Bedsprings creaked as the occupant shifted, rolling to the other side and reaching for something that wasn't there. When lavender fingers fell on the unused pillow instead, a whimper escaped her, and she twisted further in the sheets. Outside, the first drops of freezing rain and sleet began to fall, creating a staccato sound on the roof like running steps.

Running…she was running, barefoot, feeling the painful sting of sharp rocks and broken terrain under her soles…

Despite the house being heated, the room had a chill to it that made exposed skin shiver and prickle with goosebumps.

Everywhere she looked, it was all wrong. Everything was dead and decaying, a landscape devoid of all life and with her only company writhing shadows and foul, sulfurous miasma that sapped the heat and life from her…

The sound of whimpering woke Spike, and he climbed up on the bed, trying to figure out what had upset his human so…only to find her sleeping, her clothes soaked in sweat in spite of the chill.

She needed Sunset. Had to find Sunset. Sunset could get her out of this place. Sunset would make the light come back to the world. She screamed her name, hoping to hear an answer in turn. She only heard silence.

Spike pawed at Twilight, licking her face and nosing her as forcefully as he could, trying to break the nightmare’s hold.

How long had she been looking? Forever it seemed, before she had found her. But something was wrong. Sunset wasn't moving. Why wasn't she moving? She grabbed Sunset by the shoulder to get her attention, only for the figure to fall backwards into a pool of liquid shadow that wasn't shadow…eyes that once shined with laughter and love now empty and vacant…

And it was only then that Twilight realized her own hand was holding a jagged, dripping spiral…

Twilight sat up with a ragged, painful sound, one somewhere between a gasp and a sob. Her heart was pounding and the fragments of the nightmare left her whole body shaking with a cold that did not want to leave no matter how many blankets were wrapped around her. Spike, who had fallen back when she woke, crawled into her lap and whined, trying to soothe her as best he could, and she petted him with one hand while she shook and trembled, desperate to push back the lingering images of her nightmare.

Yet as the image of those familiar blue-green orbs staring blankly at her swam before her mind’s eye, Twilight couldn't hold it in anymore and she burst into tears. Even the faded image of Sunset like that from a purely fictitious nightmare sent sharp, crippling agony through her, and she hugged Spike tight, wishing Sunset were with her.

For a fleeting moment, she thought of calling Sunset, but the blurred numbers on her clock stopped her—it was a little after three in the morning and Sunset had a history test in school she needed to be rested for. So Twilight changed her mind, and settled for recounting the nightmare and her fears to Spike. At first, the words wouldn't come—even after her sobbing had trailed off into little hiccups—her mouth refusing to form them as if by speaking it aloud she would somehow will the horrible nightmare into existence.

“….I’m scared…” she managed, rocking back and forth with Spike clutched tight to her chest. “….so scared, Spike…” The admission came haltingly, but labeling it helped her deal with it easier. “…I…saw something…a nightmare….it was awful…and it scared me, Spike…”

Her dog whined, licking her face in sympathy, and it helped loosen some of the words lodged in her chest, past the lump in her throat. “…I…It happened to Sunny…in the dream…and I just wish she was here now, Spike…I want Sunset so badly right now to be here…so I can hug her and know she’s okay…that it was just a dream…”

Spike perked up and wriggled free of her arms to scamper over to the other side of the bed, grabbing her phone in his mouth and bringing it to her, tail wagging. That made her tears start anew. “I can't, Spike. She’s sleeping and she has a test in the morning at school…” She took the phone from him and set it in her lap.

Twilight tried to scrub the tears away. It was illogical, irrational, to be this upset over a nightmare. Especially one so bizarre and completely disconnected from reality. Yet as much as she told herself that, as much as she tried to dismiss it, some deep seeded part of her cried out in fear and despair, and she just could not shake the sense of impending doom hanging over her.

It had happened before, she realized with an odd start, right before winter break, when Sunset had been pulled into drama at her school, trying to stop those three girls from following in her former bully persona’s lead and potentially getting people hurt. She had been suffering nightmares then, and left with this same feeling of dread and worry….but Sunset was not under duress at the moment, so why?

The teen wracked her brains, mumbling to her dog the whole while. “It…it doesn't make sense, Spike. Last time…she was upset and agitated and I couldn't help her, and so my brain translated that into anxiety and nightmare, but she’s been doing wonderful lately. Every time we talk…she’s…just overflowing with stories and anecdotes about her friends and how good things seem to be going for her right now!” She hugged herself as a shiver passed through her thin frame. “So why do I feel this way now? Is this…some kind of manifestation of jealousy? Stress? I…I don't want bad things to happen to her, Spike…so why is my brain showing me this!”

Her oldest friend whined and snuffled at her face, before licking her cheek as if to tell her it was alright. Then he hopped down and once more padded across the bed, this time across Sunset’s side to grab something off her desk and bring it to her.

Twilight stared down at the faulty detector in her hands, absently wiping off the dog slobber from the device she couldn't manage to get right. “Spike?” she asked in confusion. She knew her dog was smart, but…was this random, or was he trying to tell her something? What did her research have to do with th—

Images slammed to the fore in her mind, not of Sunset and the nightmare, but of readings and dates. Of the spikes she’d missed in early December. The same week Twilight had been wracked with nightmares. The same week Sunset had had important things going on at school.

No. It was ludicrous. Ridiculous bordering on superstitious and nonsense. People did not have the ability to sense such things…No amount of science had ever proven any such thing existed as more than random chance or hoaxes, all easily understood as being interpreted by hopeful humans as ‘wishful thinking.’

Right?

It had to be. She was a logical, rational mind, and science was how she explained the world around her—it had rules and patterns and explanations for everything, even if those explanations had not yet been deciphered. And there was no place in that rational pattern of existence for silly things like premonitions and gods and the spike of an unidentified energy triggering an emotional response in someone nowhere near the events.

Her feet hit the floor before she could stop them. She needed to debunk this nonsensical idea before it turned into some kind of flight of fancy….

Once she changed into clothes that weren’t soaked with sweat, tears, and snot from her bout of crying and distress. She couldn't go out to the lab like this—she’d freeze before she got there. Twilight shuffled over to her closet, digging through it for something that would be warm and comfortable that wasn't pajamas.

Past her extra uniforms and formal attire, beyond a plethora of jeans and skirts, her fingers hit soft, thick fabric and she pulled the item out, revealing a worn hoodie that might’ve started out black but was now a faded dark gray, and a pair of old sweatpants…along with memories.

At the time, she’d been curious about Sunset's strange association between eating meat and being a violent, unpleasant person. On and off over the ensuing months, she speculated about the source of that, coming up with and dismissing several potential theories, such as wondering if the redheaded girl’s former guardian had perhaps been Buddhist…yet Sunset’s lack of knowledge and utter disinterest in religion of any kind—to the point where she only seemed to remember religion existed when it was brought up by someone else—suggested otherwise.

Other things though, jumped out at her now, in more detail than they perhaps had at the time, and she let her mind drift through the memory as she rubbed the well worn, soft fabric between her fingers…

"I'll get you something you can wear, so you aren't out and about in pajamas.”

Visceral revulsion made her body go cold and her innards twist at the very thought of touching the clothes she’d been wearing the day before, let alone putting them back on her body…never mind that the blouse was ruined, the buttons gone and the fabric torn violently at the hands of…of those…those—

Twilight jerked her thoughts away, focusing back on Sunset Shimmer. The fact that she recognized without Twilight voicing her feelings exactly how she felt brought a sharp sensation of relief that made her eyes prickle with tears of gratitude. Gratitude that immediately became concern when she realized the older girl was moving slowly and gingerly, taking several tries to push herself up off the couch, and her steps more a limp than a walk.

Blue-green eyes met hers, and Sunset seemed to realize Twilight was watching her. A crooked hint of a smile tugged the corner of her lips upward. “…Though I might have to walk you home. I'm not sure I could keep the bike upright with how my hips feel right now." She pulled open a standing cabinet that turned out to be a small but neat wardrobe to start rifling through its contents.

"You're in pain? What happened?” Maybe it was meant to be reassuring, but Twilight felt her stomach sink and sick horror crawled up her spine. Particularly once her mind started conjuring up images and ideas of where the other girl might be injured significantly enough to make using a bike difficult and how she might’ve gotten hurt that way. She swallowed around a pained lump in her throat. “Was it... it wasn't from the fight was it?" Unconsciously, her hands twisted, nails scraping over her skin as she tried to combat the sensation of a thousand ants crawling along her skin and trying to avoid digging deeper into the flesh to rid herself of the feeling of harsh, violent male hands touching her.

"No. Earlier in the night.” Sunset shrugged, her words faltering for just a split second too long, enough for even Twilight to notice. “Part of my public humiliation included a bit of a fall. Nothing broken, but I'm feeling it today."

Relief warred with anxious distress at the nonchalant tone. Twilight knew that tone, had heard it far too many times over the years from her own lips. It was the tone of someone who had been hurt—not once, but many times—while others did nothing to prevent it or intervene, and all a person could do was not let anyone, not even themselves, see how much it hurt.

"Did the other girl push you?" the dark haired teen asked, suspecting the answer she’d receive even as the words left her lips. Given the amount of self-recriminations and self loathing from the night before, Sunset would find a way to blame herself.

The redhead shook her head, her expression darkening for a brief instant before she schooled her face back to neutrality. "...no. I did it to myself. I did something incredibly stupid that I thought would get me what I wanted... and it all went horribly wrong."

Twilight took no satisfaction in her hypothesis being correct, but said nothing as Sunset continued talking, pain poorly hidden in blue-green eyes.

"It's sheer luck that no one was hurt badly or worse because of me. Including myself."

Except you are hurting. She didn't have it in her to say it aloud, knowing that it would not be appreciated. She certainly wouldn't have wanted someone to puncture her denial either, nor would she have been happy at any person who did confront her in such a manner.

“Here. These should fit you okay.”

Instead she allowed the abrupt subject change and accepted the offered clothing being thrust into her hands, nodding at Sunset’s somewhat hesitant follow up statement.. “I…figured you might not want to put last night’s clothes back on, so you can have these. They don’t fit anymore, so I don’t care if I don’t get them back.”

The clothing given to her was warm but fairly shapeless, all encompassing, and let her hide from prying eyes. It smelled of warmth and sunshine and fresh air, and even touching it calmed her nerves. Just one more little thing that made her marvel at this girl she’d just met, who seemed to know what she needed even without Twilight ever saying a word…

Twilight brought the old hoodie to her face, inhaling the scent that she now knew was synonymous with Sunset, and feeling her nerves settle. She’d never bothered to give the clothes back, not out of a desire to keep them, but because she’d stuck them in the back of her closet so her family wouldn't ask questions. Now she was glad she hadn't—in Sunset’s absence, they gave her comfort. It didn't take long for her to strip out of sweat soaked pajamas and into the clothes that had once been Sunset’s. Almost immediately, the tremors that had been wracking her ceased, and she hugged herself, more determined than ever to prove her unusual hunch wrong.

“It's not rational,” the teen told her dog, “and I’ll prove it. I need to prove it.” If she couldn't, then…

Twilight shoved her feet into a pair of old shoes, and hurried out of her room, barely remembering to put her phone in her pocket. Spike scampered after her, still whining softly. She ignored the noise and his attempts to herd her towards her parents room. The teen had more important things to do in her lab and no reason to interrupt her parents' sleep; she had her own key to the lab and they wouldn't understand what she was anxious about anyway.

Her brief trek through the yard made her huddle even more into the hoodie, as sleet and freezing rain pelted her with needles of icy cold. It was a miserable night, but she continued on with a sort of dogged persistence, unlocking the lab and slipping inside to its relative warmth, Spike whining and shaking ice particulates from his coat just behind her. She spared him a brief pat and the effort to cover him with a blanket in the lab’s doggy bed so he would stay warm, then turned her attention to the lab computer and her collected data…

The computer seemed to take forever to boot, and Twilight tapped her foot in a restless gesture, even as she tried to organize her thoughts. She needed to verify that her estimation of her nightmares did not coincide with her readings from December, and then cross check that with her instruments to see if there was any source of energy spike that day to correspond with the nightmare that woke her up. “There won't be,” she told Spike, though it was half to herself.

Spike huffed at her from under his blanket. The dark haired girl frowned. “Because it's a silly notion, Spike, the same assumption that has religious people drawing corollaries between disconnected events as some kind of divine punishment or opinion.” She rolled her eyes. “There’s a reason I’m a woman of science and not one of faith.”

A brief piece of classical music and a neutral woman’s voice interrupted her speech. “Good morning, Twilight Sparkle,” the voice said, resembling the cool tones of the computer from Star Trek. “The time is three thirty seven AM…”

“Good morning, Athena,” she responded absently, even though her machine couldn't hear her. She was still working on her ideas for complex voice recognition software. “Now, lets see that data…”

Click. Click. Click. In moments, she had the data opened on several windows and she began searching through it, using her phone to double check the dates of the texts she and Sunset had exchanged during the week Sunset had been dealing with trouble at her school. As she did, her premature sense of triumph began to drain away, replaced by a growing unease. “No…thats silly…” Click. Click. Clickity-click-click.

Pushing herself away from the machine, Twilight jumped to her feet and hurried to the simple detection instruments she’d set up in her home lab to help facilitate triangulation, dumping the data to Athena. She needed that day’s information.

Dropping back into the chair with enough force to send it rolling, she pulled herself back to the computer screen, willing the analysis program to work faster. It was all she could do not to jump back up and pace, her feet tap-tap-tapping against the floor as she watched the spinning icon on the screen that told her Athena was compiling as fast as its processor could. Twilight groaned, slumping against the desk and fisting her hands in her hair. “I should have upgraded you last summer,” she lamented. “I could have sprung for that new processor with birthday money, and maybe more RAM…” Her voice rose in volume and pitch as she berated herself. “I shouldn't have spent it all on books. This is taking too long and I need to know now.”

Spike whined from his nest of blankets at her, sounding worried. Twilight tightened her grip on her hair. “No, Spike…If there’s a correlation then there has to be a scientific basis behind it and I need to know!” Pain flaring in her scalp and made her gasp, and Twilight forced herself to unclench her hands and lower them to her lap. She stared blankly down at strands of dark hair clinging to her fingers, not quite comprehending its connection to the way her scalp throbbed in time with her heartbeat.

She had no idea how much time had passed before a melodic chime from Athena caught her attention, making her jerk back to the screen. Frantic eyes checked back and forth on the timeline, over the spikes of energy and how it seemed to affect things like seismology…then fastened on the most recent data from the last few hours.

There was a faint roaring in her ears, and her stomach knotted up even as it fell to her toes. “No…no…” Staring back at her from the screen was a modest spike of the energy that very evening, starting a few hours before and while it was still active, it had been dying down right about the time she’d pulled the data. “This isn't rational…can this energy affect the human psyche?” she asked, half to Spike, half to herself, the words sounding strangled. “…no! This has to be some kind of error! I need to recheck the data!”

It didn't help. Double checking it changed nothing. Neither did triple checking it. Even flushing the download and redownloading the data to Athena to recompile it didn't change the results.

Twilight sat back, her thoughts swirling wildly. What could this mean? Was the energy capable of affecting the human psyche? She had only been exposed to residual traces and a few objects. Was it dangerous? Could—

Rationality and cold logic reasserted itself. “This is still not more than circumstantial evidence,” she reminded herself. “Correlation is not causation, and a good scientist does not jump to conclusions without more evidence. The first time it happened, I was under considerable stress and worry about Sunset. That was when she was hurting and upset, and the events at her school disrupted our established routine.”

There was a snort from Spike, and she turned in her chair to look at him. “Yes, I am aware that I do not do well with a disruption in my routines. So that could logically be responsible for the nightmares the first time…” She considered. “And this time…I’m…not suffering worry about Sunset. Our relationship, maybe…introducing her to Wallflower…working up to coming out to Mom and Dad, maybe…”

Spike growled, shaking his head and causing something in his mouth to flop around. When the motion stopped, Twilight recognized one of her old school uniform socks that Spike had stolen after she’d thrown it away. “…but I am stressed about school, about my project…and my routine has been completely disrupted because of my—” Twilight caught herself and recanted part of her statement. “Because of the loaned laboratory at school being changed on me. And since Sunset and I talked about it just the other day, it's all still stirred up in my mind.”

Her dog huffed at her, as if chastising her for what was a gross misrepresentation of events…well, okay, maybe not that, but at least a carefully worded understatement of what happened.

Sunset had been there when Twilight had gotten home from school, and the dark haired girl had barely had time to accept the offered snack and hug from her mother before Sunset had ushered her upstairs and into the bedroom, where the redhead had hugged her so tight that her ribs protested. “Sunny…” she protested with a squeak. “Too tight.”

“Sorry, sorry…you really scared me today,” Sunset admitted, shadows in her eyes. “I was on the verge of cutting out of class to…come to your school or call your mom or something.” She rested her forehead to Twilight’s, refusing to let her go just yet. “Are you going to tell me what upset you so badly?”

Twilight felt her face flush with heat, and her eyes skittered away from those worried blue-green ones. “I…overreacted…to a perfectly normal situation, and…I’m really sorry for that, Sunny.” She gripped Sunset’s shirt tighter. “It wasn't my intention to cause you worry, and at the time, I had an audience when you called, meaning I couldn't speak as freely as I might have otherwise.”

Silence stretched between them, and Twilight let her eyes track back to her girlfriend. The older teen didn't look the slightest bit reassured—if anything, she seemed more concerned than anything, the lines on her forehead deepening alongside her frown. “Twilight…” she began.

“My principal decided that I needed to move to a larger, better equipped laboratory space on campus,” she cut in. “It seems this had all been organized for some time, but unfortunately the presentation of the space was held up by the necessary refurbishment of the equipment, due to the previous occupant having left things in a bit of a state.” Twilight did her best to keep tone level despite a large portion of her wanting nothing more than to bury her face into Sunset’s shoulder and cry out all the emotions caused by her unpleasant discovery that the space in school that she had long considered her cherished, personal sanctuary from the other students and their harassment had been nothing more than an illusion.

“That..” Sunset took a breath, and continued. “That seems…really shady and unfair, Twilight. Not just to you but to whoever used this lab right up until she kicked them out of it. And…shouldn't you have been told about it in advance? I mean, it's your lab, your workspace.”

“No,” Twilight said, perhaps more terse and sharp than intended, and she did her best to soften it as she continued. “No…it was a misunderstanding. Principal Cinch had informed Wallflower, who she has decided shall be my new project assistant for the rest of the semester.”

Her girlfriend interrupted, sounding more than a little incredulous. “She decided. Without asking. In a project where you’ve repeatedly told me you want to handle it on your own? And…you're…okay with this?”

She squirmed. “Given that Principal Cinch and Crystal Prep are providing some funding to it, it gives her the right to make some decisions in the project.”

“Sparky…that’s messed up.”

The dark haired girl cringed a little. “It's not great, but…it's one more thing that I need to get used to if I intend to go into science and academia. Principal Cinch is aware of that.” It sounded weak, and both she and Sunset knew it.

One eyebrow arched, and Sunset blew air out her nose in a snort. “Uh-huh. Alright, Sparky. So…Wallflower didn't think to let you know that this plan was in the works?”

“Wallflower was under the impression it was meant to be a surprise…”

Blue-green eyes looked right through her. “Twilight,” Sunset’s voice was flat, “you hate anyone messing with your lab space without permission or direction from you. Didn't Wallflower know that? She’s supposed to be your friend, and…well…you're not subtle about stuff like that.”

Twilight struggled with the emotions threatening to boil over, focusing on keeping her voice even. “Except it was never my space, my lab, not really. It was the school’s and Principal Cinch’s. I…was under a false assumption and this move helped me to understand that.”

At that, Sunset brushed fingers along her jaw, tipping her chin up to make Twilight meet her eyes. “Helped you?” she repeated, and the tone could not have been flatter if she’d taken a steam roller to it. “How is leaving you upset and distraught to the point that you couldn't type a coherent text or manage to reply helping you? How is driving you to tears—and I know you’d been crying, I could hear it when you finally answered your phone—helpful or educational? That just seems…unnecessarily cruel and malicious, especially since your Principal deliberately didn’t inform you in advance.”

“That was…my own fault…” she countered weakly, feeling her emotional wall starting to crack with her voice. “I…came in and everything was gone…and I thought…I’d done something wrong…and I panicked.”

Sunset made a noise in her throat and snorted again. “Sparky, are you listening to yourself? You didn't overreact. Your principal did something that's really questionable and kind of manipulative—and believe me, I know, because that's exactly the kind of thing I used to do to people at my school to hurt them or get them to react a particular way. And this…putting your friend into a position on your project without asking? Going through your notes and equipment? That’s…not okay, and you’re reacting like you did something wrong instead of her…that this is some kind of ‘tough love’ to teach you something about ‘the real world…’” Those brows pinched together. “That's the same kind of thing I heard a lot from my old school when other students would do lousy things to me to ‘show me my place’ because I was an orphan and they had families that mattered.”

Too stunned to respond, Twilight watched as her girlfriend pulled out of the hug they’d been in to gesture with her hands. “And more than that, I’m a little worried about why your Principal is paying so much special attention to your project. Don't you think it’s…I don't know…a little weird?”

A measure of irritation rose in her core and Twilight couldn't help but snip a little. “How is that any different from what you’ve mentioned about your principals being interested in your project? I mean, you did say that you've been meeting weekly with them about it and that they gave you a workspace to use with your group?”

A low sound burbled up from the redheaded teen’s throat, and she ran a hand through her mane of wild curls. “Because that’s literally part of the conditions for my probation at school. Sparky, as much as you don't want to hear it, because you never knew that side of me, there’s no sugarcoating it. I spent years being a manipulative, tyrannical bitch, who enjoyed making people dance to my tune, and not only did I torment other students for over a year, I caused major property damage to the school and came within a hair’s breadth of killing both someone else and myself with what I did the night of the formal.” She made a sweeping gesture with her hand. “I have weekly meetings because that was part of the deal they made with me for not calling the cops and pressing charges or expelling me. They are doing this to make sure I’m still keeping up my end of the bargain, and the only reason I have the workspace is because it's a group project, and I have done my best to turn my life around from what I was. But that doesn't mean they trust me yet, or that they should.”

Twilight shook her head, not wanting to get sidetracked by the extremely negative and exaggerated way Sunset always talked about her past like she was…some kind of hardened criminal, rather than having behaved in a way that, in Twilight’s experience, was quite common for high school popular girls. She pushed those thoughts away, searching for a response instead. “…it doesn’t change that Principal Cinch has invested a…significant amount of money in providing me with this new laboratory—some of the equipment in there costs as much or more than a high end motor vehicle! It’s only natural that she would want to keep a close eye on the whole setup, to ensure I don't make frivolous use of it, and…just like in the real world, I need to produce results that justify the funding I had received.”

Sunset took a breath, visibly struggling to calm herself down, and Twilight thought it sounded like she was counting under her breath. If it was counting though, it wasn't a language the younger girl recognized. When she opened her eyes, she focused on Twilight with an intense stare. “Okay, Sparky…judging by the fact that your mom was in a good mood when I came in, I’m guessing you haven't told her what happened today.”

“Um…” Twilight looked away from those eyes that could see right through her, focusing on the way Sunset’s hair fell over her collarbone.

Her girlfriend frowned and the stubborn set to her jaw gave away how unhappy she was. “Right. Let’s go.”

Twilight's gaze snapped back to stare at her girlfriend, "…what? Go where?"

“Downstairs." Sunset's voice was short, but the arm that curled around the shorter girl’s shoulders was gentle, suggesting that none of the negative emotions were directed at Twilight herself.

“Why?”

She kissed Twilight’s temple. “Look…I might be this—the world’s worst person to speak on the subject of how families work, but even I know this much, Sparky: your parents need to know what happened, and they are not going to be okay with how this was handled by your school.”

Twilight looked at the data again, drumming her fingers on the desk restlessly. Sunset had gotten increasingly cagey the more they talked, more suspicious about Principal Cinch’s interest in the project. “But…it's not just because of this,” she said to Spike thoughtfully. “She’s been…uncomfortable with my project all along.”

Spike growled and barked quietly. Twilight nodded. “She was. Like…back at Thanksgiving…when she solved that equation I was working on…”. Her lips thinned in a frown, thinking over that first incident where Sunset had reacted negatively to her research. “In fact…it felt more like she knew more than she was willing to tell.”

There was a low whine from the doggy bed, and the teen gave a huffy sigh, giving him a long look. “Yes, I know it's possible she signed some kind of NDA with all the stuff around her emancipation and her guardian, but it feels like she should tell me—especially if she believes it really is dangerous! I’m her girlfriend and her best friend, and I’d like to think that in a real scenario, my well-being would rank a little higher, don't you?” If it sounded a little scathing and whiny, there was a reason for it, she decided, pushing away a nagging sense that she was being unduly harsh.

Her dog barked, wrinkling his muzzle up in clear admonishment, and it made her shift uncomfortably in her seat. “It's not unreasonable—I understand that such things are considered a matter of personal integrity, but such integrity when weighed against safety of someone should place higher value on that safety…and it clearly has to be about that, with how she keeps siding with Mom and Dad, and is all kinds of worried and paranoid about the project and my principal’s motivations! So what isn't she telling me?”

Silence fell for a long minute as Twilight and her dog engaged in a staring contest that seemed almost a contest of wills, and it was Twilight who looked away first. “There’s got to be something she isn't saying, Spike. It's the only thing that makes sense. Sunset doesn't jump at shadows…” Spike cocked his head. “But what?” Twilight asked, just as much to herself as to him.

Memory tickled her mind insistently, and Twilight let it play out, searching for the answer to her questions…

“Do you remember where you saw the equation before? If it was in a book or a paper somewhere, I might be able to track it down....” She could barely contain her excitement—that equation had been a thorn in her side for weeks, and she’d nearly cried in frustration more than once over it.

Sunset paused. More than paused, Twilight noticed, in a way that didn’t seem like her normal thoughtful pause, and seemed more like uncomfortable hesitation. And when she did speak, the humor from moments before had been lacking as she shifted her weight, eyes focusing everywhere but on Twilight’s and the nervous way she’d chewed on her thumbnail before answering.

“...it was before I ran away...” she said, her words slow, deliberate, and careful, like each one was meticulously chosen. “I found papers with high end research on them in her private study. She was angrier than I could ever remember when she caught me—there was lots of yelling, and it is why she sent me away...”

She. The guardian that treated Sunset as disposable. She brought Sunset in for a hug, trying to help push away any of the negative feelings that had been stirred up…waiting to see if there was more, or if this highly succinct, sanitized version was all the redhead would part with at this moment in time. Sunset gripped Twilight tighter, and for a time they just breathed together, sharing warmth.

“Look…Sparky?” Sunset’s voice trembled with emotion. “Promise me you’ll be careful?”

Twilight pulled back slightly, worriedly searching her girlfriend’s face. The other girl looked like she felt guilty, but also somewhat scared, an emotion so strange on Sunset’s face that it hit her hard. It recontextualized the tightness of the hug, and the way Sunset did not seem to want to let her go. Sunset spoke again into the silence between them. “If she got...that mad about me looking at the equations with no context...I’m afraid of what other people might do if they learn you’re researching this energy.”

The dark haired girl frowned, mulling over the memory. At the time, she hadn't really thought too much about her behavior and words, more concerned with comforting the older girl, and letting her change the topic to something less fraught with an emotional minefield.

But now... those words came back to her, along with sea-green eyes filled with fear and guilt... It was as if the older girl had wanted to tell her, to warn her…but she was frightened enough by what she knew to be afraid to actually speak…scared of what the consequences might be of breaking her silence. Almost as if... by telling her, she risked losing her somehow.

Twilight pondered that thought in her mind, turning it over and examining it. What if that was the heart of it? She knew from the nightmare that had woken Sunset up screaming, from the way she had talked about it, that the older girl feared losing her with a terror that went beyond rationality...not that she was much different, she acknowledged, shying away from her own nightmare and its implications.

But why?

“I found papers with high end research on them in her private study…”

Sunset’s guardian. A woman who was wealthy, important somewhere, and had reason to have research on the anomalous energy in her study. A woman who, Twilight was starting to suspect, was Old World royalty. Which meant connections, connections to agencies and organizations that had power and goals, who could bypass a lot of the rules ‘lesser people’ had to follow…

A former guardian who knew where Sunset was, since she would have had to have been involved with the emancipation process. Important enough to have everything redacted from Sunset’s files according to Shining, yet still never be in the news or forced to face justice for what she’d done…

What if she was still watching her former charge? Who in the area did she have as contacts?

Who would someone like that be friendly with? Who would be looking for signs that Sunset had violated the gag order, the clearly enforced silence about her history?

Her own mother’s voice echoed in her ears, full of frustration and worry. “Because someone like Abacus Cinch doesn’t do something like that for nothing. People like that are always looking out for number one and there is something in all of this she hasn’t told you and won’t tell you until she knows you can’t get out of it, Twilight. Everything has a cost, and if they aren’t telling you upfront what it is, then you can be damned sure it’s a cost you don’t want to pay!”

Icy dread gripped her heart. Had her mother been right?

Twilight thought back to the inventory she’d taken just the day before, of all the equipment in the new lab space, marking its condition and serial numbers meticulously. How she’d started to realize that every piece of equipment was brand new and not cheap. How some of the devices cost as much or more than a new house on their own…and even Wallflower had been impressed with the funding that had been put into outfitting the lab. At the time, it had driven home to Twilight that she needed to put forth her best effort forward in her project…

But now? Now she wondered.

Where had the hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of equipment come from? Who had access to that? Why would a private high school level academic institution pour that kind of funding into equipment that was going to be used (sometimes unsupervised) by teenagers?

Doubt joined anxiety in making her stomach twist. Was Principal Cinch working with Sunset’s former guardian? What if there was another reason she was excited about the energy Twilight had discovered?

The dark haired girl struggled to breathe, feeling like she was surrounded on all sides. Sunset wasn't telling her everything, had practically admitted as much. Her parents, her brother, even Cady had been exchanging looks recently that suggested they were keeping something from her. Now she wasn't sure she could trust her principal…or Wallflower, who had shown she would jump to doing whatever the principal asked of her without a second thought…and there was the possibility of Sunset’s former guardian sniffing around her, her research, and her girlfriend.

The energy and the research… she realized, the dread from her nightmare resurfacing. That was the common factor. The guardian knew about it. She’d discovered it. Sunset feared it. Cinch was excited for it. But who could she trust, other than herself? She didn't want to put Sunset at risk. Or herself…but if they already knew she was doing the research…

“What do I do, Spike?” she asked, feeling close to being overwhelmed.

Her dog looked at her, then at her computer, whining. His teeth found her sweatpants and he gave a tug, still whining.

Could she keep it here? The school computers all had administrative access that her Principal could use to go through even hidden or encrypted files. Athena’s mainframe was away from them physically…but she was still connected to the web.

A stand alone terminal? That…that might work. One with no hardline or wireless connections where she could store her data, only putting it on Athena when she needed to do calculations, only putting select data on her weekly reports, carefully controlling what part of her tests and experiments her principal saw until she knew for certain who to trust.

Anxiety became fuel for action, and Twilight jumped from her chair to the cabinet and containers full of computer parts, old cases and outdated pieces donated to her from a dozen different sources, from old lab tech at her fathers job, to pieces parts not quite right to go into refurbished PCs she often built over the summers for Cady’s Foundation, to things Shining had brought home to the disassembled bits of appliances, televisions and other tech that she had scavenged from everything from other people’s trash to yard sales to bargain bins at electronic stores. Everything was inventoried and sorted, and she began retrieving what she needed.

The computer would be primarily storage…but it needed to look unassuming. Perhaps not even like a computer at all. Twilight sorted through her parts and found the old washing machine she’d claimed when her parents replaced it a few years back. She’d long since gutted the insides for circuitry, wiring, and of course the drum and agitator…but she’d held onto the big boxy outside in case she found a use for it. For now, it would serve as a special housing for this computer with some minor tweaks and a few mounting brackets, all hidden near other imperfections and mounts. The back provided plenty of ports for venting waste heat, and she had some old fans that with some modifications to a liquid cooler heatsink would do to keep the whole thing running at optimal temperatures….

Twilight rambled as she worked, first to Spike as she put the hardware together, then to herself once she booted the machine and began to upload her custom OS, the one she had used and refined on Athena. This one…she tweaked the settings as it installed, then went into the code itself, searching and changing pieces as she went, adding new sections and commands at a furious pace, layers of security and encryption that she’d learned from books and websites and plenty of “online communities” in places that no one in her family knew she was even aware of.

Then she ran the updates she’d added, checking it for errors. When it all came up green, she smiled at the query that came up in the text box on the screen.

[Parameters?]

She typed quickly, something inside her urging her on. The commands were accepted after a minute.

[Parameters saved. Medusa Security Protocols Engaged.]

Satisfied, she began to work on copying all her data to the new terminal that she’d named Artemis and checking over Athena’s security at the same time, implementing portions of the Medusa program to Athena to increase security. At school, she would have to be careful, and decide what of her data to keep to herself and what to allow Wallflower—and therefore Cinch—to know about. She would have to do most of her actual work at home in the end…because she couldn’t risk anyone catching on to what she was doing.

The teen bit her lip hard enough that a coppery taste flooded her mouth. The hardest part was going to be keeping this from Sunset... as much as she longed to get her girlfriend's input, to tell her any of this, would be to put her in danger. She knew Sunset, knew beyond the shadow of a doubt, like she knew her own name, that the older girl would do anything, go to any lengths, no matter the danger to herself, if she thought it was needed to protect Twilight...

Looks like Sunny's not the only one suffering nightmares, hmm?

As mentioned before, there will be a holiday hiatus this year so I can deal with Real Life family nonsense. That will be starting the week of the 18th, and last until New Years. That means 3 more updates before the holidays.

I apologize for it, but there's just no way I can keep track of the update schedule and deep editing of chapters while also dealing with "National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, the Extended edition" as my life.