Concentrating in class was almost impossible. Mostly because Twilight had told her about seeing Rarity at the bar, all Sunset could do was watch her during their lecture instead of take notes. Her former best-friend’s normally entitled comments were conspicuously absent today, and her eyes looked dark and slightly puffy — which, no surprise there, she had used makeup to lessen the obvious. Even her hair looked droopier than usual.

Was Sunset’s interference with what might have happened between her and Blueblood to blame? Or would she have been in even worse shape now if she hadn’t done anything? There was no way of knowing. At the root of things, her and her breakup up was the actual problem, and all that happened afterward merely the fallout. Still, Sunset did feel a slight pang of guilt for not doing anything to help.

By the time the professor had finished her lecture, Rarity looked worse than ever. Not that it was going to be easy or fun, but Sunset decided that she couldn’t stand it anymore and walked over to her.

“Hey, Rarity?”

“Huh? What do you want?” Her former friend’s eyes were flinty. Guarded.

Ignoring the pointed nature of such a response for the time being, she pressed on. “You, um… I was wondering if you wanted to get some lunch.”

“Oh yes, because then we’d have such a blast.” Sunset didn’t budge. “What, are you serious?”

“Maybe I am.”

Flashing a tight and clearly sardonic smile, the girl began to gather up her things. “You’ve made it crystal clear that you and I have nothing to talk about anymore, Sunset Shimmer. So what’s the point in trying to be besties again now?”

“What?” She was honestly shocked by that statement. “What are you talking about? When did I do that?”

“Wow. You have no idea, do you?” When there was no response save for a blank stare, Rarity grunted in disgust, grabbed her flashy-looking messenger bag and stood. “Nevermind. I should have known you didn’t care enough to remember.”

“Wait, but if I don’t remem—”

“Later, darling.” The endearment, while it may have been sweet when they were still friends, wasn’t nearly as kind this time around. But there was no use in pushing; Rarity was already at the door. Just when Sunset began to decide if she should call out to her, to try again, she heard another voice behind her.

“Oh, Miss Shimmer — I wondered if I might have a moment?” her professor called out.

Conceding temporary defeat, Sunset walked toward the front of the room instead of the back. The woman didn’t wait, but merely entered her office and left the door open.

“What is it, Professor?”

“I just wanted to know if you have that book with you,” she said as she settled herself behind the desk, sighing at the weariness in her own bones. “Now that your essay has been turned in — and congratulations on that, by the way, top marks — I should like to return it to my collection.”

“Oh, the book. Well…” How would it sound if she simply told the older woman that she was still ‘using’ it to regularly contact a pony-goddess from another world? Maybe she could get by on part of the truth. “It’s not with me at the moment, sorry.”

The woman’s eyes narrowed very slightly behind her thick glasses. “Surely you’re not still reading that dusty old thing, are you? It’s not exactly exciting bedtime material.”

“Well, I’ve been glancing through it.” That much was true; since she left it in her bathroom, she had started paging through it whenever she was there. Besides the summoning spell, there were tons of other interesting stuff within its pages, though she was afraid to try most of them. However, summoning Twilight was more or less one of the only really complicated ones. Mostly there were little spells to enhance your mood, or to bring about a bountiful harvest of apples, oddly enough.

“Really? I must say, you didn’t seem the type to be interested in this sort of thing.” She shrugged. “But, then again, neither was I at your age. I was more into the natural sciences instead of the occult and paranormal. I’m glad you’re getting something from it, at any rate.”

Nodding gratefully, Sunset leaned against the door frame, trying to appear at ease. “Thanks for loaning it to me. I’ll bring it back next time, if you need it.”

“Take your time. So long as I have it before finals, that should be just dandy.”

There was a pause. It wasn’t a long pause — not really. But it felt like it stretched on for months, with both of them watching each other carefully, sizing the other up as if they were somehow opponents instead of teacher and pupil. Then, the elder woman spoke again.

“You aren’t… doing anything silly like trying out any of these spells… are you?”

Swallowing, Sunset whispered, “What?”

“Nothing, nothing,” she said with a wave of her hand as she looked down at her day planner. “Silly, idle thought, is all. Never mind me. That’ll be all, Miss Shimmer.”

Though Sunset did make her way to the door, she couldn’t help but wonder why she even bothered to ask that last question. It was almost as if she had a more personal attachment to the book. As if… she had used it herself.

Ridiculous. Even though the woman was a little bit eccentric, she just seemed like an old academic-for-life who had a passion for history and literature. Nowhere in the book were there notes in the margins or anything that might have indicated it had been used in recent memory — well, used as anything other than an academic resource. It was just a book, wasn’t it?

Then again, it was just a book that happened to be written by a real person… er, pony… and contained an actual working spell. Perhaps dozens more. That was slightly less commonplace. It had to be. Otherwise, there would be people wandering around casting spells willy-nilly, every moment of the day.

But what if there were? After Twilight’s initial appearance, she had used a ‘glamour’ — a spell to hide her true appearance — and looked like any other human being from that point forward. At least, with other people. With Sunset, she still made concessions in the form of her hair, skin, wings and horn. There could be others among society — other beings from Twilight’s world, or even different worlds — watching, tricking them, tampering with the natural order of things.

Just like I did, she couldn’t help thinking.

By the time she reached the hallway, she was already trying to shove all that out of her conscious mind and focus on her new assignment. In fact, she saw Rainbow waiting impatiently for her so they could make their way to the student union, where they typically went over their class loads and compared notes. Of course, they could easily do that at home, and often did, but sometimes it was good to trap themselves there where they were free of the distractions that TV and too-comfortable couches provided.

Also, they could order food.

“So it’s actually only a couple hundred years older than the alternative religion, even though they’re from generally the same region and base culture,” Rainbow remarked sardonically with a pencil between her teeth half an hour later. “Wow, that’s so interesting. People love to act like they got the market cornered as far as religion is concerned, but yeah, no, not really.”

Nodding absentmindedly, Sunset’s next comment had nothing to do with her friend’s. “We need to get down something about these two different schools of thought. What do you have?”

“Hang on, we sh—hey!”

When Sunset put down her book to see what had happened, she saw a football bounce off the table and fly past her shoulder. Apparently, its first stop had been the side of Rainbow’s head, and now it was bound for parts unknown.

“Sorry about that!” said the young man who jogged past them, an easy smile displaying that he actually didn’t care in the slightest about Rainbow’s irritation other than to spout out an obligatory apology and then move on to what he actually wanted to do: get back to his pointless game of catch that shouldn’t be indoors in the first place.

“Oh, yeah!” she shouted back at him, rubbing her head where the ball had hit. “No problem, it’s only my head! Not like I don’t have others lying around, or anything!”

Looking around, Sunset noticed Blueblood getting ready to catch it. So he had been the culprit behind the throw. However, the usual spring was gone from his step; he looked like he hadn’t been sleeping. A brief pang of guilt shot through her when she thought about how much she had probably contributed to that particular situation. Obviously he was a jerk, but was he a big enough jerk to deserve permanent mental trauma?

“Hello, Earth to Sunset?”

“What? I mean, yeah?”

Sighing, Rainbow flipped her textbook shut. “Whatever. Let’s bounce. Footballs flying through the air ain’t gonna help anybody learn anything except for how to dodge. Besides, we have some decent food from your mom waiting for us.”

“Yeah,” she sighed heavily. “Great, decent. The same old stuff.”

“Oh, don’t be like that,” she told Sunset gently as they packed their books away and got ready to leave. “You know your mom’s a bomb ass cook. You just get burnt out on it, since you have it every week.”

“True. And you can have plenty of it, as long as you get me some decent substitutes.”

‘“Mac and cheese? Or are we busting out the microwavable burritos?”

Making a face, Sunset began to explain to her friend just how much money it would take for her to start consuming microwave burritos on a regular basis as they walked through the double doors and through the quad.

This time, Sunset almost found herself wishing for nighttime. For Rainbow to leave so she could summon Twilight again, even it if meant sentencing her friend to an hours-long incarceration in her other friend-slash-roommate's company.

Yes, it still filled her with a sense of unease and fear knowing what was about to happen when she shed blood to bridge their two worlds, but the whole experience was so exhilarating that she was willing to overlook those feelings. But even moreso than the experience itself, than what she would get out of their partnership.

Twilight understood her. Maybe it was part of her abilities as the Goddess of Friendship, or whatever she called herself: that innate knowledge of a person’s nature, or their hopes and fears, their motivations. A little creepy, but there was also something comforting there; that she didn't have to hide anything from her, because hiding it would be futile. She could be herself. It was very freeing, even as it was the scariest thing she’d ever encountered.

So she did summon her again; welcomed a divine, mystical being into her home. She smiled when she saw her standing in her bathroom — and at how she now arrived in that silly poodle skirt, knee socks and blouse combo instead of that ghastly form she had first appeared as. She knew Sunset’s preference and ‘dressed’ accordingly. It was more flattering than she cared to admit, having someone pay her that level of attention.

Maybe she shouldn’t feel so readily pleased about it, given this was probably the status quo for Twilight. She might even be doing it to lower Sunset’s guard, and actually be angling to steal her soul, or something along those lines. However, Twilight had never done anything to hurt her or steer her wrong so far, and she had no reason to believe that she was going to change in the immediate future.

“You’re smiling,” the goddess commented.

“What? I am not.” The world’s most feeble lie had just been created.

“You are,” she laughed. “Did something good happen? Maybe with Flash?”

That made Sunset blink. “Oh… no, not really. But I thought you would already know that.”

“Remember, I only know what’s on your mind during the summoning. The rest is just intuition. Though this time… all you were thinking about when you summoned me was…”

Then she fell silent.

“Was what?”

“...was the summoning,” Twilight finished, as if it were going to be her answer all along. Sunset suspected she had a different one on the tip of her tongue and changed her mind at the last second. “So honestly, I shouldn’t assume why you’re so chipper today. But hey, this is a good thing!”

“You think so?” This time, she was first to exit the bathroom, so as to give her an excuse to hide her weird grin. What was wrong with her? Was she really so dissatisfied with her small circle of friends that a magical pony goddess paying attention to her was this gratifying? “I mean, I guess compared to how pissy I was that first time…”

“Compared to that, yes.” Then the voice was a little close to her ear as it whispered, “I’m glad, though.”

Whipping around, Sunset backed up a step when she noticed Twilight was only inches away — and she also pulled back slightly, though she didn’t move from the spot. “O-oh, you are? I mean, why would it matter to you? I thought I was just a job… or something. Aren’t I?”

That came out wrong. She didn't mean to so blatantly accuse Twilight of merely ‘using’ her, or vice versa, even though it may or may not be true. However, Twilight didn’t seem offended.

“In a sense. We get summoned for ‘jobs’, as you say, and there’s a purpose behind those. But that doesn’t mean I don’t like you.” Sunset’s shocked expression made her laugh. “Seriously, you never sometimes like one of your customers even though it’s your job to get them what they need? I can compartmentalize, you know?”

“Yeah, I guess,” she admitted with a chagrined expression. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

“You’re fine, you’re fine. But you didn’t call me here for just a chat. What’s next on the agenda — or, should I say, whom?”

For a second, she was all set to switch gears, to get back to business. To start discussing one of the other assholes who deserved a taste of divine justice. Maybe it was her earnest feelings, or pure curiosity. Or maybe she just felt cocky enough to say something to the contrary of Twilight’s assumptions about the reason for this particular summoning.

“What if I did call you here just to chat?”

“Hmm?” Both of her dark eyebrows knitted together in the center. “Well… I suppose we could do that, if you wanted. Seems like a waste of a summoning to me, though. Are…” Then she stepped forward slightly, cocking her head to one side as she examined Sunset’s face. “No… you are. You’re serious. I’ll be damned.”

Now Sunset could feel her face heating up in embarrassment. She really was pathetic, to a degree she didn’t think was possible. “S-sorry. You don’t have to, um, we can—”

“No! No, please don’t feel bad!” Twilight said hastily, waving her hands back and forth as if to ward off embarrassment. “It’s— I’m really, very honored, seriously! I mean, this isn’t the first time it’s happened, but I can count the occasions on one hoof… hand.” She frowned slightly. “Well… the times it wasn’t men who desired my ‘company’ in an entirely different way.”

“Really? And, um… what do you do then?” Sunset wasn't sure if she wanted to know.

“More like ‘did’,” the goddess grunted shortly. “And I did what you think I did, to a lesser degree. However, shortly thereafter I let my teacher know that just because I’m a goddess and can be summoned for tasks to fulfill doesn’t mean I’m a prostitute.” Her expression softened somewhat. “Luckily, despite what it looks like, she does care for my well-being, and I was released from my obligations in that regard.”

“That’s good,” Sunset sighed in relief. “I mean, It sucks that you have to do all this stuff, so I’m glad you’re not required to… yeah. Ick.”

Laughing, Twilight tossed her hair over her shoulders as she took her spot on the couch, picking up one of Sunset’s manga from the coffee table and opened it. “Don't worry. It was a while ago; that kind of thing with summoners, or on their behalf, has been strictly at my discretion for a long time.”

“How long is a ‘long time’?” Slapping her own forehead, Sunset took one of the chairs instead of the couch this time, hoping it would give Twilight the freedom to stretch out if she wanted to. “Sorry, that’s kind of personal, isn’t it?”

“Kind of.” But a second later, she shrugged as she flipped through the pages. “Well, I honestly don’t know how you’ll react if I answer, that’s all.”

“Go for it. What am I gonna do, judge you? When you’re from another dimension or something, it’s kinda hard to, you know?”

“It’s not so much another dimension, as a… reflection of this world. But that’s irrelevant.” Sunset didn’t reply, so after shooting a brief glance over into the chair, she flipped through more pages and said, “It’s actually kind of hard to pin down since time works differently between worlds. A year or so on this world seems to be longer back home.”

“So you’re a lot older than me? I guessed as much. Ballpark it?”

Twilight ‘hummed’ thoughtfully. “Well, would it help if I told you that one time I was summoned to help establish the Library of Alexandria?”

Sunset considered that, trying to remember what she knew about that particular library. “Wasn’t that… built in, like, Egypt way back when?”

“Third century B.C., to be more precise,” Twilight amended. “It might surprise you, but I was a librarian back before I was a goddess. So I was more than thrilled to help with that.” Then her face darkened, her eyes narrowing to slits and she all-but growled, “Imagine my surprise, then, when I was summoned later only to find out that what was essentially my library on Earth had been burned to the ground. I did what I could to keep it running for a time — as much as I could, anyway — but it was never the same after that.”

“Oh…” Sunset did the math; that would have made Twilight well over two thousand years old... and that was just in human years. If time ran slower on her world than on Earth… there was no telling how old Twilight really was, and she wasn’t sure asking would even get anywhere.

The smile that Twilight shot towards her was both amused and guarded. “Thought you weren’t going to judge.”

“Who said I am?”

“You do, with your tone and body language. You’re more tense, less comfortable than you were a minute ago. Me being older than you makes you feel less open with me.” Her face suddenly turned mock serious. “It’s ageism, that’s what it is!”

“Oh, shut up,” Sunset laughed, still uneasy but trying to shake it off. “Wow, though, you… you’ve seen all of modern civilization being built, countries born… bellbottoms. Everything.”

“I’ve seen bits and pieces, and remember most of what I have. But you aren’t allowed to use me as a history book, don’t be fooled,” Twilight teased, pointing at her. “You still have to stay in school and read your books, young lady!”

“God, don’t do that. You’re supposed to be my cool older friend who’ll buy me beer, not be my grandma.”

“Yeah, technically I could do that, if you asked me to.” she giggled. “Again, a misuse of a summoning; you could pay some grad student twenty bucks instead of shedding some blood over cutie marks. Not to mention you’d still have to give me the money to buy the beer!”

Sunset blinked, thinking she misheard Twilight for a moment when she said ‘cutie marks’, but shook her head, smirking. “What, don’t you carry around human money in case you need it?”

“Why would I? It would vanish when I got back home.”

“It would?”

“Haven’t you ever heard the phrase, ‘you can’t take it with you’? Pretty accurate in my case.” Sunset nodded thoughtfully, so then she closed the manga — with her finger pressed between the pages, holding her place. “Why, what is it?”

“Well, you’d think I’m dumb.”

“Never have yet. Spill it, Sunny.”

“Fine. I was wondering if I could, like, give you a cell phone, and if it might still work when you reached the other side.” She couldn’t meet Twilight’s eyes. The notion seemed ludicrous now, even if it had been exciting when she first thought of it.

“That’s… don’t worry. What would I do with one, anyway? It’s not like I could call anyone here, I don’t have any contacts.”

“You’d have mine. We could get in touch that way, maybe decide when we’re summoning… I don’t know. I told you it was stupid.”

There was silence for a few seconds. Once it became unbearable, Sunset glanced up — and saw that Twilight’s eyes were watering. Maybe it was an illusion, maybe she was just doing it to convey what might be expected of her. There was no way of knowing for sure if they were genuine feelings of an affectation, as she had previously debated. Either way, Sunset felt a flash of guilt for bringing the entire thing up.

“It’s not stupid,” Twilight said softly. “No, the plan wouldn’t work, but the thought you gave it? That you… no, it isn’t stupid in the slightest, and I don’t think you are, either.”

“I thought I could give a magical pony princess a phone to call me from her world. Sounds pretty lame to me.”

By the time she felt a hand on her shoulder, she really did almost feel like crying. It was the stupidest reaction over nothing she had ever felt, and she was completely bewildered. The phone idea wasn’t even one she had been all that serious about, and she certainly shouldn’t care once it turned out to be impossible, rather than something in which Twilight had no interest. So why was she reacting so strongly?

“I’m sorry,” the goddess whispered as Sunset shivered. “It’s... I should have pieced it together when I was first summoned from the flashes in your memory. You’re… pretty lonely, aren’t you?”

“No,” she protested, hating how strained her voice sounded, how weak she was. “I mean, that’s just it — I’m not. I have some friends, and my mom is here, and… there’s no good reason for me to be lonely.”

“That means nothing. We both know that no matter generous Rarity was to you before, she isn’t your friend now — though that status isn’t permanent. And Rainbow is a good friend, but you don’t have that… connection you really want from a true, loyal friend. That will form with time, or maybe not. And Fluttershy… sometimes kindness needs to come from both directions to truly form a friendship from it.”

She paused significantly, as if letting the weight of her words settle on Sunset’s shoulders before continuing. “There are other important elements to friendship… but let’s save those for another time. As if stands now, though, yeah, you’re not as comfortable in your circle of friends as you would like.”

All Sunset could do was nod as tears streamed down her cheeks. It hurt to admit these things; tore at her inside. She avoided thinking about it as much as she could, pretending that she was happy. And it was a lie. She just lied to herself to feel less depressed, even though it didn’t work.

“Celestia... please, don’t cry,” Twilight whispered, petting her messy hair and gripping her shoulder even tighter. “I’m sorry, this wasn’t what I -- you were supposed to feel better, and I said everything wrong. I made you feel even worse. I’m so bad at that. What I meant was, I’m sorry you’re so lonely, and that things will get better, okay? Not that… not this, damn, I’m so stupid!”

For some reason, that last exclamation cut through Sunset’s fog of sadness and self-loathing. “What? How does that make you stupid?”

“Because I didn’t think before I spoke. You’d think being the Goddess of Friendship means you always know what to say, but even after a few thousand years, I still mess up at the important times. You’re so… I was just trying to help, and I made everything worse! I’m so out of touch…”

Before she could stop herself, Sunset rolled over in her chair and buried her face in Twilight’s neck — and she couldn’t even summon her usual misgivings about getting that close to the goddess, about what might happen. She just cried, let it all pour out of her and into the long, silky-soft hair of a being far, far older than she was. Life didn’t make any sense. Then again, maybe it didn't have to all the time.

And she was warm, and comforting. Too warm to be human, as she’d already known, but otherwise she felt soft and real. Her arms wrapped around Twilight’s neck, grabbing feebly at hair and skin and the soft feathers of her wings. If she had had the presence of mind to notice, Sunset would have realized that this was also the first time she had actually felt the goddess’ wings. But with her bawling her eyes out, she hardly noticed. Eventually her sobs slowed and, towards the end, all she was doing was breathing in the heady incense of Twilight and finding comfort in the closeness, letting her own body wind down from the emotional peak it had hit.

Once she was a bit more calm, she began to notice the hand petting her back gently through her hoodie, could hear a steady stream of “Shhh, you’re okay. It’s okay,” from overhead in barely a whisper. It had likely been lulling her back to a state of calm even before her ears had focused on the sound.

“I’m really sorry about this,” she finally managed to mutter against the crisp, white blouse. “You… just came to… and this isn’t against the rules or anything, is it? I’m messing it up, and you’re going to go away, I—”

“Shhh. Don’t think like that. I’ve got you.” But after a second, Twilight pushed her shoulders and petted her damp cheek. “You’re right that I’m going to go away when the time is up; that’s how this works. I just don’t want you to think that it’s because I don’t like you or anything, okay? Nothing of the kind.”

Shaking her head, Sunset winced slightly as a pang shot through her belly. “No, I didn’t think that. You’re… pretty damn awesome. Just wish you were, like, somebody in my class instead of some kind of magical princess from another world. Would be a lot easier to figure out how to be friends with you.”

Twilight looked at her oddly, as if wanted to say something, but then frowned slightly. “Hey, are you okay? That looked like actual pain, not just sad pain.”

“Yeah,” Sunset said halfheartedly. “Cramps. No biggie.”

“Ohhhh. Hey, that’s something I can fix.”

Then, without warning, she pressed her hand against the lower part of Sunset’s stomach. Before she could even squeak out a “What the hell are you doing?!” or otherwise protest, a glow began to emanate from the very tip of her horn, and then from her hand. The light form her hand seemed to sink right down into her body, and pure heat rippled out from her belly. But it was more than just heat; it was something powerful that seemed to come from inside Twilight straight into Sunset.

“Are you… ooh,” she sighed, sniffling as she fluttered her eyes shut. “That… feels nice. What are you doing? Some kind of spell?”

“Yeah. Something like that.” The hand moved in a slow circle, and Sunset smiled gently. “It’s a basic heating charm. Haven’t you ever used a hot water bottle during your period?”

“No,” she sighed again. “Do people even use hot water bottles anymore?”

“Maybe not. That’s right, you have electric heating pads now. Duh!”

After a few seconds, Sunset put her hand over Twilight’s. It was very warm — just shy of hot — and reminded her of the temperature she preferred her showers at. If her hand were directly on her skin of her stomach, it would probably have been too hot for comfort. But maybe not; magic was weird like that.

“I bet this comes in handy during your time of the month, huh?”

“Oh, it wouldn’t,” Twilight half-laughed. “We don’t get periods.”

“Really? Wow, lucky. Because you’re immortal, or something?” She was super jelly.

“No, because ponies don’t menstruate. We have estrus instead.”

Sunset frowned in confusion. “And that is…?”

“We go into heat,” the goddess explained patiently. “Kind of the opposite, as far as treating with magic like this is concerned. Doesn’t happen monthly, but can get just as irritating.”

“What, does going into heat hurt, or something?”

At that, Twilight laughed. Her hand moved slightly against the outside of her shirt, but not too much as to cause the magic to cease. “We actually get super, mega horny. Seriously, most mares can’t think about anything but sex. Like I said, pretty irritating for those of us who work all the time.”

“Yeah… I’ll bet,” Sunset mumbled, feeling her cheeks warm along with her belly. The idea of Twilight, a magical pony princess-slash-goddess, super horny and on the prowl for booty… she didn’t know what to think about that.

“But, I have been practicing this lame little parlor trick for a few centuries. Useful when called on by human girls who need to vent a little.”

“It’s not lame. Nothing about you is. Like, I don’t know if you can tell how much cooler you are than regular humans… but yeah, a lot.”

The hand stopped moving, but she didn’t turn off the heat as she looked over at Sunset again, meeting her eyes. “You really think that? You think that I’m superior because I’m immortal, can do magic, or can be summoned to other realities?”

“I… aren’t you?” Then she kind of debated internally for a second, nodding. “Okay, you have to come here and do whatever I ask when I summon you. That’s a little annoying. But hey, at least your job takes you places, right? And then you get to live forever! What’s that like?”

Pursing her lips, Twilight leaned in and spoke in a low voice, as if someone might actually be listening in — which, to be fair, was a distinct possibility. “Honey, you want to define ‘dead end job’, look no further. This is it. Yes, I’m a princess and the successor to an immortal sun goddess. But seriously; an immortal sun goddess. Immortal, as in, she’ll never die. Or retire. Ever. I’m stuck in limbo being her apprentice forever, until the end of time.”

“But… you’re a princess, too.” Sunset stammered, feeling like she was called out on the carpet for not doing her homework. “Don’t you have… like, your own kingdom, or something?”

Twilight’s expression was flatter than an airport. “I oversee a small city-state. That’s it. Not a full kingdom like my teacher, my sister, or even her daughter does. And even then, my little ponies do pretty much whatever they want to; I’ve never been much of a ruler.” She paused, looking somewhere over Sunlight’s shoulder. “Not only that, but it hasn’t been the same since all my friends were there with me.”

“I… I see,” she murmured. “Well… damn.”

“Pretty much. Anyway, this is my life until the end of time.”

“Damn,” Sunset repeated. “That’s heavy. Guess it’s not all butterflies and rainbows, huh?”

Snorting, Twilight rolled her eyes. “Sunny, you have no idea.”

Sunset smiled then, already feeling tons better from Twilight’s levity combined with the heat easing her cramps. “And, um… thanks for getting me through that crappy moment just now. Didn’t mean to fall apart the way I did.”

“Hey. You’re only human.”

“Wow! Wow, that was bad, and you should feel bad.”

“Yeah, but it got you to say something mean to me again,” Twilight said with a grin. “Sounds a lot more like the Sunset who’s my part-time supervisor. Welcome back.”

“Hey! I do not say mean things. I’m a good person!”

“Good people can say mean things, and mean people can say good things in this crazy, mixed-up world. Someday, you’ll understand that.”

Narrowing her eyes, she grumbled, “Don’t you Casablanca me. I might be young, but I’m not culturally starved.”

“You know your classics! There’s hope for you yet.” Standing and stretching — which Sunset was sure wasn’t strictly necessary — Twilight sat on the arm of the couch and declared, “So! We can either stick it to another of those ‘fuckboys’ you’ve come across, or we can just hang out a few more hours. Your blood, your pick.”

“I already shed my blood. I thought we discussed this.”

“Doesn’t matter either way; the rules are pretty clear. You didn’t even have to use your blood. Any source of life force will do. But the spell has a habit of going walleyed if you don’t, especially if you’re a newbie… crossed wires at the interdimensional gate, that kind of thing. So yeah, safe bet. Anyway, what do you wanna do?”

“Well…” If she were really honest with herself, she did sort of want to ask if Twilight wouldn’t mind just finding something on Netflix and settling in under a blanket. Especially knowing how much warmth she could get out of it. But that seemed so selfish; she had brought a goddess — one that technically ruled over an entire city-state, even though she said she let them do what they want — into an entirely different world. Wasn’t it wasteful to do anything other than her original task?

“Say it,” she urged as she sat up straighter. “Whatever’s on your mind, right now — three, two, one, go!”

“I want to watch a movie!”

Laughing and clapping her hands, Twilight said, “Alright! You actually did it! I figured you’d tell me to ‘fuck off’ or whatever they say these days!”

“No, we still say that,” Sunset said, only slightly sheepish but grateful she was being laughed with instead of at. “You… really don’t mind?”

“I don’t. Of course, my teacher might roll her eyes at both of us, but she likes it when I have some fun. If your request is ‘watch a movie’, and I fulfill it, then I have done my job and had fun while doing it!”

“True, but I mean… are you sure you want to?”

“Sure!” Then, in response to Sunset’s skeptical look, she shrugged and added, “Well, it’s not like I have a choice; if you decide to, I’m watching a movie. Done and done. But! Even outside of my job description, I honestly have nothing against some couch potato time. If you’d have asked me a couple thousand years ago, I might have spazzed a little. But the older you get, the more you appreciate the time to you get to lay back and do nothing. Movies are a lot of fun, and there’s plenty here that I haven’t seen yet — especially ones from the past decade or so.”

“You sure you’re not just saying that?”

“Hey, I haven’t lied to you yet and I’m not going to start now. Let’s watch — what are you in the mood for?”

Picking up her remote awkwardly, she turned on the blu-ray player and said, “Well, um… I dunno. You’re the guest.”

“Guest, hired hoof, whatever. Something fun, right? Unless you have a craving for a tear-jerker.”

“Not even,” Sunset grunted.

“Good. Oh, and I need to look the part. Here.”

As she stood up from the arm of the couch, Twilight’s skirt and blouse melted and was replaced by a slightly oversized pink t-shirt and comfortable-looking short shorts with books patterned across them. The look was completed with fuzzy bunny slippers. She held out both arms out to the sides as she modeled her new look, pirouetting like a professional dancer. Her wings flared slightly during the turn, blowing Sunset across the front with a gentle gust of wind. Her shirt was also complete with holes for her wings to poke through.

And it was only during this impressive move that Sunset noticed something. Marring each of her upper thighs, just below the hem of her shorts, was a pair of markings — a darker purple than her skin tone, mixed with shades of lavender and bright pink. But what really drew her attention to them wasn’t the fact that they were there. What really caused her to notice them were the pattern of nasty-looking scars that was splashed across both of them — shiny and raw, as if they were fresh wounds instead of thousands of years old. They worked across the markings like a spider’s web of tiny scars, or like splinters in a broken mirror. Easy enough to miss since she always wore that knee-length poodle skirt, but she only saw them at this point because of the brief ballet display drawing her eyes downward to the bare skin of her thighs.

“Too much?”

“Huh?” Then Sunset drew her eyes back up to the goddess’ face. “Oh, yeah, I can’t believe…” She couldn’t help laughing, and Twilight weathered it with a good-natured grin, hands on hips and lips pursed. “And you still look the same, just with jammies on!”

“Well, I did tell you this was my favorite form, didn’t I? Except for my original one.”

“Yeah, I guess you did.” That didn’t make any sense, though. If she had the power to make herself into any form she wanted, why would she purposefully create such a disfiguring mark? What would be the purpose?

After a second, her guest tilted her head to the side. “I could change, if you want — to something else, or just somepony else.”

“No, it’s you. I don’t want you to change.” Then Twilight was smiling that quiet little smile that would be bashful if she weren’t far too old to be embarrassed by things anymore. For some reason it hurt Sunset, but she couldn’t figure out why. Therefore, she pushed ahead. “Okay, since you like Disney so much, have you seen any of their recent stuff? Ratatouille? WALL-E? Toy Story? What about Brave?”

“No, yes, only the first one, and totally!”

Grinning at the emphatic response, Sunset weighed her options. “Alright, avoiding repeats, um… we’ll start with Ratatouille and move onto Toy Story if we have time afterward, but we probably will. Or we’ll just start the second one and finish up next time.”

“Sounds groovy!” While Sunset snickered at the use of ‘groovy’, Twilight turned to bounce toward the kitchen. “Got any snacks? Or you could send me on that previously-requested beer run…”

“We’ll probably survive without alcohol, but not popcorn. Or chocolate.”

“Oh, chocolate for sure — and we don’t have Doritos back home. That stuff is like crack.” Then she grinned and held up her hands, wiggling her fingers towards Sunset. “And if you wanna see another cool trick, give me a bag of popcorn.”

‘“What? Why would— oh. Oh! Seriously, you can do that?!”

Again, that eerie little smile seemed to hold all the secrets of the universe. And maybe it did.