fires an automated rifle at her. Sunset jumps out of the way, but was still hit, once in her side and several down one leg, nothing lethal but still hurt like Hell. The guard was about to move in to deliver the final shot when he noticed the flash drive they were looking for lying on the table next to a computer. He broke pursuit, claimed the drive, and returned to Flash Sentry. “Sir, I have the package.”

“Good, has your target been eliminated?”

“No sir, not yet. Should I eliminate her now?”

“Not necessary. We have what we came for, let’s leave. Empress Twilight wants this in her hands as soon as possible.” Flash radios the other guard, “Cancel pursuit and return to Elysia.”

“Roger, roger.” and the guards marched off towards the door. Meanwhile, Sunset was lying on the floor, bleeding out through her bullet wounds. Sunset was dragging herself across the floor, to try to get to a good vantage point for when the guard, inevitably she thought, came back to finish her off. She had gotten to the wall on the other side of the room, leaned up against it, summoned her pistol and aimed at the guard, only to find that there wasn’t one there. She held her position, but the pain was beginning to become too much for her and she couldn’t stay awake for much longer. Soon enough, she passed out.

---

Flash approached the throne room on Elysia. The doors were huge, they stretched 12 feet tall, were made of heavy marble and had gold trimming. The throne room itself was massive, the ceiling was twice as high as the doors. Large stained glass windows lined the wall on one side of the room, the windows gave the room a deep reddish tint. Large marble pillars were set in between each of the stained glass windows several feet from the wall and had a twin on the exact opposite side of the room from center. At the far end of the room from the door was a throne, elevated by a short flight of wide stairs.

In the throne sat a robed figure, dressed in dark lavender with dark magenta highlights and subtle gold trimming, her dress was long and her sleeves were loose, very regal-looking. The figure’s hair was dark purple with a magenta stripe, it was long and was kept in a small bun in the back with a tail extending down from that, her bangs were flat, cut in a straight line out of her line of sight. She had large wings that were lavender with a darker undercoat, her skin was also lavender.

Flash Sentry approached the robed figure sitting on the throne.

“Flash.” the figure said, “I take it you found the flash drive?”

Flash kneeled before the figure, took his helmet off and bowed his head, “Yes Empress Twilight. I have retrieved the drive as you commanded.”

“Good, good.” said Empress Twilight. “Soon we shall see what secrets it holds and crush any resistance that dares defy me.”

“I doubt there is anyone in Equestria who would dare defy you milady.”

“Oh, dear, you flatter me.” Twilight said as she flicked her hand flirtatiously at Flash and placed her chin in her hand as she looked out towards the nearest stained glass window with a calm smile.

“Unfortunately, when we opened the drive, we found that what we were looking for had been erased.”

Twilight snapped her head to the direction of Flash Sentry and pounded her fist on the arm of her throne, her wings flared up menacingly. “WHAT?!” she exclaimed.

---

Sunset groaned as she woke up after having a splitting headache that caused her to pass out earlier, she also felt a comforting tingling in her left leg. She opened her eyes to see Sweetie Belle kneeling over her wounded leg, Sweetie’s hands and Sunset’s leg were glowing a pale green.

“Oh good, you’re awake.” Sweetie Belle said, “You’re lucky nothing broke otherwise I’d have put you into a coma with that sleep spell.” she continued jokingly.

“Har, har.” said Sunset. She eyed Sweetie Belle for a moment, “What are you doing?”

“Healing you.” Sweetie Belle said, not breaking her concentration on the wounded leg.

“Why?”

“Well, Apple Bloom promised you that we would help you find whatever that map was pointing to, and she’s not one to go back on a promise, especially if she brings her friends into it. And Scootaloo is not one to abandon a friend for any reason, so when Apple Bloom drags her into a promise with her, she stays by her side on the matter. And me, well, I found someone who needed help.” Sweetie Belle then gave a soft smile at Sunset.

“How generous of you.” Sunset said as she leaned forward, outstretched an open hand over her leg and her hand started to glow red and yellow. Sweetie Belle caught Sunset’s hand, stopping the glow.

“Don’t.” Sweetie Belle said. “You lost quite a bit of blood. If you try to heal yourself now you may pass out again from exhaustion.”

Sunset retracted her hand, leaned back and after a moment of silence began to say, strenuously, “Sunset...”

“NO! DON’T GO TOWARDS THE LIGHT!” screamed Sweetie Belle, as she grabbed Sunset’s shoulders and began to shake her violently.

Eyes wide, Sunset grabbed Sweetie Belle’s wrists and pried them off her shoulders and yelled, “I’m not dying you idiot!” she took a deep breath to calm herself and continued, “That’s my name, Sunset, Sunset Shimmer. One of your friends asked me for it earlier.”

“Oh.” Sweetie Belle said as she retracted her hands awkwardly and put them back to the task of healing Sunset’s leg, “Nice to meet you Sunset Shimmer, I’m Sweetie Belle.”

“Nice to meet you too... Sweetie Belle.”

Just then, Scootaloo entered the room, “Hey, Sweetie Belle, is everything OK? I heard screaming.”

“You.” Sunset said, pointing at Scootaloo, “Do you still have the flash drive?”

“No.” Scootaloo said with a straight face.

“You lost it!” Sunset yelled, straining to get up but was stopped by a sharp pain in her side where she had been shot and Sweetie Belle attempting to hold her down.

“No~,” Scootaloo replied calmly, “I left it for them to take, but I did wipe everything off of that drive and moved it onto this one.” Scootaloo said holding up another flash drive. “Leaving only a special surprise for them when they try to open it. Hehe.”

---

A man was dancing on screen with a microphone in front of him, “Never gonna give you up. Never gonna let you down...”

“This is what we found when we opened the drive.” said Flash Sentry with an open hand directing at the computer screen, a looping video of Rick Astley singing “Never gonna give you up”.

Twilight stared at the computer screen, arms crossed as she breathed slowly, contemplating on what she will do next.

The room they were in consisted of many computers and their monitors, with people in white coats at nearly every single one of them, often getting up, moving around and trading places with each other as the computer screens scrolled through an endless stream of data.

Twilight lifted her hand and, with the sound of a low rumbling bass, a ring of purple magic manifested around Flash’s neck, lifting him up into the air and choking him. Nearly everyone in the room paused their work for a moment, before promptly ignoring Flash’s predicament.

“You have failed me miserably Flash.” the Empress said as she turned to see Flash struggling against the magic around his neck and flailing his legs wildly. “But I am willing to give you a second chance.” she continued as she dropped Flash Sentry onto the floor with an unceremonious ‘thud,’ landing on his butt and falling over to his side, coughing to regain his breath. “But this time you will be accompanied by my apprentice.” Twilight gestured towards behind Flash Sentry and another woman in a robe approached them. Her robe was similar to Twilight’s but looked more like a cape, was of a pale pinkish-purple color, had cyan highlights and no gold anywhere. Her hair was a lighter purple to Twilight’s and had an aquamarine stripe and was kept in a high ponytail and her bangs were swept to one side, matching the curl of her tail. “Flash Sentry, meet Starlight Glimmer.”

Flash immediately shot up to stand in attention to Starlight Glimmer and bowed, “Pleased to meet you, Starlight Glimmer.”

“Hm.” Starlight responded, eying over Flash Sentry before turning to Twilight. “You called me, Master?” she bowed to Twilight and both she and Flash stood back up.

“Yes, Starlight. I want you to accompany Flash here to retrieve a flash drive for me.”

“Over nine months with no communication from you, and you call me now to play fetch?”

“Is that a problem?”

Starlight looked at Flash again, then back to Twilight and with a straight face and said, “No.”

“Good. Now off you go, and be sweet to Flash please.” Twilight walked out of the room, her high heels clacking against the tile floor as she walked down the hall.

Flash turned to Starlight and Starlight looked over him once more. “What does my master see in you?” she says and exits the room walking down the hallway.

Three hours later, Flash and Starlight arrive back at Sunset’s place, with transport trucks parked behind them.

“Alright men…” Flash was just about to motion for his men to move forward but Starlight put her arm in front of him, signaling him to stop.

“No.” she said. “Let me handle this.” Starlight walked into the building.

When Starlight entered she saw that the place was a mess, junk strewn all across the floor, several mounds of it at the edges of the walls. When Starlight entered the third room, she saw Sunset Shimmer standing in the middle, her back towards Starlight. Starlight flicked her right hand outwards and with a “snap-hiss” sound, a cyan beam-sword extends out from her palm and she takes a swipe at Sunset Shimmer, only for it to pass harmlessly through her.

“An illusion spell?” Starlight said to herself.

The image of Sunset Shimmer turned around to face her would-be aggressor, “So sorry I wasn’t here for you to actually kill me Flash, but don’t worry I’m sure you’ll still have a blast.” the image grinned and dissipated like a mist.

Starlight heard several beeping noises coming from all around her and she noticed small lights blinking for a moment before everything exploded around her, causing the building to collapse.

Flash was standing around looking bored and irritated until he heard explosions go off and the building in front of him collapse. Flash jumped forwards a little bit before he started to pace around in a panic.

“Twilight’s apprentice just died. What am I going to do? What do I tell her? Will she kill me if I do tell her? She will most assuredly kill me if I don’t tell her and she finds out later. So in that case, do I just run away and join one of these lawless factions in the wasteland? Do I-” he stopped when he noticed rubble starting to move. A cyan bubble grew from underneath, when it slowly surfaced over halfway up, it silently popped, sending the rubble that had continued to lay on top of it to be thrown very far, revealing Starlight to emerge unscathed, merely dusting off her shoulders as she walked towards Flash.

“Well, looks like this mission’s a failure.” Starlight said with a flat tone and neutral expression when she reached Flash.

“Oh God. What am I going to do?” Flash said, starting to panic again.

“You are going to tell her what you found, a destroyed house.” she said, seemingly without emotion.

“Oh no, I’m not going to take the blame for this. You’re the one who blew up the house.” Flash said, pointing a finger in Starlight’s face.

“Our target had already set explosives around the place and set to trigger after her message to you was finished being delivered.”

“Wait, she left a message for me?” Flash said a little too eagerly.

“Yes. She said that she was disappointed that she wasn’t around to see you die. Quite frankly, I’m starting to share the feeling.”

Flash glared at Starlight. “Whatever, let’s just report this to Empress Twilight.”

“You go on ahead. I’ll catch up with you.”

“Oh no. You’re not dodging Twilight’s punishment that easily, you’re coming with me, now.”

Starlight began to force-choke Flash with her magic.

“Or later.” he managed to say and was quickly let go. “But we’re going to report this together.”

“Unless you and your men wish to join me in my mediation, I suggest you go on without me.”

Flash stared at Starlight for a moment, and his expression soured at the thought of his men trying to meditate, and how annoying they would be when they failed. “OK you win, but you’re going to have to get back on your own.”

“Fine by me.” Starlight waved her hand to a group of guards and they rolled a motorcycle off of a transport truck. “I brought my own ride.”

Flash looked at the bike then back to Starlight and raised an eyebrow at her. “Whatever.” he said as he walked away and waved a hand dismissively. “Have fun mediating.” Flash and the guards boarded the trucks.

“One more thing.” Starlight said before Flash drove off for Elysia. He looked at her with curiosity. “The target apparently knew your name. You wouldn’t happen to know hers, would you?”

“Sunset Shimmer.” he said flatly. “Why?”

“I just wanted to put a name to a face.”

Flash rolled his eyes and signaled the driver to go, and they drove off, leaving Starlight alone to mediate.

Starlight sat down in front of the crumbled house, legs crossed, hands laid face-down on her knees. She closed her eyes and took deep, controlled breaths.

Minutes passed in silence as Starlight meditated, then she opened her eyes“New Pegasus, huh?” she stood up and smirked, “I look forward to our meeting, Sunset Shimmer.”

Then Starlight heard the cock of a handgun behind her head, followed by a proud, raspy voice, “You know Sunset Shimmer?”

Comments

[Marcthelightspark2004]

“It’s the gorram Alliance."

Take mah love, take mah land, take me where i cannot stand. i don't care i'm still free, you can't,take me out to the black, tell em i ain't comin back, there's no place i can be, since i've found serenity, but you can't take the sky from me!
---The ballad of Serenity, Joss Whedon's Firefly.

[Speculore]

Twilight getting rick-rolled was something I found much funnier than I thought it was gonna be.