Nestled among the hustle and bustle of Canterlot tourist traps, just beside a small museum, was the one place Twilight Sparkle had always called a second home. And as much as she would’ve liked to have told herself that this visit was just like the others, she knew that this time was different.

She’d watched over the bookstore with a doctor’s diligence, coming back every day during her trip to Canterlot to see if any more signs would be posted on the window. The first day, when she’d just stopped by to pick up a magic theory book, there was only one sign, one that warned that shipments of new books were coming in late. That in and of itself was hardly a sign of deeper disease, but when Twilight kept coming back, the messages kept piling up in droves.

On the second day, the signs had already doubled. New ones alerted shoppers that their gift cards would no longer be valid, that they would not receive a refund on them, and that ponies could no longer rent records from the store’s music department.

On the third, other rashes covered the store’s windows. An advertisement for a comic book sale. An alert that ponies could no longer sell records or books to the store. Flyers for bookstores in Canterlot’s other districts.

Looking back on it, everything should have prepared herself for what she would find today. The signs had been everywhere, but more than anything, after all the changes Twilight had faced in her life, she’d hoped with everything she had that this wouldn’t be one of them.

The paper it was printed on was blue and surrounded with slightly-tacky multicolored triangles, just like every other Haystings ad. It was almost enough to make it look like a normal occurrence in the store’s life. But as soon as she read it, she wasn’t fooled.

Twilight had stroked the sign with her hoof several times, almost as if doing that would make it disappear. As a princess of Canterlot, she figured she was out of place enough even if she didn’t break down crying, and that was the only thing that kept her from breaking into tears then.

She could see through the window as the shopkeepers prepared the bookstore for the Daring Do midnight release party. If she could just focus on that for long enough, maybe she would forget she’d ever saw what she saw. Those were the only parties you could’ve gotten her to attend back when she was a filly, and all the other ponies would stay up all night to be there and see that very same happiness.

As she was staring through the glass door longingly, she could just feel a hoof prodding her on her back.

“Hey! Other ponies need to get in, too! Stop blocking the way!”

With a start, Twilight backed away from the door as fast as she could and faced the other mare, a white unicorn with a short red mane that she recognized from Rarity’s Canterlot boutique.

“Sorry,” she said with one of her signature nervous smiles. “I really didn’t mean to.”

The other pony lowered one of her eyebrows and gave her a confused look in response.

“Princess Twilight? What are you doing here?”

Just when she was about to reply, the unicorn lifted her hoof in realization, and her face contorted with glee.

“Oh, my gosh. You’re a Hopeful Life fan, too? I know all the dance moves from that show. Even the ones from the music videos!”

“Um, what are you talking about?” Twilight asked. “Loving Live or something? I’ve never heard of that, and I kinda pride myself on keeping up on these things.”

“Wait! Um, uh, you don’t have to lie to me. I know it’s not what the Canterlot elite normally does, but it’s their loss for not getting enough full combos in their lives so they can earn fifty Hope Jewels so they can scout on a 10+1 promotion with SR or above guarantee, hopefully with their best filly in the mix, so they can wait just a little while longer and maybe, just maybe, end up tiering the Score Match and maybe, just maybe, just maybe saving the school.”

“Um,” Twilight repeated, “what are you talking about?”

The white unicorn gave her an annoyed sigh, facehoofing as she did so.

“Figures,” she muttered. “I can’t believe I actually thought a princess would be into that sort of thing. Even she is the nerdy one.”

Something about the phrasing of what the unicorn just said, Twilight realized, just might be the answer to everything.

“The nerdy one of what?”

“Of the princesses. I mean, Princess Celestia’s the older-sister type one, Princess Luna’s the dark and mysterious type, Princess Cadance is the cute type, I guess, and you’re the nerdy one. All of you are different and appeal to different ponies. Almost like the idol singer ponies in the games I play.”

Normally, Twilight would’ve been more than a little confused to hear a subject talk about her fellow princesses in such terms, as if they were no different from the colt bands her brother would listen to when he thought nopony was looking. But at that moment, she had already caught onto what the pony with the pepper cutie mark was getting at, and it was certainly something worth considering.

“These singers…are they just in games or whatever?” the princess asked. “And what was that about saving a school?”

“It started out as a manga story from Neighpon, actually. These fillies’ school is about to shut down, so they all work together as a band to get it publicity and…”

Twilight had already darted away after hearing this.

“Where are you even going?!” the other unicorn yelled after her.

“To do some research. If I’m going to save this bookstore before Nightmare Night, I need to find out everything I can about these ‘idols’ or whatever. So, I’ll buy every volume they have and make sure I double-check it at least three times to make sure I actually stand a chance of saving this thing.”

“If you’re going to take all the fun out of this like that, go ahead,” the other unicorn grumbled after her. “Just, if you start playing the game, don’t get in my way. I have URs that you couldn’t even imagine. Ones that could make your gaming experience a true nightmare. Ones so powerful that no matter how hard a song is, I’ll never lose stamina, I’ll never lose a match, and I’ll certainly never lose to a newbie like you!”

The door slammed shut as she said this.

“Gee, and I’m the one who’s taking this too seriously?” Twilight wondered to herself.

As the sky turned dark, Twilight found herself standing outside Canterlot Castle, having torn through the manga volumes already. The more she examined them, the more she realized that she had a gold mine on her hooves. And the more she watched ponies playing the game in the city arcades, the more she realized that CanterhotCayenne had severely embellished her rhythm gaming abilities. The unicorn from Haystings, for all her fan-ponying, hadn’t even reached 22500 points, which, five days into the event, could be achieved just by throwing enough bits at the machine and clogging up the line for hours.

The one time Cayenne did manage to show up, she promptly cursed the machine for freezing up just when she had figured out how to move her hooves to a particularly hard beat.

“Darn Expert Mode,” she had muttered as she left. “Making it harder for all us newbs to get decent point totals…”

That was approximately when she realized that shadowing somepony with “hot” in her username who did nothing but brag about her “superior gaming skills” was probably the absolute worst way of going about things. And so, she was back to her original plan, the one she should’ve gone with all along.

She had two months to save the store. Even less than that, taking out-of-business sales and other factors into account. That certainly didn’t leave her time to chat with other players or figure out game mechanics. Besides, in the grand scheme of things, games and scores didn’t matter at all.

The only numbers that mattered were the only four who stood a chance of saving Canterlot’s literary district. Once she recruited all of them, everything would fall into place from there. Ponies would practically follow them anywhere they went.

It was only a matter of getting them out of their routine.

“Twilight,” Cadance began, “I get that you’re upset. Shining and I liked Haystings just as much as you did. But don’t you think you’re going a bit…overboard with this idea of yours?”

Conveniently enough, Celestia had already gathered all the princesses into one area for a “retreat” that was really a retreat in name only, the sort that went by a relaxing name but was really nothing more than an excuse to dupe ponies into doing work. In any case, it was about to begin, and it already wasn’t anything close to what the other princesses had expected.

“It has to work,” Twilight replied. “It’s the perfect plan. How better to save a place built on stories than to pull out one of the oldest tropes in the book? It’s an act of symbolic rebellion!”

“Little wonder you’re not the edgy one of the group,” Luna muttered. “In my day, the other side knew what you were rebelling against, symbolism or no symbolism! You put up a few protest signs or staged a couple coups, and that was that. In what way does ‘let’s start a band’ lead to ‘bookstores are valuable and must be protected?’”

Twilight started to rub her hoof through her mane as Luna brought this up. When she put it that way, the plot to the manga, and all the other books she’d read about starting bands to save things, made little to no sense. For once, the Princess of the Night appeared to have outlectured her, and she could only respond by giving the worst possible reason:

“Well, it worked for Syrens, didn’t it?”

Grave looks crossed everypony else’s faces as soon as she brought this up. Celestia looked straight to where her magical mirror had once been, only to find it gone, as it had been for moons. Cadance and Luna stared at the planning table, as if they could come up with war strategies just by looking at it. Even Flurry Heart seemed shaken by the statement.

“I meant the band!” Twilight yelled after seeing the reaction she was getting. “The band of Syrens. Not--“

None of the others changed in their expressions, and Celestia was already running her quill along a scroll she had just found.

“Containment of the Sirens commonly known as the Dazzlings has been a failure,” the sun princess dictated to herself as she wrote. “We know not where they are in Equestria, but assuming they are unable to take pony form, all royal guards are to patrol the country’s seas with extreme caution—“

“Wait, Princess!” Twilight protested. “I didn’t mean—“

“I know what you want to say,” Celestia replied, “and I forgive you. You could not possibly have known that the spell you and your friends placed on the Sirens was only temporary, and so you have no reason to feel guilty. But for now, we need to put this idea on hold and give the guards the best reinforcement we can.”

The Princess of Friendship could only slam her head onto the table repeatedly, unable to comprehend how she had somehow gone from trying to start a band to causing a nationwide security scare.

With a sigh, she muttered, “’Syrens’ with a y. That’s the name of the band in the manga I read. Equestria is not doomed.”

Everypony in the room breathed a collective sigh of relief, including Flurry Heart. Or rather, the closest a baby could come to one. A moment of peace spread across the chamber, leading Luna to continue to her next point.

“So, correct me if I’m wrong, you’re going by a comic book’s advice about all this?” she questioned. “Could we not just, I don’t know, pour enough funding into the store, considering it is the last one of its kind in the immediate Canterlot area, in the name of encouraging literacy?”

“You always have to take the fun out of everything,” Celestia replied with a clearly fake pout.

“I—it’s not about that, and you know it!” Luna protested. “I want the bookstore to stay open as much as Twilight does. My Nightmare Night is not meant to be spent watching bibliophiles shutting themselves in and crying because they can no longer obtain books. All I am saying is that we have neither the time, nor the resources, to start a decent band with all the diplomacy and bureaucracy expected of a princess in mind. Besides, we do not even know if this plan will work.”

“My logic behind it was that ponies are willing to flock to anything as long as it involves all of us,” Twilight explained. “Canterlot in particular is notorious for this. Recall how Rarity’s line of royal dresses sold out within a week?”

In response to this, Luna pulled out a copy of Twilight’s manga and flipped it to a page where the ensemble of schoolfillies was putting on one of their famous performances.

“Yes, I understand that much,” she spoke. “But to sing songs with these sorts of lyrics, about how ‘love is like the sun’ and all that? To wear these sorts of outfits, that look more like oversized marshmallows than any kind of reasonable clothing?”

Admittedly, the clothes displayed on the page were more than a bit outlandish. Plaid pastels, poufy skirts, all surrounded by star-shaped pins that were more pointless than cute. And that wasn’t even mentioning how many barrettes and hair accessories were in their manes.

“Then what sorts of lyrics would you want to write?” Cadance challenged.

Luna looked at her niece with the slightest hint of fear.

“She’s roped you into this, too? I thought we were on the same page about this being an overly dramatic solution to a simple problem.”

“Really, Luna?” Celestia questioned with a chuckle. “You’re accusing other ponies of being melodramatic?”

“I have worked long and hard to get over that, and more importantly, Celestia, nopony asked you.”

Luna realized then that almost everypony at the table had some sort of happy or devious grin on their faces. She was outnumbered and would almost have to be dragged into this thing.

“I’m just doing my job as the ‘older sister-type who likes to tease,’” Celestia said with a chuckle. “I have a feeling I’ll like playing that role.”

With a final defeated sigh, Luna looked to Cadance and asked, “So does that mean you want me to be the lyricist? I mean—if I wanted to start a band or anything?”

“I think you’d probably be the best at it,” Cadance replied. “You’ve always struck me as the type who has a way with words, and if you don’t like the way Twilight’s manga does the songs, you’d be just the right one to add some extra oomph to it. Plus, with your pipes, I’m sure you’d be a great singer, too. You’ve gotten enough practice with your Royal Canterlot Voice to be good with crowds.”

With an exaggerated groan, Luna finally surrendered.

“Then I guess I’ll join you guys,” she muttered. “Not that I wanted to or anything. Just because I want to pick up a good mystery paperback and jazz record now and then. That and, well, Tia always wanted to start a band as a filly. I’m putting myself through all this for the books and for her and for nothing else, got it?”

This time, however, her acting was much less convincing, and the other ponies in the room couldn’t help but shoot her skeptical glares.

“Fine,” she sighed after everypony had stared at her for long enough. “I wanted a way to unwind just as much as the rest of you, assuming the other nobles could keep up our slack. But alas, we’re going for a market that likes ponies who are a bit less…easily convinced. I am acquainted enough with the music and manga industries to know that audiences like a dramatic story behind a band’s founding and that tsunderes sell. So, while I was opposed to the idea at first, everything after the fake siren scare was just pretending on my part.”

Once she realized that her sister had pulled off a prank that had fooled even her, Celestia could only gape open-mouthed and applaud as loud as she could. Other than that, the rest of the room was filled with silence.

“So,” Luna continued, “shall we make Flurry Heart our vocalist in between our louder rock verses?”

The silence inside was still enough to pierce a planet’s atmosphere.

“I mean, I think Tia would prefer something with more of a metal edge to it. I mean, she’s more into it than I am, I’m more into rock with a jazzy sort of sound, but I can take one for the team. Not that I like metal that much or anything, in spite of the stereotypes…”

“Luna,” Cadance finally whispered. “You can save the stage persona and the tsundering for the shows.”

“Oh, thank Faust,” the older princess sighed in relief. “I don’t know how much more blasphemy I could take, saying stuff like that.”

All except Flurry Heart would end up working into the night, formulating all the exact intricacies for creating a band so good the executives would have to listen, and now that Luna could speak her mind without denying herself, everything seemed to run that much smoother. Or, then again, perhaps it was not having to hear a baby pony crying from across the room.

Either way, it was in that moment that much of the details of the soon-to-be mega-band were formed:

It would be called Bibliographie in honor of the team’s ultimate mission. This was one of the larger debates that the princesses had: Twilight in particular had opposed the intentional misspelling of “bibliography” and insisted on the correct spelling, which only gave Luna more evidence that she could never be the “edgy” one.

All five members would take turns singing verses, with the songs’ melodies preloaded onto a record player. It would be like a round of karaoke, albeit a ridiculously star-studded one with semi-high stakes.

After a night filled with light arguing and the occasional manga reading, Luna had finally come up with lyrics that compromised all their ideas into one, hoping more than anything that they would somehow flow into something resembling a coherent song.

When all that was settled, all they needed to do was set out on their way, put up fliers across Canterlot, and watch as their combined prestige launched Bibliographie into the stuff of pure musical legend.

Nopony ever knew exactly when Bibliographie would stage their next concert or even how long they would stay together. And, in a way, this was part of their appeal. This made it so that crowds consistently flooded Haystings day by day, if only for the chance to hear the famed singing princesses, or perhaps more importantly, to see how their rulers were without the veils of formality they almost always wore. Just for a moment, they would cast them aside for energetic music and frilly clothes (albeit slightly less frilly than the manga performers had, to Luna’s joy and everypony else’s dismay).

The truth, however, was far less complicated: the princesses simply couldn’t have consistent performance times with their schedules, and so turned themselves into Canterlot’s greatest mystery. When they found out that saving the store would take more time than they thought, they took another page out of the manga’s book and formed “subunits,” where certain performances would center on duets between just Cadance and Twilight or Celestia and Luna. Gimmick or not, Bibliographie was still Bibliographie, and the crowds would still come even when Cadance and Twilight would have to leave Canterlot.

However, even from the beginning, they had planned for this to be their last performance. Nightmare Night, almost exactly two months to the day they had formed. While other ponies hunted for candy, they’d play their loudest, most rock-edged songs in the best venue anypony could want—in a place filled to the brim with horror tales.

Granted, the ponies who came to the now-restored and hugely popular Haystings Bookstore for reading didn’t much enjoy the racket. But for just one night, Haystings wasn’t the place for that. It was the place for rock.

Looking out at the crowd one last time before turning her crown back in, Cadance began the final song:

“You pull me to the corner, and never let me go.”

“You always wear your heart, but you never let it show,” Luna continued.

“I try so hard but I never can forgo,” Twilight chimed in.

“You try so hard, but I’m a dynamo,” Celestia finished.

All four princesses gripped their microphones and prepared to belt as loud as they could. This was the part where they’d all sing together, and it was the one that would clinch the performance.

“Oh whoa oh, oh whoa oh, oh whoa oh!” they all yelled. “Why don’t you just stop it with the show?”

“Really, silence is cheap,” Twilight sang, “bubblegum goes for two bits a piece. You pull me in and you chew me out, wondering what all this is about. But I can see you from the street, I hear your hoofbeats, you’ve got to decide…”

“Got to decide…” the other princesses chimed in.

“Do you really want me or is this just a spree?” Luna replied. “I’ve been hurt before, don’t want an encore. Do you really love me or is this just an act? Because if it is, then I’m prepared to attack.”

“Are you here to bring me up or leave me out?” Celestia belted. “I don’t have to put up with all of this doubt. I can find others, that is for sure, but if you’d stayed true, then you could’ve been cured.”

“Are you really so spicy or are you just sweet?” Cadance continued, “Are you really so special, just another elite? My heart is a bubble, always ready to pop, and you really, really, need to know when to stop!”

A guitar solo played in the background and Flurry screamed as loud as she could, blending into the music surprisingly well. Well enough to even have her own fans despite barely being able to sing at all.

“Bubblegum romance,” all four sang.

“You don’t stand a chance,” Cadance yelled.

“Bubblegum romance…”

“I’m out of your trance,” Celestia chimed in.

“Bubblegum romance…”

“I’m in battle stance.”

“You played a game, we’re in control. We’re breaking out, becoming whole. The bubble will pop, and we will fly. The siege will succeed, we will defy.”

As applause erupted throughout the bookstore coffeehouse, Twilight finally felt as though she had really accomplished something. Even without Bibliographie there to bring in guests, ponies would still be curious enough about the store’s history to go there anyway and buy a book or two…or fifty. As long as the princesses were still there to support it in spirit, it’d maintain just the sort of notoriety it needed. And in that moment, that was enough.

She realized, for about the fifth time, that sooner or later, Bibliographie was bound to fade away. In a year or so, the idea of a princess band would be foreign to Canterlot society yet again. But what mattered was that they had tried, they had fought, they had won…

“Hey, Twilight,” a figure whispered from the makeshift stands as she got off her makeshift stage.

The yellow unicorn stared at her with devious blue eyes, raising her eyebrows as gracefully as she could.

“I thought you’d said the Rainbooms were the only band you’d ever joined?”

All four princesses gave each other quick side glances as sweat came down their faces.

“Hey, Celestia?” Luna muttered through gritted teeth. “Is…that…the other apprentice you had?”

“This really wasn’t how I imagined my reunion with Sunset would go,” Celestia admitted with a nervous chuckle. “I think we all know what to do from here.”

A wall of wings stretched out, blocking everything in sight, and before Sunset could mutter any more words of friendly jealousy, they had all disappeared.

And that is the story of how Bibliographie went from a band of princesses to a band on the run.

Author's Notes:

For those curious, one of the cut scenes was actually going to have Cadance saying "Cady Cady Ca" as part of her routine and making hoof gestures...

...I'll go back to idol hell and never talk about this on here again.