"I missed you so much baby sis." Midnight cried into Vinyl, happier than he had ever been to be hugging her once more.

"I missed you too Nighty." Vinyl cried as well. While the two were of the same age and if Vinyl was honest, she was a few months older than Midnight, but that didn't stop him from calling her his little sister. Vinyl didn't mind, she often called Midnight Nighty or Big Brother, something Midnight never minded. Twilight felt a smile spread as she witnessed the two hug each other, her smile only growing as she looked on. Midnight set Vinyl down and held her at arm's length.

"It's great to see you again, Vinyl." Midnight said a long-absent grin on his features.

Vinyl had a grin as well, “It’s great to see you too. Come inside, we can talk for a bit." Vinyl said, dragging Midnight by the hand to her dressing room, Twilight following. Vinyl plopped down on the couch again, Midnight sitting next to her. Twilight sat in a loveseat opposite the two. Vinyl noticed the unicorn for the first time, remembering that she was the nervous voice at the door. "Hi, I'm Vinyl Scratch" Vinyl said, extending her a fist.

Twilight nervously returned the fist bump, voice quivering a bit from excitement. "Hi, I'm Twilight Sparkle. I'm a huge fan." Twilight said with a sheepish smile and nervous laugh.

Vinyl's grin only grew, if that was at all possible. "I'm glad you like my music. How do you know about me and Nighty?" Vinyl asked, giving Midnight a playful push that he laughed at.

"Well, I-I'm Princess Celestias student. When she announced the return of her son, I rushed to Canterlot to meet him. We became friends after that." Twilight said, her nervousness slowly leaving as she talked.

"Princess Celestias student? Damn, you have good tastes in friends, Midnight." Vinyl said, leaning back into the couch.

Midnight chuckled, “Well, I meet you, didn't I?" he said, returning her playful shove.

"Yeah, I guess you did." Vinyl laughed as she lay down with her legs over Midnight's lap and head resting on the armrest of the couch. She put both hands behind her head before asking, “So what's happened after dear old mom whisked you off to yonder castle?"

Midnight grimaced as he remembered his years spent in another false home flooded his mind. "Same as usual, only with my own mom this time." Midnight said, a slight damper in his voice.

"Really? I thought you would be super-excited to be with your mom." Vinyl said, slightly surprised.

"It wasn't all I thought it would be. She tried her hardest to get me to let her in but... I just can't. Fourteen years is a long time, baby sis. I mean, yeah, she's my mom, but I don't know if I can forgive her. At least, not for a long time." Midnight explained.

"Oh... I'm sorry Nighty. Did you, uh... ever find out who your dad is?" Vinyl asked. She had read the note on Midnight before the two of them meet. She didn't know the whole story, only that the father's whereabouts were unknown. Midnight's eyes filled with the cold stare that Twilight had come to know, only aimed at the floor.

"Mom doesn’t even remember his name." Midnight said. Vinyl sat up and gave Midnight another big hug.

"I'm so sorry big brother." Vinyl said, Midnight's stare dissipating as she hugged him.

"I'll be okay, baby sis." Midnight said, returning her hug. He always felt safe when Vinyl hugged him, no matter what happened.

Twilight began to feel like a massive third wheel and thought up of a reason to leave. "It was really nice to meet you Vinyl, but I better get going. Spike has a tendency to stay up late if I'm not around." Twilight said rising.

Vinyl nodded and rose to give her a handshake. "Alright, feel free to stop by anytime. A friend of Midnight's is a friend of mine." Vinyl said.

Twilight shook her hand. "Thank you. See you later Midnight." Twilight said, turning for the door.

"See you later Twi." Midnight called after her, giving a small wave.

Vinyl noticed that there was something different about his left wrist; the scars there were two more in number. Vinyl grabbed his arm and sat down next to him. "Wasn't there only three lines here?" Vinyl asked, tracing her fingers over them.

"No, there have always been five." Midnight said, looking away from her.

"No, there were only three. I remember you said a stray cat had scratched you. Now there are five." Vinyl said, using her free hand to turn his head to face her. Midnight looked into her crimson eyes and sighed.

"They... might not have come from a cat. Exactly." Midnight said, lowering his eyes from hers.

"Then where did they come from? And why are there five now? Exactly." Vinyl asked, confused and curious at the same time. Midnight took a deep breath and paused, he looked back to Vinyl and down to the floor again.

"They... came from me." Midnight said, releasing the breath he took.

Vinyl's eyes widened in shock, “What?"

"I did them. All of them. I didn't tell you because I didn't want to scare you." Midnight said, hanging his head in shame. Vinyl was silent, turning her gaze back down to his wrist, the five white lines even in spacing, silently smirking at her.

"Why?" Vinyl asked quietly, stroking Midnight's arm with one hand and turning his head back up to her with the other.

"You should know the answer for the first three. Shitty homes, shitty lives, and the pain... it made it go away for a while. Made me hurt less inside. As for the top two... those happened at Canterlot. Adding not being able to see you with everything else... they made that hurt less to. Auntie Luna caught me though. See made me promise to stop, so I did." Midnight said, tears flowing down his cheeks. "I'm so sorry Vinyl."

Vinyl was still surprised that she hadn't noticed these for what they were when they were 12. Vinyl gave Midnight another big hug, “It’s okay, big brother. You don't have to anymore. I'm here." Vinyl said softly. Midnight cried into Vinyl again, only with shame this time.

"I'm so-sorry baby sis." Midnight choked out between quiet sobs.

"Sshhh..." Vinyl said, running fingers through his royal blue hair, holding him close as he let out his tears and shame. They stayed like this for a while, until a knock came from the door, followed by an Earth male entering.

"Vinyl, five minutes to- oh. Am I interrupting?" The man asked. Vinyl whispered to Midnight and rose to walk over to her boss.

"Uh, hey. Can I have tonight off? That's my best friend in the whole world, and he's been through a lot. I need to be there for him right now." Vinyl said in a hushed tone.

Her boss looked from Vinyl to Midnight a few times before responding, “Isn’t that Midnight Sun, Princess Celestias son?" her boss asked surprised. Vinyl nodded, pleading eyes focused on her boss. "You’re his best friend?" He asked, still unsure.

"Since we were seven." Vinyl said.

Her boss looked from Midnight to Vinyl one last time. "Uh... yeah. Yeah, you can take tonight off. Just put on a long enough playlist, alright?" Her boss said.

Vinyl smiled and gave him a quick hug. "Thanks boss."

Her boss awkwardly hugged her back. "Yeah, yeah, don't get used to it." He said playfully with a smile of his own. Her boss gave one more look to Midnight and left to attend to the club's other needs. Vinyl walked over to Midnight, who was recovering from his sobbing, and gave him another small hug.

"I got to put on another playlist and then I'll be right back, kay?" Vinyl said.

"Yeah. I'll be here." Midnight responded quietly, hugging her back. Vinyl tightened her hug before she turned to set the longer playlist on. Midnight watched he go, eyes drifting down her body, her amazing, toned body. 'Whoa, whoa, hold up Midnight. This is your best friend we're talking about here.' Midnight thought to himself angrily. Midnight sighed and fell back into the couch, hands on his face.

***

Vinyl walked up to her turntables, but instead of getting ready to do what she loved, she rummaged through one of the drawers for a little flash drive that had an "emergency" playlist for events such as this. 'Come on, I know it's here somewhere...' Vinyl thought, pushing aside CD's and empty cases for a variety of things. 'Ah ha! Gotchya!' Vinyl thought triumphantly grabbing the little red flash drive that read "Emergency Playlist" along its length. She plugged the little device into her laptop, removing the old one once she had the new playlist going. It would last long enough to fulfill the length of the club's operating hours so that someone would be able to just push "Stop" once they closed for the night (Well, 4 a.m. isn't quite night).

'Now, back to Nighty.' Vinyl thought happily as she began walking back to her dressing room. While it was a short distance, only a 2 minute walk normally, it felt like forever because she knew Midnight was there. She smiled as she thought of him, incredible dark blue hair, mesmerizing eyes (Just like Celestias), and nice figure- wait, what was that last part? Vinyl stopped just short of the door, shaking her head in an attempt to banish the strange thoughts that had entered her head. 'You can't think of big brother like that girl. That's just weird.' Vinyl thought to herself before opening the door. "I'm back. Miss me?" Vinyl said playfully.

Midnight lowered his hands from his face, a smile/frown hybrid on his face. "Too soon Vinyl." Midnight said in a mix of happy and sad tones.

"Oh... right." Vinyl said, looking down and awkwardly rubbing the back of her head.

"So... how about you? What have you done after I was 'whisked away off to yonder castle'?" Midnight said in a terrible attempt to copy Vinyl's voice. Vinyl laughed and sat down next to Midnight again.

"Well, first I got my own laptop, paid for it and everything after Celestia took you off to the castle. Once I had it, I started making my own songs on it. I didn't plan to let anyone hear them, but one of the parents I stayed with after you left heard one and thought it was really good. He bought me my own beginners’ turntable that would plug into my laptop and then this appeared." Vinyl explained, pointing to the left side of her neck, to her cutie mark. "When I first started mixing some of my songs, I knew I would want to do it for the rest of my life." Vinyl said, grin on her as she looked over to Midnight. "What about your cutie mark, Nighty? What does it mean?" Vinyl said.

Midnight looked down to his cutie mark, a black sun rising over the horizon that was his collar bone. Alicorns cutie marks appeared there, both princesses possessing theirs in the same spot as well. Unicorns had theirs appear on their necks, pegasus at the base of their wings, and earth humans on their upper arm. Males had theirs on the right arm/wing/neck and females on the left. "I'm... not sure what it means. The sun shows that I'm royalty and the son of princess Celestia, but I don't know why it's black." Midnight said, looking back to Vinyl.

Vinyl looked at his cutie mark, “What about the fact that it's rising?" she asked, looking back to Midnight's eyes.

"I never thought it was rising." Midnight responded sadly.

Vinyl placed her hand over his. "Why not?" She asked. "

How could a sun be rising on a life as crappy as mine's been?" Midnight asked.

"Well... you met me." Vinyl said with a small smile. Midnight chuckled and Vinyl's smile grew, Vinyl always knew how to make Midnight laugh. A few moments of silence passed between the two, both enjoying each other's presence after so many years apart. Vinyl snuggled into Midnight's side, hugging him again. "I love you big brother." Vinyl said quietly.

Midnight hugged her back, “I love you too baby sis." More time passed as the two hugged, until Vinyl spoke up again.

"So, how do you plan on getting home again?" Vinyl asked, not breaking the hug.

"I'll get Twi to open the door. Why?" Midnight asked confused.

"No reason, I just thought most people were asleep by twelve thirty in the morning." Vinyl said happily.

"What?!" Midnight said, almost yelled, breaking the embrace and causing Vinyl to laugh hysterically as he stared at the clock. Sure enough, the clock read 12:37 a.m. on its digital readout.

"Do you ha- have a key?" Vinyl managed between laughs, only laughing harder as Midnight slapped his pockets in search of one.

Midnight waited for Vinyl to calm down before deciding to ask her what was so funny about him being locked out of his only place of residence. "Can I spend the night at your place?" Is what decided to come out of his mouth instead, surprising both Vinyl and Midnight. Silence hovered in the room as Vinyl contemplated his offer and Midnight wishing he could go back in time and punch past him in the nose.

"Sure." Vinyl said standing and walking over to the door.

"Vinyl I'm sorry I didn't- wait, what?" Midnight said, thinking that Vinyl would be upset with him for making such a rash decision.

"I said yeah, you can crash at my place tonight." Vinyl repeated, a mischievous smile on her face. "You comin' or what?" Vinyl said grabbing her jacket of the peg on the wall.

"Uh, yeah!" Midnight said, jumping off the couch and closing the door after he and Vinyl left.

Vinyl's Apartment

"It's not much, but its home." Vinyl said, flicking on the lights. It was a mid-sized apartment, the living room, dining room, and kitchen all made to be the same room with a hallway down the middle that led to the bathroom, guest room, and master bedroom. "Oh, I should probably tell you that the guest room is my personal studio, so you'll be bunking with me tonight." Vinyl said, tossing her jacket over a chair at the dining table.

"What? What's wrong with the couch?" Midnight asked, feeling warmth crawl into his cheeks.

"Nothing. Unless you want to be stiff as a rock when you wake up." Vinyl said, making her way down the hall for her bedroom. "I'm going to change. No peeking." Vinyl called to him in a playful voice.

Midnight thought over his options; sleep in a non-sexual way with his best friend in the entire world like they did when they were kids, or sleep on a couch that would cause him to be a generally unhappy person in the morning, and mornings were not his favorite part of day. Another reason Celestia was that much harder to accept. Midnight knew it wasn't her fault, but still. Sleep with Vinyl, sleep on couch. Vinyl, couch. Not a hard choice. Midnight made his way down the hall, taking note that the bathroom was the first door on the right (hey, you never know) before coming to a halt at the doorframe to her bedroom, staring at Vinyl.

Midnight got to see Vinyl finish pulling down a black tank-top after seeing her incredible body (her breasts were covered) and saw she was wearing black short shorts that had a red line down the sides the same color as her eyes. Midnight was rooted to the spot, looking Vinyl over a few times before her voice dragged him back to reality. "Keep staring like that and I might just think you like me." Vinyl said, climbing under the blankets to her unkept bed. Midnight began stammering much the same way Celestia had, trying to find a way to explain himself. Vinyl laughed. "Calm down Nighty. It's just a joke." Vinyl said, giving the spot next to her a pat.

"Oh, uh, yeah, I knew that." Midnight said, taking off his shirt and climbing awkwardly in next to Vinyl. It was Vinyl's turn to stare, now that she had a clear view of Midnights muscular frame unhindered by his slightly large shirt.

"Uh... why'd you take your shirt off?" Vinyl said, feeling the blush on her cheeks. "

Hmm? Oh, I don't sleep with a shirt on. Makes my wings feel cramped." Midnight said, pulling the covers up to his chest. Midnight clicked off the lamp that was on the nightstand and felt Vinyl snuggle up against his side, just like she used to when she had a bad dream as kids.

"Goodnight Nighty." Vinyl said before yawning.

"Night Vinyl." Midnight said, holding her close.