Adagio was up bright and early the next day. She had made sure to set an alarm; she and her sisters had neglected a number of chores over the past several days because they were focused on the Battle of the Bands. Groceries were at the top of the list – practically all they had left was butter and cereal! It was Sonata's turn to go to the store. Unlike cleaning her room, Sonata actually liked grocery shopping.

“Sonata!” Adagio called. “It’s your - “

As if on cue, Sonata showed up in the kitchen. She clutched her bright pink shopping bags in one hand and held out her other hand expectantly.

“Yep! I just need the grocery list and money and I’m ready to go!”

Adagio handed her the list and two crisp new fifties.

“And remember, stick to the list! You can get one taco kit and that’s it,” Adagio admonished.

“Yeah, yeah, I know, I know! Just what’s the list,” Sonata replied matter-of-factly.

As Sonata left, Adagio lit up a cigarette. Aria finally came out of her room and joined her sister smoking. Out of the three of them, Sonata was the only one who didn’t smoke. She frequently complained about the smell, but she had never been able to make a strong case against it – since they used to be immortal, none of the health effects had been of any concern.

Hopefully it won't cross her mind to bug us about that shit now that we’re mortal, Adagio thought. It’s not like I plan to stay mortal for very long, anyway.

“So what's up for today?” Aria asked, taking a long drag on her cigarette.

Adagio sighed and took a sip of her coffee.

“Probably nothing. As good as he is, I highly doubt that even Blood Hound can dig up any useful info so soon. This isn’t the first time I’ve hired him, but I can tell you that he takes his time to be thorough and maximize his chances of success. At the end of the day, though, you can never really predict when something will turn up – or if it will turn up at all,” Adagio explained.

“Just be patient. We WILL create new pendants and we WILL win the next time we tangle with those Rainbitches. I’m not just gonna sit around with my thumb up my ass until I die of old age!”

“Well, duh! I’m not interested in turning into some wrinkled old bag!” Aria answered.

Adagio shivered involuntarily at the mere thought of dying of old age.

“Never!” she stood up and exclaimed, “We’ll restore our power and immortality or die trying!”

Aria sat there in silence. Her eyes darted nervously toward the door to her bedroom.

I guess she’s still a bit jumpy after the other night, Adagio thought to herself.

“Anyway, it's your turn to cook today,” said Adagio, regaining her composure and sitting back down. “What do you have in mind?”

“Umm…. uhhhh…” stammered Aria.

Adagio sighed and covered her face with her palm.

“You knew it was your turn today! Your turn is always the day after mine! I know you don’t like cooking, and we’ve had a rough week, so I’ll tell you what – if you can come up with a meal, I’ll help you prepare it.”

“Ugh, can’t I just order us a pizza or something?” Aria asked.

Adagio just scowled at her.

“Okay, fine! How about spaghetti, then?”

“We just had that,” Adagio reminded her.

Aria stared up at the ceiling and groaned loudly.

“Come on! You know how much I hate to cook! I don’t even like thinking about what to cook!” she complained.

Adagio stood up and pointed towards the kitchen.

“Get your ass in there! I'm tired of having this argument with you every fucking time it’s your turn to cook! You don’t think there are days when I’d rather not cook? I just suck it up, do it anyway, and don’t complain about it! There are three of us living here, so we split the chores and errands three ways! You weren’t interested in helping me decide how to divvy them up back when we first moved here, so don’t complain to me about the division of labor now! I’m not asking for a six-course meal, and I even said I’d help you out! Now move it!” she ordered.

Aria rolled her eyes, groaned once more, and stomped toward the kitchen.

“Jawohl, mein Fuhrer!” she muttered, under her breath but still loud enough for Adagio to hear.

Adagio rolled her eyes and followed Aria the kitchen. She gets nervous if I make any sudden moves, but otherwise back to her usual sassy, back-talking self, Adagio thought.

Before they even had a chance to start, Sonata returned. Adagio saw out of the corner of her eye that Sonata was empty-handed, but what she saw when she turned around to scold her sister shocked her. Sonata had a black eye, and bruises on her face and arms. Tears were streaming down her cheeks.

Adagio gasped and made a beeline for her sister.

“Sonata! What the hell happened!?” Adagio asked her, her voice wavering with shock.

Sonata began to sob.

“I... I...” was all she stammered out before collapsing onto the floor, bawling her eyes out and covering her face with her hands.

Aria was dumbstruck, mouth agape in disbelief at her sister’s condition. Adagio snapped her fingers to get Aria’s attention.

“Help me get her into the living room.”

Coming to her senses, Aria quickly complied. She wrapped one of Sonata's arms around her neck; Adagio did the same. The two of them then walked their sister into the living room and laid her down on the couch.

Sonata cried and cried for several more minutes. Her sisters waited patiently for her to calm down enough to tell them what happened, rubbing her back and looking at each other in bewilderment.

Sonata finally got her sobbing under control and wiped the tears from her eyes. Hands still shaking, she wordlessly grabbed Adagio's pack of cigarettes and lighter. She lit one up and took a puff, not even coughing. After several more drags she had calmed down enough to speak.

“Huh. This... it really helps calm you down. I guess I see why you two like it so much,” she said.

Aria gently placed her hands on Sonata's cheeks and turned her sister’s head to face her.

“Sonata, please tell me, what in the name of Celestia happened to you!” she worriedly asked.

“Well, I... I was on my way to the store, and I ran into two guys from CHS. First they just tried to hit on me. I told them to get lost, and they got really aggressive... I... I... I got scared, and I started to run…”

Adagio’s and Aria’s expressions darkened as it dawned on them what Sonata was telling them.

“… but they were faster than me…” Sonata continued.

Adagio felt the rage welling up in her chest and struggled hard not to explode like a hydrogen bomb in front of Sonata. She didn't want to upset her even more with such an outburst.

Sonata took a final drag from her cigarette and put it out.

“They caught me, and they hit me… I tried really hard to defend myself, but without my magic I didn't stand a chance. Then they threw me on the ground and they tried to... they tried to...”

Sonata couldn’t finish, instead starting to cry again.

“They were touching me everywhere, and they pulled down my underwear, and… and…” she said between sobs. “Is that… is that enough? I can’t do this anymore!”

She wrenched away from her sisters, ran to her room, and violently slammed the door shut. Her sisters got up and followed her. She had locked the door behind her, so Adagio knocked.

“Sonata, please open up! We need to know exactly what happened!” Aria said.

“No! Go away! I just wanna be alone!” Sonata yelled.

Adagio knocked on the door again. She could hear Sonata still sobbing on the other side.

“If you don't open the door, I’m gonna call 911! Depending what happened, we might need to take you to the hospital, and I also can’t tell if you’re planning to hurt yourself while you’re locked away in there! Either way, it’s for your own good, but I’d much rather we take care of this as a family than have a bunch of strangers take you away!” Adagio said.

“Fine...” Sonata said, stifling her sobs for a moment, and opened her door.

Adagio and Aria hugged her tightly right then and there, and for a couple of minutes no one said anything. Aria finally let go and broke the silence.

“Look, we know that this must be really difficult for you, but we really do need to know exactly what happened so we can deal with it properly,” she said gently.

Adagio nodded in agreement. Sonata let the two of them into her room, and they all sat down on her bed together. Adagio and Aria starting giving Sonata another back rub to calm her.

“They didn't manage to… to… to do what they had in mind. I kept struggling and I managed to kick one of them in the face, and I managed to get close to the main road and they stopped following me…”

Adagio and Aria both breathed a sigh of relief and hugged Sonata again.

“You're safe with us now. They can’t get you here… but who were they? Who did this to you?” Adagio asked.

“I... I don't know their names, but I remember them from the Battle of the Bands back at CHS… those two rappers. I thought… I thought they were alright back then…” Sonata said.

Adagio narrowed her eyes as she came to the realization.

“Snips and Snails! Sunset Shimmer’s old lackeys!”

Adagio was furious, and she didn't even try to hide her rage anymore. She jolted up from the bed and began to pace back and forth like a hungry tiger locked up in a cage.

“I’ll kill them! I’ll fucking KILL THEM!” she screamed.

She clenched her fists, just barely controlling herself enough not to smash anything.

“How DARE they! I’ll fucking torture them to death!” she roared.

Aria was still holding Sonata tightly and rubbing her back.

“Sonata, where was this? I’m going to deal with them personally! I‘ll teach those fucking bastards a lesson they won’t forget for the rest of their miserable lives!”

Sonata thought about it for a moment.

“It… it wasn’t far from here. It was right around that playground that’s on the way to the grocery store. I guess they chose it because it's always deserted at this time,” Sonata replied. “They had bottles of… vodka, I think. I bet they're skipping school.”

That was all Adagio needed to know. She stormed out and went into her own room. She changed into a pair of jeans and put on her hoodie. Then she unlocked a drawer that she hadn’t opened in a long time. She hadn’t had a good reason to use what was inside. Not until now, that is.

She withdrew a pistol from the drawer, checked the safety, and ejected the magazine. She looked back down into the drawer. She had several boxes of bullets inside; half of the boxes were red, and the other half were blue. She considered her options briefly. She decided on the blue box.

Adagio filled the magazine and loaded it into the gun. She checked the safety one last time, then put it into the front pocket of her hoodie. She stormed out of her room and went back to Sonata's.

“Aria, you stay here and make sure Sonata is going to be alright. Do your best to distract her and get some tacos delivered. I’ll leave money on the kitchen counter. I'll be back soon,” she said.

Adagio left without waiting for a response. She put on her steel-toed boots and walked outside, slamming the apartment door behind her.

One of the neighbors was out on the corridor.

“Miss Dazzle! For the hundredth time, would you please stop slamming the doors all the time?

“Shut the fuck up!” she shot back.

Not in the mood to deal with the neighbor’s shit, Adagio marched out of the apartment complex and out to the street. Blood boiling, she ran to the playground Sonata had mentioned. She had passed by a hundred times before without a second thought; this time, though, it was the only place on her mind. She hoped, even prayed that those two bastards would still be there!

She finally arrived at her destination. The cloud that had fallen over the day had a silver lining – they were still there! The two of them seemed to be having a great time, drinking and smoking and laughing it up.

Petty thieves, too, Adagio thought. Even if a store was lax about carding its customers, no clerk with half a brain could possibly mistake those underage imbeciles for adults, so their booze and cigarettes were almost certainly stolen.

The chubby one was the first to notice Adagio approaching.

“Yo Snails! Look what we got here! Another one of them mermaid-cunts!”

“Oh, we're gonna have a lot of fun with you! You’ll be ‘adored’ all right! That’s what you said in the song, isn’t it?” Snails chortled.

“Yeah, and you’re gonna give us all your money for breaking our phones, too!” Snips added.

All through their verbal assault, Adagio had been implacably approaching them. She had decided that she’d save the gun as her ace in the hole. Finally getting within arm’s reach, she began to pummel Snails. She landed a heavy blow on his face, and he stumbled back. She then turned her attention to his cohort.

“How DARE you dipshits to do this to my sister!” punching Snips first in the stomach and then in the face. He staggered backward, and Adagio followed up with a jab into his fat neck before throwing him to the ground, straddling his torso, and mauling him like a furious mother tiger.

Adagio couldn't think straight anymore. She just struck blow after blow to his fat face, putting all the force she could manage into every one of her punches. She had cut her knuckles knocking out some of his teeth; her hands and his face were covered in a mixture of both of their blood, but she didn’t care.

In her single-minded focus on Snips, she didn’t notice Snails recovering from her initial assault. As she continued to beat Snips, Snails came up behind her and grabbed her by the hair, pulling her off of his friend.

“Get off him, you crazy bitch!” he yelled.

Adagio cried out in pain.

I guess it’s time, she thought.

Adagio pulled out her gun and pistol-whipped Snails right in the mouth. She could feel several teeth dislodging from the force of the blow. He screamed and fell to his knees, hands over his mouth and blood dripping down his chin. Adagio followed up with a swift kick in the balls, and he doubled over in pain.

“What, did you two think that you stood a chance against me! I’ll teach you to fuck with me and my sisters, you worthless wannabe thugs!”

Not letting up, she brought down the butt of her gun on the back of his head as hard as she could.

“What is it? No more fight left in you? How does it feel to get your asses in a two-on-one?” Adagio demanded.

She kicked Snails in the ribs repeatedly as he knelt there and whimpered. She finally stopped long enough to release her gun’s safety and chamber a round. She then walked around Snails so that both of them were in front of her, in her line of fire.

“Both of you get on your knees NOW!” she ordered.

They struggled to comply as quickly as they could manage in their condition.

“Now give me one reason, one fucking reason why I shouldn't kill you motherfuckers right here on the spot!” she yelled.

Their expressions were a mixture of pain and terror.

“Please don't kill us! We're sorry! We’ll never do it again!” Snips begged.

Adagio was both amused and disgusted when she saw they were literally pissing themselves. Grinning menacingly, she stepped closer to Snips and put the barrel of her gun right up against his forehead.

“No! Please! Don't kill me! It was all his idea!” Snips cried.

“What! Why, you dirty little...” Snails began, but Adagio silenced him with a pimp slap.

“Shut the fuck up!” she ordered, grabbing his collar and jerking him to his feet.

“If Sunset Shimmer had any sense, she would have killed you two back when she had the chance. I know I would have fried a couple of miserable failures like you without a second thought!” Adagio raged.

Adagio dropped him and took a step back.

“Since I’m a generous person, I’ll give you a sporting chance. You have until the count of five, then I start shooting. How does that sound?” she said, smiling evilly. “One...”

“Oh shit, she's serious! RUN!” Snips shouted, scrambling to his feet.

“Two...”

Snails joined him in his flight, but barely got a few yards before he tripped and fell on his face. Snips was about to help him get back on his feet, but was interrupted by gunfire.

“Five! I never said it would take five seconds for me to count to five!” Adagio said gleefully.

The two lowlifes screamed and dove for cover, covering their heads instinctively. Adagio lowered her gun and took a step closer.

“I’m only going to warn you once. I don't want to see your ugly faces around here ever again, understood? Next time I won’t be firing blanks!”

Snips and Snails gave her a look of pure terror, then made a mad dash away from her.

“She's insane, she's a complete psycho! Even when she turned into that devil thing, Sunset wasn’t this crazy!”

That was the last Adagio heard of them as they rounded the corner. She sighed and pulled out a cigarette. She doubted she’d see them ever again. Rather, when they did, it would be on her terms – after all, they still had to settle the score with Canterlot High.

As she smoked, her cell phone rang. Adagio heart sank. Had something happened at home? Her worries proved unfounded, though; she looked at her caller ID, and it was actually Blood Hound who was calling.

“Yes?” she answered.

“Hello, this is Blood Hound. It’s nice to speak with you again.”

“Cut to the chase, Blood. I've had a shitty day, so unless you’ve got something big…”

“Well, actually... I’ve been watching Sunset Shimmer, and I know it seems too soon, but I think you should know immediately since this is highly unusual. It seems like this girl has some kind of heavily customized tablet computer. It looks like a book with a sun on its cover, but it vibrates and gives off a purple glow every now and then. Then she picks it up and does something with a pen or stylus. It looks like she’s writing in it rather than typing. I have to keep my distance while she’s on school grounds, so I can’t give you any more details right now, but I just thought you ought to know,” he explained.

Adagio was silent for a moment while she thought about what Blood Hound was telling her.

“Thanks for the information. Just do your job and try not to think too hard about it, alright?” Adagio said.

“I will. That's what you pay me for. Oh, by the way, that the girl you sent to my office is the most impertinent little...”

“Don't care. I don't have the time or energy to worry about Aria's antics right now. Good day.”

Adagio rolled her eyes and groaned as she hung up. She took one last pull from her cigarette, then dropped it on the ground and stomped it out. She half expected a SWAT team to rush in as she left the playground, but nothing happened.

There are some advantages to living in this part of town, she thought. I guess the neighbors are used to this kind of shit.

She let out a sigh of relief and headed home, thinking about that strange book – or whatever the hell it was – that Blood Hound had told her about.

Finally arriving home, she came in to find Aria cleaning up after dinner. Aria looked at her worriedly.

“PLEASE tell me you didn’t kill those idiots…”

“They’ll live. I beat the shit out of them, but I only loaded blanks. I doubt they'll bother Sonata ever again, though,” Adagio said indifferently.

“Good. Sonata really packed in the tacos, but there are still a couple left if you're hungry.”

Adagio nodded and put her gun down on the counter.

“She's sleeping now. I gave her a few shots of whiskey,” Aria continued.

“Okay,” replied Adagio. “In the meantime, we need to discuss Sunset Shimmer. I think she's in possession of some kind of artifact from Equestria.” Next Chapter: Vengeance Estimated time remaining: 35 Minutes