The door to my office opens with a quiet creak and I look up from the papers to see the ER floor director peeking in. “Doctor Blaze? Your sister is awake and asking for you.”

My eyebrow goes up in surprise but I nod. “It’s one in the morning, Director Redheart, why are you still here?”

The older, pink-haired woman shrugs a little too innocently. “Oh… this and that, a woman’s work is never done, you know?”

“Right,” I say with a dry laugh, “I’ll head down to ‘Nata’s room in a sec, thanks for letting me know.”

“Also,” she continues, smirking, “Doctor Hardcase from Osteo might be trying to get your transferred to his floor again, so keep an eye out.”

So that was why she was still here. I laugh, shaking my head. “I can’t believe old Hardass still trying that after you told him-”

“-that he could take my best doctor over my cold, dead body?” Redheart finished with a dark grin. “Yeah, sorry Blaze but your ass is mine, I’ve never had a doctor who’s immune to burnout before, so you’re not going anywhere.”

One of the things I like about working in the ER at Canterlot General is that gallows humor and caustic wit are the only real methods of communication. I fit in perfectly for once.

“No plans to, Director,” I reply, matching her grin.

She nods, starting to step away before stopping and poking her head back in. “That last patient you dealt with, by the way? I had a question about him.”

“The guy who decided to cut down a tree in his backyard with a chainsaw at eleven at night and nearly sawed his own damn leg off?” I ask dryly. The nature of that one, among others, still makes me question whether humans really have a functioning brain. “What about it?”

“The Nurse Autumn said it took you five minutes to patch him up,”

“Tch, yeah I know, I’m rusty, sorry,” I respond with a grimace. If I’d taken five minutes to patch that kind of wound a year ago Billy would’ve been so far up my jacksie I’d be coughing up chainsaw lubricant for the next two trials.

The room is dead silent for a solid minute after I apologise as Redheart stares at me with an unreadable gaze. Finally, she just shakes her head in disbelief. “One day, Blaze, you’re going to tell me where you served that makes you think being able to fix up a ragged wound full of splinters, dirt and god knows what else in five minutes is bad.”

‘Where I served.’

Redheart had asked me that very question after my first week on the job. I’d apparently unnerved some of the other doctors and nurses because of my approach to medical treatment. I’d almost been sued because I’d asked a patient if he wanted anesthesia or if he wanted to keep his arm because I could do one or the other and then proceeded to do the latter because he seemed stupid enough to say the former.

“I don’t have any military service on my record, Redheart,” I say, for the tenth time, “you know that.”

Redheart shrugs. “You handle burnout like a veteran military doctor, Blaze,” she replies, eyeing me closely. “And I only say that because that’s what my father was, God rest his soul, and you treat people just like he used to. He saw wounds I can’t even imagine and had to fix them with whatever he had on hand. Just like him, you treat general anesthesia like a luxury at best, and that’s when you’re not acting like it’s a waste of time.”

“We aren’t even at war,” I say, with a crooked smile, trying to defuse the situation. “Plus, I’m only twenty-one, when and where would I have gotten that kind of experience?”

“That,” Redheart says with a smirk, “is exactly what I’d like to know.”

I roll my eyes and file away the forms I was filling out, patient reports from the day’s work, and stand up, stretching and groaning as my joints pop. I’ve been sitting still way too long, my body just isn’t used to it. Not after spending so much time running around the Trials.

“You can keep wondering, Director,” I reply, cracking my knuckles. “I’m going to go see my sister, I’ll do her checkup too, so don’t worry about that. I’ll leave the file on your desk.”

I walk her out of my office and lock it behind me before heading down the hall. They’d been kind enough to give me an office close to Sonata’s room after I’d been hired, though personally I just counted myself lucky I ended up in this job at all. I originally took it out of necessity but who knew I’d end up loving the work so much?

It was after we got back after the dust had settled and my sisters and I were trying to figure out our next move since we still didn’t have papers or any legal records of ourselves, that Tempest of all people came to our rescue. Turns out she knew a guy who could get us into ‘the system’. So long as we had the money to pay him, which we had in spades, he could furnish us with whatever identities we wanted and all the necessary paperwork to go with it.

I’ll never admit it to her out loud, but Friendship Princess Sparklebutt had a good point when she advised us to make some friends. We wouldn’t have gotten far without Tempest’s intervention.

Adagio and Sonata were given identities as private low-end investors who helped small businesses get back on their feet and consulted on financials and business management; between Adagio’s political savvy and Sonata’s head for numbers they picked up a solid legitimate track record to support the fake one Tempest’s buddy manufactured. I, on the other hand, became Aria Blaze; the twenty-year-old former EMT wunderkind who graduated far ahead of her class with a medical doctorate.

Someone had to have a way to keep an eye on Sonata, after all since she never really recovered from what the Entity did to her physical body. Where before the Trials she was vivacious and energetic, now she’s frail. Her immune system is shot, and the other doctors think it was from severe, prolonged exposure to something like black mold. I happen to know that it’s a side-effect of having your soul ripped out of your body. The animating force that keeps every person running just wasn’t there in Sonata for so long that it had permanent effects. Not that it seems to put a damper on my sister’s spirit.

Somehow, Sonata is just as cheerful as ever.

The identity I asked for shocked my sisters, I guess I’ve always been more of a mechanic than a healer but I figure a doctor is just a mechanic for the human body. Same principles apply except the parts are just a lot… squishier.

Tempest’s friend; a short, fat, weasley guy with spiked, frosted tips named Grubber, warned me that I’d have to back that kind of identity with skills. As if I didn’t know that. So I studied day and night. I’ve always learned best on my own and it’s not as if I was looking to be a neurosurgeon or anything hyper-specialized.

I applied as an ER doctor, a role that Canterlot General apparently badly needed because I was hired with almost indecent haste once they saw my totally legitimate and not-at-all-forged work history.

As it turns out, Canterlot is kind of a shit hole. Who knew? Seems there’s no shortage of crime, violent and otherwise, in the city. GSW’s and knife wounds are common, same with broken bones and the like. Apparently, I made a good impression when, two weeks into my hiring, a couple of gangs in the Commons had a scuffle that got well out of hand and turned into a firefight.

Twenty patients were brought in over the course of two hours starting at just around eleven at night and we didn’t manage to even start to wrap up until almost the next evening.

Doctors and nurses were pulled in from anywhere that could spare a hand because people were dropping like flies. Some of them tapped out and went home, but I didn’t. I kept working. It didn’t even occur to me to leave. I didn’t feel burned out, I felt energized.

Finally, things were starting to feel normal again.

It only occurred to me afterward that that’s probably not healthy. The feeling of running on the ragged edge, knowing the difference between success and failure was literally life or death.

That felt normal.

That was also about when Director Redheart planted her flag in my ass and started treating me like her prize stallion, snapping at any of the other floor administrators that tried to poach me.

As if I’d leave the ER anyway. None of the other floors are nearly as exciting.

I stop in front of Sonata’s door and knock gently before letting myself in. The lights are kept dim at all hours because she sleeps most of the time. The other doctors chalk it up to chronic exhaustion from her condition and they’re only half right.

“Welcome back, ‘Nata,” I say softly as I walk over to her bedside and start taking her vitals. “How was the trip?”

Sonata astral projects, another happy side effect of being disjoined from your soul. For the past eight or nine months, ever since she learned to control it, she’s been scouring the astral dimensions for any sign of our missing sister.

“Aria…” Sonata’s breathing is harsh and ragged, and I immediately scowl as I examine her. Her vitals are low, lower than usual. “Everfree… Forest… she’s coming…”

“I don’t understand, ‘Nata,” I say, as I work my necklace free from my collar. “Take a breath and calm down, I don’t need you overexerting yourself and going into a grand mal.”

Kneeling down, I hold out my necklace and pull an identical one out from around Sonata’s neck and touch the gems that are hanging from each one together. A faint glow suffuses both of them and I push a small amount of magic into Sonata’s gem.

I can’t ever really express how grateful I am for this little gift from the Princess of Friendship. It serves to help maintain our magic with a little low-grade ambient magic absorption. No way to manifest the full extent of our powers, not that we have any desire to anymore, but with it, we can stay healthy and sated.

More importantly, it keeps Sonata’s trashed immune system from killing her. If it were anyone but the purple pony princess who had given us these amulets I would have immediately assumed they were doing so to get control of us.

But Sparkle? Extortion and death threats aren’t really in her wheelhouse.

Sonata’s breathing evens out and, now that I get a closer look at her, I realise she looks bad. Her entire body is sweat-stained and her eyes are barely focusing, though I can see the life coming back to her. She takes several deep breaths as I grab a little cup of water with a straw and hold it to her mouth. After a few sucks from it, she nods and I put it away.

“Aria…” Sonata starts again, her voice stronger. “You have to get ready… she’s coming back... She’s almost here!”

My comm clipped to my coat breast pocket fritzes to life as Sonata speaks almost nonsensically and I hit the receiver on reflex. //Doctor Blaze to ER, two incoming via air ambulance.//

“I’ll be there in a moment,” I respond, before clicking it off and turning back to my sister with a shake of my head. Reaching out, I stroke my sister’s cheek. “You’re babbling, ‘Nata, what are you talking about?”

“I found her, Ari’,” Sonata says, her eyes almost feverish and I nearly drop my the water cup. “I found Sunset!”

My jaw drops open and I stare. I’m not sure what I was expecting my sister to say but that wasn’t on the list. For over half a year of failing to find any trace of our sister… I’d honestly given up hope. I knew Sonata would never, but I had. I think Adagio has too… I had hope in the beginning but…

I close my eyes, feeling all that familiar pain of our escape. Of the night we somberly celebrated as our ‘exodus night’.

The night all but one of us escaped from hell.

I stumble onto cold concrete and the first experience that slams into my senses is the smell. I hadn’t realised it at the time but every inch of the Entity’s realm smelled faintly of blood among other more unpleasant things that changed trial-to-trial. The smell of blood, though, is always there.

And suddenly it’s not.

I lift my head and take deep gulps of clean, winter air as I drop to my knees, feeling light-headed and almost giddy. Adagio kneels slowly and sets Sonata’s prone form on the ground between us, carefully cradling her head.

“Aria Blaze? Adagio Dazzle? Sonata Dusk?” A voice exclaims in shock. “How!?”

The voice is vaguely familiar and I glance up to see a disheveled and sweaty Princess Twilight Sparkle looking down at me in surprise.

“And good evening to you, Princess,” my sister says, a little sarcastically. Adagio stands and I realise she’s back in her youthful form, the magic of the Entity that mutated her having been left behind. The Hare mask was still strapped securely to her belt, though. “And the how of it should be obvious, we were in that dimension of grotesqueries along with your precious Sunset.”

“Where is she?!” Twilight steps forward, glaring at Adagio and I feel my hackles go up as I stumble to my feet and stand next to my sister. “Why isn’t she out yet?”

“Don’t be impatient, Sparklebutt,” I snap, scowling at her. “She’s probably just making sure everyone gets out before coming through herself.”

Another pulse from the statue draws our attention and I rush forward to catch Starlight and Sour as they stumble out with Rainbow between them. Twilight, along with one of Rainbow’s friends, Fluttershy I think was her name, sprints between all of us to grab her. I let her, I have no desire to deal with the Rainbooms tonight; we’ll see how our new sister feels about them before Adagio, Sonata, and I decide how we’ll treat them.

“You okay?” I ask as Starlight leans heavily against me, breathing hard.

She nods and takes a breath. “Oh god, I never thought I’d breath clean air again,” Starlight practically moans, smiling wearily at me.

I laugh, clapping her on the back. “I thought the exact same thing, Star,” I respond with a grin. “It’s nice not to have everything taste like ash and blood all the time, right?”

“Ugh, no shit,” Sour Sweet remarks as she collapses to the ground beside the statue and stretches her arms. “And no more trials! No more campfire! No more crazy murderers!” Sour flops back into the cold, icy grass and sighs. “I am never going camping again.”

I scan the school front and grimace as I spy the rest of the Rainbooms, most of them are standing, nervously if their body language is any hint, a respectful distance from the statue. Weirdly, there’s also a tall, older guy sitting on a ratty chair in front of a t.v., I chalk that up to magic. Two of them are kneeling and hugging two of the younger girls, sisters I assume. A part of me wants to go over and kick them a few more times for what they pulled but… I can’t break up sisters. It goes against something fundamental in me.

“You did it Rainbow,” Twilight says quietly from near the statue, her hand on Rainbow’s shoulder. “You got out.”

“I didn’t do jack, Princess,” Rainbow says grimly, sitting down on the concrete steps. “Sunset had a plan, a good plan, and I just… got my ass kicked.”

“You helped,” I say, surprising myself and just about everyone else. I just shrug, though. “Credit where it’s due; you helped in the end.”

Rainbow stares at me almost suspiciously for several moments before just nodding. I turn back to the statue; Sunset and Tempest are next.

C’mon Sunny, where are you?

The portal pulses again and I smile, bracing myself to greet her. Tempest, is the first out, and then…

CRACK

Every head on the grounds turns at the sound of something like splintering glass. I stare at the statue, more specifically at the smooth slab of marble that makes up the portal. Right on the face of it is an almighty crack, like a split mirror. Tempest turns and I can see the tears streaming down her face as she presses her hands, and then her cheek to the slab and lets out a harsh, wracking sob.

I’ve never, in all the time I was trapped with her, ever heard Tempest cry.

“T-Tempest?” I step up to her side and stare down at her. “Tempest… where’s Sunset?” She just continues to cry and I feel Adagio approach me and put her hand on my shoulder. “Tempest,” I reach out and grip the rough cloth of her vest and I realise I’m shaking. “Tempest, where is my sister?!”

“She tricked us,” Tempest chokes out the words finally. “Mi sol lied, she only told Sonata the truth; that the bars keeping her imprisoned could never be lifted. That they only lifted for the others because the Entity willed it.” Tempest takes another breath, before turning to stare up at me and I see the broken heart behind her eyes. “She’s not coming, Aria… she’s gone.”

Everything feels cold. Not cold like the winter but cold like… emptiness. I stare at the empty slab and then snap my gaze around to fix it hard on Twilight Sparkle, who’s staring in grief-stricken horror. All of the girls look shell-shocked. I hate that a part of me wants to beg the Princess to intervene. To do something. To save Sunset.

If she could have, though, she wouldn’t need me to beg her for it.

Adagio’s hand grips mine hard, and I hear Sonata cough as her soul finally realigns with her body. My ears are filled with Tempest’s quiet crying. I’m not quiet, though. Now is not the time for silence.

I crash against Adagio, gripping her by the shoulders and letting my weight rest on her as I scream out my rage and grief wordlessly.

Barely a night has gone by that I haven’t dreamt of her.

Floating out there in the darkness; cold, alone, and separated from everything else. I try to reach her, over and over again I try to bridge the gap. A year of stretching my arms to their limit only for a wall of barbs to part us.

Just like the night I lost her, my last view of her is through the terminus wall. The one path she wasn’t able to pass through no matter how tricky or brilliant she was that night.

The dream tonight starts the same; with darkness as far as I can see except in one direction. I see a glimmer of red and gold sparking in the night like an ember and push towards it. Sometimes it feels like I’m swimming through muck, other times like I’m wading against a stormtide, but it’s always the same deal. I can never get as close as I want to, as I need to, before the darkness swallows her up.

Except…

There’s light this time, faint and distant. The dream hasn’t changed even once in a year but tonight it has. Why? I swim towards the spark in the night, my whisper of dawn.

My sun.

Maybe it’s the strange logic that governs dreams but I imagine as I move that it’s… easier. Like the tides of shadow are pulling at me less than they once did. For the first time in a long time, I feel a glimmer of hope. Maybe this time! Maybe I can make it!

My world shudders violently as I near her, I can make out her outline, limned in the faint light. She’s not just floating there, asleep and unmoving like I always see her. She’s stirring and shifting. I swear I can almost see the movement of her eyes under her eyelids.

“Sunset!” I scream, like I have so many times in my dreams, into the lightening dark, “Mi sol! I’m here!”

The shaking becomes unbearable, and it feels like my teeth are about to rattle out of my skull. I push forward harder despite the pain, despite the discomfort, just to get another few inches. If not tonight then maybe tomorrow night, or the night after. I’ll keep searching dream and reality alike if I have to.

I reach out through the shadows, feeling my whole body vibrating painfully. “Sunset, please wake up!’

She never does, in my dreams, when I shout for her. When I beg her to wake up or to open her eyes. Sunset always slumbers through it all.

Not this time.

I swear I feel my heart stop as her eyes snap open and her head turns to nail me with its fiery blue gaze. God… I realise suddenly that I’d nearly forgotten how beautiful her eyes are. I’m so wrapped up in them and in the terror of losing the dream as it collapses around me, that I nearly miss her mouth moving.

My ears are deafened by the quaking reality around me but I make out the last shapes of her words curving around lips I’ve missed for so long.

...d you…

My eyes snap open and I jolt out of bed, swiping my sheets and covers away with an arm as Sunset’s name tears out of my throat. My dyed red hair is hanging lank over my face, and my hand is stretching out towards… nothing.

Just a dark and empty room.

To my left, my phone is rattling loudly on my nightstand and for a moment I want to crush it for waking me up. I don’t know that that’s exactly what it was but I’m in no mood to split hairs.

As I’m reaching for my phone my door bangs open and Starlight barges in with an exhausted but worried expression on her face and with Sour Sweet hot on her girlfriend’s heels. The two had been each other's rocks after the exodus night and it was to no one’s surprise when it eventually blossomed into something more than just a fast friendship. We’d ended up sharing an apartment mostly out of convenience but it helped, too, to be constantly in touch with one another.

No one else could really understand how bad it gets after we go to sleep.

“Tempest?” Starlight asks, her voice slurred with sleep. “Another nightmare?”

I hold up a hand and grab the phone, letting the name register fully before sliding the ‘answer’ icon to the side and poke the speakerphone button. “Aria? You’re on speaker, que onda, amiga?”

//Tempest, are Star and Sour there with you?!// Aria’s voice comes out rushed and panicked, immediately waking us all up.

“Si, why does-”

//Good, all of you unbunch your panties, pull on your big girl trousers, and get to Canterlot General!//

“A-Aria?” Starlight walks up to my nightstand where the phone is sitting and kneels. “What’s wrong? You sound scared or… something.”

//This is not an invitation to fucking discuss, ladies!// Aria practically yells. //I’m telling you to get here right the fuck now! Sonata found her, girls! She found Sunset Shimmer!//

I move quickly alongside the gurney, only a titanic effort of will is keeping my face calm as I stare down at the girl laying on it. Her hair is pooled around her like a red and gold halo and her face is pale but so painfully familiar, it’s like she’s in between forms; in between what she was born as and what she was made into. Sunset Shimmer is jerking and twitching so hard they had to strap her in multiple times, scavenging extra belts from other gurneys.

“Hold her down!” I shout, pointing at one of the burlier orderlies before looking to two of my nurses. “Both of you help him!”

I throw my own weight into holding her down but her strength… the sheer ironclad force she’s putting out makes me feel like I’m a child trying to wrestle down a bodybuilder. It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before as a doctor.

But it’s achingly familiar as a Survivor.

It’s the strength of a Killer.

“Someone get me a four cc dose of Ativan!” I shout, pushing her left arm down with the help of another orderly and pulling her coat sleeve up.

“That’s a dangerous dosage, Doc-” I shoot a glare at the speaking nurse, one of the older and nicer ones, and she instantly withers making me feel like shit. “D-Doctor… I’m just speaking in the patient’s best…”

I let out a calming breath and nod, pushing my temper down. “I know, Nurse Kindheart, I know,” I reply after a moment as I continue to hold her down, wincing at the bruising. “But believe me when I say that I could probably inject her with a dosage ten times that and all it would do is give her a headache when she woke up tomorrow.”

I go back to pinning her and a moment later I’m handed the syringe. I take a quick glance to make sure the volume is right for the ratios and trust that whoever prepped the vial did it correctly. Well, either way, it’s not like it’ll kill her, but I’ll be pissed off if my instructions weren’t followed right.

“Everyone put your backs into it!” I say, and start pushing her down. Both orderlies and two nurses join us and I pull her arm out. Fortunately, her entire body is flexed and tensed so finding a vein is no problem.

Holding my hands steady, I slide the needle in with a single practiced movement aerate, then depress the plunger. She struggles for several more seconds as the drug begins to take effect. It’s slow, agonizingly so, but her spasms and twitches become significantly less pronounced after a moment. I sigh, sagging against the gurney along with everyone else.

“Okay,” I gasp out, “good work everyone, now let’s get her to an exam table and will somebody tell me where we even found her?!”

“Them,” Director Redheart’s voice says from the end of the hall, she’s walking towards me with a clipboard. “Two patients have been admitted; one male, name of Timber Spruce. He’s conscious but otherwise healthy as far as I can tell.”

I do my best not to call bullshit. Timber? As in… I remember Sunset’s first trial was Timber’s last; hung from the hook by Billy to die. I remember Sunset arguing with Tempest over it and nearly coming to blows. He’s back? Oh, Sunset… where did you go?

“Second patient,” Redheart continues, nodding to Sunset, “is a Jane Doe. No medical history, and no identifying marks or papers. I’ve called up a friend to run a picture through the criminal database but so far nothing. Health is…” The director grimaces. “Doctor Blaze I’ve never seen anything like this in all my life.”

She hands me the papers and gestures for me to follow her as the nurses bring her to an exam room. I scowl as I flick through them, leaning against the wall next to as Redheart continues to talk.

“I thought her teeth were prosthetics, but they’re not, and the less said about her fingers the better,” Redheart says, her voice quiet and a little hollow sounding. “We’ll need to inject her again, by the by. The EMT’s said they sedated her once to get her into the copter, and twice on the way over. She’s burnt through enough sedative to put down a powerlifter three times her weight.” Redheart nudges me and points out a section on the report. “Her blood is black, haemoglobin levels are off the charts, platelet counts too, her biology… Blaze it’s like she’s not even really human.”

“She’s not, not anymore anyway,” I say softly, as I scan through the papers, drawing a strange look from Redheart. “Her name is Sunset Shimmer, she’s an orphan. There’s more to it but I can’t explain everything else to you now, I can try later but I guarantee you won’t believe me.”

“I can’t very well ignore the evidence,” Redheart responds huffily, gesturing to the report. “Fantastical or not, that is hard science right there.”

“It’s not the biology,” I respond, “it’s how it happened. But the short of it is this: you asked where I served? I served in hell, and that girl on the gurney served with me.”

I tuck the report under my arm and march towards the ER exam room away from my stunned supervisor, ordering up another cocktail of sedatives. If Ativan doesn’t cut it I’ll find something that does, but whatever is truly wrong with her won’t be solved with modern medicine.

A magical problem needs a magical solution.

I flick open my phone and hit the speed dial, a second later it picks up and a sleepy voice on the other side answers with an unintelligible grunt.

“Adagio, I need your help,” I say without preamble.

I explain the situation as best I can, a bit proud of how little my voice is shaking. It’s easier, I think, to be calm when I’m wearing my ‘Doctor Blaze’ persona. I’m barely halfway through the explanation before Adagio is out the door and on her way. I pocket my phone and walk back into the exam room, shooing away the nurses.

“I’ll handle this one, just… take a ten,” I say softly to Kindheart.

Nurse Kindheart hesitates for a moment, but then nods and steps out. I close the door and lock it behind her before turning to the sedated form of my ‘sister’. We might not be related, but no one has ever done anything like what Sunset did for me. Not even my blood sisters have ever sacrificed so much for me. For us.

Sunset gave everything for us the way that only family would.

“You made it…” I whisper, reaching out and brushing away a matted strand of red hair. “You wild, crazy bitch… I can’t believe you really did it.”

I pull up a chair next to her bed and sit down, tracing the lines of her face with my fingers. She looks a little older than I remember, or maybe she just looks more worn. Time doesn’t exist in that horrible place but trauma does. I stopped keeping track of how long my sisters and I were there, but in the real world, only a little more than a month had passed. Sunset was there for what felt like weeks but here only a day had gone by.

How long must she have spent there over the course of a year?

A pounding at the door knocks me out of my reverie and I stand, irritated but certain I know who’s on the other side. “Calm down, Tempest, I’m right here!” I snap as I walk over and unlock the door.

Aria opens the door, glaring at me and I wince as I realise how loud my knocking must have been. I can’t dwell on it for long though, the memory of what Aria had said is still ringing in my brain. Sunset Shimmer was found!

“Where is she?!” I gasp out, my hair still hanging lank in front of my face. I’m sure I must look awful, even terrified. “Please tell me you weren’t-”

“I would never lie about her,” Aria cuts me off with a grimace, sounding annoyed that it even occurred to me. “She’s right here.” She steps back from the door and gestures to the exam room bed where a familiar redhead is laying sedated.

I walk forward and it feels like I’m locked in a dream, a part of me is terrified to accept that what I’m seeing is real just in case it isn’t. In a moment I’m standing over her, she's sleeping peacefully, her chest rising and falling evenly with every breath. Swallowing hard, I reach out and touch her cheek. Just the lightest brush of my finger against her bare flesh.

She’s warm and just as soft as I remember. Somewhere in me a dam breaks and tears start rolling down my face as I collapse into the chair by the bed. I grab her hand, trying to avoid her blades but unwilling to jostle her in case she’s hurt, pressing her knuckles to my lips, and sob wordlessly. Her touch, her scent, her everything is exactly how I remember.

Sunset Shimmer. The girl I fell in love with. The girl I left in the grip of hell.

Everything blurs and I’m vaguely aware that I’m speaking, apologising over and over and kissing her fingers and palm and begging her to forgive me for letting her down.

To forgive me for ever, ever letting her go.

I’m not sure how long I’m sitting in front of her but I feel a hand on my shoulder after a while. I look up to see Adagio standing over us both, a sad look in her eyes.

“We need to move her to Sonata’s room, Tempest,” Adagio says softly. “I need all three of my sisters if we’re going to try and snap her out of whatever this is.”

I nod, wiping my face and standing. “I’ll help,” I reply, moving to right above her head as Aria brings a gurney to the side of the bed while Starlight and Sour go to her feet. As soon as it’s in position I nod to the others. “Alright amigas, uno, dos, tres, vamonos!”

We lift and shift Sunset from the bed to the gurney in one movement and starting wheeling her down to the end of the hall.

“What’s wrong with mi sol, Aria?” I ask, and I can feel my lips making a hard line. “Is she in danger?”

Aria shakes her head. “I don’t know, but something has her locked in a comatose state. She’s violent, aggressive, but completely unresponsive. I drugged her to keep her docile, but her Killer biology is burning through the meds like water.”

“A curse, then,” Adagio says from the other side of the gurney. “Or at least it sounds like it.”

“Can you lift it?” I ask, turning to Adagio and I hate the way my voice cracks. “Please tell me you can help her!”

“I can’t make any promises, Tempest,” Adagio replies sorrowfully, but I will have a much better chance with Sonata’s help. “But if it’s something from the Entity then…”

She doesn’t need to go on. Twilight had explained how the Entity’s magic was proof against her spellcraft, even fueled by an artifact from her world. Even the thing we’d been introduced to as the self-proclaimed God of Chaos, Discord, could barely influence events.

“Let’s go, and Aria, you said there were two?” Adagio clarifies, and Aria nods. “Good, bring him too, he’s might well be in the same state.”

Splitting off, Aria and Sour go to retrieve Spruce while we wheel Sunset to Sonata’s darkened room. Spruce is wheeled past the group and put on the couch near the window of the room and wrapped in a blanket, his head hanging low in slumber while we park the gurney next to the youngest siren’s bed. At first, I think Sonata is asleep but the moment Sunset is by her side, her eyes flutter open and she turns her head to look at Sunset, smiling widely.

“Gotcha…” Sonata whispers almost imperceptibly.

“Sisters,” Adagio’s eyes are closed but her voice cuts through the silent darkness of the room like a blade as she moves to Sunset’s side and holds out her hands. “Join me.”

Aria moves next to Adagio and takes her right hand while Sonata pulls her arm free of her covers and takes Adagio’s left hand. The elder siren closes her eyes and I can feel the faint prickle of power emanating from the three of them. Their necklaces glimmer softly in the low light as Adagio begins to hum softly. I feel a chill as I recognise the lullaby of the Huntress, a sound that haunted us for so many Trials. Aria and Sonata’s voice join hers a moment later, harmonizing and building on their sister’s voice.

Their voices are low; the damage that crippled them during the Battle of the Bands had apparently permanently stolen the higher ranges of volume and control from them, but something low and relaxed like a lullaby was apparently still within their reach. Aria had confessed that she was a little bitter about her singing voice being gone once when we spent an evening drinking together. She didn’t blame Sunset, of course, she just hated the loss itself.

I understand, now, why that is; seeing the three of them connect like this. It must’ve been like losing a sense. A way of perceiving her loved ones, her sisters, that no one else could see.

The lullaby trails through its paces softly and the glow slowly becomes a shimmer, then a shining light. I can hear how hard it is, though. Their voices are barely holding, riding the ragged edge of cracking and breaking completely. The light is growing but barely.

But it’s not alone.

From Sunset there’s a darkness, like a sheen of oil and sickness clinging to her that’s swallowing the light and getting stronger by the second even as the light is fading in the presence of the Entity’s endless shadow.

I can hear Aria, Adagio, and Sonata try to match their tone to the strength of the shadow but I can hear the cracks in their voice too. It feels like the moment before an entire building comes crumbling down. I can feel the failure impending.

I can’t let this happen again!

On instinct, I reach out, gripping Aria’s free hand with my right. “Come back to us, mi sol!” I cry out, my voice split between desperation and anger. “We’re here! We’re all here! And we’re never giving up on you!”

I feel another hand take mine and I see Starlight smiling at me, on her other side is Sour Sweet, hold Starlight and Sonata’s hand, completing the circle. The room rattles as the light extends to all over us, and I feel my heart catch in my throat as I see the shadow surrounding Sunset fade back for the first time.

Starlight turns back to Sunset and chokes back a sob.

“You gave us everything you had, Shimmer,” Starlight says in a tearstained voice. “And you gave me everything I have now, you gave me the chance at a real life,” she looks over at Sour and smiles shyly, “and at real love.” Turning back to Sunset, her face sets into a determined glare. “So take whatever you need from me! Because without you I’d have nothing!”

Sour smiles with a faint air of cockiness and nods. “What she said, Red, you’re coming back to us whether you like it or not.”

“Come back to me, mi sol,” I whisper, closing my eyes and praying to whatever or whoever will listen. “I’m never going to let you go again, I swear it.”

The cracking, ragged edge to the Siren’s voices starts to fade and I open my eyes in surprise as their tone and volume rise. The three of them look equally shocked at the development but their mastery over their craft stops them from faltering in their spell. As their voices strike a crescendo and the hospital room rumbles like it’s caught in a localised earthquake, I hear something in between the tones of the Siren’s song.

Come back to us, sister.

Our minds align in that moment, Siren and human, reaching across whatever distance the Entity has put between us and Sunset.

“COME BACK TO US!”

The song ends in a riotous crack of light and color, and we all stagger back. Sunset is floating inches above the gurney, her body suffused in a light that’s eating away at the shadow like fire burning away the dark of night.

The Killer fades like a bad dream, her fog-forged bladed fingers turn to mist, leaving behind the delicate hands I remember. Her pallid skin shifts back to a healthy amber, and as Sunset lets out a slow, soft sigh of relief, I see her teeth have gone back to normal too.

Then the moment passes and Sunset settles back onto the gurney. The six of us stare at each other as we try to absorb what we just witnessed. Aria sums it up neatly, though.

“What the fuck was that?” the middle Siren says, her voice raw and winded. “That wasn’t siren sorcery!”

“No,” Adagio says, stepping up close to Sunset and gently touching her cheek. “But it was similar, it was… close.”

“How were we able to sing again, ‘Dagi?” Sonata asks, her voice almost at the edge of tears. “We lost our voices in the Battle!”

“A small miracle, maybe,” Adagio answers, her voice distant but happy. “Maybe there’s more to the magic of friendship than just empty platitudes and pleasant lies.” Kneeling down, Adagio lifts Sunset hand and grasps it in her own. “Sunset never gave up on us and we refused to give up on her, and I think… maybe there’s some kind of magic in that. Something all it’s own.”

A small groan from Sunset stops all of us in our tracks, and I stare. Smiling, Adagio stands and gestures for me to come over. “You should be the first one she sees.”

I nod dumbly and stumble over, practically knocking Aria over in my haste, and take a knee where Adagio had been standing, and take Sunset’s hand. It couldn’t have been more than a few seconds but finally, she takes a slow, strong breath, and her eyes flicker open.

Slowly, she turns to face me and I can’t help but start to cry as I see clear, bright eyes, untainted by the black magic of the Entity. Her beautiful lips curve into a smirk and her mouth forms the shapes I remember from my dream with sound to accompany it.

“Found you.”

I crash against her, wrapping Sunset in my arms and pulling her close, burying my face in her shoulder as I cry like a child against her. Sunset just chuckles softly as her arms wrap around me in return. I don’t have anything I can say, there’s nothing I want to say that can’t wait. Right now… she’s back, and I’m whole again.

A moment later we’re joined by Sonata, Aria, Sour, and Starlight, all crushing Sunset in affection, laughing and crying equally in relief. Adagio stands aloofly to the side but fools precisely nobody.

With the return of Sunset, it finally feels like it’s finished. The nightmare is finally, finally over. Our exodus is complete.

“Good to have you back, sister,” Adagio says calmly, though her eyes are misty with tears.

“Good to be back, ‘Dagi,” Sunset says as she pats me on the back. “By the by, I brought someone back with me that you might want to meet.”

Adagio raises an eyebrow at that. “Oh yeah?”

She lifts a hand and points at Spruce, and Adagio’s eyes narrow in the darkness trying to pick out details. “You never met him right? The one before me?”

“I didn’t,” Adagio confirms as she walks over to Spruce. “He would’ve been my replacement I suppose,” she says with a smirk as she reaches out and lifts his chin up to look at his face.

None of us are prepared for the cry of alarm that issues from her lips as Adagio staggers back like she’s been burnt. She’s staring down at Spruce with a haunted look.

“Magic is a funny thing, ‘Dagi,” Sunset continues, her voice tired and wan. “But sometimes it’s something truly incredible.”

Spruces eyes flicker open a moment later and he looks around the room, his eyes fixing on all of us, and Sunset, after a second. “We made it?” He whispers, almost unbelieving. “Did we… really?”

Sunset nods. “Yeah, thanks to my friends,” she says, before nodding to Sonata. “Especially this one, I’d have never found our way back to this dimension without your little light.”

“I knew you’d see it eventually,” Sonata says with a tired smile.

“H-How…?” Adagio’s voice comes out in a whisper, and Spruce looks up at Adagio.

His first reaction is a kneejerk spasm of fear. Understandable, since he’s been up against the Huntress plenty of times and Adagio’s hair was a dead giveaway, but a moment later he smirks in that infuriatingly cocky manner of his that usually ended with him on a hook.

“Uh, hi,” Spruce says with a grin. “The name’s Timber Spruce, guess we should introduce ourselves now that I’m not running away screaming anymore, huh?”

“T-Timber?” Adagio still sounds a little broken as she says the name, and she’s stuck ramrod still as if he were a venomous snake.

Timber Spruce chuckles, and nods. “Uh, yup, that’s me,” he forces a laugh before saying in what I suppose is a manner meant to break the tension, “you know, uh, if I’d known you were that beautiful under that mask I probably wouldn’t have run from you so much.”

Adagio lets out a laugh that’s half sob at his cheeky grin, but it seems to animate her again. After a moment she chuckles and looks back up at him with hope in her eyes. “You… think I’m beautiful?”

Seeing his tactic working, Spruce puts on the full smirk. “Most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen!”

They laugh and I turn back to Sunset and before she can say anything I pull her into a kiss. The warmth of her lips, the softness and the faint scent of autumn leaves surrounds her. It’s so calming and I feel like an age passes before we pull apart.

“Making up for lost time?” Sunset says breathlessly, smiling seductively up at me. “Because we’ve got a lot of time to make up for if we’re using my clock.”

“I’ll take that challenge, mi sol,” I say, my voice growing heated as I pull her against me. “We’re finally together again and that’s never going to change.”

“Good,” she mutters, her voice cracking as she pulls closer to me and buries her face against my neck. “Because I’m tired to fighting and I’m tired to losing.”

“The fight is over,” Aria says, standing up and smiling down at her sister, but freezes as Sunset shakes her head.

“It’s not,” Sunset whispers. “There’s something else…”

“What?” I ask, pulling away, and she meets my gaze with fear in her eyes.

Swallowing thickly, Sunset leans in and kisses me softly before pulling away. “I saw it when I was there… the Entity is dying.”

“What?! How?” Aria demands, alarm in her voice and her eyes wide.

“My plan was nuts, just like all my plans,” Sunset starts. “I figured if the Entity could rip holes in reality to our world, and others could get in through them… maybe I could get out the same way. But when I reached him something was wrong. Something was killing him. The old stain was writhing in pain and weak, as if someone had been ripping its power away, that was the only reason I was able to get Spruce away from him.”

“Was it because of what we did to the killers?” Starlight asks, cocking her head to the side. “They feed the Entity right, could that be why?”

Sunset shakes her head. “No, I saw what was doing it, just a glimpse mind you, but I saw it. Dark wings and darker magic, and when I tried to get closer it batted me away like I was nothing. It’s the reason we got home though, it ripped a hole in reality and I followed it but we got lost until Sonata found us and guided us back to this reality. Exposure to the unbridled energy of the space between planes is what put me in the state you found me in, I put Spruce in an enchanted sleep so he’d avoid it but… someone had to steer. We eventually came out in a grotto in the Everfree Forest and I think that’s where that thing came out too.”

“You think it’s human, then?” Aria asks in surprise. “A human that’s capable killing the Entity?”

Sunset nods. “I do, I think somehow, someone has found a way to steal its power and that can’t continue. If they’re here then everything is in danger.”

I nod. “We’ll find them, mi sol, I promise, and when we do we’ll put an end to the Entity’s powers once and for all.”

With a sigh, Sunset slumps against me and tightens her grip on my hand. “I’m so happy… even though we’re not safe yet I’m so happy I found you again, I love you.”

“I love you too, and I’ll never let you go, mi sol,” I promise, lifting her chin to kiss her again. “Whatever comes, we’ll face it together.”

Author's Notes:

Fin

Sunset Shimmer and her crew may return in Dead by Midnight.

(i.e. if I decide to, but I have another story lined up before that.)