Jumper

by lollipopchica

Chapter 41

“Did you invite him?” Luna stared at Ardent with as much dispassion as Adagio on her worst day.

He shifted under her gaze. “Yea...”

“And he doesn’t know that I’m going to be there, right?”

“No...”

Sonata shot a glare at the other girl for her attitude. “Look, Ardent. It’s okay... Nothing bad is going to happen to anyone. No one is making him do anything.”

The trio managed to meet up after school away from prying eyes.

“But you don’t think it’s just as awful to set this up?”

Luna rolled her eyes. “No one is forcing him to drug these girls and try his luck. We’re just making sure a friend will be in attendance. Nothing more...”

“But what if we can’t stop him for going all the way?”

“We will... I promise.” Sonata could tell he needed more convincing. “After this, no one will ever have to worry about him again.” She gently traced his scar and gave him a hopeful look. “He’s a monster and it’s up to us to take him down.”

Steeling himself, Ardent allowed his mind to fully take on her words. “You’re right.”

The Dazzling smiled and Luna had to admit that the two made a rather sweet couple. She was wrong to lump Ardent with Regal as clearly the boy was still struggling with everything that had happened.

The alicorn heir dropped her attitude and gripped his shoulder in a rare display of encouragement.

“This is the right thing to do. You... Aren’t like him. ” She felt her lips pull into an awkward smile when the other boy visibly relaxed some.

“It’ll be okay,” he breathed as Luna removed her hand.

With a nod, Luna took her leave and headed back towards the school as she pulled out her cellphone.

Punching in a number, she didn’t miss a beat when the person answered on the fifth ring.

-*-*-*-*-

Cadence couldn’t help the anger and grief she had felt when she’d come across her sister wrapped in the arms of her ex earlier that day.

She couldn’t believe Shining Armor had moved on so quickly and seemed to have no problem broadcasting his new relationship to the whole school.

She’d wanted to march over and give the two a piece of her mind. Fortunately, she had been halted by one of the girl’s from the team who had a question about something practice related. The girl had followed her gaze and grimaced when she realized her teammate wasn’t listening. “Don’t make a scene... Just get even,” she’d said and drug her off and away from the shamelessness of the school’s newest couple.

To say that her day had been a shit day, was an understatement.

The cold silence she’d directed towards her sister was justified, she thought, not caring that her attitude poisoned everyone else’s mood and stilted dinner.

“How was school today?” Their mother asked quietly, almost absently.

“It was about as pleasant as one could expect with a knife wedged in their back,” Cadence snorted ill-naturedly, making her sister frown.

“Cadenza,” Adelpha warned tiredly. “This melodrama is getting old.”

“It’s fine, Mom. Cadence is entitled to her own interpretations even if they are grossly inaccurate.” Her eldest raised her head like the Queen she could very well be one day. A thought that made the matriarch falter just a bit. Could she really go through with this?

“Grossly inaccurate?” The youngest scoffed in loud offense.

“Girls...” Justinian tried.

Chrysalis didn’t bother hiding her annoyance, “you’re acting like someone forced you into doing something against your will.” Not allowing a rebuttal she plowed ahead in defense of herself and the boy who risked his life for her. “You broke up with your boyfriend and pushed him away- I didn’t do anything but stand up for you! I begged him to ignore your bullshit, but you couldn’t be bothered to get out of your own way!”

Adelpha’s fork clattered to the table as she looked between the two the girls trying to muddle through her own feelings of guilt and anger. “That’s quite enough,” she hissed, slapping the table angrily. Her response startled the two into silence.

The older teen still shot tentative glances at the seething prima donna who refused to look at anything other than her plate.

Justinian simply stared between the three trying to take everything in.

What was happening here? He wondered. What had he missed?

Disgusted, Cadence gave up on trying to hide her disdain and simply excused herself from the table and stormed up to her room.

“Can I... go for a walk?”

“To where?” Adelpha asked a little too quickly.

“Just around...”

“By yourself?”

She shook her head not bothering to elaborate more as she knew her parents had a pretty good idea who would accompany her.

Her mother stared at her for a long time before exhaling loudly and massaging her temples, “Be back before nine, thirty. Call me every hour.”

Chrysalis nodded, and took her half-eaten plate into the kitchen, leaving her parents alone.

The two looked at each other tiredly.

“How is it possible that things are only getting worse?” Justinian thought aloud. “And what are you so concerned about?”

Adelpha shoveled food into her mouth to keep from answering.

*-*-*-*-*

Cadence looked out the window and saw her sister walking down the street in her true skin.

As if feeling her gaze, Chrysalis stopped and looked up with an expression that raised her ire.

With a sneer, Cadence quickly snatched her curtains to, incensed at the longing sketched into those features. How dare Chrysalis look that way as if she weren’t going to see the teen that occupied her heart.

She found herself texting Regal.

’Ardent is having a party next weekend...Are you going?’ She sent remembering her call from her cousin earlier. ‘We should meet up when I come down. I feel like you’re my only friend these days.’

‘The same way we met up last time?’

‘I told you we left early. I apologized didn’t I? Besides you couldn’t even make good on your promise to take me to the show.’

‘Touche.’

‘.... Shining Virgin is dating my sister now.’

‘....’

‘....’

‘I’m sorry to hear that, Cadie... I really am.’

‘I really liked him... A lot.... and he just...’

‘Forget him! He’s a fuckin’ loser. I could help you feel better... Do what he wouldn’t with you.’

‘And what’s that?’

‘Worship you like the Princess you are.’

‘You’re just saying that...’

‘I’d never humiliate you like that. Let me prove it....’

Cadence thought she just might. She wondered what her sister was doing.

*-*-*-*-*

Shining Armor studied the teen in front of him.

How could he have not put two and two together before?

The raw attraction and curiousness he’d felt for Nyx and the longing and softness he felt for Chrysalis... and to realize they were the same person... Sometimes, the jock couldn’t believe his luck. How was it possible to feel so strongly for one person?

“What?” She asked almost shyly.

The two sat in a nearby park, dangling comfortably in a pair of swings.

“I like the way you look like this.” Chrysalis rolled her eyes, trying not to blush at the way his eyes took in her features. “Why do you hide it?”

“Hide it?”

“Well you certainly don’t walk around at school like this...”

“I didn’t even know I could look like this until earlier this year.” She snorted trying to hide her embarrassment.

Shining Armor looked thoughtful as he reached out and held her hand in his own. Absently rubbing soothing circles against the back of her hand, he hummed curious about other things she could do. “You’re unique.” He concluded as if that explained everything.

“I think you’re pretty,” she shot back.

“Just what every man likes to hear,” he snarked before pressing a kiss to her temple.

Chrysalis hummed wriggling her eyebrows playfully before a bout of seriousness settled over her features.

“What is it?” Shining Armor asked.

“I can’t... I can’t reach my sister like this.” She spoke of the animosity her sister was so unwilling to let go. Shining Armor was silent as his own emotions churned beneath his skin.

“I can’t believe she’s the same girl some times. I don’t not like her, but...”

Chrysalis turned, gracing him with a tight smile, trying to reassure him as best as she could. “I hate that my being with you makes her so unhappy, but I don’t want to give you up... I won’t.... Unless you changed your mind-“

“I won’t. I haven’t.” He interrupted surging forward and taking her lips against his, making the chains rattle as he held their swings together. “But....” He muttered after breaking away and pressing his brow against her own, “I could never hold it against you if you did. I’d hate it but not you.”

“I wish I could make her understand without having to go back.” She turned away from him as a smothering veil of shame settled upon her.

Shining Armor frowned and took her face into his hands and pulled her attention back to himself. “This time you have me, and Maude and Fluffle, your cousins and even Twilight. You’re not alone and whatever power you think he has over you- he doesn’t. You’re still here and you’re still this fierce and loving girl all of us would fight for.” Bright eyes shone in the night with the wetness of tears. “That filth sought to ruin you, but he couldn’t. He can’t. You wouldn’t allow it. As much I care for you, and you know I do, as much as all of us love you, it is solely because of your own strength and stubbornness that I’m able to sit with you and kiss you like this.” He pressed wet kisses to her mouth before tracing his thumb across her bottom lip. “That you allow me your affection. You are not his prisoner in any sense of the word. That place has no power over someone like you.” He tenderly wiped away the saline drops that slipped down her cheeks.

“Someone like me...?”

“Yes... Like my Goddess of Night.”

Chrysalis couldn’t think over the rush of their combined emotion.

She was doomed to love this boy and he seemed all too ready to drown her in his adoration of her.

Author's Note:

An update for those still tuned in! Gonna use a time jump later as I feel this needs to mosey along.

Comments

[Velvet-Fresh]

dammit Cadence. Hope Luna's plan still goes off without a hitch with Cadence involved.